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You rarely hear mention of Alfred Hitchcock’s last cinematic foray, Family Plot, and you would assume that means a throwaway title — a fall from his illustrious heights. Not so! In fact, it’s rather a shame more folks haven’t turned the movie on because it proves the Master read more

There we are gliding across the River Thames making our way toward the regal facade of Tower Bridge. Where’s one apt to find a more picturesque view of London? It’s definitely an auspicious return to his native land for the Master of Suspense. Frenzy is without question a singular Hitch read more

There we are gliding across the River Thames making our way toward the regal facade of Tower Bridge. Where’s one apt to find a more picturesque view of London? It’s definitely an auspicious return to his native land for the Master of Suspense. Frenzy is without question a singular Hitch read more

Jack Nicholson was awarded the distribution rights of The Passenger soon after the movie came out, and he purportedly kept it out of circulation until the 2000s. From my understanding, it wasn’t for the typical reasons. He wasn’t trying to kill it so no one would catch wind of what a de read more

The world of blue-collar workers is immediately spelled out through a visual shorthand of hard hats, bulldozers, and oil rigs. At the center of Carole Eastman’s story is Bobby (Jack Nicholson) a young man who works alongside his buddy Elton and lives with his sometime girlfriend Rayette (Kare read more

“If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.” There’s no beating around the bush when it comes to Easy Rider. It remains a cultural landmark not only of the counterculture of the ’60s, but it also stands tall as one of the Great American Road movies, albeit fr read more

With time it’s become more and more ironic that Blow-up, the film having become synonymous with the Swinging London scene of the 1960s, came from two Italians: Carlo Ponti and Michelangelo Antonioni. In the picture, Antonioni casts David Hemmings as a kind of snarky, scruffy hero of the Londo read more

The Last Hunt considers an era that is no more. Once America’s Great Plains ran rampant with herds of bison numbering up to 60,000,000 based on the estimation of this movie. The initial premise of Richard Brooks’ western intrigues for the sole fact that this is a slice of history that doesn’t read more

My only qualm with Westward The Women might be the title itself because otherwise, it’s a striking movie that should rightfully be heralded as a supremely significant western for the story it chooses to tell. At the very least, the title does make it evident that this is a story with women at read more

There are three names emblazoned over the title credits engulfing the screen: Richard Widmark, Henry Fonda, and Anthony Quinn. Somehow they all figure into this story — into the war that we are about to be privy to. The question remains, how so and on what sides? It turns out, it’s far read more

“You’re standing on the edge of a cliff. I don’t advise you going through life with your eyes closed.” – Doc Frail Delmer Daves isn’t often remembered alongside the foremost western directors. Although in the 1950s, he crafted some stellar movies, and something l read more

We’re in the Arizona territories. The year is 1873. Glorious overhead shots give us a sense of the vast panorama of the terrain in CinemaScope as Richard Widmark gets hunted down and returns the fire of his pursuers. The distinctive red rocks have the hint of John Ford and if nothing else, re read more

“You just don’t seem like the kind of man who would hunt a man for money.”  “I am.”   Ride Lonesome has a setup as obvious as it is simple, further indicating why the collaborations between Budd Boetticher and screenwriter Burt Kennedy were so plentiful. It comes with read more

I Shot Jesse James is an off-center western as only Sam Fuller could possibly conceive it. At the very least it brings a journalistic eye and a shift in perspective. Because distilled down to its most basic elements, it’s a psychological character piece with John Ireland at the heart of it as read more

My knowledge of silent cinema is admittedly littered with blindspots. Some of this must be attributed to the sheer number of shorts the era engendered and also the number of extant films which will remain lost if not for some secret cache hidden away in someone’s perfectly insulated basement. read more

Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated on April 4th, 1968. Uptight was released in December of the same year. It’s a rather unnerving circumstance because the movie was conceived well before the horrid tragedy, and yet this cataclysmic moment haunts the picture. If the struggle for unity was read more

The opening title card sets the stage in strife-torn Dublin in 1922 with a reference to Judas, the man who betrayed Jesus Christ to be killed. The allusive nature of the story becomes apparent only with time, connecting with John Ford’s own deeply religious inclinations as an Irish Catholic. I read more

Before there ever is an incident to speak of in Larry Peerce’s film, we open on the lowest scum of the streets, played by Martin Sheen and Tom Musante, shooting pool and kicking up any trouble they can manage. Between catcalling after women and ambushing pedestrians for 8 lousy bucks, theyR read more

I was recently marveling how a theater actor I know predominantly from TV show appearances, William Redfield, could show up as an earlier incarnation of himself in an unorthodox film like The Connection. Then, about a week later, I had a similar revelation seeing Barney Miller’s wife, actress read more

In The Heat of The Night is a testament to the collaborative nature of Hollywood. We watch Sidney Poitier step off the train. Haskell Wexler’s cinematography gives an instant texture to the world so the sweaty atmosphere is almost palpable around him. However, one of my immediate recollection read more