News

Powerhouse Indicator’s first foray into the Universal library yields six noir thrillers, all crime-related and all different: the list introduces us to scheming businessmen, venal confidence crooks, black-market racketeers, a femme fatale, a gangster deportee and baby stealers. The B&w features are enriched with some of the best actors of the postwar years, and the titles themselves are a litany of vice and sin: The Web, Larceny, Kiss the Blood Off My Hands, Abandoned, Deported and Naked Alibi.

Universal Noir #1

Region B Blu-ray

The Web, Larceny, Kiss the Blood Off My Hands, Abandoned, Deported, Naked Alibi

Powerhouse Indicator

1948-1954 / B&w / Street Date November 14, 2022 / available from Powerhouse Films UK / £49.99

Starring: Ella Raines, Edmond O’Brien, Vincent Price, William Bendix; John Payne, Joan Caulfield, Dan Duryea, Shelly Winters, Dorothy Hart; Joan Fontaine, Burt Lancaster, Robert Newton; Dennis O’Keefe, Gale Storm, Jeff Chandler, Raymond Burr; Marta Toren, Jeff Chandler, Marina Berti, Richard Rober; Sterling Hayden,...

Let’s shout our approval of this foursome of vintage noirs, all of which have been scarce since Eddie Muller was old enough to rob candy stores. Three Paramounts and one Universal give us four notable directors and a gallery of attractive stars, including a swoon-worthy array of actresses: Marta Toren, Loretta Young, Susan Hayward, Gail Russell, Frances Farmer and Marina Berti. The selection includes one of the key ‘just prior to the official style’ titles, a thriller with supernatural overtones, a ‘woman in jeopardy’ story and a gangster tale reportedly inspired by Lucky Luciano.

Kino Noir Times Four

Blu-ray

Among the Living, Night Has a Thousand Eyes, The Accused, Deported

Kl Studio Classics

1941-1950 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / Street Date November 16, 2021 / available through Kino Lorber / Separate Purchases / 24.95 each

Starring: Albert Dekker, Susan Hayward; Edward G. Robinson, Gail Russell; Loretta Young, Robert Cummings, Wendell Corey; Jeff Chandler, Marta Toren.

Directed by Stuart Heisler,...

Barbara Steele has one of her better performance showcases in Camillo Mastrocinque’s classy ghost story with a somewhat dispiriting twist. Steele’s fan-collectors won’t need extra encouragement, as she’s in most every scene and gets to play a variety of moods from delicate to seductive to outright poisonous. Quality performances flatter a flawed screenplay, and the fine direction and attentive cinematography clearly inspired Steele to give it everything she had. Severin’s quality HD transfer is everything we’d want, with dual language tracks and good extras including a Kat Ellinger commentary and a second track featuring stellar input from Ms. Steele herself.

An Angel for Satan

Blu-ray

Severin Films

1966 / B&w / 1:85 widescreen / 96 min. / Street Date October 26, 2021 / 34.95

Starring: Barbara Steele, Anthony Steffen, Claudio Gora, Mario Brega, Marina Berti, Ursula Davis, Vassili Karis, Aldo Berti, Betty Delon, Antonio Corevi, Antonio Acqua, Livia Rossetti, Halina Zalewska, Giovanna Lenzi.

Hello, dear readers! To paraphrase a popular movie, “We’re in the Endgame now,” as Halloween is now merely only a few days away. If you’re looking for some last-minute viewing ideas to get you to the spooky season finish line, we definitely have a great array of choices heading home on Tuesday. The biggest recommendation that I can personally make in regard to perfect Halloween movie experiences is the Wnuf Halloween Special, which is getting a killer Blu-ray release tomorrow. Arrow Films is giving Dario Argento’s Deep Red a 4K upgrade this week, too, and Severin Films is showing love to both An Angel for Satan and Beyond Darkness.

Other releases for October 26th include Don’t Breathe 2, The Amazing Mr. X, Boardinghouse, Eye of the Devil, Skull: The Mask, Frankenstein’s Daughter, and Underworld: Limited Edition 5-Movie Collection.

The Amazing Mr. X: Special Edition

An atmospheric masterpiece,...

MPTF (Motion Picture & Television Fund) hosted the 14th annual edition of its iconic pre-Emmy Awards party, reimagined as “The Evening Before: Special Edition.”

The virtual benefit took place on Saturday, September 19, and celebrated Emmy nominees and other TV industry members, all while helping to raise funds for their colleagues and work family who benefit from MPTF’s charitable programs and services. The evening featured one-of-a-kind musical performances, special appearances from Emmy nominees and some of television’s brightest stars sharing how MPTF is supporting the entertainment community during this unprecedented time. The annual event raised $1.5 million last night.

“MPTF has never been more essential to our entertainment community. It has stepped up during this pandemic in heroic ways both for our residents on campus and for our workforce in the community. We’ve never been prouder of our efforts to take care of our own,” said Jeffrey Katzenberg, Chairman of the MPTF Board of Governors.

'Ben-Hur' 1959 with Stephen Boyd and Charlton Heston: TCM's '31 Days of Oscar.' '31 Days of Oscar': 'Lawrence of Arabia' and 'Ben-Hur' are in, Paramount stars are out Today, Feb. 1, '16, Turner Classic Movies is kicking off the 21st edition of its “31 Days of Oscar.” While the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is being vociferously reviled for its “lack of diversity” – more on that appallingly myopic, self-serving, and double-standard-embracing furore in an upcoming post – TCM is celebrating nearly nine decades of the Academy Awards. That's the good news. The disappointing news is that if you're expecting to find rare Paramount, Universal, or Fox/20th Century Fox entries in the mix, you're out of luck. So, missing from the TCM schedule are, among others: Best Actress nominees Ruth Chatterton in Sarah and Son, Nancy Carroll in The Devil's Holiday, Claudette Colbert in Private Worlds. Unofficial Best Actor...

Stars: Irene Miracle, Laura D’Angelo, Flavio Bucci, Gianfranco De Grassi, Macha Méril, Enrico Maria Salerno, Marina Berti, Franco Fabrizi | Written by Roberto Infascelli, Renato Izzo, Aldo Lado, Ettore Sanzò | Directed by Aldo Lado

With some of the recent releases from 88 Films they’ve delved into the Video Nasty vaults and picked out a chosen few for Blu-ray releases. With Night Train Murders which is part of The Italian Collection we get Aldo Lado’s take on Last House on the Left which surprisingly manages to be more effective than Wes Craven’s infamous classic.

When Margaret (Irene Miracle) and Lisa (Laura D’Angelo) decide to take the train from Germany to Verona for a Christmas vacation to visit Lisa’s family. Catching the eye of two young men Blackie (Flavio Bucci) and Curly (Gianfranco De Grassi) at first they playfully flirt with them in a conversation that seems innocent enough.

Charlton Heston movies: ‘A Man for All Seasons’ remake, ‘The Greatest Story Ever Told’ (photo: Charlton Heston as Ben-Hur) (See previous post: “Charlton Heston: Moses Minus Staff Plus Chariot Equals Ben-Hur.”) I’ve yet to watch Irving Rapper’s melo Bad for Each Other (1954), co-starring the sultry Lizabeth Scott — always a good enough reason to check out any movie, regardless of plot or leading man. A major curiosity is the 1988 made-for-tv version of A Man for All Seasons, with Charlton Heston in the Oscar-winning Paul Scofield role (Sir Thomas More) and on Fred Zinnemann’s director’s chair. Vanessa Redgrave, who plays Thomas More’s wife in the TV movie (Wendy Hiller in the original) had a cameo as Anne Boleyn in the 1966 film. According to the IMDb, Robert Bolt, who wrote the Oscar-winning 1966 movie (and the original play), is credited for the 1988 version’s screenplay as well. Also of note,...

After recuperating from two big releases this October, Blue Underground are hitting the ground running in January of 2012 with original Video Nasty, Night Train Murders.You Can Tell Yourself It's Only A Movie... But It Won't Help!It was released as Second House On The Left, New House On The Left, and Torture Train. The ads screamed, "Most movies last less than two hours! This is one of everlasting torment!" It remains one of the most graphically fiendish films in exploitation history, the story of two teenage girls traveling through Europe, forced into a nightmare of sexual assault and sadistic violence.Irene Miracle (Inferno, Midnight Express), Flavio Bucci (Suspiria), Macha Meril (Deep Red), and Marina Berti (What Have They Done To Your Daughters?) star in this depraved...

A fascinating book reveals the real-life scandal that lay behind Federico Fellini's La Dolca Vita

In glamorous Rome, Fellini's La Dolce Vita was the box-office hit of 1960, and launched Marcello Mastroianni as an international heart-throb. No film captured so vividly the flash-bulb glitz of Italy's postwar "economic miracle". After the drawn-out trauma of fascism, the nation was poised for a consumer boom of televisions, fridges and Fiat 500s. Daringly, Fellini disavowed the neo-realism of films such as Bicycle Thieves for the stylised fantasies of Hollywood. The Vatican not surprisingly objected to the scene in which Mastroianni makes love to Anita Ekberg in the waters of the Trevi fountain, and tried to have the film censored. Ever since, says the historian Stephen Gundle, Rome has endured as a fantasy of the "sweet life".

Yet all was not well behind the roseate flush of Italy's newfound prosperity. The miracolo italiano...