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The Western genre follows a classic, nostalgic formula. Full of iconic gunslingers, dangerous outlaws, and well-meaning sheriffs, these stories are thrilling at every turn and a great watch for anyone hoping to see a heroic battle in the rugged landscape of the Wild West, potentially in the form of one of pop culture's best non-movie Westerns. Hollywood has maintained its fascination with this niche genre, turning out Western TV shows like the Paramount hit Yellowstone and HBO's Westworld, both of which ran for multiple seasons and found a dedicated fan base.

Though classic Westerns are often looked to as relics of Hollywood's past, many modern Western TV shows would not exist without classic movies and shows that streamlined the genre. In fact, some franchises have even gone on to see new popular adaptations, such as Zorro and The Lone Ranger, due to their influence. Beyond their genre-defining effects, some classic...

For this week’s home media releases, we have killer superheroes, prehistoric creatures, Frankenstein by way of Hammer, Anjelica Huston as a witch, the final farewell to Rick Grimes, and more on tap. Kino Lorber is keeping busy this Tuesday with several new Blu-rays, including 4D Man, Dinosaurs! and Billy the Kid vs. Dracula, and Scream Factory is releasing the recent indie horror flick I Trapped the Devil and more Hammer genre goodness with Horror of Frankenstein as well. Another film I’m very excited to see hitting Blu is The Witches from the Warner Archive Collection, and William Friedkin’s Cruising is getting the special edition treatment from Arrow Video.

If you missed it in theaters, Brightburn will arrive on various formats this week, and for those of you who want to enjoy Rick Grimes’ final moments from this past season of The Walking Dead, you’ll get your...

Billy the Kid Vs. Dracula

Blu ray

Kino Lorber

1966/ 1.85:1 / 73 min.

Starring John Carradine, Chuck Courtney, Virginia Christine

Cinematography by Lothrop B. Worth

Directed by William Beaudine

William Beaudine, the human assembly line behind a warehouse full of movies that included Voodoo Man and Bowery Buckeroos, hauls John Carradine onto an over-lit and under-budget stage for another shot at the Count in Billy the Kid Vs. Dracula.

In 1966 Beaudine was very near the end of his career but Carradine reigned for three more decades, giving him ample time for reflection: “I have worked in a dozen of the greatest, and I have worked in a dozen of the worst. I only regret Billy the Kid Vs. Dracula. Otherwise, I regret nothing.”

Shot in eight days, producer Carroll Case and writer Carl K. Hittleman conceived the title as part of a matched set for the drive-in crowd – both Billy and Jesse James...

Dogs have long been referred to as "man's best friend," but they can be loyal to the undead as well, as evidenced in 1977's Dracula's Dog, aka Zoltan... Hound of Dracula, coming to Blu-ray this fall with a new 4K master from the team at Kino Lorber, who are also releasing 1966's Billy the Kid vs. Dracula on Blu-ray this August.

Kino Lorber announced the Dracula's Dog Blu-ray release on Facebook, and the Billy the Kid vs. Dracula Blu-ray news comes from Dawn of the Discs and Blu-ray.com.

An exact release date for the Dracula's Dog Blu-ray has yet to be announced, but it is expected to arrive in October, while Billy the Kid vs. Dracula is slated for an August 20th release.

Directed by Albert Band from a screenplay by Frank Ray Perilli, Dracula's Dog stars José Ferrer, Michael Pataki, and Reggie Nalder.

Dracula's Dog Synopsis (via Blu-ray.

Sometimes in horror, a giant creature will do. It takes us back to a simpler time, I think. A time when an oversized spider, or a massive lizard sparked shuttered eyes at the Drive-In or local theatre. It feels almost like a cleansing; a reset of the scare-o-meter back to the innocent levels of the Saturday matinee. And if you were a kid in the ‘70s, Bert I. Gordon’s The Food of the Gods (1976) fit the bill nicely.

Released in June by Aip stateside, and then rolled out across the world in ’77, Food brought in $1 million at the gate (good revenue by Aip standards) and the reviews were, not surprisingly, as low grade as the budget. But hey, legendary schlockmeister Gordon did not survive the biz on good copy. And what kind of reviews would you expect from a movie that features giant chickens, gargantuan rats, and Marjoe Gortner?...

Testing old rape kits could put countless rapists in prison-and exonerate others who were wrongly convicted. Linda Fairstein on the tragedy of letting these truth-tellers collect dust.

Charles Courtney, Jr., was arrested in Franklin County, Indiana, in September 1996, for the knifepoint rape of his wife, Mary Jane, when she told him she wanted a divorce the night he returned from a trip on his job as a long-distance truck driver. Like defendants in many domestic-violence cases, Courtney was offered a plea to a lesser charge of sexual battery. As such, his two-year sentence was far lighter than it would have been had he raped a stranger-a sad truth about many rapists whose victims are partners or acquaintances. That conviction earned the government the right to put Courtney's genetic profile in the FBI's convicted-offender databank. He was released from prison on January 4, 1998.

Related story on The Daily Beast: Lindsay Lohan's...

Chicago – With the release of “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World,” there is a reminder of all the films in cinema history that dared to challenge something, within an existence that sometimes has trouble getting out of bed. Here are ten such films, filling in the holes of and taking on the mantle of (Blank) vs. (Blank).

Kramer vs. Kramer (1979)

Kramer vs. Kramer

Photo credit: Columbia Pictures

This weeper did take on some pretty lofty issues in a post feminist society where gender roles – while loosening up considerably – were still pretty rigid. Meryl Streep does her usual scene stealing as Joanna Kramer, a frustrated wife and mother who shakes up circumstances by leaving her husband Ted (Dustin Hoffman) and their young boy Billy (Justin Henry).

Ted is forced to care for a child he’s barely known, and goes through a transition of his own. This Academy Award winning Best Picture...