News

The New York Choral Society chorus member Craig Schoenbaum with music producer and 99 Records founder Ed Bahlman on Richard Einhorn’s oratorio Voices of Light and Carl Theodor Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc: “It’s intense.”

Carl Theodor Dreyer’s 1928 silent film La Passion De Jeanne d'Arc, shot by Rudolph Maté and starring Renée Falconetti with Eugène Silvai, André Berley, Maurice Schutz, Antonin Artaud, Michel Simon, Jean d’Yd, and Louis Ravet is a cinematic masterpiece, based on transcripts of Joan of Arc’s actual trial. With a fascinating history of lost prints and numerous edits, the film still speaks to us about faith, calling, and the divine, as they clash with deception, corruption, and power.

Craig Schoenbaum with Ed Bahlman and Anne-Katrin Titze on Music Director and Conductor David Hayes: “You want to be prepared, you want to go there prepared when you're doing it with this guy.

It’s important for movies to ask serious questions. Brian Netto and Adam Schindler’s new Netflix thriller “Don’t Move” asks a very, very big one: What if a scene that would only be a couple minutes long in any other movie was the whole damn movie?

“Don’t Move” makes a decent attempt to address themes of mortality and depression but more than anything it’s a formal filmmaking exercise. In a nutshell, the film stars Kelsey Asbille (“Yellowstone”) as Iris, a mother mourning the accidental death of her son. At the start of the film she nearly takes her own life on a hiking trail. She’s interrupted by Richard, played by Finn Wittrock (“Origin”), who snaps her out of it and helps her remember that “Broken doesn’t have to mean hopeless.”

Then, right when Iris has finally rediscovered her will to live, Richard tases her, ties her up,...

The prisoners in the movie The Shawshank Redemption watch a classic Rita Hayworth film that has more significance than it seems. Written and directed by Frank Darabont, the iconic prison drama was adapted from the Stephen King novella Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption, originally included in his collection Different Seasons. Rita Hayworth was one of the biggest stars of the 1940s. She doesn’t appear in The Shawshank Redemption, but she is central to the plot. Not only is one of Hayworth’s movies screened for the prisoners, but Andy Dufresne also uses a big poster of Hayworth to conceal the tunnel he’s digging out of his cell.

Although it bombed at the box office on its initial release, The Shawshank Redemption has since come to be regarded as one of the greatest movies ever made. It sits comfortably in the number-one spot on IMDb’s “Top 250” list. Since...

"You've been dealt a bad deal… so don't make it worse." Did anyone know about this? There's a brand new 2022 remake of a classic 1940s film noir film titled D.O.A., premiering soon at the Fort Lauderdale Film Festival. The original D.O.A., directed by Rudolph Maté & starring Edmond O'Brien, was about a P.I. named Frank Bigelow who is told he's been poisoned and has only a few days to live, so he tries to find out who killed him and why. "While the story shares a title and premise with the original movie… most of the plot elements are original," the director of this new one explains. "With the clock ticking, Bigelow descends into a world of crooks and double-dealers, treacherous women and violent men, slashing through a tangle of conspiracies to figure out who 'killed' him & why." This one stars John Doe as Frank, with Paola Duque,...

“This picture is perfect, end of review.” That may not be 100 true, but Leo McCarey’s unabashed leap into romantic Nirvana really hasn’t been bettered, although his color & ‘scope remake is very good. Never was smart adult dialogue this winning — Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer’s cinematic courtship is a highlight of the Big Studio years. And Maria Ouspenskaya’s performance will send you out to pamper the nearest grandmother. The restoration for this one is a revelation, as the show has looked terrible for sixty years- plus. Serge Bromberg and Farran Smith Nehme make the extras especially valuable.

Love Affair

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 1114

1939 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 88 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date February 15, 2022 / 39.95

Starring: Irene Dunne, Charles Boyer, Maria Ouspenskaya, Lee Bowman, Astrid Allwyn, Maurice Moscovitch, Ferike Boros, Scotty Beckett, Bess Flowers, Harold Miller, Dell Henderson, Frank McGlynn, Sr., Joan Leslie.

Cinematography: Rudolph Maté

Art Director: Van Nest Polglase,...

By Hank Reineke Normal 0 false false false En-US X-none X-none

Lesley Selander’s Flight to Mars (1951) was one of the earliest offerings of cinematic science-fiction’s Silver Age. The film is not one of the best of that era’s productions, and not even the best of 1951 – that honor would arguably go to Rudolph Maté’s When World’s Collide due to that film’s ground-breaking animation of George Pal. But the stage was already set for science-fiction to replace door-creaking Gothic horror as more dependable, bankable product. Moviegoers of 1945 through 1950 had already been primed for space-travel and alien-enemy films through such entertaining Republic serials as The Purple Monster Strikes, King of the Rocket Men and Flying Disc Man from Mars. The 1947 crash near Roswell, New Mexico, also made a lot of folk’s look up to the skies to ponder – and fear – what might be floating above them in the cosmos.

The name talent attached makes this late- Weimar thriller a must-see proposition: Billy Wilder, Robert & Curt Siodmak, Franz Waxman. Their dark murder farce resembles what would later become the self-aware Black Comedy. The trouble begins when a suicidal nice guy can’t pull the trigger, and hires a crook to do the job for him. The satire is clever but the execution is awkward — the filmmakers set up big laughs that the heavy German filming style doesn’t deliver. Just the same, the situations seem extremely progressive, ahead of their time.

The Man in Search of his Murderer

Blu-ray

Kino Lorber Kino Classics Kino Repertory

1931 / B&w / 1:33 flat / 97 min. / Der Mann, der seinen Mörder sucht; Jim, der Mann mit der Narbe, Looking for his Murderer / Street Date April 6, 2021 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Heinz Rühmann, Lien Deyers, Raimund Janitschek, Hans Leibelt, Hermann Speelmans, Friedrich Hollaender, Gerhard Bienert, Roland Varno.

The November 2020 lineup for The Criterion Channel has been unveiled, toplined by a Claire Denis retrospective, including the brand-new restoration of Beau travail, along with Chocolat, No Fear, No Die, Nenette and Boni, Towards Mathilde, 35 Shots of Rum, and White Material.

There will also be a series celebrating 30 years of The Film Foundation, featuring a new interview with Martin Scorsese by Ari Aster, as well as a number of their most essential restorations, including films by Jia Zhangke, Ritwik Ghatak, Luchino Visconti, Shirley Clarke, Med Hondo, and more.

There’s also David Lynch’s new restoration of The Elephant Man, retrospectives dedicated to Ngozi Onwurah, Nadav Lapid, and Terence Nance, a new edition of the series Queersighted titled Queer Fear, featuring a new conversation between series programmer Michael Koresky and filmmaker and critic Farihah Zaman, and much more.

See the lineup below and learn more on the official site.

George Pal’s second science fiction classic has conceptual imagination and visual wonder to spare, along with a million awkward and dated details. When rogue planets threaten to obliterate the Earth, a super-Ark spaceship is built to spirit forty ‘chosen ones’ to safety. The Ark passengers have the right stuff, but you may be enraged by the rigged process to select who gets to go. Gee-whiz spectacle is the order of the day — how many End Of The World movies actually show terra firma expunged from the Solar System? Barbara Rush and John Hoyt are the acting standouts, but top honors go to Pal’s visual effect artists and designers.

When Worlds Collide

Blu-ray

Viavision / [Imprint] 6 (Australia)

1951 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 83 min. / Street Date August 26, 2020 / available through [Imprint] : $34.95

Starring: Barbara Rush, Richard Derr, Larry Keating, John Hoyt, Judith Ames, James Congden, Stephen Chase, Frank Cady, Hayden Rorke, Kirk Alyn, Casey Rogers, John Ridgely,...

George Pal’s second science fiction classic has conceptual imagination and visual wonder to spare, along with a million awkward and dated details. When rogue planets threaten to obliterate the Earth, a super-Ark spaceship is built to spirit forty ‘chosen ones’ to safety. The Ark passengers have the right stuff, but you may be enraged by the rigged process to select who gets to go. Gee-whiz spectacle is the order of the day — how many End Of The World movies actually show terra firma expunged from the Solar System? Barbara Rush and John Hoyt are the acting standouts, but top honors go to Pal’s visual effect artists and designers.

When Worlds Collide

Blu-ray

Viavision / Imprint (Australia)

1951 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 83 min. / Street Date August 26, 2020 / available through [Imprint] : $34.95

Starring: Barbara Rush, Richard Derr, Larry Keating, John Hoyt, Judith Ames, James Congden, Stephen Chase, Frank Cady, Hayden Rorke, Kirk Alyn, Casey Rogers,...

As much as we adore and revere the theatrical experience, as theater chains prep to reopen amidst a virus that is spreading rapidly in certain areas of the country, one is far better off staying at home and enjoying films from around the world. There’s no better place to do that than The Criterion Channel, and now they’ve unveiled their July lineup.

Coming to the channel next month are retrospectives dedicated to the stellar early films of Atom Egoyan, works by Miranda July, films featuring Ryuichi Sakamoto scores, Olympic films (including their recent release Tokyo Olympiad), plus Kelly Reichardt’s masterful Certain Women, Med Hondo’s Soleil Ô (coming soon to disc with Scorsese’s next World Cinema Project release), Lizzie Borden’s Born in Flames, Asghar Farhadi’s A Separation, and much more.

See the lineup below and explore more on their platform. One can also see our weekly streaming picks here.

Stuart Whitman, best known for his role in the TV western series Cimarron Strip and his Oscar-nominated turn in the drama The Mark, died in his home in Montecito, California. He was 92.

According to TMZ, Whitman had been in and out of the hospital as a result of skin cancer seeping into his bloodstream. He was surrounded by family at the time of his death.

More from DeadlineR.D. Call Dies: 'Into The Wild', 'Born On The Fourth Of July' Actor Was 70Earl Pomerantz Dies: 'Mary Tyler Moore Show' & 'Cheers' Writer, 'Major Dad' Producer Was 75Mart Crowley Dies: The Trailblazing 'Boys In The Band' Playwright Was 84

Whitman was born on February 1, 1928 in San Francisco before his family would move to Brooklyn. He went on to graduate from Hollywood High School and served in the United States Army in the Corps of Engineers.

It’s ‘Marriage Story’ circa 1936. Talk about older shows that still pack a dramatic wallop… William Wyler’s most celebrated ’30s film is this Sinclair Lewis adaptation. The Production Code frowned on disrespecting the institution of marriage, but Wyler & writer Sidney Howard keep the divorce theme intact — their well-off couple learn more about each other and simply grow apart. Industrialist Walter Huston gets pushed a little too far. His social-climbing wife Ruth Chatterton doesn’t appreciate what she’s got, while luscious Mary Astor is the Depression equivalent of a Malibu Earth Mother.

Dodsworth

Blu-ray

Warner Archive Collection

1936 / B&w / 1:37 flat Academy / 101 min. / Street Date March 24, 2020 / available through the WBshop / 21.99

Starring: Walter Huston, Ruth Chatterton, Paul Lukas, Mary Astor, David Niven, Gregory Gaye, Maria Ouspenskaya.

Cinematography: Rudolph Maté

Film Editor: Daniel Mandell

Original Music: Alfred Newman

Written by Sidney Howard from his play of the novel by Sinclair Lewis...

Above: Italian 4-foglio for Dodsworth; illustrated by Anselmo Ballester.William Wyler’s 1936 masterpiece of mid-life crises and European travel, Dodsworth, will play in all its glory at Alice Tully Hall in a brand new restoration at this year’s New York Film Festival. To be introduced by playwright and director Kenneth Lonergan and Wyler’s daughters Catherine and Melanie, it will be a tony affair, as befitting this classiest of productions. Based on Nobel Prize-winning author Sinclair Lewis’ 1929 novel—which had already been adapted very successfully for the stage by Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Sidney Howard—about a wealthy midwestern industrialist, Sam Dodsworth (Walter Huston), who retires and takes his restless wife (Ruth Chatterton) on a grand tour of Europe, produced by Samuel Goldwyn, and shot by Rudolph Maté, who had previously shot Dreyer’s Vampyr and The Passion of Joan of Arc, Dodsworth was a prestige production par excellence. And...

Mill Creek and Kit Parker package nine mid-range Columbia features from the 1940s and 1950s, not all of them strictly noir but all with dark themes — crime, creepy politics, etc. None have been on Blu-ray, and all but one are in fine condition.

Noir Archive 9-Film Collection

Address Unknown, Escape in the Fog, The Guilt of Janet Ames, The Black Book, Johnny Allegro, 711 Ocean Drive, The Killer That Stalked New York, Assignment: Paris, The Miami Story

Blu-ray

Mill Creek / Kit Parker

1944 -1954 / B&W / 8 x 1:37 Academy; 1 x 1:85 widescreen / 734 min. / Street Date April 23, 2019 / 49.95

Starring: Paul Lukas, Nina Foch, Rosalind Russell, Robert Cummings, George Raft, Edmond O’Brien, Evelyn Keyes, Dana Andrews, Barry Sullivan.

Cinematography: Rudolph Maté, George Meehan, Joseph Walker, John Alton, Joseph Biroc, Franz Planer, Joseph Biroc, Burnett Guffey, Henry Freulich.

Written by Herbert Dalmas, Aubrey Wisberg, Louella MacFarlane, Philip Yordan, Karen DeWolf, Richard English, Harry Essex, William Bowers,...

Let’s take a trip back to Bronson Caverns, but with new and better photos! Once you visit this hiding-in-plain-sight Hollywood location, you’ll start seeing it every time you tune into an old movie.

CineSavant Article

The most frequent ‘unknown’ location in film history?

Part of what was cool about moving to Los Angeles in 1970 was realizing that, since the majority of Hollywood movies were filmed locally, just about every interesting sight in the city has been used as a movie location. You don’t have to be ga-ga about movie stars to see the ‘historicity’ in famous locations, or feel saddened when a special place is torn down. The art deco Pan-Pacific Auditorium was one such example. It featured prominently in the King Bros. movie Suspense (1946) and can be glimpsed briefly in the opening of Steve De Jarnatt’s Miracle Mile (1989), which was filmed just before it burned...

The Passion of Joan of Arc

Blu ray

Criterion

1928 / 1:33 / 81 Min. / Street Date March 20, 2018

Starring Renée Jeanne Falconetti, Eugene Silvain

Cinematography by Rudolph Maté

Written by Joseph Delteil, Carl Dreyer

Music by Richard Einhorn, Will Gregory, Adrian Utley

Edited by Carl Dreyer, Marguerite Beaugé

Produced and directed by Carl Dreyer

For over a century the story of Joan of Arc has been catnip to an army of filmmakers ranging from DeMille to Bresson. Surrounded by meddlesome producers and difficult divas, maybe those weary moviemakers saw something of themselves in the embattled heroine – but no director had better insight into God’s own rabble-rouser than Carl Dreyer.

90 years on, The Passion of Joan of Arc continues to astonish. Combining the grim-faced piety of Renaissance art with the unvarnished intimacy of depression era portraits, Dreyer’s 1928 masterpiece still has the power to transform the lowliest grindhouse into a cathedral.

In 1417 a trio...

Normal 0 false false false En-us X-none X-none

“The Beauty Of Rapture”

By Raymond Benson

Aside from some of the comedy classics of the silent era, it’s arguable that the one picture of the period you should make a point to see is Carl Th. Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc, a film that has appeared on Sight and Sound’s top ten films poll five times and consistently cited as one of the most essential motion pictures in history.

That’s high praise, and it’s deserved.

For those of you who won’t watch silent movies because you think they’re boring or slow or whatever—forget it. The Passion of Joan of Arc is one of the most riveting pictures you’ll ever see. Its brevity (only 81 minutes at 24 frames per second) is a strength, but its power lies in the faces of its actors.

Of all the legendary early horror films Carl Theodor Dreyer’s vampire nightmare was once the most difficult to appreciate — until Criterion’s restoration of a mostly intact, un-mutilated full cut. Dreyer creates his fantasy according to his own rules — this pallid, claustrophobic horror is closer to Ordet than it is Dracula or Nosferatu.

Vampyr

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 437

1932 / Color / 1:19 Movietone Ap. / 73 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date October 3, 2017 / 39.95

Starring: Julian West (Baron Nicolas De Gunzberg), Maurice Schutz, Rena Mandel, Sybille Schmitz, Jan Hieronimko, Henriette Gérard.

Cinematography: Rudolph Maté

Art Direction: Hermann Warm

Film Editor: Tonka Taldy

Original Music: Wolfgang Zeller

Written by Carl Theodor Dreyer, Christen Jul from In a Glass Darkly by Sheridan Le Fanu

Produced by Carl Theodor Dreyer, Julian West

Directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer

Carl Theodor Dreyer’s Vampyr is a tough row to hoe for horror fans, many of whom just...

A classic film noir is getting a remake and modern update.

Silver Plane Films and Kingfisher Media announced that the production for D.O.A. Blood River will start shooting this month in Louisiana.

The noir thriller is inspired by director Rudolph Mate’s 1950 thriller D.O.A.

D.O.A Blood River will follow Sam Collins as a pharmaceutical sales rep, who visits a small town in Louisiana to close a business deal of a lifetime. Collins enters a world of sex, corruption and murder—as he is poisoned with no antidote. In a search for answers, he turns to a local girl named Jesse, in which their path leads to a voodoo priestess that confirms Sam’s fate. With nowhere to go and no others to trust, Sam and Jesse are on the run from police detectives, the Mob and a corrupt sheriff who wants him dead.

The studio also announced Billy Flynn...

Billy Flynn, Chris Mulkey, and D.B. Sweeney have boarded D.O.A. Blood River, the thriller written and helmed by Stephen C. Sepher. Filming beings next month with Sepher also serving as producer along Rory Fradella, Kim Barnard and Nazo Bravo. Inspired by Rudolph Mate's 1950 noir thriller, the film follows pharmaceutical salesman Sam Collins as he travels from Los Angeles to a small town in Louisiana to sign the business deal of his career with Dr. Alexander, a doctor…...

By Todd Garbarini

The Ahrya Fine Arts Theater in Los Angeles will be presenting a fun-filled weekend of six science fiction classics from Friday, April 15th to Sunday, April 17th. Several cast members from the films are scheduled to appear in person at respective screenings, so read on for more information:

From the press release:

Anniversary Classics Sci-Fi Weekend

Part of our Anniversary Classics series. For details, visit: www.laemmle.com/ac.

Re-visit the Golden Age of the Science Fiction Film as Laemmle Theatres and the Anniversary Classics Series presents Sci-fi Weekend, a festival of six classic films April 15-17 at the Ahrya Fine Arts Theatre in Beverly Hills.

It was dawn of the Atomic Age and the Cold War, as Communist and nuclear war paranoia swept onto the nation’s movie screens to both terrify and entertain the American public. All the favorite icons are here: Robby the Robot from Forbidden Planet,...

Otto Preminger looks at police corruption and comes up with a classy noir starring Dana Andrews as a rogue cop and Gene Tierney as the woman whose father he accidentally frames for murder. With Karl Malden, Gary Merrill and velvety-slick B&W cinematography by Joseph Lashelle. Where the Sidewalk Ends Blu-ray Twilight Time Limited Edition 1950 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / 95 min. / Ship Date February 9, 2016 / available through Twilight Time Movies / 29.95 Starring Dana Andrews, Gene Tierney, Gary Merrill, Bert Freed, Tom Tully, Karl Malden, Ruth Donnelly, Craig Stevens. Cinematography Joseph Lashelle Art Direction J. Russell Spencer, Lyle Wheeler Film Editor Louis R. Loeffler Original Music Cyril J. Mockridge Written by Ben Hecht, Robert E. Kent, Frank P. Rosenberg, Victor Trivas from the novel Night Cry by William L. Stuart Produced and Directed by Otto Preminger

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Want to see an example of a gloriously polished studio production, a film noir...

This adult film noir masterpiece showcases the most glamorous pin-up dream girl of the 1940s. Rita Hayworth, a young Glenn Ford and a sinister George Macready form a sophisticated, poisonous love triangle. Criminal intrigues and killer striptease fill out the bill. Gilda Blu-ray The Criterion Collection 795 1946 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 110 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date January 19, 2016 / 39.95 Starring Rita Hayworth, Glenn Ford, George Macready, Joseph Calleia, Steven Geray, Joe Sawyer, Gerald Mohr, Ludwig Donath, Argentina Brunetti, Eduardo Ciannelli, Ruth Roman. Cinematography Rudolph Maté Film Editor Charles Nelson Music underscore Hugo Friedhofer Written by Marion Parsonnet, Jo Eisinger, E.A. Ellington Produced by Virginia Van Upp Directed by Charles Vidor

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Some of the best 'movie' times I remember were seeing classic pictures cold, with no knowledge beforehand. Back at film school they'd show us things we'd never heard of, often in prints of incredible good quality.

Akira Kurosawa goes full tilt humanist with this emotionally wrenching, vastly insightful look at human nature. A faceless bureaucrat, alone and empty, is diagnosed with stomach cancer. He rebels and breaks down, but then finds a way to give meaning to his life even as he's losing it. Kurosawa one-ups the Italian Neorealists by seeing hope and value even in the oblivion of the human condition. Ikiru Blu-ray The Criterion Collection 221 1952 / Color / 1:37 flat Academy / 143 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / To Live / Street Date November 24, 2015 / 39.95 Starring Takashi Shimura, Shinichi Himori, Haruo Tanaka, Minoru Chiaki, Miki Odagiri, Bokuzen Hidari Cinematography Asakazu Nakai Production Designer So Matsuyama Original Music Fumio Hayasaka Written by Shinobu Hashimoto, Akira Kurosawa and Hideo Oguni Produced by Sojiro Motoki Directed by Akira Kurosawa

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Criterion has made slow but steady progress upgrading its impressive Akira Kurosawa library from DVD to Blu-ray. The newest...

Special Mention: Un chien andalou

Directed by Luis Buñuel

Written by Salvador Dalí and Luis Buñuel

France, 1929

Genre: Experimental Short

The dream – or nightmare – has been a staple of horror cinema for decades. In 1929, Luis Bunuel joined forces with Salvador Dali to create Un chien andalou, an experimental and unforgettable 17-minute surrealist masterpiece. Buñuel famously said that he and Dalí wrote the film by telling one another their dreams. The film went on to influence the horror genre immensely. After all, even as manipulative as the “dream” device is, it’s still a proven way to jolt an audience. Just ask Wes Craven, who understood this bit of cinematic psychology when he dreamt of the central force behind A Nightmare on Elm Street, a film intended to be an exploration of surreal horror. David Lynch is contemporary cinema’s most devoted student of Un chien andalou – the severed ear at...

David Cronenberg's Videodrome isn't just a classic sci-fi horror, but also a brilliant noir thriller. Ryan explains why...

Everything in Max Renn’s life is beginning to pulsate. First the Betamax videotape sent to him by one Bianca O’Blivion, which seems to breathe in his hand as he removes it from its beige packaging. Then Max’s television, squatting in the corner of his apartment, appears take on a life of its own: veins twitching, the screen bulging to the sound of a woman’s voice: “Come to me, Max. Come to me...”

David Cronenberg’s Videodrome, released in 1982, is loaded with violent and startling imagery like this. Like Apocalypse Now, its very narrative seems to disintegrate as its morally suspect protagonist Max Renn (James Woods) embarks on a journey into his own heart of darkness: a fascination with the origins of a video signal soon leads him to a world of corruption,...

The Museum of Modern Art in New York has just announced "Two Evenings of Films with Yoko Ono," happening on Monday and Wednesday. More goings on: A free sneak preview of Takashi Murakami's Jellyfish Eyes, Technicolor in New York and Toronto, an evening of work by Jack Smith in Los Angeles, which sees a Frank Borzage series opening tomorrow—plus Rudolph Maté's D.O.A. (1950) and more pulpy movies every Saturday. Hardcore David Cronenberg in San Francisco. Eric Rohmer's Full Moon in Paris (1984) in Chicago. And Ed Halter writes about George Kuchar's Hold Me While I’m Naked (1966), screening every day at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. » - David Hudson...

The Museum of Modern Art in New York has just announced "Two Evenings of Films with Yoko Ono," happening on Monday and Wednesday. More goings on: A free sneak preview of Takashi Murakami's Jellyfish Eyes, Technicolor in New York and Toronto, an evening of work by Jack Smith in Los Angeles, which sees a Frank Borzage series opening tomorrow—plus Rudolph Maté's D.O.A. (1950) and more pulpy movies every Saturday. Hardcore David Cronenberg in San Francisco. Eric Rohmer's Full Moon in Paris (1984) in Chicago. And Ed Halter writes about George Kuchar's Hold Me While I’m Naked (1966), screening every day at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. » - David Hudson...

Teresa Wright in 'Shadow of a Doubt': Alfred Hitchcock heroine (image: Joseph Cotten about to strangle Teresa Wright in 'Shadow of a Doubt') (See preceding article: "Teresa Wright Movies: Actress Made Oscar History.") After scoring with The Little Foxes, Mrs. Miniver, and The Pride of the Yankees, Teresa Wright was loaned to Universal – once initial choices Joan Fontaine and Olivia de Havilland became unavailable – to play the small-town heroine in Alfred Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt. (Check out video below: Teresa Wright reminiscing about the making of Shadow of a Doubt.) Co-written by Thornton Wilder, whose Our Town had provided Wright with her first chance on Broadway and who had suggested her to Hitchcock; Meet Me in St. Louis and Junior Miss author Sally Benson; and Hitchcock's wife, Alma Reville, Shadow of a Doubt was based on "Uncle Charlie," a story outline by Gordon McDonell – itself based on actual events.

D.O.A.

Written by Russell Rouse, Clarence Greene

Directed by Rudolph Maté

U.S.A., 1950

In a terrifically dramatic opening, D.O.A. begins with a series of smooth tracking from behind one man as he walks the corridors of police headquarters whilst the credits appear in the forefront. When the man’s face is revealed, the viewer learns that it is actor Edmond O’Brien, here playing one Frank Bigelow, modest accountant and public notary. Once seated with the police captain he reveals that he has been murdered! Is Frank Bigelow a ghost? No, but he is a dead man walking as the viewer quickly learns when the picture flashes back to the start of Bigelow’s tale when he chose to go on vacation in San Francisco alone, much to the initial consternation of his infatuated girlfriend Paula (Pamela Britton). It is at a bar one night in San Francisco that...

We have Frank Miller to thank for reminding us of the valiant tale of the Battle at Thermopylae as 300 Spartans fought off an invading force from Persia. His 300 graphic novel is a wonderful retelling of the tale and a pretty damn fine film from Zack Snyder. With the film sequel forthcoming any second now, 20th Century Home Entertainment has wisely issued the Blu-ray debut of the film that inspired Miller when he first saw it as a kid. The 300 Spartans may lack the visual panache of Snyder’s version but it makes for compelling viewing.

Oh, the script is nowhere near interesting although it does a nice job of sticking to the historic facts as Leonidas (Richard Egan) is asked by Themistocles of Athens (Ralph Richardson) to lead the army against King Xerxes (David Farrar). Not a single soldier is as ripped as Snyder’s army nor is Gorgo (Anna Synodinou), Leonidas’ wife,...

Every year, we here at Sound On Sight celebrate the month of October with 31 Days of Horror; and every year, I update the list of my favourite horror films ever made. Last year, I released a list that included 150 picks. This year, I’ll be upgrading the list, making minor alterations, changing the rankings, adding new entries, and possibly removing a few titles. I’ve also decided to publish each post backwards this time for one reason: the new additions appear lower on my list, whereas my top 50 haven’t changed much, except for maybe in ranking. Enjoy!

Special Mention:

Michael Jackson’s groundbreaking dance routines and unique vocals have influenced generations of musicians, dancers, and entertainers. He was one of entertainment’s greatest icons, and like most gifted individuals, he was always pushing boundaries, reinventing himself, and testing his limits. One of his biggest accomplishments was Thriller, a 14-minute...

This week: Director Danny Boyle crafts a stylish modern-day film noir with a bizarre love triangle in "Trance," starring James McAvoy, Rosario Dawson and Vincent Cassel.

Also new this week is the British crime drama "Welcome to the Punch," which also stars McAvoy as well as Mark Strong, and the Blu-ray debuts of "The 300 Spartans" (1962) and Ang Lee's "The Ice Storm" (1997).

'Trance'

Box Office: $2.3 million

Rotten Tomatoes: 68% Fresh

Storyline: Director Danny Boyle's British psychological thriller stars James McAvoy as Simon Newton, a fine art auctioneer mixed up with a gang led by Franck (Vincent Cassel) When a heist goes wrong and a revered painting goes missing, hypnotist Elizabeth Lamb (Rosario Dawson) is hired to help Simon remember where the painting is. The stakes get higher when the boundaries between reality and hypnotic suggestion begin to blur.

Extras!: Both the DVD and Blu-ray contain deleted scenes,...

Louise Brooks in Prix de Beauté: 2013 San Francisco Silent Film Festival Louise Brooks will kick off the 2013 San Francisco Silent Film Festival. At 7 p.m. on Thursday, July 17, the Sfsff will screen Augusto Genina’s Prix de Beauté aka Beauty Prize at the Castro Theater. Released in 1930 — when talkies had already become established in much of the moviemaking world — the French-made Prix de Beauté came out in both sound and silent versions, a widely common practice in those days as many theaters had yet to get wired for sound. Needless to say, the San Francisco Silent Film Festival’s Prix de Beauté print is the silent version, recently restored by the Cineteca di Bologna. (Photo: Louise Brooks in Prix de Beauté.) Prix de Beauté, which marked the last time Louise Brooks starred in a feature film, tells the story of a typist who enters a beauty contest — much to her...

The Passion of Joan of Arc

Directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer

Written by Carl Theodor Dreyer & Joseph Delteil

France, 1928

The Toronto Silent Film Festival got off to an impressive start at Innis Hall on Thursday night, as a packed room experienced the inspired fusion of two complementary works of art, created 85 years apart. One of the most exciting things about silent films is their tantalizingly protean quality, thanks to the conditions under which they were produced. What might once have been considered a weakness (especially from the point of view of an autocratic auteur intent upon controlling every aspect of the production) has now become a source of strength. Because they rely upon the kindness of musical strangers in order to come fully into being, silent films have an open-endedness to them which makes them infinitely more available (at least in some ways) to contemporary audiences than classic films made...

Throughout the month of October, Editor-in-Chief and resident Horror expert Ricky D, will be posting a list of his favorite Horror films of all time. The list will be posted in six parts. Click here to see every entry.

As with all lists, this is personal and nobody will agree with every choice – and if you do, that would be incredibly disturbing. It was almost impossible for me to rank them in order, but I tried and eventually gave up.

****

50: Thundercrack!

Directed by Curt McDowell

Written by George Kuchar

1975, USA

Thunderstruck! is by far the most obscure film you will find on this list. It is without a doubt one of the true landmarks of Underground cinema. With a screenplay by veteran underground film maker George Kuchar (story and characters by Mark Ellinger) and directed Curt McDowell (than student of Kuchar),

Thundercrack! is a work of a crazed genius.

31 – Rosemary’s Baby

Directed by Roman Polanski

USA, 1968

Roman Polanski’s brilliant horror-thriller was nominated for two Oscars, winning Best Supporting Actress for Ruth Gordon. The director’s first American film, adapted from Ira Levin’s horror bestseller, is a spellbinding and twisted tale of Satanism and pregnancy. Supremely mounted, the film benefits from it’s strong atmosphere, apartment setting, eerie childlike score and polished production values by cinematographer William Fraker. The cast is brilliant, with Mia Farrow and John Cassavetes as the young couple playing opposite Ruth Gordon and Sidney Blackmer, the elderly neighbors. There is ominous tension in the film from first frame to last – the climax makes for one of the greatest endings of all time. Rarely has a film displayed such an uncompromising portrait of betrayal as this one. Career or marriage – which would you choose?

30 – Eraserhead

Directed by David Lynch

USA, 1977

Filmed intermittently over the course of a five-year period,...

25 – Halloween

Directed by John Carpenter

1978 – Us

A historical milestone that single-handedly shaped and altered the future of the entire genre. This seminal horror flick actually gets better with age; it’s downright transcendent and holds up with determination as an effective thriller that will always stand head and shoulders above the hundreds of imitators to come. Halloween had one hell of an influence on the entire film industry. You have to admire how Carpenter avoids explicit onscreen violence, and achieves a considerable power almost entirely through visual means, using its widescreen frame, expert hand-held camerawork, and terrifying foreground and background imagery.

24 – Black Christmas

Directed by Bob Clark

1974 – Canada

We never did find out who Billy was. Maybe it’s for the best, since they never made any sequels to Bob Clark’s seminal slasher film, a film which predates Carpenter’s Halloween by four years. Whereas Texas Chainsaw Massacre, released the same year,...

Note: This is the second article in this series of posts. Click here to see the first entry.

Every year I spend the majority of the month of October watching as many horror movies as I possibly can. So I decided to take it upon myself to list off the greatest horror movies ever made. I felt the need to break up the list into several categories. You see, usually when people ask me for recommendations of what horror films they should see, they still have some idea of what sub genre they are interested in watching. So as appose to having one big jumbled list, I’ve broken it down to help with those looking for recommendations in a specific area. Please Note: by the end of the month, the last entry in this series will include a list of what I think are without a doubt, the 31 greatest horror movies ever made.

Humphrey Bogart, the most revered Old Hollywood tough guy, is Turner Classic Movies' Star of the Day this Wednesday as TCM continues its "Summer Under the Stars" film series.[Humphrey Bogart Movie Schedule.] My favorite tough guy — by far — is Edward G. Robinson. The star of Little Caesar, The Sea Wolf, House of Strangers, Key Largo, etc. is followed by James Cagney — when in psycho mode — and a whole bunch of tough dames, among them Barbara Stanwyck, Jane Greer, Ann Sheridan, and Ida Lupino. Bogart isn't on my list. In the aforementioned Key Largo, for instance, he is all but eviscerated by Robinson's charisma. TCM is currently showing John Huston's The Maltese Falcon (1941), officially Hollywood's first film noir and one of the most widely admired classics of the studio era. Needless to say, I'm at odds with the general consensus. I much prefer Roy Del Ruth's less atmospheric but more entertaining 1931 version...

First released in 1946, Gilda is a wonderfully perverse noir classic that comes over as a cross between Casablanca (an intentional influence) and Hitchcock's Notorious (which appeared just weeks after Gilda). The movie revolves around the exotic Rita Hayworth and was produced by Virginia Van Upp, the most powerful woman at Columbia, who was charged by tough studio boss Harry Cohn with supervising the star's career. Hayworth is stranded in Buenos Aires at the end of the second world war, trapped between her sadistic, middle-aged husband, the Nazi-sympathiser Ballin Mundson (George Macready), and her ex-lover, the cruel, amoral American adventurer, Johnny Farrell (Glenn Ford). The men have a homoerotic love-hate relationship. After Johnny sees Ballin's phallic sword-cane the first time they meet, he says admiringly: "You must lead a gay life."

Hayworth is sad and stunning, the film is beautifully lit by Rudolph Maté (who photographed Dreyer's The Passion of Joan of Arc,...

Flix Picks [1] is a new semi-regular feature that explores the depths of my Netflix queue and allows me the chance to catch up with some older films that I’ve not yet seen. You can count me as one of the many cinephiles in the Alfred Hitchcock fan club. I’ve seen a wide array of his films, although mainly the more well-known titles. So, in an attempt to widen my knowledge on the Master of Suspense, I recently caught up with Foreign Correspondent, a slightly less talked-about film in his canon. As usual, thanks to my handy-dandy Netflix account, it was an easy find. Set during the days leading up to WWII, Foreign Correspondent tells the story of Johnny Jones, a crime reporter who’s editor assigns him to Europe after becoming fed up with vague reports from other correspondents. Despite a lack of experience in foreign affairs, Johnny...

Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1932

"I wanted to create a waking dream on screen and show that horror is not to be found in the things around us but in our own subconscious," said Danish film-maker Carl Theodor Dreyer, whose loose adaptation of two stories from Sheridan Le Fanu (Carmilla and The Room in the Dragon Volant) was initially conceived as a silent movie. Sound was added during production, but the film's trance-like images could stand on their own as a visual poem in which the action seems to take place on the cusp of dreams and reality.

Apart from German actress Sybille Schmitz, who plays the vampire's chief victim, and French actor Maurice Schutz, who plays her father, the cast was non-professional. Baron Nicolas de Gunzberg, who provided finance for the film, also took the leading role under the pseudonym Julian West. He plays a roving occult investigator called Allan Grey...

There seems to be no exhausting the raw eyeball pleasure to be had from old-fashioned handmade (or semi-handmade, or whatever) animation, and we may be well living through a pop renaissance of it.

The eruptions below the Pixar/Dreamworks budget tier have been spectacular and international, beginning perhaps with 2003's "The Triplets of Belleville," learning from Miyazaki, Oshii, Aardman and the Quays, moving on to Kim Moon-saeng's "Sky Blue," machinima, "The Corpse Bride," "A Scanner Darkly," "Persepolis," "Coraline," "Waltz with Bashir," "Fantastic Mr. Fox," "Mary & Max," "Sita Sings the Blues," "Fear(s) in the Dark," "The Secret of Kells," and now the Belgian nonpareil "A Town Called Panic."

The variety of toolboxes and styles at work seem limitless (the seductive but uniform look of pure 3D computer animation is getting tiresome just as other approaches proliferate), but it's the personal engagement that makes most of the films sing.

Many of...

Acquarello

Notes on Rendez-vous with French Cinema 2010

David Cairns

The Forgotten: Trousering the Ghost

The Forgotten: Vessel of Wrath

The Forgotten: Is My Face Red

The Forgotten: Lock-Up

Zach Campbell

Some Kind of Realism: Rossellini's War Trilogy

Andrew Chan

Sinophilic Cinephilia: Asia Society's "China’s Past Present, Future on Film"

Adrian Curry

Movie Poster of the Week: "Cold Weather"

Movie Poster of the Week: "Glory to the Filmmaker" or: Kitano in Posters

Movie Poster of the Week: "Feeder" and the SXSW Poster Award Winners

Movie Poster of the Week: "Everyone Else"

David Hudson

Berlinale. Cons and Ex-Cons

Daniel Kasman

Image of the Day: Unrequited Love #1

The Potential of the Mobile Film Festival: Rotterdam@Bam

Images of the Day: Joan Alone: Joan Bennett in Fritz Lang's "Secret Beyond the Door..."

At the Cinematheque: "The Prowler" (Joseph Losey, 1951)

Jean-Luc Godard's Homage to Eric Rohmer

Now in Theaters: "Shutter Island" (Martin Scorsese,...

You haven't seen Iranian Kidney Bargain Sale? Then you haven't dipped a toe into the motliest crew on record

The other day I finally got a chance to see Iranian Kidney Bargain Sale, a documentary I'd been meaning to get to for some time. Chronicling the adventures of assorted young Iranians who sell their kidneys to buy a taxi, or finance their ­education, or pay off debts, Iranian Kidney Bargain Sale is not the kind of movie that is readily available at most local video stores. But it is available – free – in the movie section at YouTube. So is a lot of other stuff.

Mostly when I visit YouTube it is to watch cats falling off chairs, parodies of Heath Ledger's turn as the Joker or sportscasters being tormented by stalking sock puppets. But it was recently pointed out to me that YouTube also has a section that is...

• The year is 2054. The city, Paris. Walled off from the rest of the world, Paris has been expanded in every direction—up, down, and inward—but out, resulting in a futuristic maze-like metropolis superimposed over the classical architecture for which the city is world famous. A network of streets and passageways (and also waterways) crisscross the airspace between street level and the heights of the city’s towers. Glass enclosed shopping centers operate below ground. Images on billboards move and speak, advertising the sale of eternal youth and beauty. Among these streets a woman in her early twenties is kidnapped outside a dance club in an intense, stylish, and bizarre sequence that projects through the windows of your mind like a scene from a David Lynch remake of Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train animated by Frank Miller. The title of the film is Renaissance. Distributed across North America by Miramax Films,

...