Vinyl is Dead, Long Live Vinyl

September 23, 2010, 11:55 am

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I grew up with parents who loved music and many of their favorite records were film soundtracks. On any given evening you could hear popular songs from movie musicals like West Side Story (1961), My Fair Lady (1964), Hello Dolly! (1969) and Camelot (1967) coming from my home. Ennio Morricone’s score for The Good, the [...]

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Treat yourself… to THE WOMAN WHO CAME BACK

September 24, 2010, 2:00 am

≫ Next: John Frankenheimer’s The Extraordinary Seaman – How Bad Could It Be?

≪ Previous: Vinyl is Dead, Long Live Vinyl

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Now that it’s officially Fall, the Halloween Countdown can begin in earnest.  Mind you, we weirdos begin our Halloween Countdown beginning on October 32nd but we keep that clock watching to ourselves lest the rest of the world start piling sticks at our feet.  ‘Round about this leafy time o’ year, I’m often asked by [...]

John Frankenheimer’s The Extraordinary Seaman – How Bad Could It Be?

September 25, 2010, 9:03 am

≫ Next: Northwest Cinemas

≪ Previous: Treat yourself… to THE WOMAN WHO CAME BACK

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I’m a big admirer of John Frankenheimer’s early work from such live TV dramas as The Comedian (1956) and Days of Wine and Roses (1957) to All Fall Down (1962), Birdman of Alcatraz (1962), The Manchurian Candidate (1962) and Seconds (1966). I’ve also enjoyed several of the more commercial projects he helmed throughout his career such [...]

Northwest Cinemas

September 26, 2010, 12:42 pm

≫ Next: My Little Piece on Five Easy Pieces

≪ Previous: John Frankenheimer’s The Extraordinary Seaman – How Bad Could It Be?

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I’m visiting Portland for the weekend and was originally planning on interviewing the TCM V.P. of New Media about his erotic fantasies involving Joe Eszterhas, but he decided to stay in Atlanta instead. (Something about a wife, a birth, and a child – but I bet what he’s really doing is hiding out in his [...]

My Little Piece on Five Easy Pieces

September 27, 2010, 10:01 am

≫ Next: The 48th New York Film Festival, Part 2

≪ Previous: Northwest Cinemas

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Five Easy Pieces, a seminal work of the Film School Generation, was originally released 40 years ago this month. In recognition of its anniversary, a restored 35mm print is making the rounds of art houses and special venues. Facets’ intrepid programmer, Charles Coleman, snatched it up, and Five Easy Pieces will be showing at our [...]

The 48th New York Film Festival, Part 2

September 28, 2010, 11:00 am

≫ Next: Tony Curtis (1925-2010)

≪ Previous: My Little Piece on Five Easy Pieces

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The Social Network, the opening night selection at the 2010 New York Film Festival (and opening nationwide October 1st), consists of men (and one girl) talking in rooms and around tables. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg)  is the reluctant participant in these discussions, hunched over and bristling, much preferring the inscrutable company of his [...]

Tony Curtis (1925-2010)

September 29, 2010, 7:52 pm

≫ Next: It’s Lovecraft Season

≪ Previous: The 48th New York Film Festival, Part 2

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“I was born in and worked in a period that could be called enviable.” – Tony Curtis Tony Curtis, who died on September 29th at age 85, never seemed to be at rest. Even in repose and in old age, he appeared to be an eternally restless spirit. Sometimes that drive got him into trouble, [...]

It’s Lovecraft Season

September 30, 2010, 1:20 pm

≫ Next: Brides, Brides, everywhere a Bride, breakin’ up the scenery, changin’ my mind!

≪ Previous: Tony Curtis (1925-2010)

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Like many horror aficionados I enjoy reading horror fiction as well as watching horror movies. And as summer makes way for autumn I’ve been indulging in a bit of both. Much like my fellow Morlock, Richard Harland Smith, I eagerly await this time of year. It gives me an excuse to spend my free time [...]

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Brides, Brides, everywhere a Bride, breakin’ up the scenery, changin’ my mind!

October 1, 2010, 10:20 am

≫ Next: Bette Davis is THE NANNY

≪ Previous: It’s Lovecraft Season

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Tonight at 9:30 pm EST (6:30 Pacific time), Turner Classic Movies will show THE BRIDES OF DRACULA (1960), Terence Fisher’s follow-up to Hammer Studios’ HORROR OF DRACULA (UK: DRACULA, 1958), as part of its month-long, 20-film “Hammer Horrors” tribute.  I recently turned in a 1,600 word programming article on the film, its origins, production history [...]

Bette Davis is THE NANNY

October 2, 2010, 10:01 am

≫ Next: Buggin’ Out

≪ Previous: Brides, Brides, everywhere a Bride, breakin’ up the scenery, changin’ my mind!

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Hammer Studios were always experts at following cinema fads and providing their own particular spin on a popular genre quickly to satify fans and take advantage of moviegoing trends. Besides the steady stream of horror films that made their reputation in the late fifties, they also had mini-franchises that ran from costume adventures (Sword of [...]

Buggin’ Out

October 3, 2010, 12:14 pm

≫ Next: Dark Romance: Hammer’s The Curse of the Werewolf

≪ Previous: Bette Davis is THE NANNY

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TCM’s spotlight on Hammer Horror this month gives me the opportunity to give a special shout-out to one of my personal favorites: Five Million Years to Earth (aka: Quatermass and the Pit, 1967). It screens later this month on TCM (Friday evening, October 22nd). I first saw it as a kid back in the seventies [...]

Dark Romance: Hammer’s The Curse of the Werewolf

October 4, 2010, 10:05 am

≫ Next: The Age of Senseless Violence: The Damned (1963)

≪ Previous: Buggin’ Out

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‘Tis the season for fright nights, fright fests, and fright fans. Chicago is a horror kind of town, and between Facets’ own Fright School, the 24-hour horror marathon at the Music Box Theater next weekend, and assorted programs at the Portage Theater, I doubt if I get a wink of sleep all month. Needless to [...]

The Age of Senseless Violence: The Damned (1963)

October 5, 2010, 11:00 am

≫ Next: “Nothing can eat your soul!”

≪ Previous: Dark Romance: Hammer’s The Curse of the Werewolf

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Every Friday night this month, TCM is showing a slate of Hammer Horror films, so we at Movie Morlocks have been saluting the venerable production company’s work. Hammer Films, launched in 1934, has an imposingly large filmography, and has just re-started after a 30 year hibernation.  Let Me In (the remake of Let the Right [...]

“Nothing can eat your soul!”

October 7, 2010, 12:21 pm

≫ Next: Treat yourself to… MARK OF THE VAMPIRE!

≪ Previous: The Age of Senseless Violence: The Damned (1963)

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I must begin this with a confession. I’m obsessed with Hammer films. I love the “Studio That Dripped Blood” unconditionally so I was thrilled to learn that TCM was planning on showing Hammer films every Friday evening during the month of October. I was even more excited when I was told that The Movie Morlocks [...]

Treat yourself to… MARK OF THE VAMPIRE!

October 8, 2010, 2:00 am

≫ Next: William Klein’s The Little Richard Story – Not on DVD

≪ Previous: “Nothing can eat your soul!”

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I’m not supposed to like Tod Browning’s MARK OF THE VAMPIRE (1935), much less love it, but I do.  Love it, I mean… and what’s not to love?  For the price of admission you get Bela DRACULA Lugosi, Lionel DOCTOR X Atwill, big-ass bats, poorly landscaped graveyards, moldy family crypts, lanterns glowing in the fog, [...]

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William Klein’s The Little Richard Story – Not on DVD

October 9, 2010, 8:27 am

≫ Next: Argento’s Witches and Jungian Sighs

≪ Previous: Treat yourself to… MARK OF THE VAMPIRE!

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Those who follow the current art scene and are well versed in art history know William Klein as one of the most influential American photographers to emerge in the fifties along with his contemporary Robert Frank. Famous for his unconventional fashion shoots for Vogue as well as his candid documentation of New York City street [...]

Argento’s Witches and Jungian Sighs

October 10, 2010, 12:15 pm

≫ Next: Confessions of a Screenwriter, Part I

≪ Previous: William Klein’s The Little Richard Story – Not on DVD

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“Witches always fascinated me; I don’t believe in the devil, in the movies he always makes me laugh… What’s more, Suspiria is heavily influenced by Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs; in an early draft I even planned to have the action take place in a child’s school where the witches were teachers who tortured [...]

Confessions of a Screenwriter, Part I

October 11, 2010, 10:02 am

≫ Next: Douglas Sirk: Filmmaker Collection

≪ Previous: Argento’s Witches and Jungian Sighs

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It occurred to me recently that I know a lot of talented people, which is one of the blessings in my life. I know or work with artists, filmmakers, musicians, and writers of all types, including my fellow Morlocks whom I learn from every day. I also know two fledgling screenwriters who are both working [...]

Douglas Sirk: Filmmaker Collection

October 12, 2010, 11:00 am

≫ Next: Dancing The Mephisto Waltz

≪ Previous: Confessions of a Screenwriter, Part I

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The Tarnished Angels (1957) is one of Douglas Sirk’s greatest accomplishments, and it was not available on DVD in the United States until last month (one had to nab Region 2 DVD editions in France and England previously).  TCM released it on September 31st (in partnership with Universal) as part of the Douglas Sirk: Filmmaker [...]

Dancing The Mephisto Waltz

October 14, 2010, 2:20 pm

≫ Next: Notes From Underground

≪ Previous: Douglas Sirk: Filmmaker Collection

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The legend of Faust is one of the oldest occult tales in the Western world. This German fable has been the basis of countless plays, poems, novels, musical compositions, works of art and films. Although the Faust legend has been reinterpreted many times in various ways; most renderings describe Faust as an aging unsatisfied scholar [...]