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Fondly remembered as a permanent resident on all-night movie channels, this patchwork concoction has just enough ‘good stuff’ to qualify as a fun monster show. Jim Davis’s stock-footage safari arrives just in time to be irrelevant to the fate of the title monsters; some good actors are along for what amounts to a picnic in Griffith Park’s Bronson Caverns. There’s still not a full accounting of who did what, special effects-wise. But Hey! The picture has stop-motion animation, which always guarantees viewer interest.

Monster from Green Hell

Blu-ray

The Film Detective

1957 / B&w with colorized sequence / 1:85 widescreen + 1:33 open matte / min. / Street Date March 8, 2022 / Available from The Film Detective / 24.95

Starring: Jim Davis, Robert Griffin, Joel Fluellen, Barbara Turner, Eduardo Ciannelli, Vladimir Sokoloff.

Cinematography: Ray Franklin

Production Designer: Ernst Fegté

Visual Effects: Louis DeWitt, Jack Rabin, Irving Block, Wah Chang, Jack Cosgrove, Gene Warren

Film Editor: Kenneth G. Crane...

Too Awesome to Describe! Too Terrifying to Escape!

The Film Detective will release Kenneth G. Crane’s classic B-movie creature feature Monster From Green Hell (1957) on special-edition Blu-ray and DVD, March 8. Featuring a new 4k transfer, exclusive bonus features and rare, colorized version of the film’s climax.

From the era of giant bugs and atomic testing comes this low-budget howler about mutant wasps. When scientists try to understand the effects of radiation on earth creatures, the result brings them to an area of Africa known as “Green Hell,” where wasps have mutated into monsters!

Jim Davis, who later starred in the TV series Dallas, plays Dr. Quent Brady, the scientist who starts the whole mess. The film also stars Vladimir Sokoloff (The Life of Emile Zola, Mission to Moscow) as the skeptical Dr. Lorentz and Joel Fluellen (Raisin in the Sun) as Arobi, who warns Brady to beware of the African location.

The triple-threat talent Gordon Parks gets carte blanche to film his own autobiographical novel back in his old home town — and the result is one of the better depictions of growing up black in the Midwest. Parks’ memories don’t wield a fiery political agenda, nor does he say that ‘there were good people on both sides.’ It was what it was and it wasn’t always pretty. As young Newt, Kyle Johnson ‘does the right thing’ and his experience helps explain the pervading lack of faith in justice, to put it mildly. Parks’ beautiful film remains positive, reflecting his warm memories, and his direction gives us a full ensemble of black talent at work: this is said to be the first Hollywood film produced and directed by a black man.

The Learning Tree

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 1107

1969 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 107 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date December 14, 2021 / 39.95

Starring: Kyle Johnson,...

Lorraine Hansberry’s play has been given a masterful film adaptation, with the emotional truth of her words left intact. We’re told of some superficial compromises, but they do not diminish the play’s powerful clash between old and new ideas in a Southside Chicago family struggling to escape poverty. This may be Sidney Poitier’s best screen performance, but the honors are shared with a superlative cast.

A Raisin in the Sun

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 945

1961 / B&W / 1:85 widescreen / 128 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date September 25, 2018 / 39.95

Starring: Sidney Poitier, Claudia McNeil, Ruby Dee, Diana Sands, Ivan Dixon, John Fiedler, Louis Gossett Jr., Stephen Perry, Joel Fluellen, Louis Terrel, Roy Glenn.

Cinematography: Charles Lawton Jr.

Film Editors: William A. Lyon, Paul Weatherwax

Original Music: Laurence Rosenthal

Written by Lorraine Hansberry, from her play

Produced by David Susskind, Philip Rose

Directed by Daniel Petrie

In more than...

Horton Foote, Lillian Hellman and Arthur Penn's All-Star vision of an Ugly America found few friends in 1965; now its overstated scenes of social injustice and violence are daily events. Marlon Brando leads a terrific cast -- Robert Redford, Jane Fonda, Angie Dickinson, Robert Duvall! -- to endure the worst Saturday ever to hit one cursed Texas township. The Chase (1966) Blu-ray Twilight Time 1966 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 134 min. / Street Date October 11, 2016 / Available from the Twilight Time Movies Store / 29.95 Starring Marlon Brando, Jane Fonda, Robert Redford, E.G. Marshall, Angie Dickinson, Janice Rule, Miriam Hopkins, Martha Hyer, Richard Bradford, Robert Duvall, James Fox, Diana Hyland, Henry Hull, Jocelyn Brando, Clifton James, Steve Ihnat Cinematography Joseph Lashelle Production Designer Richard Day Art Direction Robert Luthardt Film Editor Gene Milford Original Music John Barry Written by Lillian Hellman from the novel by Horton Foote Produced by Sam Spiegel Directed by Arthur Penn

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson...

I came across this publicity photo of Dorothy Dandridge by happenstance, which was obviously made during the golden age of studio publicity photos. There was no caption for the photo other than her name, but judging from how she’s (ahem..) dressed and the nautical looking door, it was easy to guess what film it’s from. It’s from one of her more interesting and oddest films, and definitely worth a couple of words, which I shall say right here. It’s a publicity still from her 1958 MGM suspense thriller "The Decks Ran Red," starring, along with Dandridge, James Mason, Broderick Crawford, Stuart Whitman and Joel Fluellen. To date, it’s never been available on DVD and is rarely ...

I came across this publicity photo of Dorothy Dandridge by happenstance a few days ago, which was obviously made during the golden age of studio publicity photos. There was no caption for the photo other than her name, but judging from how she’s (ahem..) dressed and the nautical looking door, it was easy to guess what film it’s from.It’s from one of her more interesting and oddest films and definitely worth a couple of words which I shall say right here.It’s a publicity still from her 1958 MGM suspense thriller The Decks Ran Red, starring, along with Dandridge, James Mason, Broderick Crawford, Stuart Whitman and Joel Fluellen. To date, it’s never been available on DVD and is...

It goes without saying that filmmaking is truly a labor of love.

Whether it be a film breaking box office records with a team of writers and a director who is simply there to shoot actors acting, or be it the smallest of small independent film, within any production you will find a person or group of people putting their heart and soul into the film.

This may not be any more clear in the 1969 film, The Learning Tree.

Written and directed by Gordon Parks, the film is based off of a 1964 semi-autobiographical novel of the same name, penned by Parks, and now, 22 years after being selected to join the National Film Registry here in the Us, the Warner Archive has brought the public this beloved and absolutely fantastic look at not only growing up, but growing up in a time and world where you aren’t wanted.

Learning tree...