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★★★★☆ / ★★★☆☆

Two of J Lee Thompson’s early films – a gritty women’s prison drama and a postwar crime thriller – serve as a reminder that the director deserves more kudos as an artist

J Lee Thompson is a British director who could maybe do with a bit more auteur respect: here is a double-bill rerelease of two of his early black-and-white films from the 1950s. The Weak and the Wicked (★★★★☆) is a melodrama that came out in 1954 just before his wrenching classic Yield to the Night, which featured Diana Dors on death row. It is a tough women’s prison film as well, one that quickly morphs into a social-issue sermon; it is richly flavoured, speckled with comic interludes and gloriously cast with Glynis Johns as Jean, a young society beauty and gambling addict whose dud cheque leads to an appearance in court and whose head-girl demeanour never falters in the clink.

Studiocanal are delighted to announce the release of two compelling dramas from British director J. Lee Thompson into their Vintage Classics Collection The Weak And The Wicked and No Trees In The Street, both Blu-ray, DVD and Digital from 5 August. We’re giving you the chance to win both copies on Blu-Ray.

Studiocanal are delighted to announce the release of two compelling dramas from British director J. Lee Thompson (Ice Cold in Alex) into their Vintage Classics Collection featuring standout performances from two legendary and much-missed British actresses Glynis Johns and Sylvia Syms. The Weak And The Wicked stars the late Diana Dors (Yield to The Night) alongside Glynis Johns (Mary Poppins), and No Trees In The Street features Herbert Lom (The Pink Panther Strikes Again) and Melvyn Hayes (Summer Holiday) alongside Sylvia Syms (Woman in a Dressing Gown) in her BAFTA-nominated performance. Both films will premiere at Bristol’s...

Grant Morrison shared an ambitious unproduced comic script involving LSD and real-life figures in a psychedelic narrative experiment. The proposed comic, "Dors of Perception," aimed to be tactile and interactive, allowing multiple interpretations through folding panels and cutting lines. Despite being unpublished, Morrison considers "Dors of Perception" as one of their most pyrotechnic works, leaving open the possibility of future publication.

Grant Morrison is unquestionably one of the greatest writers to ever work in the comics medium. Yet for all the masterpieces the writer has put out through the years, there are an equal number of scripts and concepts that never saw the light of day. Morrison recently shared their script for an unproduced story, and the wildly-ambitious comic might just be their unseen masterpiece.

Writing via their newsletter Xanaduum, Morrison shared the script for a fourteen-page comic called Dors of Perception. According to Morrison, this proposed story was produced...

To celebrate the release of a brand-new 4K restoration of director Carol Reed’s A Kid for Two Farthings, on Blu-Ray, DVD and Digital from 26 February, we are giving away Blu-Rays to 2 lucky winners!

Starring Celia Johnson, Diana Dors, David Kossoff and Jonathan Ashmore in his sole acting role, the film is packed with memorable supporting characters including the affectionate Mrs Abramowitz (Irene Handl), blowsy fashionista Lady Ruby (Brenda de Banzie) crooked jewellery salesman Ice Berg (Sid James) and finicky tailor Madam Rita (Sydney Tafler).

In the vibrant Petticoat Lane community of East London, amidst the hustle and bustle of the ancient market, small shops and open-air vendors, Joe (Jonathan Ashmore) lives with his mother, Joanne (Celia Johnson) above the Kandinsky tailor shop, where Joanne also works.

Joe is innocently and earnestly determined to make the lives of his impoverished, hard-working neighbours better. Hearing Mr. Kandinsky (David Kossoff) tell a...

The Girl Can’t Help It

Blu ray

Criterion

1957 / 2.35:1 / 98 Min.

Starring Jayne Mansfield, Tom Ewell, Edmond O’Brien

Written by Frank Tashlin

Directed by Frank Tashlin

In 1957 it was commonplace for burlesque comedians to share the bill with a musical act or two, but in New York’s theater district one of those revues stood out from the rest—it opened on February 8th at The Roxy, a magnificent theater dubbed “The Cathedral of the Motion Picture.” But that cathedral had never held a service like Frank Tashlin’s The Girl Can’t Help It—for 98 minutes the congregation was cajoled, regaled, and set free by a parade of clownish mobsters, gyrating showgirls and hyperventilating rockers raising the roof in 4 track stereo—the only thing missing was 3D—and who needed that with Jayne Mansfield center screen and busting out all over. William Castle introduced the gimmicky Emergo for House on Haunted Hill...

Lovers of vintage English crime thrillers will have a lot to chew over with this pair of escapist gangster pix, one pre-war and one post-. In each an innocent young couple suffers a run-in with a criminal gang. John Mills and Richard Attenborough are the ‘fresh’ new talent on display. The leading lady of Dancing with Crime is Sheila Sim, playing opposite her husband Attenborough. The co-feature The Green Cockatoo sports credits for William Cameron Menzies and Miklós Rózsa.

Dancing with Crime + The Green Cockatoo

Blu-ray

Cohen Film Collection / Kino Lorber

1937 & 1947 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 82 + 64 min. / Street Date January 25, 2022 / Available from Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Richard Attenborough, Sheila Sim, Barry Jones; John Mills, René Ray, Robert Newton.

Original Music: Benjamin Frankel, Miklós Rózsa

Directed by John Paddy Carstairs; William Cameron Menzies

The Blu-ray era has given home video devotees great opportunities to catch up with ‘exotic’ genre films from abroad. American TV...

Deadline’s awards team, responsible for the brand’s print publication AwardsLine, has been bolstered today by the promotion of Antonia Blyth to Senior Awards Editor, and the additions of Damon Wise as Film Editor, Awards and David Morgan as Production Editor, Awards.

Antonia joined Deadline in 2019 as AwardsLine’s Deputy Editor, after a long association with the brand as a freelance contributor. She continues to report to Joe Utichi, Deadline’s Executive Awards Editor, whose own promotion was announced earlier in the year. “Antonia has been my right hand since long before she joined us full-time,” said Utichi. “She is an indispensable part of the Deadline family; a consummate journalist and gifted writer who has fully embraced the challenge to deliver world-leading awards coverage. She is my ultimate partner-in-crime.”

Damon has had a long and storied career in his native UK, covering cinema for outlets like Total Film, Empire,...

Hello, everyone! We have a brand new assortment of horror and sci-fi headed home this week, and there are plenty of offerings that should undoubtedly make for great additions to your Halloween season viewing plans. Universal is showing some love to a trio of classics, as it is set to release John Carpenter’s The Thing as well as Rear Window and Vertigo from Alfred Hitchcock all on 4K Ultra HD today. Kino Lorber has put together new Blu-ray presentations for both The Tomb of Ligeia and Theatre of Blood, and if you’re looking to catch up with some newer horror, both Great White and Slaxx arrive today courtesy of Rlje Films.

Other Blu-ray and DVD releases for September 7th include Lawnmower Man 2: Jobe’s War, Hellbox, Witches of Blackwood, Skinwalker, and War of the God Monsters.

Great White

A blissful tourist trip turns into a nightmare for five...

Studiocanal have released a brand-new restoration of director Michael Winner’s 1963 classic crime drama, West 11. Starring Alfred Lynch, Kathleen Breck (The Three Musketeers), Eric Portman along with the inimitable Diana Dors, this sympathetic study of rootless drifters filmed on location in Notting Hill will be available to own on DVD, Blu-Ray and Digital platforms now… and you can win a copy of the film on Blu-ray by answering the question below:

Michael Winner’s foray into British Social realism sees an authentic portrayal of the grittier, darker side of West London in the 60s. In Notting Hill’s jazz club, coffee bar and bedsit land of the early 1960s, Joe Beckett (Alfred Lynch) is a young unemployed misfit and drifter whose life takes a turn for the worse when he encounters Richard Dyce (Eric Portman), an ex-army officer. Dyce persuades Beckett it will be in his interests to bump off...

Harrowing prison scenes transfigure this gripping 1956 story of a woman awaiting execution for murder, written just before the hanging of Ruth Ellis

J Lee Thompson’s gripping capital punishment drama Yield to the Night from 1956 gets a re-release: a Brit noir classic and a unique career achievement for Diana Dors as Mary Hilton, a woman awaiting execution for murder. The events leading up to Mary’s crime are intercut with her jail ordeal, attended by female wardens or “matrons” in the brightly lit cell, whose lights can never be dimmed because of suicide-watch surveillance. It unfolds like an eerie, lucid dream of squalor and shame. I first became aware of this film in 1995 when the Smiths’ Singles album came out, using as cover design the image of Dors gripping the frame of her bedstead, like the bars of a cell. The final track of that album, incidentally, is There Is...

To mark the release of Yield to the Night on 12th October, we’ve been given 2 copies to give away on Blu-ray.

Salesgirl Mary Hilton (Diana Dors) is convicted of murder and sentenced to hang. She spends her final weeks in a condemned cell remembering the events that led to her crime. Having met and fallen hopelessly in love with impoverished musician Jim Lancaster (Michael Craig), Mary left her neglectful husband for him, only to find his attraction to her deflected by his involvement with rich socialite Lucy Carpenter (Mercia Shaw). When Jim’s relationship with Lucy takes a tragic turn, a heartbroken Mary snaps – transforming her love for him into a murderous hatred for her rival.

Alone, imprisoned and desperately afraid; as each day the end grows closer Mary attempts to settle matters with her family as she awaits her final sentencing, or a possible reprieve.

Please note: This...

Van Johnson steps into adventure-guy shoes more suitable for Humphrey Bogart in this European-shot thriller. Daring Martine Carol provides the sex appeal as the mystery dame who entices Johnson to smuggle a man out of Red Albania. The movie is practically a proto- James Bond film: it’s directed by Terence Young, includes Sean Connery and Anthony Dawson in the cast list, and features a fight in a gypsy camp. But Herbert Lom steals the show from them all as a monocle-wearing, oversexed gypsy bandit who can’t abide Commies. Oh, and the disc has special treat in store for discerning, high-toned art-movie intellectuals: this is the film’s hotter Continental version.

Action of the Tiger

Blu-ray

Warner Archive Collection

1957 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 93 min. / Street Date April 14, 2020 / available through the WBshop / 21.99

Starring: Van Johnson, Martine Carol, Herbert Lom, Gustavo Rojo, José Nieto, Helen Haye, Anna Gerber, Anthony Dawson, Sean Connery,...

He’s mean, he’s nasty, he carries a razor and he’s dating your sister! Cosh Boy was front & center in 1953 debates about ‘what’s wrong with the British cinema.’ It holds up well, if not as PC social comment, then as solid exploitation fare, with our verminous hero putting the moves on tough-but-vulnerable local girl Joan Collins. The entire cast will want to stand in line to get revenge against Roy Walsh, the punk who steals from his own mum and lets his criminal gang do the dirty work. Take it from me, he’s a dirty rat.

The Slasher (Cosh Boy)

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1953 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 75 min. / Street Date January 7, 2019 / available through Kino Lorber / 19.95

Starring: James Kenney, Joan Collins, Betty Ann Davies, Robert Ayres, Hermione Baddeley, Hermione Gingold, Nancy Roberts, Laurence Naismith, Ian Whittaker, Stanley Escane, Michael McKeag, Sean Lynch, Johnny Briggs, Nosher Powell.

Louisa Mellor Nov 13, 2019

The Crown returns with a new cast this weekend. To refresh your memory, here’s the story so far…

This The Crown Season 3 article contains Major spoiler for The Crown Seasons 1 & 2 and, you know, history. It originally ran on Den of Geek UK.

Six seasons spanning 80 years, taking Queen Elizabeth II from her marriage in 1947 all the way to the present day – that’s the plan for Peter Morgan’s glossy Netflix drama, which debuts its third season this November. The 10 new episodes are the first to star Olivia Colman as the Queen, taking over from the terrific Claire Foy.

Joining Colman in Season 3 are Tobias Menzies, replacing Matt Smith as Prince Philip, and Helena Bonham Carter, replacing Vanessa Kirby as Princess Margaret. A new, as-yet-unannounced cast is expected to take over their roles in turn for Seasons 5 and 6.

The first season took the Queen to 1955, through...

” You perverted little monster!”

Director Jerzy Skolimowski’s Deep End (1970) starring John Moulder-Brown and Jane Asher screens Sunday, November 3rd at Webster University’s Moor Auditorium(470 E Lockwood Ave)at 7:30pm. A Facebook invite for the film can be found Here

In the late 60s and early 70s, it looked like Skolimowski might pick up where Jean-Luc Godard left off when he fell down the rabbit hole of Marxist filmmaking, and Deep End is perhaps the clearest evidence of why people thought this. The plot hinges on an obsession on the part of Mike (John Moulder-Brown), a 15-year-old new hire at a moldy pool, for Susan, a twentysomething pool employee who is hip and enigmatic in a way that Mike will never be. Featuring a memorable supporting performance by Diana Dors and use of the classic track “Mother Sky” by the Krautrock band Can (which was written for this...

Peter Cushing in From Beyond The Grave (1974) is now Available on Blu-ray from Warner Archives

Bolt the door, lower the lights and settle in for a stylish five-episode supernatural shocker possessed of a shivery all-star cast and drenched in evil. Welcome to Temptations Ltd., a decrepit antique shop whose unwary customers get more than they bargain for from the wily proprietor (Peter Cushing). Much more. Go to the head of the horror class if you can predict who’ll join the ranks of the doomed from among this role call of distinguished British actors: Ian Bannen, Ian Carmichael, Diana Dors, Lesley-Anne Down, Margaret Leighton, Donald Pleasence, Nyree Dawn Porter, David Warner and more. A mirror. A medal. A snuff box. An ornate door. All unleash novelty surprises for the characters – and you – in these wickedly horrific tales From Beyond the Grave.

Amicus Productions classic horror portmanteau makes its Blu-ray disc...

With October officially in full swing, we have a new crop of horror and sci-fi home media offerings coming out this week which would all make for some prime Halloween season viewings. Warner Bros. is bringing everyone’s favorite demonic doll to both Blu-ray and DVD for Annabelle Comes Home, Rlje Films is releasing the psychological thriller Gwen on Blu and DVD too, and for those of you still looking to bask in the brightly lit horrors of Ari Aster’s imagination, Midsommar hits both formats on Tuesday as well.

We also have a ton of older titles being released this week, From Beyond the Grave, My Boyfriend’s Back, Hercules in the Haunted World, and for those looking to upgrade some recent horror hits, both Jordan Peele’s Us and Get Out hit 4k for a double feature set from Universal Pictures Home Entertainment.

Other titles arriving on October 8th include Ruin Me,...

Mill Creek and Kit Parker have raided the Columbia vault once again in search of Noir Gold from the ‘fifties. Their selection this time around has a couple of prime gems, several straight crime thrillers and domestic jeopardy tales, and also a couple of interesting Brit imports. They aren’t really ‘Noir’ either, but they’re still unexpected and different. The top title is Don Siegel’s incomparable The Lineup, but also on board is a snappy anti-commie epic by André De Toth. Get set for a lineup of impressive leading ladies: Diana Dors, Arlene Dahl, Anita Ekberg — and the great Colleen Dewhurst as a card-carrying Red!

Noir Archive 9-Film Collection Volume 3

The Shadow on the Window, The Long Haul, Pickup Alley, The Tijuana Story, She Played with Fire, The Case Against Brooklyn, The Lineup, The Crimson Kimono, Man on a String

Blu-ray

Mill Creek / Kit Parker

1957 -1960 / B&w...

“You crazy rat you croaked him!” Yes, you’ve probably heard better hardboiled dialogue, but this British imitation of American gangster pictures takes the cake for screwy line deliveries. It’s derived from a book and play that’s already derived from a salacious William Faulkner story. Jack La Rue and Linden Travers try to make a kidnapper-rapist into a sympathetic, romantic figure, with marvelously awkward results. This Brit import comes with significant extras.

No Orchids for Miss Blandish

All-Region Blu-ray

Powerhouse Indicator

1948 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / 103 min. / / Street Date May 27, 2019 / available from Powerhouse Films UK / £17.00

Starring: Starring: Jack La Rue, Hugh McDermott, Linden Travers, Walter Crisham, MacDonald Parke, Danny Green, Lilli Molnar, Charles Goldner, Zoé Gail, Leslie Bradley, Richard Nielson, Michael Balfour, Frances Marsden, Sydney James.

Cinematography: Gerald Gibbs

Film Editor: Manuel del Campo

Original Music: George Melachrino

From the novel by James Hadley Chase

Written, Produced and Directed by St.

Devotees of crime and film noir will get a kick out of this Brit attempt to capture the American style, that now comes off as screamingly funny. It was both a huge hit and a big scandal in London, 1948, where the censors came down hard on the film’s flagrant immorality and over-the-top violence. Former pre-Code second-banana thug Jack La Rue tries hard to be Humphrey Bogart. Leading lady Linden Travers’ role is as non-pc now as it was then: an heiress falls in love with the gangster, who has raped her, because she likes it. But the film’s maladroit hardboiled dialogue is hilarious fun.

No Orchids for Miss Blandish

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1948 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 103 min. / Street Date March 20, 2018 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Jack La Rue, Hugh McDermott, Linden Travers, Walter Crisham, MacDonald Parke, Danny Green, Lilli Molnar, Charles Goldner, Zoë Gail, Leslie Bradley, Richard Nielson,...

A forgotten oddity from the early 1970s is Jacques Demy’s English language mounting of The Pied Piper, a rather bleak but mostly unequivocal version of the famed Grimm Bros. fairy tale about a titular piper who infamously lured the children of Hamelin to their assumed deaths after being rebuffed by the townsfolk when he similarly rid the town of plague carrying rats.

Set in the 1300s of northern Germany, this UK production blends bits of Robert Browning’s famed poem of the legend into the film, but the end result is unusually straightforward and unfussy, considering Demy’s predilection for inventive, colorful musicals, such as the classic confections The Umbrellas of Cherbourg and The Young Girls of Rochefort. The stunt casting of Donovan as the piper generates a certain amount of interest, although he’s whittled down to a supporting character amongst a cast of master character actors like Donald Pleasence, John Hurt, Peter Vaughan, and child star Jack Wild.

Notably, The Pied Piper is one of the few Demy films not to be built around a strong, beautiful female lead, which may also explain why there’s no center point in the film. Cathryn Harrison (daughter of Rex, who starred in Louis Malle’s Black Moon) and a gone-to-seed Diana Dors (though not featured as memorably as her swarthy turn in Skolimowski’s Deep End) are the tiny flecks of feminine representation. It was also not Demy’s first English language production, as he’d made a sequel to his New Wave entry Lola (1961) with 1969’s Los Angeles set Model Shop. So what compelled him to make this departure, which premiered in-between two of his most whimsical Catherine Deneuve titles (Donkey Skin; A Slightly Pregnant Man) is perhaps the film’s greatest mystery.

Cultural familiarity with the material tends to work against our expectations. At best, Donovan is a mere supporting accent, popping up to supply mellow, anachronistic music at odd moments before the dramatic catalyst involving his ability to conjure rats with music arrives. Prior to his demeaning, Demy’s focus is mostly on the omnipotent and aggressive power of the corrupting church (Peter Vaughan’s Bishop) and Donald Pleasence’s greedy town leader, whose son (a sniveling John Hurt) is more intent on starting wars and making counterfeit gold to pay his gullible minions than stopping the encroaching plague. Taking the brunt of their violence is the Jewish alchemist, Melius (Michael Hordern), who is wise enough to know the rats have something to do with the spread of the disease. Demy uses his tragic demise to juxtapose the piper’s designs on the children.

While Hurt and Pleasance are entertaining as a toxic father and son, Demy seems estranged from anyone resembling a protagonist. Donovan is instantly forgettable, and the H.R. Pufnstuf and Oliver! child star Jack Wild gets upstaged by a wild mop of hair and a pronounced limp (which explains why he isn’t entranced along with the other children), and the film plays as if Donovan’s role might have been edited down in post. The script was the debut of screenwriters Andrew Birkin (Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, 2006) and Mark Peploe (The Passenger, 1975; The Last Emperor, 1987) who would both go on to write a number of offbeat auteur entries.

Disc Review:

Kino Lorber releases this obscurity as part of their Studio Classics label, presented in 1.66:1. Picture and sound quality are serviceable, however, the title would have greatly benefitted from a restoration. Dp Peter Suschitzky’s frames rightly capture the period, including some awesomely creepy frescoes housing Pleasence and son, but the color sometimes seems faded or stripped from some sequences. Kino doesn’t include any extra features.

Final Thoughts:

More of a curio piece for fans of Demy, The Pied Piper mostly seems a missed opportunity of the creepy legend.

Film Review: ★★½/☆☆☆☆☆

Disc Review: ★★★/☆☆☆☆☆

The post The Pied Piper | Blu-ray Review appeared first on Ioncinema.com.

Born in St. Louis on May 27, 1911, iconic actor Vincent Price retained a special fondness for his place of origin, and that love was reciprocated with Vincentennial, a celebration of his 100th birthday in his hometown back in May of 2011 (for summary of all the Vincentennial activities go Here). One of the guests of honor at Vincentennial was Vincent Price’s daughter Victoria Price. Because of their close relationship and her access to his unpublished memoirs and letters, Victoria Price was able to provide a remarkably vivid account of her father’s public and private life in her essential book, Vincent Price, a Daughter’s Biography, originally published in 1999. .In 2011, her biography of her father was out of print. but now it’s been re-issued and Victoria will be in St. Louis this weekend (October 9th – 10th) for three special events. In addition to the biography, she will also be signing...

Australian writer-producer Tammy Burnstock has been fascinated by the world.s first and only .Smell-o-Vision. feature ever since she interviewed its director/cinematographer Jack Cardiff in 1986.

Now Burnstock is part of the team that aims to screen a restored version of Scent of Mystery, retitled Holiday in Spain, to cinema audiences around the world including Australia.

Released in 1960, the film starred Denholm Elliott as a mystery novelist who discovers a plan to murder an American heiress (Beverly Bentley) while on vacation in Spain. He enlists the help of a local taxi driver (Peter Lorre) to try to thwart the crime. The cast included Leo McKern, Diana Dors and Paul Lukas.

Cardiff and producer Mike Todd Jr. updated a system invented by a Swiss man, Dr. Hans Laube, which piped artificial scents through a network of tubes to the back of each seat in a theatre.

Laube first demonstrated his .Scentovision...

“Do you still say my Shylock was inadequate?”

Theatre Of Blood starring St. Louis native Vincent Price will be screened Saturday October 10th, as part of Movies for Foodies, a regular film series put on by the chefs at Tenacious Eats. The event will take place at St. Louis Banquet Center located at 5700 Leona. In attendance will be special guest Victoria Price, author of Vincent Price, a Daughter’s Biography.

Tenacious Eats presents five courses and five cocktails themed to the Vincent Price masterpiece Theatre Of Blood with special guest of honor Victoria Price! Recipes will be featured from Victoria’s parents’ best-selling cookbook “A Treasury of Great Recipes” which is being re-issued for its 50th Anniversary. Cookbooks will be available for purchase that evening. This event will take place at St. Louis Banquet Center located at 5700 Leona. Get ready for a creepy good time! Live music and cash bar begin at 6:30pm.

'Henry V' Movie Actress Renée Asherson dead at 99: Laurence Olivier leading lady in acclaimed 1944 film (image: Renée Asherson and Laurence Olivier in 'Henry V') Renée Asherson, a British stage actress featured in London productions of A Streetcar Named Desire and Three Sisters, but best known internationally as Laurence Olivier's leading lady in the 1944 film version of Henry V, died on October 30, 2014. Asherson was 99 years old. The exact cause of death hasn't been specified. She was born Dorothy Renée Ascherson (she would drop the "c" some time after becoming an actress) on May 19, 1915, in Kensington, London, to Jewish parents: businessman Charles Ascherson and his second wife, Dorothy Wiseman -- both of whom narrowly escaped spending their honeymoon aboard the Titanic. (Ascherson cancelled the voyage after suffering an attack of appendicitis.) According to Michael Coveney's The Guardian obit for the actress, Renée Asherson was "scantly...

We’ll be celebrating the 5th year anniversary of Super-8 Movie Madness at The Way Out Club in St. Louis on Tuesday October 7th with an encore performance of our most popular show. It’s Super-8 Vincent Price Movie Madness in 3D, the show that we took on the road to promote Vincentennial back in 2011. We’ll be honoring the hometown horror hero by showing condensed (average length: 15 minutes) versions of several of Price’s greatest films on Super-8 sound film projected on a big screen. They are: Master Of The World, War-gods Of The Deep, Pit And The Pendulum, The Raven, Witchfinder General, Tim Burton’s Vincent, Two Vincent Price Trailer Reels, Abbott And Costello Meet Frankenstein and The Mad Magician in 3D (We’ll have plenty of 3D Glasses for everyone)

The non-Price movies we’re showing October 7th are The Three Stooges in Pardon My Backfire...

Honorary Award: Gloria Swanson, Rita Hayworth among dozens of women bypassed by the Academy (photo: Honorary Award non-winner Gloria Swanson in 'Sunset Blvd.') (See previous post: "Honorary Oscars: Doris Day, Danielle Darrieux Snubbed.") Part three of this four-part article about the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Honorary Award bypassing women basically consists of a long, long — and for the most part quite prestigious — list of deceased women who, some way or other, left their mark on the film world. Some of the names found below are still well known; others were huge in their day, but are now all but forgotten. Yet, just because most people (and the media) suffer from long-term — and even medium-term — memory loss, that doesn't mean these women were any less deserving of an Honorary Oscar. So, among the distinguished female film professionals in Hollywood and elsewhere who have passed away without...

Visage...

Voice...

Vitaphone...

In Dimitri Kirsanoff's Menilmontant a destitute waif, betrayed and abandoned by the man who seduced her, sits on a park bench with her newborn infant. Beside her is an old man eating a sandwich. This wordless exchange is one of the greatest moments ever committed to film. Nadia Sibirskaia’s face reveals all of life’s cruel mysteries as she gazes upon a crust of bread.

The persistence of hope is the dark angel that underlies despair, and here it taunts her mercilessly. A whole series of fluctuations of expression and movement in reaction to anguish, physical pain involving hesitation, dignity, ravenous hunger, survival, self-contempt, modesty, boundless gratitude. All articulated with absolute clarity without hitting notes (without touching the keys). Chaplin could have played either the old man on the bench (his mustache is a sensory device!) or Nadia. And it would have been masterful and deeply affecting,...

If the label 'comedy blonde' has to exist, at least it pertains to some genuinely great comic actors

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In The Other Woman, Cameron Diaz, Leslie Mann and Kate Upton team up to declare an all-out, scorched-earth War Of The Scorned Blondes against philandering husband Nikolaj Coster-Waldau. Once the three of them learn about each other, they find they have a lot in common namely, an ardent thirst for revenge and humiliation, preferably involving extreme hair loss, weight gain and covertly administered pre-op transsexual hormone therapy. The star power here comes from Diaz in her Valley Girl mode, and the hot flashes from Upton, an Anita Ekberg/Diana Dors in the making. But the real energy comes from the comic genius of Leslie Mann, whom I hereby dub the current Queen of the Comedy Blondes.

Continue reading...

Hardy, who stars as Elton John in a forthcoming biopic, may appear in thriller by La Confidential screenwriter Brian Helgeland

• Tom Hardy to play Elton John

Tom Hardy is in talks to play both Kray twins in a new biopic of the notorious British mobsters, reports Screen Daily.

Described as a thriller, the film will be written and directed by La Confidential screenwriter Brian Helgeland. It is expected to shoot in the UK later this year.

Hardy has experience with the crime biopic, having made his name with a tour de force performance as the ultra-violent prisoner Charles Bronson in Nicolas Winding Refn's 2008 film Bronson. In 2015, the actor is also set to star as Elton John in the biopic Rocketman.

The Krays were feared yet iconic participants in the swinging sixties as owners of a West End nightclub, Esmeralda's Barn. They mixed with figures such as Diana Dors, Frank Sinatra and Judy Garland,...

Tom Hardy is currently in talks to play UK gangster twins in a film from Working Title called Legend. The movie was written by Oscar-winning writer Brian Helgeland (La Confidential). The story will follow the "tortured and unique relationship between gangsters Ronald and Reginald Kray, the identical twin brothers infamous for their criminal exploits in London during the 1950s and 1960s." Some of the other elements that the story will tackle include "notorious gangster Jack 'the Hat' McVitie, who was murdered by Reginald in 1967 - politician Lord Boothby, and the brothers’ nemesis in the police force, DS Leonard 'Nipper' Read, who made it his life’s ambition to put the Krays behind bars."

The twins also owned a West End nightclub, and they mingled with several prominent entertainers including Diana Dors, Frank Sinatra, and Judy Garland, as well as with politicians. They were arrested on May 9, 1968 and were both sentenced to life in prison.

Exclusive: Tom Hardy in talks for thriller about notorious UK gangsters, from La Confidential screenwriter Brian Helgeland; Working Title producing.

Working Title is the new home of a thriller about the Kray twins, written by Oscar-winning writer Brian Helgeland (La Confidential), who will also direct.

Tom Hardy is in talks to star as both brothers in Legend (working title), which will chart the tortured and unique relationship between gangsters Ronald and Reginald Kray, the identical twin brothers infamous for their criminal exploits in London during the 1950s and 1960s.

According to sources close to the British actor, the project is one of several The Dark Knight Rises star is considering. Currently in development, the production is aiming to shoot in the UK later this year.

Working Title, whose recent features include Rush, About Time and Berlin title The Two Faces of January, is developing and producing the project.

The script takes in associates, rivals - such...

By Lee Pfeiffer 

The Shadowplay niche market DVD label has released the obscure British film noir crime thriller Room 43. The 1958 B&W film was directed by Alvin Rakoff and features some intriguing star turns. The real star of the film is Odile Versois, a French actress who is largely unknown in English language films. She plays Marie Louise, a young Parisian waitress who is framed for a petty crime in a human trafficking scheme. Faced with trial and jail, she accepts the help of a British benefactor, Aggie (Brenda de Banzie), a middle aged tourist who invites her to immigrate to London to work as her personal assistant. Once in London, she is housed with many other comely young women in a building run by Aggie. She is also introduced to Nick (Herbert Lom), an assertive but seemingly kindly businessman who pretends to have her best interests at heart.

Suppressed madness bubbles through David O Russell's black comedy about con artists who get a little too close to the FBI

It's not just any kind of hustle. The adjective "American" appended to a word in a movie title always implies something with instant design-classic status, gorgeously laced with irony and modernity. There is no plausible UK equivalent. British Beauty, British Psycho and British History X sound like films from the 1950s respectively starring Diana Dors, Richard Attenborough and John Profumo. David O Russell's hellzapoppin' black comedy is an aspirational hustle, a sentimental hustle, a romantic hustle. Perhaps Hollywood Hustle is the truer title. It's a brazen, nerve-jangling, irresistibly watchable movie full of jittery backtalk, pop-eyed tension and wacky hair: wigs, frizzes and beards. The drama is loosely derived from a true story from the late-1970s of how FBI agents coerced a notorious New Jersey conman into helping them...

Jean Kent: British film star and ‘Last of the Gainsborough Girls’ dead at 92 (photo: actress Jean Kent in ‘Madonna of the Seven Moons’) News outlets and tabloids — little difference these days — have been milking every little drop from the unexpected and violent death of The Fast and the Furious franchise actor Paul Walker, and his friend and business partner Roger Rodas this past Saturday, November 30, 2013. Unfortunately — and unsurprisingly — apart from a handful of British publications, the death of another film performer on that same day went mostly underreported. If you’re not "in" at this very moment, you may as well have never existed. Jean Kent, best known for her roles as scheming villainesses in British films of the 1940s and Gainsborough Pictures’ last surviving top star, died on November 30 at West Suffolk Hospital in Bury St Edmunds, England. The previous day, she had suffered a fall at her...

Popular stalwart of film classics such as The Browning Version and Fanny By Gaslight

Jean Kent, the fiery, sexy, red-haired bad girl of British movies in the 1940s, who has died aged 92, was a fine actor, and clearly enjoyed life, her work and – while it lasted – her cinema fame. While never a top star, she gained a considerable following, and from the 1960s appeared regularly on television. Her film breakthrough came as a result of stage work: after the revue Apple Sauce, starring Vera Lynn and Max Miller, reached the London Palladium in 1941, she was offered a long-term contract, and the first of her Gainsborough Pictures appearances came in It's That Man Again (1943), with another wartime entertainer, the radio comic Tommy Handley.

It took another four films for her to make her first real mark as Lucy, the friend of Phyllis Calvert in the title role of the melodrama Fanny By Gaslight,...

Cinematographer on the first Star Wars film who worked with the Boulting Brothers, Hitchcock and Polanski

The British cinematographer Gilbert Taylor, who has died aged 99, was best known for his camerawork on the first Star Wars movie (1977). Though its special effects and set designs somewhat stole his thunder, it was Taylor who set the visual tone of George Lucas's six-part space opera.

"I wanted to give it a unique visual style that would distinguish it from other films in the science-fiction genre," Taylor declared. "I wanted Star Wars to have clarity because I don't think space is out of focus … I thought the look of the film should be absolutely clean … But George [Lucas] saw it differently … For example, he asked to set up one shot on the robots with a 300mm camera lens and the sand and sky of the Tunisian desert just meshed together. I told him it wouldn't work,...

Alec Guinness: Before Obi-Wan Kenobi, there were the eight D’Ascoyne family members (photo: Alec Guiness, Dennis Price in ‘Kind Hearts and Coronets’) (See previous post: “Alec Guinness Movies: Pre-Star Wars Career.”) TCM won’t be showing The Bridge on the River Kwai on Alec Guinness day, though obviously not because the cable network programmers believe that one four-hour David Lean epic per day should be enough. After all, prior to Lawrence of Arabia TCM will be presenting the three-and-a-half-hour-long Doctor Zhivago (1965), a great-looking but never-ending romantic drama in which Guinness — quite poorly — plays a Kgb official. He’s slightly less miscast as a mere Englishman — one much too young for the then 32-year-old actor — in Lean’s Great Expectations (1946), a movie that fully belongs to boy-loving (in a chaste, fatherly manner) fugitive Finlay Currie. And finally, make sure to watch Robert Hamer’s dark comedy Kind Hearts and Coronets...

Blu-ray Release Date: Aug. 20, 2013

Price: Blu-ray $24.95

Studio: Olive Films

Danny Kaye and Dana Wynter gun for bedroom fun in On the Double.

The 1961 comedy classic On the Double stars Danny Kaye (White Christmas) in a dual role wherein he portrays both a Brit and an American.

The wacky World War II comedy finds Kaye initially playing a timid American soldier who bears a striking resemblance to a famous British Colonel. The top military brass decides to use the poor chap as a pawn and they recruit him to impersonate the legendary Colonel, who has been targeted by a team of Nazi assassins.

Directed by Melville Shavelson, On the Double co-stars Dana Wynter (TV’s Wagon Train) as the Colonel’s suspicious wife, sexy Diana Dors (Theater of Blood) as the Colonel’s personal driver and mistress and Wilfrid Hyde White (My Fair Lady) as the officer overseeing the mission.

Olive Films...

(Charles Crichton, 1950; StudioCanal, PG)

Made during Ealing Studios's peak period from the early 40s to the mid-1950s, Dance Hall is virtually the only movie produced by that male-dominated studio that might be considered a feminist work. Co-scripted by Diana Morgan, the sole woman admitted by Ealing boss Michael Balcon to his elite creative team, it looks at the world from the point of view of four young working-class women (Natasha Parry, Petula Clark, Jane Hylton and Diana Dors). They live in council flats, work in the same west London factory, and find romance and an escape from their drab lives at the local dance hall. Except for the middle-class accents, the film presents an honest, down-to-earth portrait of Britain in the postwar age of austerity. Typically for its time, Parry (future wife of the director Peter Brook) is torn between glamorous sports car-driving spiv Bonar Colleano and dull,...

Brilliant photographer whose portraits were loved by international film stars

Cornel Lucas, who has died aged 92, was the doyen of still photography in the British film industry. Although his pictures were not destined for cinema screens, his artistry and technique were much respected by his film cameramen colleagues on both sides of the Atlantic.

During the 1940s, working at Denham Studios, in Buckinghamshire, Cornel became well known for his brilliant portraiture and as the master of a huge 12in x 10in plate camera, which gave a large negative area, capable of delivering unmatched image quality. When international superstars came to work on British productions, they were invariably photographed by Cornel to create the publicity stills.

When the film No Highway in the Sky was being made in 1948, a special session was arranged with Marlene Dietrich, resulting in a series of iconic photos. The success of the Dietrich work led to...

Director Otto Preminger holds auditions for the part of Saint Joan in Manchester

Mr Otto Preminger, the director of "Laura," "Carmen Jones," and "The Man with the Golden Arm" among other films, was in Manchester yesterday searching for a St Joan. He had already given auditions to nearly two thousand girls in the United States and Canada; now he is in Europe to hear another thousand. On Tuesday he was in London, on Wednesday in Glasgow, and today he is off to Stockholm.

The film is to be made in a British studio with Shaw's text edited by Graham Greene - but, according to Mr Preminger, almost unaltered except for the demands of a different medium. Richard Widmark will play the Dauphin and other parts are to be taken by well-known actors not yet named. But for St Joan Mr Preminger is looking for someone quite unknown, aged between 16 and 22. Established actresses,...

Anthony Sampson takes his seat in the front row as Rock Around the Clock brings a new sound to south London

Nobody in the one-and-tenpennies at the Lewisham Gaumont took much notice of the News. The pretty Teddy girl next to us, with an apple face, short tousled hair and a pony-tail, had her feet up on the seats in front and was smoking a cigarette.

She was 15, and she worked in a shoe-store at New Cross, she said. The boy on whose lap she was sitting was 18, on leave from the army. They talked to the American girl next to me. "What are American teenagers like? I bet they're hep-cats! But the Americans got no one like Diana Dors. She's gorgeous. I don't like that Marilyn girl – she's covered in make-up."

The News ended. "I'm getting in the groove," yelled a small boy unconvincingly. Some more boys – all with...

My father, Stanley Dent, who has died aged 95, swapped the world of accountancy for running Adelphi Films, which produced British feature films throughout the 1950s – comedies, romances, dramas and horror, cheap and cheerful, but good entertainment, featuring stars such as Peter Sellers, Diana Dors, Sid James, Max Bygraves, Tommy Trinder and Dora Bryan.

Stanley was born in London, one of the three sons of Arthur Dent, a successful and charismatic film salesman, and his wife Hettie. He went to Kingsbury county school (now high school), and then qualified as an accountant. During the second world war, he was a gunner in Egypt and Syria. He enjoyed the outdoor desert life, where he learned to steer his jeep by the stars.

Arthur acquired Adelphi Films in 1949 and Stanley joined the company as business director, with his brother David as a producer. Their brother, Harry, had been killed during the war. Adelphi...

The legendary Hammer Studios is widely recognized as the high watermark of the gothic macabre, creating some of the most chilling and recognizable horror films of all time.

Synapse Films is proud to present this essential collection of all 13 tales of terror from the legendary British film studio into The Complete Hammer House of Horror collector's set.

In 1980 Hammer took over the old Hampden Manor House in the heartland of England and produced a series of thirteen horror stories to air on British television.  With a host of Hammer regulars, including Peter Cushing (Twins of Evil, Star Wars) and Denholm Elliott (Raiders of the Lost Ark), classic thespians including Brian Cox (The Ring), Patricia Quinn (The Rocky Horror Picture Show), Georgina Hale (The Devils), Diana Dors (Theatre of Blood) and Dark Shadows stalwart Kathryn Leigh Scott, along with early appearances by actors like Pierce Brosnan (GoldenEye), each episode provides a...

One of our favorite shows around these parts is the anthology series "The Hammer House of Horror", and though it's been released on DVD before, you know the good folks over at Synapse Films are going to put together a package that puts that one to shame!

From the Press Release

Each generation creates tales of horror… stories that seep through the very heart of our collective fears. The legendary Hammer Studios is widely recognized as the high watermark of the Gothic macabre, creating some of the most chilling and recognizable horror films of all time. Synapse Films is proud to present this essential collection of all 13 tales of terror from the legendary British film studio into The Complete Hammer House Of Horror collector's set!

In 1980 Hammer took over the old Hampden Manor House in the heartland of England and produced a series of thirteen horror stories to air on British television.

Late British actor and U.S. game show legend Richard Dawson was diagnosed with cancer just three weeks before his death on Saturday.

The Hogan's Heroes star, who later became known as the lovable host of America's Family Feuds, died in Los Angeles from complications of esophageal cancer.

His son Gary - from the presenter's marriage to British bombshell Diana Dors - reveals his dad only learned he was battling the disease shortly before his passing, after seeking help from doctors for what he thought was heartburn.

Dawson's first radiation treatment didn't go smoothly and he suffered a heart attack during the session.

Gary Dawson tells U.S. news show Access Hollywood, "It all just kind of happened really quickly."

Dawson passed away surrounded by his family and Gary is happy he wasn't in pain for too long.

He says, "Luckily, he didn't have to go through all the bad treatments and stuff... We all got to say goodbye. When we were saying goodbye, his eyes popped open. He hugged us. It was a beautiful moment."...

Three weeks ago, Richard Dawson thought he was suffering from heartburn. The late Hogan's Hero actor-turned-game show host, fondly remembered for his lips-on approach to his Family Feud contestants, then found out he had esophageal cancer, according to his children. "It all just kind of happened really quickly," his son Gary tells Access Hollywood. Dawson, 79, died Saturday night due to complications related to his cancer. "Luckily, he didn't have to go through all the bad treatments and stuff." Dawson had a heart attack when he underwent his first radiation treatment, says Gary, a son from Richard's first marriage, to '...

Richard Dawson—actor, game-show legend, and all-round celebrity presence—died Saturday at the age of 79. Born Colin Lionel Emm to an English mother and an American father, Dawson joined the Merchant Marine when he was 14, then transitioned into a varied life as a boxer, comedian, singer, and actor. (He was also married, for 7 years, to the blonde sex kitten Diana Dors—the only British film thespian ever to be name-checked in a New York Dolls song. They had two sons.) By the time he was 30, the affable Dawson had established a solid enough identity that he ...

London, June 4: Richard Dawson an English-born actor and TV host best known for his work on the game show 'Family Feud' and sitcom 'Hogan's Heroes,' has died from complications of esophageal cancer. He was 79.

A former husband of actress Diana Dors, he breathed his last on Saturday night at Ronald Reagan Memorial Hospital.

Born in Gosport, Hampshire, he played Corporal Peter Newkirk in World War II comedy Hogan's Heroes for six years.

He became a panelist on TV show.