Welcome to BlogHub: the Best in Veteran and Emerging Classic Movie Blogs
You can rate and share your favorite classic movie posts here.
You can rate and share your favorite classic movie posts here.
Keep Your Left Up (1936, René Clément)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 18, 2015
Keep Your Left Up is a genial little short set in a small French country town. The arrival of the postman sets off the short, which eventually has local do-nothing Jacques Tati in the ring against boxer Louis Robur. The charm comes mostly from the setting, Clément’s excellent composition and read more
Angels with Dirty Faces (1938, Michael Curtiz)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 16, 2015
Angels with Dirty Faces runs less than ninety minutes, but doesn’t really fill them. The first fifteen minutes of the film are flashbacks, tracking James Cagney’s character from troubled boyhood to juvenile detention to prison. Once the present action starts, Cagney immediately reunites read more
Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981, Steve Miner)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 13, 2015
When director Miner finally does a decent sequence in Friday the 13th Part 2, it comes as something of a surprise. Amy Steel is on the run from the masked killer and, even though it’s stupid, it’s somewhat effective. Steel probably gives the film’s best performance (she’s st read more
Ride the High Country (1962, Sam Peckinpah)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 13, 2015
Ride the High Country is a fine attempt. It’s not a successful attempt, but it’s a fine one. Director Peckinpah seems to know what he wants to do, but he’s too trapped in Western genre tradition. Having icons Joel McCrea and Randolph Scott as his leads (they’re both great), read more
Fun Sunday! (1935, Jacques Berr)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 11, 2015
It takes Fun Sunday! almost the entire short film to find its footing. The problem is director Berr; he has no comic timing. Sunday cuts a couple corners as far as budget–the sound cuts in and out, going over to music and not the background noise–but it’s rather ambitious stuff. E read more
The Battle of Algiers (1966, Gillo Pontecorvo)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 6, 2015
The Battle of Algiers is brilliantly constructed. Director Pontecorvo deceptively frames the film–he also gives most sequences a date and time, which shows the viewer how greater events are progressing, but Pontecovro also gives multiple times in a day, which puts the viewer on edge even thou read more
The Decalogue: One (1989, Krzysztof Kieslowski)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 4, 2015
For the first episode of “The Decalogue,” director Kieslowski and co-writer Krzysztof Piesiewicz go straight for the jugular. Kieslowski fills the episode with foreshadowing until it spills over. And no symbolism is too obvious. One is about a computer programming professor (Henryk Bara read more
A Night at the Opera (1935, Sam Wood)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Mar 2, 2015
As good as the Marx Brothers are in A Night at the Opera–and George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind’s strong script is important too–director Wood really brings the whole thing together. The film has its obligatory musical subplot and romantic leads. Wood knows how to balance those read more
Brute Wanted (1934, Charles Barrois)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Feb 25, 2015
Quite a bit of Brute Wanted is rather funny. The whole idea is funny–dimwitted, failing actor (Jacques Tati) goes for an audition and it turns out he’s agreeing to wrestle a musclebound Russian grotesque. Tati’s got a nagging wife (Hélène Pépée) who also manages him. A lot of the read more
[Stopped Button Favorites] Episode 1 | King Kong ’76
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Feb 20, 2015
Synced to the R1 Paramount DVD release. iTunes link coming soon MP3 Download read more
[Stop Button Modells] Safe and Well: King Kong ’76
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Feb 20, 2015Inherit the Wind (1960, Stanley Kramer)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Feb 20, 2015
A lot of Inherit the Wind is about ideas and not small ones, but big ones. Director Kramer is careful with how big he lets the film get with these ideas, because even though Inherit the Wind is about Darwin vs. the Bible as its biggest idea, the smaller ideas are the more significant ones. And when read more
Friday the 13th (1980, Sean S. Cunningham), the uncut version
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Feb 13, 2015
There’s nothing wonderfully terrible about Friday the 13th. It’s not like any of the cast are bad in funny ways, not even Betsy Palmer who’s doing inept histrionics. Are any of the cast members good? Not really. Some are better than others. Kevin Bacon’s probably the most us read more
Wild River (1960, Elia Kazan)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Feb 8, 2015
Director Kazan opens Wild River with newsreel footage of the Tennessee River at flood. The film is set in the 1930s, something else the newsreel footage establishes. Kazan and screenwriter Paul Osborn spend the least amount of time possible setting up the film. The newsreel takes care of setting, w read more
The Human Condition I: No Greater Love (1959, Kobayashi Masaki)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Feb 7, 2015
The Human Condition I: No Greater Love is about, you guessed it, the human condition and the problems with being a humanist when you’re working in a foreign country your country has invaded and occupied. The film takes place in 1943, in Japanese-controlled Manchuria. It’s a desolate spo read more
The More the Merrier (1943, George Stevens)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jan 25, 2015
The More the Merrier is a wondrous mix of comedy (both slapstick and screwball) and dramatic, war-time romance. Director Stevens is expert at both–that war-time romance angle is as gentle as can be, with Stevens relying heavily on leads Jean Arthur and Joel McCrea to be able to toggle between read more
Cross My Heart (1987, Armyan Bernstein)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jan 21, 2015
Cross My Heart has a significant problem right off. Its gimmick work against the film. The opening scenes establish Annette O’Toole and Martin Short’s leads as they prepare for a date. Each has the help of a second (for exposition’s sake, though it doesn’t make the expositio read more
The Searchers (1956, John Ford)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jan 19, 2015
John Ford is never trying to be discreet with The Searchers, he’s just not willing to talk down to the audience. In the first ten minutes of the film, he and screenwriter Frank S. Nugent quickly establish John Wayne’s character and his relationship with his family. Ford, Nugent, Wayne a read more
Song of the Thin Man (1947, Edward Buzzell)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Dec 30, 2014
Song of the Thin Man has a lot of strong sequences and the many screenwriters sting them together well enough, but can’t figure out a pay-off. Some of the problem seems to be the brevity–while director Buzzell does an adequate job and Charles Rosher’s cinematography is good, none read more
The Thin Man Goes Home (1945, Richard Thorpe)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Dec 29, 2014
The Thin Man Goes Home is very genial. It would be hard for it not to be genial given some of the supporting cast is around just to be genial–familiar character actors like Edward Brophy, Donald Meek and Harry Davenport are around to be likable. And why shouldn’t William Powell and Myrn read more