The Odyssey (2026)

The Odyssey (2026)

[4] Christopher Nolan is not one of my favorite directors. Occasionally he'll make a movie that emotionally grips me, like Inception or Interstellar, but I more often than not find his work cold and hollow -- like Oppenheimer or Dunkirk. Even when…
Martin (1977)

Martin (1977)

[7] Director George Romero (Night of the Living Dead) often said Martin was his favorite among his films. John Amplas stars as Martin, a painfully shy and sullen young man who looks to be twenty years old, but claims to be an…
The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog (1927)

The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog (1927)

[6] Alfred Hitchcock directed two other films prior to this one, but the director regarded The Lodger as the first true 'Hitchcock film'. It's also widely regarded his best from the silent era. The Lodger opens with London in a panic over…
Santa Fe Trail (1940)

Santa Fe Trail (1940)

[5] Errol Flynn's third western casts him as dutiful West Point cadet Jeb Stuart, sent to Kansas to quell an abolitionist rebellion led by the pious John Brown (Raymond Massey). The film pairs Flynn with future president Ronald Reagan as a grinning…
Moonstruck (1987)

Moonstruck (1987)

[9] In New York City's Little Italy, a widowed bookkeeper named Loretta (Cher) accepts a marriage proposal from a man she likes, but doesn't love (Danny Aiello). Before her fiancée heads out of town to tend to his ailing mother, he asks…
Rasputin: The Mad Monk (1966)

Rasputin: The Mad Monk (1966)

[5] Christopher Lee gives a boisterous performance as the legendary Grigori Rasputin, the duplicitous Russian consigliere to the Romanov family in the early 1900s. Hammer Films embraces Rasputin's more mythic qualities in this Dracula-like horror film, where the disgraced monk uses his…
Taxi Driver (1976)

Taxi Driver (1976)

[9] Robert DeNiro stars as Travis Bickle, a New York City taxi cab driver so disgusted with the city's crime and depravity that he turns to armed vigilantism. After he's spurned by a beautiful political campaign organizer (The Last Picture Show's Cybill…
Grave of the Fireflies (1988)

Grave of the Fireflies (1988)

[4] In this animated film from Japan, a teenaged boy tries to take care of his little sister after their mother dies in a bombing by the Americans during World War II. The children's father is a soldier at sea who never…
Talk Radio (1988)

Talk Radio (1988)

[7] Oliver Stone (Platoon, JFK) directed this underseen and underappreciated stage adaptation about a shock-jock radio deejay (Eric Bogosian) who riles up listeners with his harsh personal criticisms and grim social commentary. Bogosian, who wrote and starred in the one-act play on…
The Night Porter (1974)

The Night Porter (1974)

[6] A concentration camp survivor (Charlotte Rampling) rekindles a sado-masochistic relationship with a former SS officer (Dirk Bogarde) in The Night Porter. Thirteen years after the end of World War II, Rampling is married to a renowned music conductor when she spots…