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.
Seven Samurai (1954, Kurosawa Akira)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 27, 2018
Seven Samurai is about a farming village, under imminent threat of bandits raiding and stealing their crop–and possibly doing much worse–who decides to hire samurai to defend them. They send four men–Fujiwara Kamatari, Kosugi Yoshio, Tsuchiya Yoshio, and Hidari Bokuzen–to town to hire the samurai. read more
A Quiet Place (2018, John Krasinski)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 26, 2018
It’d be nice if A Quiet Place were exasperating. If, after seventy or eighty minutes of building tension, the finale somehow disappointed. It doesn’t. It’s not exactly predictable, but by the time it arrives, it’s been obvious for a while the movie’s not really going anywhere. The film’s read more
The Babadook (2014, Jennifer Kent)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 25, 2018
So much of The Babadook is so good, it almost doesn’t matter the film’s third act is a series of little disasters. Director (and writer) Kent does such an exquisite job with the film until then, she can basically coast to the end credits. The Babadook is a spectacularly made film; Kent’s direction, read more
Fun Mom Dinner (2017, Alethea Jones)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 24, 2018
The best thing about Fun Mom Dinner is the soundtrack. It’s all mainstream early-to-mid eighties hits–some Cars, 99 Luftballons, the song from the end of Sixteen Candles because a Jack Ryan crush is a major plot point (which is a little weird since it’s lead Katie Aselton was six when Sixteen read more
Get Out (2017, Jordan Peele)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 23, 2018
What’s particularly stunning about Get Out is how nimble director (and writer) Peele gets with the protagonist, Daniel Kaluuya, and the narrative distance to him. Peele’s very patient with his cuts. Lots of long shots, establishing what Kaluuya is seeing (as well as the audience); the audience has read more
Sid and Nancy (1986, Alex Cox)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 22, 2018
It takes a while for anyone in Sid & Nancy to be likable. Even after they’re likable, it’s not like they’re particularly sympathetic. They’re tragic, sure, which is director Cox and cowriter Abbe Wool’s point, but entirely unpleasant to spend time with. The film has a bookend–Sid (Gary read more
Vivacious Lady (1938, George Stevens)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 21, 2018
Vivacious Lady strengths easily outweigh its weaknesses, but those weaknesses have a way of compounding on each other as the film moves to its conclusion. The most obvious–and usually forgiveable–problem is how the film can’t decide what to do with Ginger Rogers, the Vivacious Lady. Not the film, read more
The Sound Barrier (1952, David Lean)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 20, 2018
There’s a lot to The Sound Barrier. Outside the truly magnificent aerial photography, not much of it has to do with the film itself. Other than director Lean and writer Terence Rattigan rewriting actual history to make it so a private British aircraft company “broke” the sound barrier some five read more
An Untitled Portrait (1993, Cheryl Dunye)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 19, 2018
When it starts, An Untitled Portrait is about Dunye’s brother. But it’s also going to be Dunye’s family in general. But it’s also going to be about Dunye herself. The short runs three minutes, Dunye’s narration set to home movies, old film clips, but also some stylized original footage of read more
Dick Tracy (1937, Ray Taylor and Alan James), Chapter 5: Brother Against Brother
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 18, 2018
There’s no great action in Brother Against Brother. There’s what might be a real cliffhanger–Ralph Byrd shot (figure it’s safe to spoil since Byrd’s the lead and it’s chapter five of fifteen). I guess there’s some good effects at the beginning with some of the plane stuff. It doesn’t read more
A Cry in the Night (1956, Frank Tuttle)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 17, 2018
If it weren’t for the cast, there’d be very little to distinguish A Cry in the Night. John F. Seitz’s black and white photography is often–but not always–quite good, though director Tuttle struggles with the composition. He composes for the squarer Academy ratio, not widescreen. Cry in the read more
Dick Tracy (1937, Ray Taylor and Alan James), Chapter 4: Death Rides the Sky
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 16, 2018
Death Rides the Sky does not follow the concerning pattern of the previous two chapters where information falls into Ralph Byrd’s lap and he ignores it only to discover it’s of vital importance. In Rides, he knows the information of vital importance right off. Cuts down on later confusion. The chap read more
Vanilla Sex (1992, Cheryl Dunye)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 15, 2018
Vanilla Sex is the combination of a short anecdote from director Dunye, which she recounts to someone else, set (mostly) to a series of photographs scrolling up the screen. Occasionally, the footage changes to what seems to be home movie of Dunye and some other people playing around, nude (until Du read more
Dick Tracy (1937, Ray Taylor and Alan James), Chapter 3: The Fur Pirates
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 14, 2018
With The Fur Pirates, Dick Tracy starts to show some problems; outside the obvious acting ones considering the supporting cast. There’s another fast cliffhanger resolve, with the disaster not being anywhere near as dangerous as originally suggested. After that resolution, there’s some decent specia read more
Petticoat Fever (1936, George Fitzmaurice)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 13, 2018
For most of its eighty minute runtime, Petticoat Fever operates entirely on charm and technical competence. The charm of its cast, not the charm of Harold Goodman’s screenplay (from Mark Reed’s play). Robert Montgomery is the sole operator of a wireless station in arctic Canada (save Otto Yamaoka read more
Dick Tracy (1937, Ray Taylor and Alan James), Chapter 2: The Bridge of Terror
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 12, 2018
The Bridge of Terror gets off to a somewhat rocky start. The special effects on the cliffhanger resolution are outstanding. The actual resolution itself? Pretty lazy stuff. It immediately goes into Ralph Byrd (as Dick Tracy) getting in a police plane to track the giant villain aircraft, just called read more
The Potluck and the Passion (1993, Cheryl Dunye)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 11, 2018
The first sequence of The Potluck and the Passion, with director Dunye (also acting) sitting down and talking with girlfriend Gail Lloyd about the dinner party they’re about to throw. They go over the guest list as the opening titles run, who’s invited, why they’re invited, why Dunye and Lloyd read more
Dick Tracy (1937, Ray Taylor and Alan James), Chapter 1: The Spider Strikes
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 10, 2018
The Spider Strikes opens the Dick Tracy serial with an awesome sequence–a group of crime bosses meeting up on a train to meet with the big boss (The Spider). One of them tries to stand up to the unseen Spider, only to have his plans foiled… supernaturally it seems. The Spider then hunts the man read more
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966, Sergio Leone)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 9, 2018
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly ends up being about three criminals–of varying type–hunting down some stolen Confederate gold. But that Confederate gold story line takes a break after getting setup in the first ten minutes–for almost an hour of the two and a half hour plus film–so Good, the Bad read more
Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018, Peyton Reed)
The Stop Button Posted by Andrew Wickliffe on Jul 8, 2018
Despite being in the first scene in the movie and sharing most of Paul Rudd’s scenes with him, Evangeline Lilly is definitely second in Ant-Man and the Wasp. The film gives her her own action scenes–some truly phenomenal ones–but very little agency. She’s entirely in support of dad Michael Douglas; read more