Classic Cinema
Blu-Ray Review: The Pawnbroker
When Rod Steiger received an Academy Award nomination for his performance as Marlon Brando’s brother in On the Waterfront it seemed like he’d made it. However, during the next decade his career went in fits and starts and by the time he was cast to play the lead in The Pawnbroker it was undoubtedly on …
Blu-ray Review: Bringing Up Baby
Whilst he might not be as well-known today as some of his peers, Howard Hawks is undoubtedly one of the greatest America filmmakers of his generation. What sets him apart from most was his willingness and indeed eagerness to work across a number of genres. The popularity of the likes of Rio Bravo (western), The …
Blu-ray Review: Vengeance Trials
Roared on by the success of Sergio Leonne in Hollywood, a host of Italian directors followed is his wake; making a raft of Spaghetti Westerns during the 1960s. Whilst similar in many ways to their American cousins these films revelled in turning genre cliches and tropes on their head. Instead of the likes of John …
Blu-Ray Review: Mirror
Andrei Tarkovsky is without doubt the greatest Russian filmmaker of all time. He’s certainly the first name that comes to mind when discussing the movies of the Motherland. Despite making less than ten films in a career which spanned three decades, he left an indelible mark on the history of world cinema. Whilst the likes …
Blu-ray Review: Wild Search
For decades now, Chow Yun-fat has been one of the most familiar faces in Hong Kong cinema. He started out in low-budget movies during the 1970s but first made his name in John Woo’s A Better Tomorrow a decade later. Also starring in the sequel and City on Fire, The Killer and Hard Boiled. Whilst …
Blu-Ray Review: Adoption
On the face of it, communism doesn’t exactly seem like the ideal breeding ground for feminism to flourish. Whilst everyone was theoretically equal in the USSR, many rich old white men were more equal than other. The narrative pushed by the authorities was that of the heroic Marxist worker, dedicating their life to making the …
Blu-Ray Review: The Night of the Hunter
Charles Laughton was arguably the greatest actor of his generation. He was definitely one of the most recognisable. A huge screen and stage presence, he won the Academy Award for his performance in Alexander Korda’s The Private Life of Henry VIII. He was also magnificent in the likes of Mutiny on the Bounty, The Big …
Blu-ray Review: Mandabi
Often referred to as the ‘father of African cinema’, Ousmane Sembène was certainly one of the original filmmakers to come out of the sub-Saharan region and arguably the most influential of the twentieth century. The Senegalese director was the first from the continent to bridge over into international film festivals and receive international recognition and …
Blu-ray Review: Merrily We Go to Hell
Between 1927 and 1943, the year when she retired from feature filmmaking, Dorothy Arzner was the only female film director working in Hollywood. While the situation isn’t exactly perfect now, it was a whole lot worse as we entered the epoch of ‘talkies’. She made twenty films over that period and launched the careers of …
Blu-Ray Review: The Hands of Orlac
Robert Wiene was one of the great directors of the German expressionist period at the beginning of the 20th century. Indeed, he’s responsible for one of the best and still most admired films from that movement, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. He went on to make 45 films, mostly during the silent era, and whilst …