[8] Steve McQueen plays a millionaire who robs a bank just for shits and giggles, and Faye Dunaway plays the insurance investigator who will either turn him in… or fall in love with him. Director Norman Jewison embraces the French New Wave to give the film a unique tone that favors style slightly higher than substance, and I’m okay with that. The result is a …
[5] I like the premise of this one. Cary Grant plays a beach bum who relays Japanese radio messages to the military during WWII. His life is a solitary one until a plane crashes on the island, introducing him to a school mistress (Leslie Caron) and seven little girls. As you might imagine, at first he hates this estrogen invasion, but soon comes to find …
[5] Burgess Meredith stars as Dr. Diabolo, a sideshow barker who gives daring patrons a glimpse at their untimely demises in this horror anthology flick from Britain’s Amicus Productions (ever the poor man’s Hammer Studios). The four featured tales include a mind-controlling cat, a secret society of androids, a killer piano, and dueling collectors of all things Edgar Allan Poe. I expected more from venerable …
[7] In this political drama from director Otto Preminger, Henry Fonda plays the president’s newly appointed Secretary of State, but before he can take the position he must pass the Senate’s nasty accusations of communism and homosexuality. Advise and Consent starts out very plot-driven and a little dry, unless you’re really interested in senate politics. But by the mid-point, I had invested in the ensemble …
[6] A passenger plane crashes after a close encounter with a UFO. The survivors are left in a remote desert to defend themselves against a blob-like alien that creates a vaginal slit in its victims’ foreheads before crawling inside their brains, commandeering their bodies, and turning them into blood-sucking vampires. Needless to say, this film is Japanese. Goke, Body Snatcher from Hell is gitchy-cool for …
[7] Warren Beatty made his screen debut alongside Natalie Wood in this Elia Kazan film about sexual repression in 1920s middle-America. Beatty and Wood play Bud and Deanie, high school lovers who plan to get married and consummate their growing sexual urges. But their parents and their own conflicted emotions end up tearing them apart, with Bud wandering aimlessly and Deanie landing in psychiatric care. …
[7] Frank Sinatra and Laurence Harvey star as returning prisoners of war who have been unwittingly hypnotized to become sleeper agents for Communist China in the American political arena. Whenever either man sees the Queen of Hearts from a deck of playing cards, they are compelled to obey the next order they receive from anyone. But while the men are being used like pawns by …
[6] After the success of Midnight Cowboy, John Schlesinger returned to personal storytelling in Britain with Sunday Bloody Sunday, a slice-of-life movie about a middle-aged doctor (Peter Finch) and a divorcee (Glenda Jackson) who knowingly share a bohemian lover (Murray Head). Reportedly largely autobiographical, the film is a study of three different characters’ feelings toward sex and love, and there’s no didactic message here, except …
[7] Audrey Hepburn and Cary Grant star in this Stanley Donen (Singin’ in the Rain) film about a recent widow fighting off a handful of mysterious bad guys who believe she knows where her husband was keeping a stolen quarter million in cash. Charade is a successful blend of thriller, romance, and dark comedy with a number of twists and betrayals that will keep you …
[5] Roger Corman directs and Vincent Price stars in their only collaboration based on a story by H.P. Lovecraft. Price plays a man claiming an inherited castle where he gets possessed by the spirit of his great grandfather, who is hellbent on exacting his revenge on the relatives of the villagers who burned him alive one hundred years ago. Price plays both the possessed and …
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