[8] Four boys are sent to a juvenile detention center where they are raped and brutalized by the guards. Thirteen years later, two of the boys have a chance encounter with the head guard that ends in vengeful bloodshed. It’s then up to the other two boys, one now a district attorney, to free their convicted pals and enact revenge on all the remaining guards. …
[7] Humphrey Bogart plays a notorious robber recently released from prison who gets hired by his old boss for one more robbery at a California resort. While gearing up for the heist, he handles two less-capable robbers, two love interests, and an ownerless dog that brings bad luck to everyone. High Sierra paints Bogey’s character as a somewhat sympathetic one who might regret his past …
[5] The late Chadwick Boseman stars in this mediocre actioner about a New York City detective trying to stop two cop killers from leaving Manhattan by closing all the island’s bridges and tunnels. But along the way, Boseman’s eyes are opened to a broader conspiracy that could endanger his own life. 21 Bridges benefits from Boseman’s reserved coolness and two great supporting turns from Sienna …
[7] Jason Patric stars as an alcoholic drifter with a troubled past who wanders into a kidnapping/ransom plot with a widow and her uncle, played by Rachel Ward and Bruce Dern. While Dern’s character does much of the planning, Patric and Ward develop a lustful relationship. But does she really love him? And can either of them trust Dern’s character? Under the direction of James …
[5] I watched this movie several weeks ago and I still don’t quite know how to review it. An assault on the senses? Psychotic in tone? Punishingly serendipitous? Insane?… Yes, it’s all those things. But it’s also a riveting in its own kind of way — completely bonkers, but I simply couldn’t turn away. Paul Walker is a thug (I guess?) who hides in his …
[7] Fritz Lang (Metropolis, M) directs this adaptation of Graham Greene’s novel about a British man (Ray Milland) recently released from an insane asylum who gets caught up in a Nazi attempt to smuggle sensitive information out of England during World War II. Lang brings a lot of style and paranoia to the film, particularly in two strong opening sequences. The first begets a mystery …
[8] A surgeon kidnaps young women and removes their faces in hopes of successfully transplanting one on his horribly disfigured daughter in Eyes Without a Face. Released the same season as Hitchcock’s Psycho and years before Romero’s Night of the Living Dead, this French film from Georges Franju has earned an interesting place on the timeline of horror film history. Coming after decades of supernatural …
[7] Humphrey Bogart stars in this taut mystery-thriller as a district attorney trying to keep a terrified witness alive until he can testify against the ringleader of a hit-squad. The Enforcer is largely told through a series of flashbacks told by various members of the hit squad — usually proximate to their untimely demises. That sort of movie is entertaining enough, but The Enforcer is …
[7] Michael Powell (The Red Shoes) directs this British giallo flick about a photographer whose ghastly hobby is stalking young women and filming their expressions as he murders them. You could say that Peeping Tom is an early slasher film, the genre that would beget Michael Myers, Fred Krueger, and Jason Voorhees. But it’s actually a much more psychological endeavor — and more impactful for …
[6] In this courtroom drama ripped from the headlines, Arthur Kennedy plays a nervous out-of-towner who is identified by witnesses as the killer of a beloved local priest. When the whole town unties in his condemnation, it’s up to Dana Andrews, as the district attorney, to prove Kennedy’s innocence at the peril of his political career. For an Elia Kazan (East of Eden, Splendor in …
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