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What survives
I can across this picture the other day, of iconic martial arts star Bruce Lee and his son Brandon. Brandon’s about a year old here, which places this picture at some point in 1966. He was eight when...
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The Rant
Recently, a number of classic film-oriented message boards and blogs have gotten bogged down in absurd arguments with some commenters, whose petulant sense of entitlement was somehow enraged when their...
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LOLA
“Cry who will, laugh who can.” So begins Lola; with this Chinese proverb that makes clear its intentions. How does Jacques Demy’s Lola, released over a half-century ago, in 1961, still work...
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Six Degrees of Elvis Presley
For the third and final post in my informal and unintended series on Elvis Presley, I was inspired by the documentary Elvis: That’s the Way It Is, which airs on TCM on Tuesday, April 15, at 5:00am...
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Feeling Blu: Joseph Losey’s Stranger On the Prowl (1952)
With each successive generation of home video, the Hollywood studios have paid less and less attention to their archival titles. The profits generated by new releases dwarf that of their classics, so...
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Update the Classics? Sure, Why Not?
As I was scrolling through TCM’s schedule this week, I noticed the 1946 Sherlock Holmes movie, Dressed to Kill, which aired yesterday morning. Years ago, when I first saw the Basil Rathbone series, I...
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When Insects Attack: GENOCIDE (1968)
Springtime has arrived in California and do you know what that means? BUGS! During the past week I’ve battled a couple of spiders in my kitchen, wrangled with a beetle that invaded my bathroom and took...
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Turnerbirds Are Go! The TCM Classic Film Fest @ 5
The fifth TCM Classic Movie Festival got started last night with a gala opening party at Club TCM in the Roosevelt Hotel and screenings of such immortal cinematic works as Robert Aldrich’s “WHAT...
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These Boots Weren’t Made For Walking
Last week I unleashed a rant about how much better the 21st century media environment is to any previous era, and I mentioned in passing the world of gray market bootleg VHS. I figured I’d circle back...
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The Onion Field, 35 Years Later
There was a time in the seventies when Joseph Wambaugh was just about the top crime writer in the nation. In the years before John Grisham and James Patterson came to prominence, Wambaugh novels got...
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Of Hurricanes, Hamburgers, and Huston: Revisiting Key Largo
One of my courses this semester includes a section on an auteur—that fancy French word for master director. I let my students choose which director to study from a list that included a variety of...
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Diamond in the Rough: The Squeaker (1937)
The Criterion Collection built its luxury brand on an expectation of quality, and its formidable library is stacked with international classics presented in exacting restorations. This is a model...
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Upon 20 Years, Rethinking the Classics
Turner Classic Movies just recently celebrated 20 years in business and I owe it a debt of gratitude for all the movies it’s given me. Not just the big ones, like The Maltese Falcon or Singin’ in the...
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Matrimony, Madness and Murder: HATCHET FOR THE HONEYMOON (1970)
Modern weddings often bring out the worst in people. The attempt to meet family and social expectations while exchanging vows that occasionally read like a prison sentence can be a dangerous cocktail...
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Dennis O’Keefe is not Keefe Brasselle! And furthermore…
Dennis O’Keefe is not… … Keefe Brasselle. Nor is he… … Dennis Morgan,, who in turn is not… … Harry Morgan. Who is not, of course… … Henry Morgan. (Except when he is.) John Gavin is not… … Jeffrey...
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Occupy Fritz Lang
There is a secret conspiracy that rules the world. This hidden power can make or break a fortune at a moment’s whim. It decrees the rise and fall of nations. It chooses who lives, and who dies. There...
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Alfred Hitchcock’s Half-Formed Grab Bag
There are some directors who make their breakout hits early in their careers. Their landmark films announce the arrival of an important new talent by showcasing distinctive visual or thematic...
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Adventures of a TCM Fest-Goer
Last weekend, I attended the TCM Classic Film Festival as just another movie-lover in the crowd. The 2014 festival featured appearances by big-name stars Maureen O’Hara, Mel Brooks, Alan Arkin, Shirley...
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Doc Holiday: Art of the Real at the Film Society of Lincoln Center
From the beginning documentary filmmaking was synonymous was artifice. For Nanook of the North (1922), Robert Flaherty re-staged scenes of an Inuit family at home, complete with an igloo constructed...
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John Wayne: The Early Years
This is John Wayne month here on TCM and that means a five day marathon of movies, starting this week, starring the Duke. Seeing as he acted in well over a hundred movies (closer to two hundred,...
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