Classic Cinema
Blu-Ray Review: In Cold Blood
Today, true crime is big business. Newsagents’ shelves are full of magazines, bookstores stuffed to the seams with bestsellers and streaming services providing a platform, and funding, for countless popular series. This hasn’t always been the case though. When Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood was published in 1966 it was an instant success. Remaining one …
Blu-Ray Review: Coach to Vienna
Wars are not merely a simple case of good versus evil. While leaders like Hitler and Stalin might have been rotten to the core, soldiers are often there against their own will. Either conscripted into an army or forced to serve. History likes to tie events up in nice bows but anyone placed in a …
Blu-ray Review: Modern Times
While he had stiff competition from Harold Lloyd and Buster Keaton, there’s no doubt that Charlie Chaplin was the king of American silent cinema. While they were all brilliant physical comedians, the Londoner had the advantage of having the ‘little tramp’ up his sleeve. His much-loved creation is undoubtedly the iconic face of the era. …
Blu-Ray Review: Pale Flower
They say that if you go looking for love you’ll never find it but it will often find you in the most unlikely places. Opposites attract or birds of a feather stick together, depending on which magazine you’re reading at the time. It’s clear though that attraction doesn’t conform to any social hierarchies or cultural …
Blu-Ray Review: The Devil’s Trap
It seems a bizarre thing to say in the third decade of the twenty-first century, but the debate between evolution and creationism still seems to tax feeble minds. The friction between religion and science has been rumbling on for centuries. The former often used as a means of social control while the latter has been …
Blu-Ray Review: Love Affair
Leo McCarey is one of those filmmakers whose name has almost been forgotten by time, even though some of his work has not. Although he only made twenty-five feature films over a period of five decades, he was involved in hundreds more. Writing, directing and producing. He’s probably best-known today for Duck Soup, making a …
Blu-Ray Review: Written on the Wind
They certainly don’t make them like Rock Hudson anymore. He was amongst the biggest heartthrobs of the Golden Age of Hollywood and became one of the most iconic stars of his generation. The man christened Roy Harold Scherer Jr. made a splash in Magnificent Obsession but it was alongside Elizabeth Taylor and James Dean in …
Blu-Ray Review: The Indian Tomb
We live in a world which is now almost devoid of mystery, and it’s not a better place for it. Gone are the days when people who were fascinated by the exotic and the mythical had to feed their obsessions vicariously, through reports from adventurers such as Marco Polo. There was a time when Europeans …
Blu-Ray Review: The Party and The Guests
They say that the pen is mightier than the sword and It’s true that, in the long run, it’s better to win hearts and minds than use intimidation, violence and fear. This is often easier said than done. The last thing oppressive regimes want is freedom of thought or expression. One of the best ways …
Blu-Ray Review: The Sun Shines Bright
John Ford was undoubtedly on of the greatest American directors of his generation. Over the course of six decades, he made well over one hundred films. Starting his career in the silent era and ending it during the 1960s. Making a number of iconic westerns, such as Stagecoach, The Searchers, My Darling Clementine and The …