Cult Movies

The Atomic Man aka Timeslip (1955)

2009-05-21T12:50:00.002-05:00

Moving on with our "Atomic" movies, this is a cult movie with an interesting premise.
A scientist is found floating in a river, shot in the back and surrounded by a radioactive halo.
Due to an accident, the scientist can see seven and a half seconds into the future.
Before he can take the next logical step and fly to Las Vegas, he is kidnapped by crooks who plan to use him for their criminal schemes.
Why didn't he see that coming?

It was known in England as Timeslip and shown in the US under the more "colorful" title The Atomic Man.

The plot kind of makes me think of "Next" with Nicolas Cage.
But Cage could see a full two minutes into the future.

Not to be confused with the GI Joe Adventure Team member, Mike Power the Atomic Man.

I couldn't find a link to watch it online.
If you run across one, let me know.

Monstrosity / The Atomic Brain (1964)

2009-05-14T12:13:00.002-05:00

Monstrosity is a 1964 cult film directed by Joseph V. Mascelli.
It is better known under its alternate title, The Atomic Brain.
At least this is the title used when they worked it over on Mystery Science Theater 3000.
The plot involves an elderly rich woman that uses her money to convince a brilliant (but eccentric) scientist to transfer her brain into a new, beautiful body.
Hilarity ensues.
Okay, not really hilarity, it's supposed to be serious.

The director Joseph V. Mascelli, was the director of photography on another 1964 cult movie, "The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!?".
In 1964 he also directed "The Thrill Killers".
The people that wrote this were Dean Dillman Jr. and Sue Dwiggins.
Incredibly, this was Dean's only film.
However, Sue went on to be the production secretary on films like The French Connection, Deliverance, Slap Shot (one of my favorite films), and she was the production coordinator for E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial.

You can watch the movie online for free here:
http://retrovision.tv/freevideo/atomic-brain-the-1964/

Atom Age Vampire (1963)

2009-04-20T13:13:00.002-05:00

Atom Age Vampire is a 1963 black-and-white Italian horror-science fiction film that was directed by Anton Giulio Majano and starred Alberto Lupo.
The original title was Seddok, l'erede di Satana, mainly because it was made in Italy.
And despite the title, there is no real vampire in the movie.
Well the murders in the movie do resemble a vampire killing...well you need to see it to get what I'm talking about.

Anyway, when stripper Jeannette Morineau (Suzanne Loret) is horribly disfigured in a car accident, a scientist, Prof. Alberto Levin (Alberto Lupo) develops a treatment which can restore her beauty by injecting her with a special serum.
While performing the procedure, he falls in love with her.
As the treatment begins to fail, he determines to save her appearance, regardless of how many women he must kill for her sake.

This is one of the cult films that is in public domain, and lucky you, you can watch it free of charge online at Google video.
The URL is http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7573559012926163868

Grindhouseland Salutes… Vincent Price

2009-04-05T14:45:00.001-05:00

grindhouseland | Exploitation Film Reviews:

"Vincent Price is known primarily for three things. First his incredible voice, which has the rich timbre of a classically trained stage actor- can you think of anyone who can say “mmm… yes” quite the same way as Vincent Price? Second, his height (6-foot 4-inch), taking up tons of the screen without the kinds of scenery chewing you may have come to expect from other larger leading men of his generation (I’m looking at you, Orson Welles). Finally, for his knowing serio-comic manner. Vincent Price always knew he was making camp, but never let the horror aspects suffer. He was totally comfortable straddling the golden mean between the comedic and horror elements in his films, and that is perhaps what made Vincent Price who he is."

Abraxas, Guardian of the Universe (1991)

2009-03-15T19:01:00.003-05:00

Okay how bad can a movie with Jesse"The Body"Ventura be?
Let me rephrase that.....
How about ...how cool is a movie with former pro wrestler, Navy UDT veteran, former radio and television talk show host AND former Governor of Minnesota Jesse"The Body"Ventura?
Not to mention Danish actor, stuntman, bodybuilder and athlete Sven-Ole (the man has been in so many movies I'd need a whole blog by itself to list them all) Thorsen .
AND a cameo by James Belushi as Principal Latimer!

Yeah it's that bad.
Okay not really. This movie falls into the "so bad it's good" category.
And if you're a comic book fan, you'll get a really weird Jack Kirby déjà vu feeling watching it.
This Terminator / Timecop rip off is not really all that bad when you think about it.
With a bigger budget, better writers, better soundtrack, it could have actually been a decent movie.
Ummm...yeah.....

The female lead in the movie is Marjorie Bransfield who was, at the time, Jim Belushi's wife.
So that explains why he shows up.

And so you can't say I've never done anything for you (or to you) I found out you can actually watch this movie free of charge on Google Video!
Here's the URL
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7959531349208989665
You can thank me later.
At a distance.

Fight Club (1999)

2009-02-20T11:53:00.002-05:00

The twists and turns in this movie are legendary, but just in case anyone out there has not seen it, I'm not going to spoil it for anyone.
Suffice it to say, that if you haven't seen it...see it!

Fight Club is an adaptation of the 1996 novel by Chuck Palahniuk.
It was directed by David Fincher (Se7en, Zodiac and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button).
And it starred Edward Norton, Brad Pitt and Helena Bonham Carter.
Despite being one of the most controversial and talked-about films of 1999, it failed to meet expectations at the box office, and the film received polarized reactions from film critics.
The DVD release found it's audience and elevated the movie to Cult status.

" The first rule of fight club is... you do not talk about fight club.
The second rule of fight club is... you do not talk about fight club.
Third rule of fight club, someone yells "Stop!", goes limp, taps out, the fight is over.
Fourth rule, only two guys to a fight.
Fifth rule, one fight at a time, fellas.
Sixth rule, no shirts, no shoes.
Seventh rule, fights will go on as long as they have to.
And the eighth and final rule, if this is your first night at fight club, you have to fight. "

Happy Birthday Jason!

2009-02-13T16:14:00.003-05:00

I suppose you could say that today is Jason Voorhees' Birthday.
You have to remember that as iconic as the original film is, it started life as a independent horror film.
It was made for $550,000 and hated by the critics almost unanimously.
But, it went on to gross over $39.7 million dollars.
Somebody liked it.
And of course today is also the release of the series reboot.
I'm always skeptical of reboots, but I have been proven wrong before (Batman Begins, Battlestar Galactica).
So lets see how this does.

Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982)

2009-02-11T12:19:00.001-05:00

Okay, who really didn't like this movie?
I saw it in the theater when it came out and thought back then it was one of the funniest movies I had ever seen.
But not everyone felt that way.
Roger Ebert called it a "scuz-pit of a movie".
Fast Times was written by Cameron Crowe (from his book) and directed by Amy Heckerling.
Crowe went on to do two Oscar winning movies, Jerry Maguire and Almost Famous.
Heckerling did went on to do Johnny Dangerously (1984) and National Lampoon's European Vacation (1985), both of which will show up here soon.
The film starred Sean Penn, Eric Stoltz, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Nicolas Cage, Anthony Edwards, Phoebe Cates, Forest Whitaker, and Judge Reinhold.
And of course who can forget the now often parodied Phoebe Cates bikini scene?
It's been done so much the magic has worn off of it.
But at the time, in the theater I actually heard gasps.

Faces of Death, Vol. 1 (1978)

2009-02-04T12:44:00.001-05:00

Wow, this IS a cult movie.
It's one of those movies I remember hearing about long before I saw it.
The film itself is only 105 minutes long, but it made quite an impact.
And even though they say its "Banned in 40 Countries", it's only actually banned in New Zealand, Australia, Norway and Finland.
But hey, it IS actually banned in those countries.
Even though the film's budget was $450,000, it has grossed over $35 million worldwide in theatrical releases, and that's not including rentals.
Several Faces of Death sequels were made, each a little worse than the one before it. As a matter of fact, Faces of Death 5 and 6 are just highlights from the first four films!
A DVD version of the movie has been released, and also a Blu-Ray disc was released on October 7, 2008.
And there has been talk of a new version of the film.
I don't think they'll be able to get away with it now though.

If youre really interested you can go to http://tafkac.org/movies/faces_of_death_review.html, they have a scene by scene description, with criticism.
It will save you some time hopefully.

Friday (1995)

2009-01-09T13:10:00.002-05:00

I don't watch network TV anymore. I watch everything online.
So does Spike TV or USA still show this movie like once a month?

This 1995 dramatic comedy-buddy film was directed by F. Gary Gray and written by Ice Cube and DJ Pooh.
It starred Ice Cube (Craig Jones), Chris Tucker (Smokey), Nia Long (Debbie), the late Bernie Mac (Pastor Clever), Tommy Lister, Jr.(Deebo) and John Witherspoon (Willie Jones).

When the movie was released, critics pretty much liked it.
Which is kind of odd for a cult movie.
Friday grossed $6,589,341 on its opening weekend and now stands at about total of $28,215,918 worldwide.

Chris Tucker was nominated for Best Breakthrough Performance and Best Comedic Performance for the film at the 1996 MTV Movie Awards.
Ice Cube and Chris Tucker were nominated for Best On-Screen Duo.

Two sequels (Next Friday and Friday After Next) and an animated television series (on MTV2) were spawned from the original movie.

A soundtrack was released from the movie with songs by Ice Cube, Dr. Dre, Scarface and Cypress Hill among others.

The Decline of Western Civilization II: The Metal Years (1988)

2009-01-02T14:52:00.003-05:00

A documentary film directed by Penelope Spheeris, "The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years" was about the Los Angeles heavy metal scene from 1986 to 1988.
The film features interviews with Chris Holmes of W.A.S.P., Riki Rachtman and Taime Downe, Paul Stanley of Kiss, Steven Tyler of Aerosmith and Ozzy Osbourne among others.
It also has musical performances by Lizzy Borden, Faster Pussycat and Megadeth.
There was a soundtrack album released that included tracks from Armored Saint, Faster Pussycat, Lizzy Borden, Metal Church, Rigor Mortis, Megadeth, Motörhead, and Alice Cooper, featuring Axl Rose, Slash, and Izzy Stradlin of Guns N' Roses.
You can actually watch the film online for free at Google Video.
The link is here.

Walking and Talking (1996)

2008-12-19T12:52:00.002-05:00

Walking and Talking (released in 1996) is an independent film written and directed by Nicole Holofcener ("Six Feet Under", "Sex and the City") and produced by James Schamus (Brokeback Mountain and oddly enough the 2003 Hulk movie).
It starred Catherine Keener (Being John Malkovich, Capote), Anne Heche (Donnie Brasco), Liev Schreiber (who will be playing Sabretooth in X-Men Origins: Wolverine) and Kevin Corrigan (who I loved in Grounded for Life) .
The film is very dialogue driven and that accounts for most of it's charm and it's cult status.
The film's soundtrack featured Yo La Tengo, Liz Phair, and The Sea and Cake.

Aguirre, The Wrath of God (1972)

2008-12-11T13:07:00.001-05:00

Aguirre, the Wrath of God is a film that you may or may not know about.
It's not really that popular (hence the Cult Film status) but it's influence has been felt in several other films, including one true classic.
Aguirre is an independent 1972 German film written and directed by Werner Herzog and starring Klaus Kinski in the title role.
The film was given an extensive art house theatrical release in the United States in 1977, and remains one of the Herzog's most famous films. But if you walked up to the average person on the street and asked it they had ever seen it, they'd probably just look at you funny.
The story follows the travels of Spanish soldier Lope de Aguirre, leading a group of conquistadors down the Amazon River in South America in search of El Dorado, the legendary city of gold.
When I watched it, I kept thinking, " You know, this reminds me of Apocalypse Now." and I was right.
Francis Ford Coppola himself has noted, "Aguirre, with its incredible imagery, was a very strong influence. I'd be remiss if I didn't mention it."
Other films that have been seen as influenced by Aguirre are The Mission, Predator, and The Blair Witch Project.
Herzog wrote the screenplay “in a frenzy”, which he completed in two and a half days.
Much of the script was written during a 200-mile bus trip with Herzog’s half drunk football team.
Herzog's fear of chickens shows up in Aguirre, as chickens are thrown over a cliff.

Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story

2008-12-02T11:45:00.002-05:00

Unusual movie.
And even more unusual to me that it's reached cult status.
Coming in with a running time of 43 minutes, Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story could have be an episode of VH1's Behind The Music now.
This black and white film covers the life of Karen Carpenter from the time of her discovery in 1966 to her death by cardiac arrest.
What sets this film apart (and probably puts it in cult film territory) is that instead of actors, almost all parts were played by modified Barbie dolls.
Due to a lawsuit by Richard Carpenter, all copies of the film were to have been recalled and destroyed.
But several bootleg copies of the film survive and can be seen online.
You can watch it on Google video here:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=622130510713940545

Love Streams (1984)

2008-11-25T12:55:00.000-05:00

Love Streams is an 1984 American film by John Cassavetes that tells the story of a middle-aged brother, Robert Harmon (John Cassavetes) and sister Sarah (Gena Rowlands, John Cassavetes' wife ) who find themselves caring for one another after the other loves in their lives abandon them.
Most of the movie takes place in the house of Robert (in reality, it was the house of John Cassavetes and Gena Rowlands in Los Angeles).
The visual style of the film is different from Cassavetes' other works, as it doesn't contain his trademark hand-held camera work.
The film is losely based on a 1980 play by Ted Allen. In the play, Jon Voight played the part of Robert.
This was John Cassavetes' eleventh film, and most of his fans consider it his final work even though Big Trouble came out in 1986.

Love Streams [ NON-USA FORMAT, PAL, Reg.2 Import - France ]

The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984)

2008-11-18T11:17:00.002-05:00

Yes I know I did a write up on this movie awhile back, but it deserves to be mentioned again.
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension is possibly one of THE cult movies.
It's one of the first I actually heard that term applied to.
I mean come on....Dr. Buckaroo Banzai....physicist, neurosurgeon, samurai, rock musician, jet car driver, and comic book hero.
Who couldn't love that?
And of course your hero can never be any good with out a great villian.
And what better villain is there than John Lithgow chewing up the scenery as Dr. Emilio Lizardo?

The only thing that ever bothered me about this movie was that with the elaborate set up and background story, it seemed as if they really were setting it up for a sequel.
And I think that sequel would have blown the original movie away.
Of course Buckaroo Banzai Against the World Crime League never happened, but it still remains a great "what if" to me.

Rushmore (1998)

2008-11-06T11:54:00.002-05:00

Rushmore was a 1998 comedy-drama film directed by Wes Anderson and co-written by Anderson and Owen Wilson.
It was about a teenager named Max Fischer (played by Jason Schwartzman) and his friendship with the rich industrialist Herman Blume (played by Bill Murray), and their love for elementary school teacher Rosemary Cross, (played by Olivia Williams).
The soundtrack was scored by regular Anderson collaborator Mark Mothersbaugh (Devo) and features several songs by bands associated with the British Invasion of the 1960s.

The film not only helped launch the careers of Anderson and Schwartzman, it also established a second career for Bill Murray in independent cinema.
Murray went on to dramatic roles in Wild Things, Cradle Will Rock, Hamlet (as Polonius), The Royal Tenenbaums and Lost in Translation.

Rushmore won Best Director and Best Supporting Male awards at the 1999 Independent Spirit Awards and Bill Murray earned a Golden Globe nomination for Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture.

Rushmore came in at number 34 on Bravo's "100 Funniest Movies" and the film was ranked number 20 on "The Cult 25: The Essential Left-Field Movie Hits Since '83" list by Entertainment Weekly.

After this film, Jason Schwartzman went on to do I Heart Huckabees and The Darjeeling Limited.
Olivia Williams went on to do The Sixth Sense, A Knight's Tale and yes, an uncredited role in X-Men: The Last Stand as Moira MacTaggert.

Murray, Wilson and Schwartzman would later reunite on The Darjeeling Limited, directed by Anderson.

Heathers (1989)

2008-10-23T08:38:00.002-05:00

Heathers was a 1989 black comedy film directed by Michael Lehmann and produced by Denise Di Novi from a screenplay by Daniel Waters.
It starred Winona Ryder (Veronica Sawyer), Christian Slater (Jason "J.D." Dean), and Shannen Doherty (Heather Duke). (I guess Robert Downey Jr was busy at the time).
Of course the film was a U.S. box office failure, or it probably wouldnt be on this blog. BUT, it's become a true cult classic, with high DVD sales and rentals.
The movie is about four girls, three named Heather, that rule a suburban Midwestern high school through intimidation, contempt, and sex appeal.

The writer of Mean Girls, Tina Fey, considers Heathers "the hardcore version of Mean Girls."
Veronica Sawyer and Betty Finn are named after Betty and Veronica from the Archie comic and Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn.

The Heathers that ALMOST was.....
Heather Graham was offered the role of Heather McNamara.
Jennifer Connelly and Justine Bateman were both considered for the role of Veronica Sawyer
Brad Pitt auditioned for the role of J.D, but was turned down because he was "too nice".

Barbarella (1968)

2008-10-16T08:47:00.002-05:00

Barbarella was a 1968 sci-fi film directed by Roger Vadim and based on the French comic Barbarella by Jean-Claude Forest.
Barbarella is famous for a sequence in which the title character, played by Jane Fonda ( Yes THAT Jane Fonda, American Academy Award winning actress, writer, political activist, former fashion model and fitness guru) undresses in zero gravity during the opening credits.
This sequence was recreated by Kylie Minogue in the video for her song Put Yourself in My Place.
The film was simultaneously shot in French and English. In the French version, Fonda performs her own lines in French.

The whole film is camp, but a lot of the 60s were.
It did not do well with critics or at the box office, but now it's considered a imaginative and influential movie.

The influence part cannot be mistaken, like the above mentioned Kylie Minogue video.
CLAMP parodied Barbarella in one chapter of their Miyuki-chan in Wonderland manga.
A company in the UK sells lava lamps and oil projectors under the name Mathmos. Mathmos (or matmos) was a seething lake of evil slime beneath the city Sogo.
From 1984 to 2002, a nightclub located in downtown Orlando, Florida was called Barbarella.
Duran Duran took their name from the villainous Dr. Durand Durand. Some of the band's early appearances were at a nightclub called Barbarella's.
Prince has also referenced the movie several times.

A remake of Barbarella is currently being planned by current James Bond writers Neal Purvis and Robert Wade, Dino and Martha De Laurentiis and Robert Rodriguez.
The role of Barbarella could possibly be played by Erica Durance (Smallville), Sienna Miller or Rose McGowan.

The Best of Everything (1959)

2008-10-08T10:57:00.001-05:00

Okay, here is another thing about working on a blog like this. Sometimes I do movies I really like, or hate, and sometimes I find out about movies I've never even heard of before.
Case in Point...

The Best of Everything, released in 1959, is a 20th Century-Fox feature film starring Hope Lange, Diane Baker, Suzy Parker, and Joan Crawford.
It's the story of the professional and private lives of three women who share a small apartment in New York City and who work together in a paperback publishing firm.
The screenplay, by Edith Sommer and Mann Rubin, was based upon the 1958 novel of the same name by Rona Jaffe.
The film was produced by Jerry Wald and directed by Jean Negulesco.
Alfred Newman wrote the musical score, the last under his contract as Fox's musical director. He had worked with Fox since 1933.
The film has been released to VHS and DVD.

I guess what "elevates" this movie top cult status is that the movie comes across as a big soap opera.
Then again, it's got Joan Crawford in it.
It's gonna get some kind of following.
Her overacting in a soap opera type movie....priceless.
I mean, who could make up dialouge like this?
Amanda Farrow ( Joan Crawford) : When you finish the slush files, then you may go. But I want my comments on each.
Caroline Bender (Hope Lange) : Typed?
Amanda Farrow: No Miss Bender. Beat it out on a native drum.

And actually the movie was remade (sorta) in 1970 as a soap opera.

They Live (1988)

2008-10-01T10:09:00.002-05:00

Another one of my actually favorite movies.
I don't know if its the movie, or Roddy Piper showing how well he can really act outside of the ring.

They Live was released in 1988. John Carpenter directed the movie and also wrote the film under the pseudonym "Frank Armitage." Frank Armitage is a character in HP Lovecraft's The Dunwich Horror.
The movie is based on a 1963 short story by Ray Nelson entitled "Eight O’Clock in the Morning."

Part science fiction thriller and part black comedy, the film echoed contemporary fears of a declining economy (sound familiar?), within a culture of greed and conspicuous consumption common among Americans in the 1980s.
In They Live, the ruling class within the rich elite are in fact aliens managing human social affairs through the use of subliminal media advertising and the control of economic opportunity.

This movie is kind of a hit with the modern Conspiracy theorists out there, because it closely parallels many of their theories. It really reminds me a lot of David Icke's ideas, even though the aliens aren't reptilian.

In other circles it's become a cult classic. On "Rotten Tomatoes" it has a rating of 89%, although it was as high as 96% at one point.

Side note: The communicators used by the aliens are said to be the same prop that was used as the PKE Meter in both Ghostbusters features. Since Ghostbusters was released in 1984, it's quite possible.

A Bucket of Blood (1959)

2008-09-23T10:06:00.004-05:00

A really weird movie that freaked me out when I was a kid. I guess I didn't understand " Black Comedy" back then.

Roger Corman's "A Bucket of Blood" was a 1959 comedy horror film that starred Dick Miller.
The film was produced on a $50,000 budget, was shot in five days, and shares many of the low-budget film making tricks usually associated with Roger Corman's work.
It was written by Charles B. Griffith.
The film is a dark comic satire about a socially awkward young busboy at a Bohemian cafe, Walter Paisley (Dick Miller), who is acclaimed as a brilliant sculptor after he accidentally kills his landlady's cat and covers its body in clay to hide the evidence.
When he is pressured to create similar work, he turns to "alternative means" to get his subjects.

A Bucket of Blood was followed by the classic cult film "The Little Shop of Horrors" and "Creature from the Haunted Sea".
Corman had made no previous attempt at this type of comedy horror movie, although past and future Corman productions in other genres incorporated comedic elements.
A Bucket of Blood was remade in 1995 as a made-for-television film for the Showtime network.
The character name of Walter Paisley has been used by Dick Miller as an in-joke in productions such as The Howling and Shake, Rattle and Rock!, which credit otherwise unrelated characters played by Miller under the character name.

If you don't recognize the name Dick Miller, you'd recognize his face.
He's appeared in White Line Fever, The Terminator, Night of the Creeps, Small Soldiers, The Little Shop of Horrors, Amazon Women on the Moon, Chopping Mall, The Howling, Gremlins and Gremlins 2: The New Batch (as Murray Futterman), V: The Final Battle, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and he voiced the gangster Chuckie Sol in the animated feature film Batman: Mask of the Phantasm.

Showgirls (1995)

2008-09-17T08:22:00.002-05:00

Showgirls is a 1995 cult film directed by Paul Verhoeven (RoboCop, Total Recall, Basic Instinct, and Starship Troopers), starring former teen actress Elizabeth Berkley (Saved by the Bell) as a drifter who wanders into Las Vegas and climbs the seedy hierarchy from stripper to showgirl.
Significant controversy and hype about the film preceded its release. In the United States, the movie was rated NC-17. It was the first NC-17 rated film to be given a wide release in mainstream theaters.
After bombing at the box office, Showgirls enjoyed huge success on the home video market, it was among the hottest video rental titles of 1996 and has since become one of MGM's top 20 all-time bestsellers. For its video premiere, Verhoeven prepared an R-rated cut for rental outlets which refused to carry films with an NC-17 rating; this edited version runs 128 minutes and deletes some of the more graphic footage.

Since its release, the movie has achieved a certain cult status. According to activist writer Naomi Klein, ironic enjoyment of the film initially arose among those with the video before MGM capitalized on the idea.

Showgirls is shown at midnight movies alongside other cult films like The Rocky Horror Picture Show and The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. It is heralded as one of the best "bad movies" of all time, somewhat of a camp classic in the vein of Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. Although the film was not successful when first released theatrically, over the years it has become increasingly popular; it was among the hottest video rental titles of 1996 and has since become one of MGM's top 20 all-time bestsellers.

As revealed on the DVD release, a sign showing the distance to Los Angeles in the last shot of the film hinted at a sequel in which Nomi takes on Hollywood. Any such plans were scrapped upon the film's massive critical failure.

Recent years have seen a reevaluation of the movie's merits. Critics such as Jonathan Rosenbaum and Charles Taylor, as well as filmmaker Jacques Rivette, have gone on the record defending Showgirls as a serious satire. Quentin Tarantino has stated that he enjoyed Showgirls, referring to it as the "only other time in the last twenty years that a major studio made a full-on, gigantic, big-budget exploitation movie", comparing it to Mandingo.

Technorati Tags: Showgirls Paul Verhoeven movies films best classic cult movie film classics top

Withnail and I (1987)

2008-09-11T10:13:00.001-05:00

Withnail and I is a 1986 British film made by Handmade Films. It was written and directed by Bruce Robinson, it is based on his life in London in the late 1960's. Withnail was Richard E. Grant's first film role and launched him into a successful career. The film featured performances by Richard Griffiths as Withnail's Uncle Monty, Paul McGann as "I" and Ralph Brown as Danny the drug dealer. The film has tragic and comic elements (particularly farce), and is notable for its period music and many quotable lines.

The Big Lebowski (1998)

2008-09-04T10:31:00.001-05:00

Another of my all time favorite movies......

The Big Lebowski is a 1998 American comedy film written and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen. Starring Jeff Bridges as Jeffrey Lebowski, an unemployed Los Angeles slacker and avid bowler, who calls himself "The Dude". After being mistaken for a multimillionaire of the same name, Lebowski is commissioned to deliver a million-dollar ransom in order to secure the release of the millionaire's kidnapped trophy wife. The plan goes awry, and The Dude's friend Walter Sobchak (John Goodman) further complicates the ordeal. The film is narrated by a cowboy known only as "Stranger", played by Sam Elliott (awesome). Steve Buscemi, Philip Seymour Hoffman, David Huddleston, Julianne Moore, and John Turturro also star in the film. The film's structure has been compared to Raymond Chandler's novel The Big Sleep. The original score was composed by Carter Burwell, a longtime collaborator of the Coen Brothers.

The movie was not a commercial success (it grossed only $17 million domestically), but it received generally positive reviews from critics. The film, noted for its idiosyncratic characters, surreal dream sequences, unconventional dialogue, and eclectic soundtrack, has become a cult favorite and has been called "the first cult film of the Internet era." The film's devoted fans have spawned Lebowski Fest, an annual festival that started in Louisville, Kentucky in 2002 and has since expanded to several other cities.

Grey Gardens (1975)

2008-08-30T10:37:00.004-05:00

Grey Gardens (1975)

Grey Gardens is a 1975 documentary film by the direction, cinematography and editing team of Albert and David Maysles, Susan Froemke, Ellen Hovde, and Muffie Meyer. The film depicts the everyday lives of two women who lived at Grey Gardens, a decrepit 28-room mansion at 3 West End Avenue in the wealthy Georgica Pond neighborhood of East Hampton, New York.

The documentary has been adapted into a full-length musical, Grey Gardens, with book by Doug Wright, music by Scott Frankel and lyrics by Michael Korie. Starring Christine Ebersole and Mary Louise Wilson, the show premiered at Playwrights Horizons in New York City in February 2006. The musical reopened on Broadway in November 2006 at the Walter Kerr Theatre, and was acclaimed on over 25 "Best of 2006" lists in newspapers and magazines. The production won a Tony Award for Best Costume Design, and Ebersole and Wilson each won Tony Awards for their performances. The Broadway production closed on July 29, 2007. It was the first musical on Broadway ever to be adapted from a documentary.

Re-Animator (1985)

2008-08-28T16:30:00.000-05:00

Re-Animator (1985)

Another of my favorite movies.
I have no idea how many times I have seen this one......

Re-Animator is a 1985 horror film directed by Stuart Gordon and based on the H. P. Lovecraft story "Herbert West: Reanimator" and first of the Re-Animator series. It stars Jeffrey Combs as Dr. Herbert West, a medical student who transfers from a school in Europe to the medical school of Miskatonic University to continue developing a formula to revive the dead. His testing of the agent leads to unintended consequences for West and his new roommate, Dan Cain. The movie has since become a cult film, driven by fans of Combs, extreme gore, and successful combination of horror and comedy. It currently has a score of 92% on critic site Rotten Tomatoes.

Re-Animator was released on October 18, 1985 in 129 theaters and grossed USD $543,728 on its opening weekend. It went on to make $2 million in North America, well above its $900,000 budget.

It was well-received by critics, earning mostly positive reviews with a 92% rating at Rotten Tomatoes. Roger Ebert gave the film three out of four stars and wrote, "I walked out somewhat surprised and reinvigorated (if not re-animated) by a movie that had the audience emitting taxi whistles and wild goat cries". In her review for the New York Times, Janet Maslin wrote, "Re-Animator has a fast pace and a good deal of grisly vitality. It even has a sense of humor, albeit one that would be lost on 99.9 percent of any ordinary moviegoing crowd". Paul Attanasio, in his review for the Washington Post, praised Jeffrey Combs' performance: "Beady-eyed, his face hard, almost lacquered, Combs makes West into a brittle, slightly fey psychotic in the Anthony Perkins mold. West is a figure of fun, but Combs doesn't spoof him".

Slap Shot (1977)

2008-08-27T10:45:00.002-05:00

Slap Shot (1977)

Now this entry really is a labor of love, because I love this movie!
If you've seen this movie, you'll never forget the "Hanson Brothers"........

Slap Shot is a 1977 film starring Paul Newman and Michael Ontkean and directed by George Roy Hill. The film is based on a book written by Nancy Dowd, based in part on her brother Ned Dowd's experiences playing minor league hockey in the United States in the 1970s, during which time violence, especially in the low minors, was the selling point of the game.

At the time, Dowd was living in Los Angeles, when she got a call from her brother Ned, a member of the Johnstown Jets hockey team. Her brother gave her the bad news that the team was for sale. Dowd asked her brother who owned the club, and he told her that he had no idea. Dowd would move to the area and be inspired to write Slap Shot. It was filmed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Johnstown, Pennsylvania (Cambria County War Memorial); and upstate New York (Utica Auditorium).

Film critic Gene Siskel noted that his greatest regret as a critic was giving a mediocre review to this movie when it was first released. After viewing it several more times, he grew to like it more and later listed it as one of the greatest American comedy movies of all time. The Wall Street Journal’s Joy Gould Boynum seemed at once entertained and repulsed by a movie so “foul-mouthed and unabashedly vulgar” on one hand and so “vigorous and funny” on the other. Michael Ontkean’s strip tease displeased Time magazine’s critic, Richard Schickel, who regretted that, “in the dénouement [Ontkean] is forced to go for a broader, cheaper kind of comic response.”

Critical reevaluation of the film continues to be positive. In 1998, Maxim magazine named Slap Shot the " Best Guy Movie Of All Time " above such acknowledged classics as The Godfather, Raging Bull[4], and Newman's own Cool Hand Luke. Ironically, for being credited as "the best guy movie," Slap Shot was written by a woman, Nancy Dowd.

In the 2007 50th Anniversary Issue, GQ named the Slap Shot one of the "30 films that changed Men's Lives." In the November 2007 issue of GQ, Author Dan Jenkins proclaimed Slap Shot "the best sports film of the past 50 years".

In June of 2008, Adam Proteau of "The Hockey News" rated "Slap Shot" as the best Hockey film ever made.

The Harder They Come (1973)

2008-08-22T12:49:00.002-05:00

The Harder They Come (1973)

The Harder They Come was a 1972 Jamaican crime film directed by Perry Henzell.

It starred reggae singer Jimmy Cliff, who played Ivanhoe Martin, a character based on Rhyging, a real-life Jamaican criminal who achieved fame in the 1940s.

Martin is a poor Jamaican man in search of a job, before finally getting one as a reggae singer. Upon the verge of a hit record, he discovers the only way he can get a hit record is by signing away the rights. Eventually, Jose (played by Carl Bradshaw), one of the first people he met after he moved to Kingston, offers him an opportunity dealing marijuana. He turns to a life of crime and violence. There are two versions of the film — one with subtitles and one without — and each has a different ending.

Other major roles in the film were played by Janet Bartley as Elsa, Basil Keane as Preacher, the late Ras Daniel Hartman as Pedro, Beverly Anderson (who eventually married Michael Manley who became the Prime Minister of Jamaica) as the Upper St. Andrew Housewife, the late Bob Charlton as HiltonJamaican actor Volair Johnson as Pushcart Boy, and well known Jamaican comedians Ed 'Bim' Lewis as Photographer, and Aston 'Bam' Winter as the drunken husband.

The Harder They Come was released in February 1973 in New York City by Roger Corman's New World Pictures to little attention. It became more popular when it was played to midnight audiences nationwide the following April. The film is referenced in the Clash songs "Guns of Brixton" and "Safe European Home". In 2005, it was developed into a stage musical by the Theatre Royal Stratford East and UK Arts Productions in London. Adapted by Henzell, it opened on 25 March 2006. The soundtrack to the film is considered a breakthrough for reggae in the United States.

Famed Jamaican outlaw Ivanhoe 'Rhyging' Martin, died of gunshot wounds sustained during a shootout with police officers on September 9, 1948, in Lime Cay, Jamaica.
Rhyging is a Jamaican word meaning as much as 'hot', 'bad'. Though often regarded as the initial rude boy, ahead of his time, Jimmy Cliff refers to him rather as a kind of Jamaican Robin Hood, who was "very much on the side of the people".

The soundtrack to the film The Harder They Come was released in 1972. It was compiled by reggae singer Jimmy Cliff, who starred in the film and performed some of the songs. The album peaked on Billboard's North America Pop Albums chart at #140. In 2003, the album was ranked number 119 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.

Clerks (1994)

2008-08-18T13:16:00.002-05:00

Clerks is a 1994 film written and directed by Kevin Smith, who also appears in the film in a minor role. Starring Brian O'Halloran as Dante Hicks and Jeff Anderson as Randal Graves, it presents a day in the lives of two store clerks and their acquaintances. Clerks was the first of Smith's "View Askewniverse" films. It introduces several characters, notably Jay and Silent Bob, who reappear in his later works.

Clerks, which had been shot for US$27,575 in the convenience store where director Kevin Smith worked, grossed over US$3 million in theaters, launching Smith's career and reinvigorating the field of independent film.

Clerks also spun off Clerks: The TV Show, Clerks: The Animated Series, Clerks: The Comics and of course, Clerks II.

The Wiz (1978)

2008-08-04T14:05:00.001-05:00

The Wiz is a 1978 American musical film produced by Motown Productions and Universal Pictures. It was released by Universal on October 24, 1978. The movie is an urbanized retelling of L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz featuring an entirely African-American cast, The Wiz was adapted from the 1975 Broadway musical of the same name. The film follows the adventures of Dorothy (Diana Ross), a shy schoolteacher from Harlem, New York who finds herself transported to the wonderland of Oz — which resembles a fantasy version of New York City. Befriended by a Scarecrow (Michael Jackson) , a Tin Man (Nipsey Russell), and a Cowardly Lion (Ted Ross), Dorothy travels through the world of Oz to seek an audience with the mysterious "Wiz"(Richard Pryor) , who they say has the power to take her home.

Produced by Rob Cohen and directed by Sidney Lumet, The Wiz stars Diana Ross, Michael Jackson, Nipsey Russell, Ted Ross, Mabel King, Theresa Merritt, Thelma Carpenter, Lena Horne, and Richard Pryor. The film's story was reworked from William F. Brown's Broadway libretto by Joel Schumacher, and Quincy Jones supervised the adaptation of Charlie Smalls & Luther Vandross' songs for film. A handful of new songs, written by Jones and the songwriting team of Ashford & Simpson, were added for the film version. Upon its original theatrical release, Despite an all star cast, the Wiz was a critical and commercial failure, and marked the end of the resurgence of African-American films that began with the blaxploitation movement of the 1970s.

Even though being considered a failure, The Wiz was later nominated for four Academy Awards: Best Art Direction, Best Costume Design, Best Original Music Score and Best Cinematography, although it didn't win in any of those categories.

The Wiz is still periodically broadcast on television, often on Thanksgiving Day.

After the Wiz, Diana Ross didn't make anymore movies save one documentary The Making and Meaning of We Are Family in 2002.
Not counting videos, Michael Jackson did little movie work after the Wiz. Except for a cool cameo in Men in Black II.
The late Nipsey Russell stayed mainly with TV appearances.
Ted Ross made several movies and TV appearances after the Wiz, until his death in 2002. Most memorable to me at least was Bitterman in both "Arthur" movies.

Stranger Than Paradise (1984)

2008-07-22T12:09:00.005-05:00

Stranger Than Paradise is an absurdist comedy film written and directed by Jim Jarmusch (Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999)) in 1984. It starred jazz musician John Lurie, former Sonic Youth drummer-turned-actor Richard Edson and Hungarian-born actress Eszter Balint.

Shooting was begun using leftover film stock from the production of Wim Wenders' Der Stand der Dinge in (1982). It started out as a 30-minute short subject film and was later expanded into a 3-part feature. This short film was shown as "Stranger Than Paradise" at the 1983 International Film Festival Rotterdam. When it was used for the 3-part feature it was renamed "The New World".

The first section, "The New World," takes place in New York, the second, "One Year Later," in Cleveland, and the last, "Paradise," in Florida.

The film tells the story of a self-identified "hipster" (John Lurie) living in New York City when his Hungarian cousin comes to visit. Her visit makes up the first section. The next section focuses on Lurie and his friend (played by Richard Edson) going to visit the cousin at her new home in Cleveland, Ohio. The final section focuses on the journey the three of them make from Cleveland, to Florida.

The entire film consists of long takes; each of the film's scenes is contained within a single shot, followed by a few seconds of black leader.

The song "I Put a Spell on You" by Screamin' Jay Hawkins features prominently in the soundtrack.

Jim Jarmusch's wife Sara Driver is on the production credits as the producer and she also appears in the movie as 'the woman with a hat.'

In 2002, Stranger Than Paradise was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

Feed Shark

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971)

2008-07-06T09:49:00.002-05:00

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971)

Yes the original, not the Tim Burton / Johnny Depp version......

Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory is a 1971 motion picture based on the 1964 Roald Dahl novel Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It starred Gene Wilder as the eponymous title character, and was directed by Mel Stuart.

Willy Wonka was released on June 30, 1971, and earned a positive response from moviegoers, but box office figures were less than desirable due to lack of promotion. As a result, it was the fifty-third highest grossing film of the year in the U.S., earning approximately $4 million. Even though the film received positive reviews from critics such as Roger Ebert and Wilder would later earn a Golden Globe nomination for his performance, Dahl was displeased with the final product and refused to sell the rights to the sequel, Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator. Seeing no significant financial advantage, Paramount Pictures decided against renewing its distribution deal for the film when it expired seven years later. Quaker Oats sold the rights to Warner Bros. in 1977.

By the mid-seventies, the picture had experienced a spike in popularity thanks in large part to repeated television broadcasts and home video sales. It was first released on DVD in 1997, allowing it to reach a new generation of viewers, and was rereleased as a remastered special edition on DVD and VHS again in 2001 in order to commemorate the film's 30th anniversary.

technorati tags: cult movies, movies cult classics, cult classic films, top cult films, cult films

The Toxic Avenger (1985)

2008-06-22T10:49:00.003-05:00

The Toxic Avenger (1985)

The Toxic Avenger is an American cult classic horror film released in 1985 by Troma Entertainment, known for producing low budget B-movies with campy concepts. Almost ignored upon its first release, The Toxic Avenger caught on after a long and successful midnight movie engagement at the famed Bleecker Street Cinemas in New York City in late 1985.

The film has three film sequels and a children's TV cartoon. Two less successful sequels: The Toxic Avenger Part II and The Toxic Avenger Part III: The Last Temptation of Toxie were filmed as one movie. Director Lloyd Kaufman realized that he had shot far too much footage for one movie, and reedited it into two. A third independent sequel was also released, entitled Citizen Toxie: The Toxic Avenger IV. The animated children's TV series spin-off was Toxic Crusaders where Toxie was the leader of a team of mutated superheroes who fought against evil alien polluters. The cartoon series was short-lived and it was quickly canceled. New Line Cinema had planned a live action movie based on the cartoon, but the deal was ultimately canceled.

In 1975, Lloyd Kaufman had the idea to shoot a horror movie involving a health club while serving as the pre-production supervisor on the set of Rocky. At the Cannes Film Festival, Kaufman had read an article that said horror films were no longer popular, so Kaufman claims that he decided to produce his own version of the horror film. However, the film's final outcome was less a bona fide horror film and more of a violent campy comedy horror-spoof with extreme violence embedded through out. The setting of the movie in a health club and the movie was given a working title of Health Club Horror. Kaufman wrote the script with the help of writer Joe Ritter.

"The Toxic Avenger" was the film that "built the house of Troma," and was Troma's first horror film. Previously the production company focused on sex comedies such as "Cry Uncle" and "Squeeze Play"; subsequently Troma focused almost exclusively on horror films.

Akira (1988)

2008-06-04T09:26:00.000-05:00

Akira is a 1988 (Was it that long ago?) Japanese animated film co-written and directed by Katsuhiro Otomo based on his manga of the same name. The film is set in a neon-lit futuristic post-apocalyptic Tokyo in 2019. While most of the character designs and basic settings were directly adapted from the original 2,182 page manga epic, the restructured plot of the movie differs considerably from the print version, pruning much of the last half of the book. Akira is regarded by critics as one of the greatest animated films ever made.

The movie led the way for the growing popularity of anime in the West, with Akira considered a forerunner of the second wave of anime fandom that began in the early 1990s. One of the reasons for the movie's success was the highly advanced quality of its animation. At the time, most anime was notorious for cutting production corners with limited motion, such as having only the characters' mouths move while their faces remained static. Akira broke from this trend with meticulously detailed scenes, exactingly lip-synched dialogue—a first for an anime production (voices were recorded before the animation was completed, rather than the opposite)—and super-fluid motion as realized in the film's more than 160,000 animation cels.Notable motifs in the film include youth culture, delinquency, psychic awareness, social unrest and future uncertainty weighed against the historical spectre of nuclear destruction and Japan's post-war economic revival. The film also explores a number of psychological and philosophical themes, such as the nature of corruption, the will to power, and the growth from childhood to maturity both in individuals and the human race itself. Elements of Buddhist symbolism are also present in the film.

Akira will be developed into two live action films with the first scheduled for a summer 2009 release. Warner Brothers and Apian Way will adapt the two movies from the manga, with each one covering three volumes. Akira will be Ruairi Robinson's directorial debut for a feature film. He was nominated for an short film Oscar in 2002 for Fifty Percent Grey. Gary Whitta is writing the script. Andrew Lazar, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Jennifer Davisson will produce the film. No announcement has been made regarding the cast.

Un Chien Andalou (1928, France)

2008-05-23T07:38:00.003-05:00

One of the perks of doing this blog is discovering movies I have never heard of....or didn't know the names

Un Chien Andalou (English: An Andalusian Dog) is a 16-minute surrealist film made in France in 1928 by Spanish writer/directors Luis Buñuel and Salvador Dalí, and released in 1929 in Paris. It is one of the best-known surrealist films of the French avant-garde film movement of the 1920s. It is also considered one of the most prominent films in Spanish Surrealism. It stars Simone Mareuil and Pierre Batcheff as the unnamed protagonists.

The film has no plot, in the conventional sense of the word. There are two central characters, an unnamed man and woman. The chronology of the film is disjointed: for example, it jumps from "once upon a time" to "eight years later" without the events changing. It uses dream logic that can be described in terms of Freudian free association, presenting a series of tenuously related scenes that attempt to shock the viewer.

The film opens with a scene in which a woman's eye is slit by a razor. The man with the razor is played by Buñuel himself. In subsequent scenes, a man's hand has a hole in the palm from which ants emerge; an androgynous blind woman pokes at a severed hand in the street with her cane before being knocked down by a car; the man fondles a woman, who resists him violently, and then he drags two grand pianos containing dead and rotting donkeys, the tablets of the Ten Commandments, and two live priests (Dalí plays one of the priests in this scene); the man's father (played by the same actor as the man himself) arrives to punish him, but the man eventually shoots him with two books that abruptly turn to pistols; and the woman's armpit hair attaches itself to the man's face.

At the end of the film, the woman walks out of the apartment building, and meets another man on the beach (also played by Dalí). They seem to be happy, but the final shot shows two figures (apparently Mareuil and Dalí) buried in sand, dead, and "consumed by swarms of flies" according to Buñuel's original script. However, this latter special effect was left out due to budget limitations.

Pee-Wee's Big Adventure (1985)

2008-05-10T10:08:00.003-05:00

Pee-wee's Big Adventure is a 1985 adventure comedy film directed by Tim Burton in his full-length film debut. Paul Reubens, Phil Hartman and Michael Varhol wrote the script, starring Paul Reubens as Pee-wee Herman, Elizabeth Daily, Mark Holton and Diane Salinger. The film tells the story of Pee-wee Herman embarking on nation-wide adventure in search of his stolen bicycle.

The success of The Pee-wee Herman Show prompted Warner Bros. to hire Reubens to write a script for a full-length Pee-Wee Herman film. Reubens' original idea was to do a remake of Pollyanna with Pee-wee Herman in the Hayley Mills role. Burton was hired as director once Reubens and the producers saw his work on Vincent and Frankenweenie. Pee-wee's Big Adventure was a financial and critical success, leading into a cult film.

Pee-wee's Big Adventure opened on August 9, 1985 in the United States in 829 theaters, accumulating $4,545,847 over its opening weekend. The film went on to gross $40,940,662 domestically, recouping five times of its $7 million budget, making it a financial success. At the time of release in 1985, the film received mixed reviews. The film eventually developed into a cult film. Based on 23 reviews collected by Rotten Tomatoes, Pee-wee's Big Adventure received a highly rare 100% overall approval rating. By comparison Metacritic calculated an average score of 47 from 13 reviews collected. The film was nominated with a Young Artist Award for Best Family Motion Picture (Comedy or Musical).

Christopher Null gave positive feedback, calling it "Burton's strangest film". Variety compared Paul Ruebens to Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton, while Empire called the film "a one-comic masterpiece" and "a dazzling debut" for Burton. Stephanie Zacharek of Salon explained "Everything about Pee-wee's Big Adventure, from its toy-box colors to its superb, hyper-animated Danny Elfman score to the butch-waxed hairdo and wooden-puppet walk of its star and mastermind is pure pleasure." Burton had no interest in directing Big Top Pee-wee, and the financial success of the film prompted Warner Bros. to hire him to direct Batman.

The Mack (1973)

2008-04-24T07:23:00.002-05:00

The Mack is a 1973 blaxploitation film starring Max Julien and Richard Pryor. This movie was produced during the era of such blaxploitation movies as Dolemite, however it is not considered by its makers a true blaxploitation picture. It is a social commentary, according to ''Mackin' Ain't Easy'', a documentary about the making of The Mack, which can be found on the DVD edition of the film.

The movie deals with the life of John Mickens / Goldie (Max Julien), a former drug dealer recently released from prison who becomes a big-time pimp. Standing in his way is another pimp named Pretty Tony ( Dick Anthony Williams) , two corrupt white cops, a local crime lord, and even his own brother (the black nationalist), who try to force him out of the business.

The movie is set in Oakland, California and was the biggest grossing blaxploitation film of its time. Its soundtrack songs were recorded by Motown artist Willie Hutch. The song "I Choose You" was recently sampled by UGK in their song "International Player's Anthem (I Choose You)" featuring OutKast and by Jaheim in his song "The Chosen One."

The most famous scene in the movie is the one featuring the "Annual Players Ball". It has become an often-referenced cultural icon. It was the name of Outkast's first single. Also the Player's Ball scene was the theme of Jay-Z 's 1997 single Who You Wit' and it was parodied most recently by Chappelle's Show, where it became the "Player-Haters' Ball."

The vernacular term Mack is a corruption of the french word macquereau which means mackerel, but is used as slang for a pimp due to the mackerel's tendency to guide other fish to their mates.

The movie was filmed in Oakland, California.

According to Max Julien on the DVD commentary, Richard Pryor and producer Harvey Bernhard had a heated argument during filming. Later that night, Pryor was going to Bernhard's hotel room to attack him with a sock filled with ball bearings until Julien calmed Pryor down.

Evil Dead II: Dead by Dawn (1987)

2008-04-11T08:15:00.002-05:00

And now another of my favorites....I love this movie!

Evil Dead II, also known as Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn, is an American comedy horror movie, released in 1987. A sequel to 1981's The Evil Dead, the film was directed by Sam Raimi, written by Raimi and Scott Spiegel, produced by Rob Tapert and starred Bruce Campbell as Ash Williams. The film was followed by a sequel of its own, Army of Darkness, in 1993.

Evil Dead II is not a remake of the first movie and was never intended to be. For legal reasons, Sam Raimi was unable to obtain permission to use footage from the first movie in order to make a recap at the beginning that would let the audience know what had happened in the first movie. To work around this problem, he re-shot some key scenes from the first, but with a simplified plot. For example, the recap was streamlined to show only Ash and his girlfriend (now played by a different actress) going to the cabin in the woods, instead of going with their friends as well. Approximately 7 minutes into Evil Dead II, the final scene from The Evil Dead plays again, Ash standing outside the cabin alone, turning around when a spirit is approaching him, and the story of Evil Dead II begins.

The concept of a sequel to The Evil Dead was discussed during the location shooting on the first film. Sam Raimi wanted to toss his hero, Ash, through a time portal, back into the Middle Ages. That notion eventually led to the third installment, Army of Darkness.

After the release of Evil Dead, Raimi moved on to Crimewave, a cross between a crime film and a comedy produced by Raimi and Joel and Ethan Coen. Irvin Shapiro, a publicist who was primarily responsible for the mainstream release of The Evil Dead, suggested that they next work on an Evil Dead sequel. Raimi scoffed at the idea, expecting Crimewave to be a hit, but Shapiro put out ads announcing the sequel regardless.

After Crimewave was released to little audience or critical acclaim, Raimi and Tapert, knowing that another flop would further stall their already lagging careers, took Shapiro up on his offer. Around the same time, they met Italian movie producer Dino De Laurentiis, the owner of production and distribution company DEG. He had asked Raimi if he would direct a theatrical adaptation of the Stephen King (written under his Richard Bachman pseudonym) novel Thinner. Raimi turned down the offer, but De Laurentiis continued to be interested in the young filmmaker.

The Thinner adaptation was part of a deal between De Laurentiis and King to produce several adaptations of King's successful horror fiction. At the time, King was directing the first such adaptation, Maximum Overdrive, based on his short story "Trucks". He had dinner with a crewmember who had been interviewed about the Evil Dead sequel, and told King that the film was having trouble attracting funding. Upon hearing this, King, who had written a glowing review of the first film that helped it become an audience favorite at Cannes, called De Laurentiis and asked him to fund the film.

Though initially skeptical, De Laurentiis agreed after being presented with the extremely high Italian grosses for the first film. Raimi and Tapert had desired $4 million for the production, they were allotted only $3.6 million. As such, the planned medieval storyline had to be scrapped.

Groovy.

Hard-Boiled (1992)

2008-04-01T08:03:00.003-05:00

Now, from one extreme to the other.....

Hard Boiled (traditional Chinese:Làshǒu shéntàn; literally: Hot-Handed God of Cops) is a 1992 Hong Kong action film directed by John Woo.
It is also known as God of Guns.
It was the last film Woo directed in his native Hong Kong before relocating to Hollywood.

The film begins as an apparently straightforward film about the bond between a detective and an undercover cop as they fight a triad gang. However, it develops into an over two hour action extravaganza, with a body count of 307. It is structured around four major action setpieces: the opening teahouse shootout, the warehouse betrayal in the middle, the dock shootout, and the climactic thirty-minute hospital shootout.

Hard Boiled opened on the same weekend as Jet Li and Tsui Hark's Once Upon a Time in China II and suffered for it, but still managed to be successful. Hard Boiled grossed $19,711,048 HKD during its Hong Kong run.

Hard Boiled is considered one of the best heroic bloodshed movies of all time, and perhaps the definitive example, if only for the bloodshed. It increased John Woo's and Chow Yun Fat's popularity outside Hong Kong, and gained a unique cult status among genre fans worldwide.

In the 22 June 2007 issue of Entertainment Weekly, this was stated as the "9th greatest action film of all time".

Hard Boiled includes a famous action sequence in a burning hospital that is a single handheld camera long take lasting 2 minutes and 42 seconds in which Chow Yun-Fat and Tony Leung alternately fight off enemies in frantically choreographed action and engage in emotional dialogue, through many corridors and rooms spanning two levels of the hospital, including an intervening elevator ride. On the Criterion DVD, an entire chapter (appropriately titled "Two minutes, forty-two seconds") is devoted to this shot.

The PlayStation 3 version of the Collector's Edition of Stranglehold contains the only high-definition version of the movie Hard Boiled currently available (as of November, 2007) as an option off the main menu. It is only watchable on the PlayStation 3, and not other Blu-ray players, and as it is played back from inside the game as opposed to the standard PS3 movie player, lacks many common playback options such as fast forwarding, rewinding, or the ability to change subtitle or language tracks during movie playback (though subtitles and language tracks are selectable from the main menu).

Dazed and Confused (1993)

2008-03-26T11:17:00.003-05:00

Dazed and Confused is a 1993 comedy-drama film written and directed by Richard Linklater. The movie's large ensemble cast featured a number of future stars including Ben Affleck, Anthony Rapp, Cole Hauser, Milla Jovovich, Joey Lauren Adams, Parker Posey, and Matthew McConaughey.

The film took in no more than $8 million at the U.S. box office, but in recent years has achieved cult film status. Quentin Tarantino included it on his list of the twelve greatest films of all time in voting in the 2002 Sight and Sound. It also ranked third on Entertainment Weekly's list of the 50 Best High School Movies.

The title of the film is derived from the Led Zeppelin song of the same name. Linklater approached members of the band for permission to use some of their songs in the movie but, although Jimmy Page agreed, Robert Plant refused.

The Warriors (1979)

2008-03-13T08:48:00.002-05:00

The Warriors is a cult classic 1979 film directed by Walter Hill and based on the 1965 novel by Sol Yurick. The film also borrows certain elements from the Anabasis by Xenophon.

The Warriors opened on February 9, 1979 in 670 theaters without advance screenings or a decent promotional campaign. It grossed $3.5 million in its opening weekend. The following weekend the film was linked to sporadic outbreaks of vandalism and three killings - two in Southern California and one in Boston - involving moviegoers on their way to or from showings. This prompted Paramount to remove advertisements from radio and television completely and display ads in the press were reduced to the film's title, rating and participating theaters. In reaction, 200 theaters across the country added security personnel. Due to safety concerns, theater owners were relieved of their contractual obligations if they did not want to show the film, and Paramount offered to pay costs for additional security and damages due to vandalism. Despite the film's bad reputation, most theaters continued to show the movie and enjoyed packed houses. After two weeks free of incidents, the studio expanded the display ads to take advantage of reviews from reputable critics, Pauline Kael of The New Yorker and Janet Maslin of the New York Times. In its sixth week, The Warriors had grossed $16.4 million, well above its estimated $6-7 million budget.

A mild commercial success on its initial release, the film was panned by many critics as exploitative and superficial. Gary Arnold, in his review for the Washington Post, wrote, "None of Hill's dynamism will save The Warriors from impressing most neutral observers as a ghastly folly." In his review for Newsweek, David Ansen wrote, "Another problem arises when the gang members open their mouths: their banal dialogue is jarringly at odds with Hill's hyperbolic visual scheme." Yurick expressed his disappointment in the film version in a Reuter's article and speculated that it scared some people because "it appeals to the fear of a demonic uprising by lumpen youth," and appealed to many teenagers because it "hits a series of collective fantasies." In recent years, The Warriors has acquired the status of a cult film, along with a re-examination of its standing with some film critics. As of January 2008, the film has garnered a 93 percent "fresh" rating at Rotten Tomatoes.

Entertainment Weekly named The Warriors the 16th greatest cult film on their "Top 50 Greatest Cult Films" list.

While itself adapted from a novel, the film has been adapted into a number of other products as well. The film's soundtrack was released in the same year as the film. In 2005, Mezco Toyz released Warriors action figures, including Swan, Cleon, Cochise, Ajax, Luther, and a Baseball Fury.

The Warriors video game, based on the movie, was released by Rockstar Games in October 2005. Most of the game acts as a prequel to the film, creating backstory and elaborating on the characters from the film. The ending recreates much of the film's events. Several of the actors from the movie returned to perform the voices for their original characters.

A modern-day remake of the film is set to be directed by Tony Scott, with a tentative release date of 2008. The remake will include real gang members and try to create a modern version of the story, set in Los Angeles.

Faster, Pussy-Cat! Kill! Kill! (1965)

2008-03-03T13:51:00.005-05:00

Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! is a 1965 film that was directed by Russ Meyer, who also wrote the script, together with Jack Moran. It stars Tura Satana, Haji, and Lori Williams.

The film features gratuitous violence, sexuality, provocative gender roles, and campy dialogue. It has become a cult film favorite and has been widely referred to in pop culture.

It is one of Meyer's more provocatively titled and explicitly exploitative films, yet unlike most of his films it does not contain explicit nudity.

A possible remake is in talks with Quentin Tarantino, an outspoken fan of the original film, to direct with Kim Kardashian, Eva Mendes, and Britney Spears as the trio. Lead actress Tura Satana has recently stated that she feels none of Tarantino's choices are remotely suitable for portraying Varla.

Eraserhead (1977)

2008-02-28T09:48:00.002-05:00

Eraserhead is a 1977 surrealist-horror film written and directed by David Lynch. The film stars Jack Nance and Charlotte Stewart. Eraserhead initially polarized and baffled many critics and movie-goers, but over time the film has become a cult classic.

In 2004, the film was deemed "culturally significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry. Lynch has described his film as a "dream of dark and troubling things."

Eraserhead is considered a difficult film to understand and is open to various interpretations. For example, the review at DVD Verdict offers at least three interpretations. The story does not have a strictly linear plot, it is punctuated with fantasy/dream sequences of differing lengths, and the boundary between these sequences and the primary narrative strand is often blurred. Many have interpreted it as a visual-sound experience rather than a narrative or story, a film that is more about conveying a very specific and powerful mood and atmosphere. In an interview on the cleaned and remastered edition of the film in 2006, Lynch said he has yet to read an interpretation of the film that is the same as his own.

Brazil (1985)

2008-02-19T11:42:00.001-05:00

Brazil (1985) is a dystopian black comedy feature film directed by Terry Gilliam. It was written by Gilliam, Charles McKeown, and Tom Stoppard and stars actor Jonathan Pryce. The film also features Robert De Niro, Kim Greist, Michael Palin, Katherine Helmond, Bob Hoskins, and Ian Holm.

Brazil evokes the melancholy, dreamlike quality of its theme song, an English translation of a 1939 Brazilian song, "Aquarela do Brasil," featured in Disney's Saludos Amigos (1942). In that escapist film, Brazil is represented as a romantic, fantasy location that is the opposite of gloomy, northern countries. Gilliam was inspired by this song to create the fictional totalitarian government and the overall dystopian mood of the film.

The film centers on Sam Lowry, a young man trying to find a woman who appears in his dreams while he is working in a mind-numbing job and living a life in a small apartment, set in a dystopian world in which there is an over-reliance on poorly maintained (and rather whimsical) machines. Brazil's bureaucratic, totalitarian government is reminiscent of the British government depicted in George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, except that it has a buffoonish, slap-stick quality totally lacking in that particular novel.

Jack Mathews, movie critic and author of The Battle of Brazil (1987), characterized the film as "satirizing the bureaucratic, largely dysfunctional industrial world that had been driving Gilliam crazy all his life." While the film was a flop upon its initial release, it has since become a cult classic.

Gilliam sometimes refers to this film as the second of a trilogy of movies, starting with Time Bandits (1981) and ending with The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1989). All are about the "craziness of our awkwardly ordered society and the desire to escape it through whatever means possible." All three movies also focus on these struggles and attempts to escape them through imagination.

Sam is not so much beset by malicious characters as he is by a vast, impersonal, and indifferent social structure that is both hypocritical and pedantic for its own sake. The individual villains are neither malicious nor sadistic, they are merely doing their jobs.

The jilted sense of priorities that adult life often entails are also another theme. The elevation of meaningless considerations of status and vanity over personal happiness and well being is continuously portrayed throughout the movie. At one point, a police officer encourages a prisoner to cooperate, not because he is about to be tortured but because prolonged imprisonment could jeopardize his credit rating.

John Scalzi's Rough Guide to Sci-Fi Movies describes the film as a dystopian satire.

Gilliam has stated that Brazil was inspired by Nineteen Eighty-Four — which he has admitted never having read — but is written from today's perspective rather than looking to the future like Orwell's novel. Some scene resemble the film which had been released a year earlier. In Gilliam's words Brazil was, "the Nineteen Eighty-Four for 1984." In fact, Gilliam's working title for the movie was 1984½, which also pays tribute to the influence of Fellini's 8½.

technorati tags: Brazil, Terry Gilliam, Robert De Niro, Kim Greist, Michael Palin, Katherine Helmond, Bob Hoskins, Ian Holm, George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four,Time Bandits, The Adventures of Baron Munchausen

Plan 9 From Outer Space (1959)

2008-02-13T12:51:00.000-05:00

Plan 9 from Outer Space is a science fiction/horror film written, produced and directed by Edward D. Wood, Jr. in 1958, and released in 1959. The film stars Gregory Walcott, Mona McKinnon, Tor Johnson and Maila "Vampira" Nurmi. The film also claims to posthumously star Bela Lugosi through use of archive footage and a brief scene of the actor shot by Wood just before Lugosi's death in 1956, although Lugosi's character is primarily portrayed by chiropractor Tom Mason.

The plot of the film is focused on a race of extraterrestrial beings who are seeking to stop humans from creating a doomsday weapon that would destroy the universe. In the course of doing so, the aliens implement "Plan 9", a scheme to resurrect earth's dead as zombies to get the planet's attention, causing chaos.

By merit of its writing, unconvincing special effects, and multiple production errors visible in the final version of the film, Plan 9 from Outer Space is sometimes regarded as a leading candidate for the title of "worst movie ever made". It has also earned Edward D. Wood, Jr. a posthumous Golden Turkey Award as the worst director ever.

Shortly before Bela Lugosi's death in 1956, the actor had been working with filmmaker Edward D. Wood, Jr. on a horror film titled Tomb of the Vampire. When Lugosi died, he had only completed a few minutes of footage, and Wood shelved the project. Eventually, Wood developed the story and screenplay for Grave Robbers from Outer Space, planning to release it as Lugosi's final film. Wood hired his wife's chiropractor, Tom Mason, as a stand-in for Lugosi, even though Mason matched neither Lugosi's physical or vocal appearance.

Plan 9 From Outer Space is widely noted for having a plethora of obvious goofs. Most notably in the first scenes, string is clearly visible from the top of the wobbly saucer to the top of the screen. These same flying saucers cast shadows over the "space" backdrop. Criswell's opening narration redundantly informs the viewer how "future events such as these will affect you in the future." Immediately afterwards, he states that the story has already "happened on that fateful day." "Night" and "day" shots are interspersed constantly within the same scene (for example, the old man's corpse chases Paula Trent through the cemetery, with the scene switching between night and day nine times). One porthole on the alien spaceship shows a cloudy day (shown during a scene set at night), while the others show only blackness.

Mason's attempts to hide the fact that he is not Lugosi are unsuccessful.As an early version of Leonard Maltin's movie guidebook put it, "Lugosi died during production, and it shows." In one scene, as his character is being riddled with bullets, Mason's Dracula cape unintentionally starts to slip off his shoulders and he quickly pulls it back into place.

During a scene in an airplane cockpit, a flash of light from a flying saucer reveals the shadow of the boom mic. Also in this scene, the actress playing the flight attendant bumps into the curtain several times while waiting for her cue. In the numerous graveyard scenes, as characters brush against tombstones, the stones wobble and, in one case, fall over (e.g., the cross at the right side of the screen in an early scene).In the scene where Inspector Daniel Clay's body rises out of the ground, the "grave" and headstone are clearly out of proportion to all the leaves on the ground. When Tor Johnson drops the girl in the cemetery, a pillow is clearly visible beneath her.

During the U.S. Army attack on the UFOs, the rockets used are actually (and obviously) ground-to-ground mortar type rockets that practically cannot even fly at a required altitude to harm aircraft. Also the majority of the weapons used in the scene were never actually used in combat. In the same scene, Col. Tom Edwards clearly casts shadow on the "horizon" behind him. The Colonel is also missing most of his rank identification items, while the Captain beside him doesn't have any at all. In scenes set in the Pentagon, there is a map of the United States on the wall. The map is from the Santa Fe Railway. The railroad's logo is visible in some shots, but was covered with black tape in others.

Five Deadly Venoms (1978)

2008-01-29T09:16:00.002-05:00

Five Deadly Vemons (aka 5 Deadly Venoms, aka Shaolin Deadly Poisons) is a 1978 Hong Kong cult martial arts film directed by Chang Cheh. The five deadly venoms are The Centipede, The Snake, The Scorpion, The Lizard and The Toad. The film was listed at number 11 on Entertainment Weekly's Top 50 Cult Films list.

The dying master of the powerful Poison Clan dispatches his last pupil on a crucial mission. Worried that the skills he has taught are being used to evil ends, he orders the Yan Tieh to trace a retired colleague and warn him that the fortune he amassed from the clan activities is under threat from five of his former pupils. Each an expert in his own lethal combat style, they comprise a truly invincible force. Yan must discover the whereabouts and true identities of these deadly masked warriors, and decide which, if any, he can trust to join him in his perilous mission.

Technorati Tags: Five Deadly Vemons 5 Venoms Shaolin Poisons movies films best classic cult movie film classics top

The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

2008-01-18T12:06:00.000-05:00

The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

The Shawshank Redemption is a 1994 drama film, written and directed by Frank Darabont, based on the Stephen King novella, Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption. The film stars Tim Robbins as Andy Dufresne and Morgan Freeman as Ellis Boyd "Red" Redding.

The film portrays Andy spending nearly two decades in the cruelty of Shawshank State Prison, a fictional penitentiary in Maine, and his friendship with Red, a fellow inmate. This movie exemplifies the gap between box office success and popularity. Despite a lukewarm box office reception, The Shawshank Redemption received favorable reviews from critics and has enjoyed a remarkable life on cable television, home video, and DVD, and continues to be noticed by popular culture. It is frequently ranked amongst the greatest films of all time.

Roger Ebert suggests that the integrity of Andy Dufresne is an important theme in the story line, especially in prison, where integrity is lacking. Andy is an individual of integrity (here referring to adherence to a code of morality) among a host of criminals, and guards, with little integrity.Additionally, some critics have interpreted the film as a Christian parable due to its handling of hope, original sin, redemption, salvation, and faith in the afterlife. Some Christian reviewers have referred to it as a film "true to Christian principles." In the director's commentary track on the tenth anniversary DVD, Darabont denies any intent to create such a parable, and calls such interpretations of the film "fantastic."

In 1999, film critic Roger Ebert listed Shawshank on his "Great Movies" list, and in reader polls by the film magazine Empire, the film ranked fifth in 2004 and first in 2006 on the lists for greatest movie of all time.

In the 1994 Academy Awards the movie was nominated for seven awards (Best Picture, Best Actor – Morgan Freeman, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Original Score, and Best Sound) but, in the shadow of 1994's big winner Forrest Gump, failed to win a single one. In 1998 Shawshank was not listed in AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies, but nine years later, it placed at the 72nd position on the revised list, outranking both Forrest Gump (76th) and Pulp Fiction (94th), the two most critically acclaimed movies from the year of Shawshank's release.

technorati tags: dvds movies, live action movies, dvd movies, movie directors, movie review, fiction movies, american movies, cool movies, drama movies, the movies, films movies, movie news, movies, movie

Scarface (1983)

2008-01-13T14:18:00.002-05:00

Scarface is a 1983 film directed by Brian De Palma, written by Oliver Stone and starring Al Pacino as Antonio "Tony" Montana. A loose remake of the 1932 Howard Hawks gangster film of the same title, it tells the story of a fictional Cuban refugee who comes to Florida in 1980 as a result of the Mariel Boatlift.

Tony becomes a gangster against the backdrop of the 1980s cocaine boom. The film chronicles his rise to the top of Miami's criminal underworld and subsequent downfall in Greek tragedy fashion.

The film is dedicated to Howard Hawks and Ben Hecht, who were the writers of the original Scarface.

Scarface was directed by Brian De Palma, produced by Martin Bregman, and written by now famed director Oliver Stone battling a cocaine addiction. Stone consulted the Miami police and the Drug Enforcement Agency while writing the film, incorporating many true crimes into the film, including using crime scene photos to inspire the infamous chainsaw scene.

The film was originally to be filmed in Florida but received criticism from the Cuban community who objected to the depiction of Cubans as drug dealers. Community representatives requested changes to the script to make Tony a Castro spy and subsequent anti-Castro activity against him in Miami a part of the plot. After protracted negotiations the producers ultimately refused to give in, saying the film was about cocaine and not the politics of Castro's Cuba. In order to ensure the safety of the crew and to avoid confrontations - with the exception being obvious exterior shots - the movie was filmed in and around Los Angeles.

When the film was submitted to the MPAA it was rated X for its extreme violence and graphic language, with the chainsaw scene the primary object of concern. DePalma cut the film twice but it still received an X rating. After the film was rejected for the third time DePalma with the help from a panel of experts including real narcotics officers told the MPAA the violence was an accurate portrayal of real life drug dealers and the film should be released with the violence intact to show viewers how violent the drug business was. With a third vote of 18 to 2 in favor of an 'R' the MPAA agreed. But DePalma who felt the differences between the two 'clean' cuts he put together were insignificant arranged to have the uncut version released to theatres with an R rating instead.

Scarface held its premiere on December 1st, 1983 in New York City where it was initially greeted with mixed reaction. Among those in attendance were the film's two stars: Al Pacino and Steven Bauer as well as Burt and Diane Lane, Melanie Griffith, Raquel Welch, Joan Collins; her then-boyfriend Peter Holm and Eddie Murphy among others . According to AMC's "DVD TV: Much More Movie" airing: Cher loved it, Lucille Ball, who came with her family, hated it because of the graphic violence and language; Dustin Hoffman was said to have fallen asleep. Writers Kurt Vonnegut and John Irving were among those who were said to have walked out in disgust after the notorious "chainsaw" scene. At the middle of the film, Martin Scorsese turned behind to Steven Bauer and told him "You guys are great - but be prepared, because they're going to hate it in Hollywood. . . because it's about them". Scarface, upon its first release, drew controversy regarding the violence and graphic language in the film, and received many negative reviews from movie critics. Despite this, the film grossed $65 million worldwide and has since gathered a large following. On the 2 Disc Special Edition, director Brian De Palma said that the film was well received by only one notable critic, Vincent Canby of The New York Times. However, Roger Ebert rated it four stars out of four in his 1983 review and he later added it to his "great movies" list.

Technorati Tags: Al Pacino Brian de Palma Scarface movies films best classic cult movie film classics top

Repo Man (1984)

2008-01-02T17:49:00.001-05:00

Repo Man is a 1984 cult film directed by Alex Cox. It was produced by Jonathan Wacks and Peter McCarthy, with executive producer Michael Nesmith, and stars Emilio Estevez and Harry Dean Stanton.

Otto Maddox (Emilio Estevez), an alienated young punk rocker living in mid-1980s Los Angeles, is fired from his menial, supermarket stock clerk job for talking back to his boss. Shortly afterwards, he finds out that his pot-smoking, ex-hippie parents have donated their entire savings account to a popular, but sleazy, televangelist. Leaving home and broke, Otto gets a job almost by accident with the disingenuously named "Helping Hand Acceptance Corporation", a small-time automobile repossession agency, where he is mentored by Bud (Harry Dean Stanton) a seasoned repo man who teaches Otto about the often hazardous profession.

Otto soon learns that "the life of a Repo Man is always intense." He enjoys the drug use, real-life car chases, and good pay. His old punk rock lifestyle seems boring by comparison, and begins to develop a rapport with his fellow repo men as well.

Soon, Bud, Otto and competing repo men all over town are searching for a 1964 Chevrolet Malibu from New Mexico, ludicrously overvalued at $20,000; this vehicle, unknown to them, contains something mysterious and dangerously powerful in its trunk, also sought by a strange female FBI agent, Agent Rogersz (Susan Barnes) and her staff.

The film draws on the experiences of Alex Cox, who worked briefly as a repo man in Los Angeles, but soon deviates into the surreal with aliens, the CIA, televangelism, punk rocker thieves and other strange characters and situations, all amid a long string of hilarious running gags and almost-impossible coincidences.

The soundtrack features now-classic punk rock tracks by Black Flag, the Circle Jerks, Suicidal Tendencies, Iggy Pop and others. Producer Mike Nesmith has a small cameo role (a mock TV commercial taken from his video production Elephant Parts).

It was meant to capture an angry spirit and features a collection of punk bands of the time.

Indie-rock label American Laundromat Records has announced plans to release a tribute to the film in 2008 with some of their favorite artists covering the classic punk-rock tracks. At the suggestion of Alex Cox himself, the tribute will include a bonus track "Burning Down The House" by The Talking Heads. The song was supposed to appear in a scene of the original film but the scene was cut due to song clearance issues.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)

2007-11-26T11:29:00.000-05:00

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is a 1974 American horror film/cult film, written, directed and produced by Tobe Hooper and Kim Henkel, who had writing credits. The film features a cast of many non-professional actors, including Marilyn Burns, Gunnar Hansen, Edwin Neal and Paul A. Partain. The film, despite its label as excessively graphic, does not rely so much on explicit gore to generate terror in the audience as it does on suspense, the deserted location and dramatic tension. The film has developed a dedicated cult following.

The plot of the film revolves primarily around a group of friends on a road trip in rural Texas. The purpose of the road trip is to visit the hometown of Sally and Franklin's father in order to check on their grandfather's grave after reports of grave robbing. After their van runs low on gas, the group of friends visits the childhood home of Sally and Franklin's father where they are attacked by a family of cannibalistic men, including the chainsaw-wielding Leatherface.

The film was an independent production, produced on a budget of just $83,532 and went on to gross $36,000,000 at the US box office in 1974 — making it the most successful independent film ever until surpassed by Halloween in 1978. While it is not the first of its specific genre, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre influenced subsequent films in the sub-genre. The film is the first of four Chainsaw films (completed or pending) directed by Hooper and Henkel. In 2003, it spawned a remake.

technorati tags: The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, 1974, horror film/cult film, Tobe Hooper, Kim Henkel, Marilyn Burns, Gunnar Hansen, Edwin Neal, Paul A. Partain, cult movie,cult horror movies,cult classic movies,cult videos,cult movies,movies cult,cult classic films,cult films

Pink Flamingos (1972)

2007-11-24T12:07:00.001-05:00

Pink Flamingos is a 1972 film directed by John Waters. It made an underground star of the flamboyant female impersonator, Divine. The independent film also stars David Lochary, Mary Vivian Pearce, Mink Stole, Danny Mills, Cookie Mueller, Edith Massey and Steve Yeager. Produced on a budget of only $12,000, it was shot on weekends in the vicinity of Baltimore, Maryland. The majority of the film was shot in Phoenix, Maryland, a suburb of Baltimore.

Since its release it has had a rather large cult following and is one of John Waters' most famous films. In 1997 the film was re-released, with an improved stereo soundtrack (which, unlike the original, was made available to the general public, on compact disc), and after the end of the original movie the new version contained a brief video commentary by Waters, plus a few scenes cut from the original release. The re-release was rated NC-17 by the Motion Picture Association of America.

The film came in at number 29 on the list of 50 Films to See Before You Die, on a show in the United Kingdom.

technorati tags: cult movie,cult classic movies,cult videos ,top 10 movies,cult movies,movies cult,cult classic films,cult films

Harold and Maude (1971)

2007-11-23T13:13:00.000-05:00

Harold and Maude (1971)

Harold and Maude is a cult classic movie directed by Hal Ashby in 1971. The film, featuring slapstick, dark humor, and existentialist drama, centers around the exploits of a morbid young man -- Harold -- who drifts away from the life that his detached mother prescribes him as he falls in love with septuagenarian Maude.

The film is number 45 on the American Film Institute's list of 100 Funniest Movies of all time, and number 42 on Bravo's 100 Funniest Movies. In 1997, it was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress as being deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

The film was a commercial failure when it was released and the critical reception was extremely mixed. It now has a large cult following.

The screenplay upon which the film was based was written by Colin Higgins, and published as a novel in 1971. The movie was shot in the San Francisco Bay Area. Harold and Maude was also a play on Broadway for some time.

The movie has given rise to two new words: "Harolding" (hanging around cemeteries) described by Douglas Coupland in "Harolding in West Vancouver" (1996); and "Maudism" or "Maudianism", the philosophy of living each day to the fullest. This may also have a link to the phonetically-identical philosophy of Mod-ism.

The entire soundtrack for the movie is by Cat Stevens.

technorati tags: cult movie,cult horror movies,cult classic movies,cult videos,sci fi movies,top 10 movies,cult movies,movies cult,cult classic films,cult films

Freaks (1932)

2007-11-16T12:36:00.000-05:00

Freaks is a Pre-Code 1932 horror film about sideshow performers, directed by Tod Browning.

The movie was made by Al Boasberg, Willis Goldbeck, Leon Gordon, and Edgar Allan Woolf from the short story Spurs by Tod Robbins. Browning, famed at the time for his collaborations with Lon Chaney and for directing Bela Lugosi in Dracula (1931), took the exceptional step of casting real people with deformities as the eponymous sideshow "freaks," rather than using costumes and makeup. Director Browning had been a member of a traveling circus in his early years, and much of the film was drawn from his personal experiences. He intended to portray the classic moral of how outer beauty does not necessarily equate to inner beauty. In the film, the physically deformed "freaks" are inherently trusting and honorable people, while the real monsters are two of the "normal" members of the circus who conspire to murder one of the performers to obtain his large inheritance.

Reaction to this film was so intense that Browning had trouble finding work afterwards, and this in effect brought his career to an early close. Because its deformed cast was shocking to moviegoers of the time, the film was banned in the United Kingdom for thirty years.

In 1994 the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

technorati tags: cult movie,cult horror movies,cult classic movies,cult videos,sci fi movies,top 10 movies,cult movies,movies cult,cult classic films,cult films

The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)

2007-10-07T10:43:00.002-05:00

The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)

The Rocky Horror Picture Show is a 1975 musical comedy film that parodies horror films, based on the British musical stage production The Rocky Horror Show, with the screenplay written by Richard O'Brien and Jim Sharman. The film features Tim Curry, Susan Sarandon and Barry Bostwick.

The film is considered a cult classic and a midnight movie — although it is widely known by mainstream audiences. It has a large national and international following. While it can be said that the popularity is high, critics point to the lack of plot and cartoonish style as well as the overly sexual nature of the film as some of its major drawbacks. Regardless of these facts the movie has gone on to become one of the most well known and financially successful midnight movies of all time. It is the longest running theatrical release in film history. More than 30 years later it is still in limited release in theaters around the world. In December 2005, Librarian of Congress James H. Billington added The Rocky Horror Picture Show to the National Film Registry, a list that contains only 450 films.

technorati tags: science fiction, horror, action

This Is Spinal Tap (1984)

2007-09-29T17:24:00.001-05:00

This Is Spinal Tap (1984)

This Is Spinal Tap (which is officially spelled with a non-functional umlaut symbol over the N) is a 1984 mockumentary directed by Rob Reiner and starring members of the semi-fictional heavy-metal glam rock band Spinal Tap. The film is a mock rockumentary that satirizes the wild personal behavior and musical pretensions of bands such as Slade, Led Zeppelin, Iron Maiden, AC/DC, Saxon, Deep Purple, The Rolling Stones, The Who, Queen, Dio, Aerosmith, Kiss, Black Sabbath, Motörhead, Judas Priest, Sweet, Pink Floyd and The Beatles, among many others.

Much of the film was ad libbed, and several dozen hours of footage were shot before Reiner edited it down to the released film. A 4½ hour bootleg version of the film exists and has been traded among fans and collectors for years.

The three core members of Spinal Tap, David St. Hubbins, Derek Smalls and Nigel Tufnel, are portrayed by the American actors Michael McKean and Harry Shearer and British American Christopher Guest respectively. They all actually play their instruments and speak credible British English throughout the film. Reiner appears as Marty DiBergi, the maker of the documentary. Other actors in the film are Tony Hendra as the group manager Ian Faith and June Chadwick as St. Hubbin's interfering girlfriend Jeanine. Actors Paul Shaffer, Fred Willard, Fran Drescher, Bruno Kirby, Howard Hesseman, Ed Begley Jr., Patrick Macnee, Anjelica Huston, Dana Carvey and Billy Crystal all play supporting roles or make cameo appearances in the film.

The name "Spinal Tap" alludes to lumbar puncture, a particularly unpleasant medical procedure.

This film is number 64 on Bravo's "100 Funniest Movies", and number 29 on AFI's 100 Years... 100 Laughs.

The movie cut a little too close to home for some musicians. Robert Plant, Dee Snider and Ozzy Osbourne all reported that, like Spinal Tap, they had become lost in confusing arena backstage hallways trying to make their way to the stage. Singer Tom Waits claimed he cried upon viewing it and Eddie Van Halen has said that when he first saw the film, everyone else in the room with him laughed as he failed to see the humor in the film. "Everything in that movie had happened to me," Van Halen said. When Dokken's George Lynch saw the movie he is said to have exclaimed, "That's us! How'd they make a movie about us?"

Horror Movie A Day

2007-08-27T17:48:00.000-05:00

VERY cool blog......

Horror Movie A Day

technorati tags: science fiction, horror, action

The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension

2007-08-16T15:56:00.000-05:00

The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension
Written by Anthony Burch

" That's right -- it's the third installment of our "Real Men Love _____" film nostalgia serial, and the first film we've spotlighted whose title doesn't begin with the letter "R." The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension is the quintessential cult classic B-movie: from its mishmashing of dozens of different film genres, to its detailed creation of a fictional world and hero, to its final, inexplicably cool ending credits, Buckaroo Banzai is, to put it bluntly, pure awesome. It failed to reach a real audience at the time of its release, but it now holds up as a test of true grit: only real men love The Adventures of buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension. "

full article here:
http://www.doubleviking.com/real-men-love-the-adventures-of-buckaroo-banzai-across-the-8th-dimension-5921-p.html

And its a must read if you like Buckaroo.

Week in Rewind--Movie Reviews by Christopher Smith: DVD Review: Cult Camp Classics Vol. 1: Sci-Fi Thrillers

2007-08-08T18:33:00.000-05:00

Week in Rewind--Movie Reviews by Christopher Smith: DVD Review: Cult Camp Classics Vol. 1: Sci-Fi Thrillers

Dr. No

2007-07-16T16:32:00.000-05:00

Dr. No is a 1962 spy film. It is the first film in the James Bond series, and the first to star Sean Connery as MI6 agent James Bond. Based on the 1958 novel Dr. No by Ian Fleming, it was adapted by Richard Maibaum, Johanna Harwood, and Berkeley Mather. The film was directed by Terence Young, and produced by Harry Saltzman and Albert R. Broccoli, a partnership that would continue until 1975.

In Bond's first film adventure, he is sent to Jamaica to investigate the death of a British agent. The trail leads him to the island home of Dr. Julius No, where he meets Honey Ryder. Bond and Ryder are soon captured by Dr. No, who has been disrupting American rocket tests in order to avenge himself on the West.

Dr. No's success, as the first Bond film, led to a long, very popular series of films that continues to this day. It does not show Bond earning his double-O status which grants him a licence to kill, instead it presents Bond as a seasoned veteran. Many of the iconic aspects of a typical James Bond film were established in Dr. No, beginning with what is known as the gun barrel sequence, an introduction to the character through the view of a gun barrel, and a highly stylized main title sequence, both created by Maurice Binder. Through Ken Adam, it established a unique and expansive visual style that is the hallmark of the Bond film series.

Psycho

2007-07-14T16:00:00.000-05:00

Psycho is a 1960 suspense/horror film directed by auteur Alfred Hitchcock from the screenplay by Joseph Stefano about a psychotic killer. It is based on the novel of the same name by Robert Bloch, which was in turn inspired by the crimes of Wisconsin serial killer Ed Gein. The film depicts the encounter between a secretary, Marion Crane (Janet Leigh), who is in hiding at a motel after embezzling from her employer, and the motel's owner, the lonely Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins). "The Shower Scene" has been studied, discussed, and referenced countless times in print and in film courses with debate focusing on why it is so terrifying and how it was produced, including how it passed the censors and who directed it.

It initially received mixed reviews but outstanding box-office returns, prompting a re-review which was overwhelmingly positive and led to four Academy Award nominations. Regarded today as one of Hitchcock's best films and highly praised as a work of cinematic art by international critics, Psycho is also acclaimed as one of the most effective horror films. The film spawned several sequels and a remake, which are generally seen as works of lesser quality.

Although Psycho is regarded as a classic, it set the scene, and even laid down the template for countless cult films to follow.

technorati tags:horror, Psycho, Alfred Hitchcock, Joseph Stefano, Ed Gein, Norman Bates

Breathless

2007-07-04T13:42:00.001-05:00

Breathless (French: À bout de souffle; literally "out of breath") is a 1960 film directed by Jean-Luc Godard.

Godard's first feature-length film is one of the inaugural and best-known films of the French New Wave. He wrote it with fellow New Wave director, François Truffaut, and released it the year after Truffaut's The 400 Blows and Alain Resnais's Hiroshima, Mon Amour. Together the three films brought international acclaim to the New Wave.

Breathless shocked contemporary audiences with its bold visual style and editing—much of which broke the rules of classical Hollywood cinema. Most notable of its innovations were jolting jump cuts and hand-held camera.

It was remade in 1983 as Breathless, starring Richard Gere and Valérie Kaprisky. The remake was released in France under the title "A Bout de Souffle Made in USA" .Where the original film is about an American girl and a French criminal in Paris. The remake is about a French girl and an American criminal in Los Angeles.

The film was directed by Jim McBride and written by McBride and L.M. Kit Carson.

Charles Band

2007-07-01T15:37:00.000-05:00

Charles Robert Band was born December 27, 1951 in Los Angeles, California. He is a director, writer, and producer of horror films. He is also the son of director-producer Albert Band.

One of the few non-horror films he worked on was the Prehysteria trilogy, which were made by his family-oriented company Moonbeam Entertainment.

His most famous films are the Puppet Master films made by his Full Moon Features company. Before he had Full Moon Features, his earlier (and now defunct) company Empire Pictures made films like Ghoulies and Re-Animator. His son, Alex Band, is the vocalist for The Calling.

List Of Full Moon Picture Films

Puppet Master Series
Puppet Master
Puppet Master II
Puppet Master III: Toulon's Revenge
Puppet Master 4
Puppet Master 5: The Final Chapter
Curse of the Puppet Master
Retro Puppet Master
Puppet Master: The Legacy
Puppet Master vs Demonic Toys

Miscellaneous
Crash and Burn
Doctor Mordrid
Doll Graveyard
The Gingerdead Man
Head of the Family
Meridian: Kiss Of The Beast
Trancers ( I loved that movie!)
Trancers II

http://www.charlesband.com/

technorati tags: science fiction, horror, action

www.scifi-horror.com

2007-06-01T16:09:00.000-05:00

www.scifi-horror.com

Simple to navagate site, but not a HUGE selection of movies.
But they do have some good ones.
Locate a movie and click on the picture and it takes you to IMDB for the info. Good idea and time saving.
The Sci-Fi section has some classics.....
20 Million Miles To Earth, Teenagers From Outer Space ( it was an extra on the 2005 PS2 video-game, "Destroy All Humans!") ,It Came From Outer Space to name a few.
And ACTUAL classics like Alien,Close Encounters,The Day The Earth Stood Still,Invaders From Mars and Starman ( hey..." I" liked it!)
The Horror section has some classics like Carnival Of Souls, House On Haunted Hill, Night Of The Living Dead and the original Silent Night Bloody Night.
They also carry a section of Pre-viewed Classic Movies.

The url is: http://www.scifi-horror.com

technorati tags: science fiction, horror, action

cultrent.com

2007-05-24T23:33:00.000-05:00

cultrent.com's site is a tad more cluttered than the last, but still easy to navigate.
They seem to lean more towards exploitation films, didn't see a lot of sci-fi or fantasy.
BUT on the first page theres " I Drink Your Blood" so all is not lost!

Looking around I also saw " Bamboo House of Dolls" which I saw at a drive in ages ago.

"Highway to Hell" is also on there. I thought that movie was hilarious.....is that bad?

Anyway, its a good site and well worth checking out.

The URL is http://www.cultrent.com/

But like I said earlier...be warned!

They have some pretty extreme films there.

technorati tags: science fiction, horror, action

Atomic Cinema

2007-05-19T21:16:00.000-05:00

Atomic Cinema

First off a VERY clean site. Navigation is a breeze.
They list movies by Directors, Actresses, Import DVDs, Clearance, Art and Cult, Sexy Cinema and Horror.
In the Horror section they have a large section that includes not only films, but trailers and specialized sections like Asian horror and Giallo films. Science fiction is also included in the horror area.
They also list a section of Exploitation Genres, including Cannibals and Women in Prison.
Like I said, very clean and easy to navigate, and to me that counts for allot!
LOL

http://atomiccinema.com

technorati tags: science fiction, horror, action

Dark Sky Films

2007-05-15T23:04:00.000-05:00

Dark Sky Films is a DVD distribution company, specializing in classic horror films, grindhouse titles, lost films, and general cinematic oddities. It was founded in 2005 as a wholly ownerd subsidiary of the Chicago-based video company MPI, itself famous for its wide range of releases, first in videotape in 1980s and then on DVD beginning in the late 1990s.

Among Dark Sky's releases thus far are the notable cult films The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Henry: Portait of a Serial Killer, Magic, and The Manson Family.
Among its speciality items are The College Girl Murders, Dog Eat Dog, Violent Midnight.
Its horror film catalog includes The Horror of Party Beach, The Curse of the Living Corpse, Don't Go Near the Park, The Flesh Eaters, Frankenstein Meets the Space Monster, and The Terror Beneath the Sea.
Dark Sky Films has also released "lost" films including Wet Asphalt and Without Warning, the motorcycle gang movies The Losers and Werewolves on Wheels, the documentary The Serial Killers, television shows such as the British series The Invisible Man and the made for TV movie Trilogy of Terror.
A series of drive-in double bill discs featuring Invasion of the Neptune Men with Prince of Space, and Creation of the Humanoids (widely reputed to be Andy Warhol's favorite film, though no one has been able yet to track down the source of the quote) with Prince of Space.
Most recently Dark Sky Films has released a trio of films produced by the British company Amicus: Asylum, And Now the Screaming Starts, and The Beast Must Die. Tobe Hooper's Eaten Alive has been announced as a forthcoming release.

http://www.darkskyfilms.com/

technorati tags: science fiction, horror, action

The Wild One

2007-05-12T21:29:00.000-05:00

The Wild One is a 1953 outlaw biker film. It is remembered for Marlon Brando's portrayal of the gang leader Johnny Stabler as a juvenile delinquent, dressed in a leather jacket and driving a 1950 Triumph Thunderbird 6T. Acting opposite of Brando was Lee Marvin as a rival gang leader. This low-budget production had Brando playing a "rebel without a cause" two years before James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause (1955).

The Wild One was based on a short story, "The Cyclists' Raid" by Frank Rooney, in the January 1951 issue of Harper's Magazine. The story was later published in book form as part of The Best American Short Stories 1952. The story took a cue from an actual biker street party on the Fourth of July weekend in 1947 in Hollister, California that was elaborately trumped up in Life Magazine, and dubbed the Hollister riot, with staged photographs of wild motorcycle outlaw revellers. The Hollister event is now celebrated annually. In the film, the town is located somewhere in California.

While at one point Johnny does threaten Kathy that he could take their cafe apart so fast they won't know what hit them, if they don't stop "needling" him, the bikers for the most part are just generally rowdy in pursuit of a good time, and don't radiate the sinister menace seen in later biker movies based on the Hells Angels, some of whom actually appeared in those films. Interestingly, Sonny Barger, the notorious founder of the Oakland Hells Angels, stated in his memoir that he identified with Chino, and considered Johnny the bully. Barger later bought the striped shirt Marvin wears in the film at an auction.

technorati tags:Marlon Brando,Johnny Stabler,1950 Triumph Thunderbird 6T, Lee Marvin,James Dean ,"The Cyclists' Raid"

They Live by Night

2007-05-06T16:29:00.000-05:00

They Live by Night is a Film noir released in 1949. The film was directed by Nicholas Ray (his first feature film) and starred Farley Granger as 'Bowie' Bowers and Cathy O'Donnell as 'Keechie' Mobley. The movie is the prototype for the 'couple on the run' genre, generally seen as the forerunner to the movie Bonnie and Clyde. The movie was based on Edward Anderson's Depression-era novel Thieves Like Us. Another movie based on that book was released in 1974, Robert Altman's Thieves Like Us. Actor Byron Foulger appears uncredited as the owner of the cabin where the two try to hide out.

Bowie (Farley Granger) teams up with fellow thieves Chicamaw and T-Dub to rob a bank - he needs the money to hire a lawyer to prove he's innocent of murder. Now on the run, Bowie finds momentary peace when he elopes with a young woman (O'Donnell). Things are compliciated when Chicamaw and T-Dub want him for one more job.

technorati tags: science fiction, horror, action

The Killers

2007-04-24T13:07:00.000-05:00

The Killers is a American film noir about the investigation of a mob murder. It is based in part on the short story of the same name by Ernest Hemingway. The film was directed by Robert Siodmak and released in 1946, starred Burt Lancaster in his screen debut, as well as Ava Gardner, Edmond O'Brien, and Sam Levene.

The film's story is about two hit men assigned to find and kill a man, Ole Anderson aka "the Swede"(Burt Lancaster), at a small-town dinner. Impatient for his arrival, they kill him instead at a boarding house where, resigned to his fate, he awaits their arrival.

Because Anderson's life was insured, Investigator Jim Reardon (Edmund O'Brien) is assigned to look into the murder for his company. Interviewing several people from Anderson's past, Reardon develops the theory that Anderson's murder stemmed from an unsolved payroll robbery years earlier.

Working with a police detective (Sam Levene) who was a boyhood friend of Anderson's, Reardon sets a plan in motion to trap the hired killers, and the man who hired them.

The first twenty minutes of the film, showing the arrival of the two contract killers, and the murder of Anderson, is a very close adaptation of Hemingway's short story. The rest of the film, showing Reardon's investigation of the murder, is wholly original. The Killers was the first, and to date the only, adaptation of a Hemingway work to leave successfully intact the author's laconic dialogue. According to Hemingway's biographer, Carlos Baker, The Killers "was the first film from any of his works that Ernest could genuinely admire."

Producer Mark Hellinger paid $36,750 for the screen rights to Hemingway's story, his first independent production. The screenplay was written by John Huston, uncredited due to his contract with Warners, and Richard Brooks.

Lancaster wasn't his first pick for the part of "the Swede," but Warner Bros. wouldn't lend out actor Wayne Morris for the film. Others considered for the part included Van Heflin, Jon Hall, Sonny Tufts, and Edmund O'Brien, who was instead cast in the role of the insurance investigator. In the role of the femme fatale, Kitty Collins, Hellinger cast Gardner, who had appeared virtually unnoticed in a string of minor films.

The 1964 remake was made by director Don Siegel with an updated plot, starring Lee Marvin and a villainous Ronald Reagan in his last motion picture.Originally made for television around the time of Kennedy's assassination, Siegel's film was deemed too violent for the small screen and was released theatrically, first in Europe, then years later in America.

In 1958, director Andrei Tarkovsky, then a film student, created a 19-minute short based on the story which is featured on the Criterion Collection DVD release.

Scenes from The Killers were used in the Steve Martin film noir spoof Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982).

The opening chords of Miklós Rózsa's theme music was later reused for the Dragnet television series.

The Killers is used as an example of noir cinematography in the documentary Visions of Light (1992).

technorati tags: action,casting film, classic film noir, classic movies, cult classic films, cult classic movies, cult films, cult movie, cult videos, film, film actor, film music, film noir,

The Elephant Man

2007-04-16T15:31:00.001-05:00

The Elephant Man is a 1980 biopic loosely based on the story of the 19th century British deformed celebrity, Joseph Merrick (called John Merrick in the film). The film was directed by David Lynch and stars John Hurt, Anthony Hopkins, Anne Bancroft, John Gielgud, Wendy Hiller, Michael Elphick, Hannah Gordon and Freddie Jones.

The screenplay was adapted by Christopher De Vore, Eric Bergren and David Lynch from the books The Elephant Man and Other Reminiscences (1923) by Sir Frederick Treves and The Elephant Man: A Study in Human Dignity by Ashley Montagu. It was shot in black-and-white.

The film is based on historical events but makes numerous changes to recorded fact. For example, the incidents in Belgium and at the railway station took place before Merrick was admitted to Treves's hospital, not afterward, and Merrick travelled to Belgium of his own accord, because freakshows had been made illegal in Britain, unlike the film, in which he is kidnapped. There is also no evidence that Merrick was abused while working at the horrible freakshow. In fact, Merrick had saved up a great deal of money from the wages he had earned while working there. Likewise, Treves did not "rescue" Merrick from a sadistic carnival proprietor; it was Merrick who freely approached the doctor with a written note requesting his care.

Contrary to the film, Dr. Treves did not cajole Merrick into speaking his first words. Indeed, on account of a severe constrictive deformity of the mouth, it actually took several operations before Merrick was physically able to speak at all. The film's chief antagonist, Bytes, is an altogether fictitious character. As played by Freddie Jones, wearing ratty clothes with a stove-pipe hat, a perpetual five-o'clock shadow and a chronic case of alcoholic tremors, Bytes is clearly modeled after Robert Newton's characterization of Bill Sykes in David Lean's 1948 film of Oliver Twist.

The film also repeats an error in many early biographies and fictionalizations of Merrick's life in calling him John, when his name was, in fact, named Joseph.

The film was produced by Mel Brooks, who downplayed his involvement as he did not want the project to be perceived as a comedy.

The make-up for John Hurt was made from casts of Merrick's body, which had been preserved at the Royal London Hospital. David Lynch originally attempted to do the make-up himself but the results were not filmable. The final make-up was devised by Christopher Tucker. The make-up was so convincing that the Motion Picture Academy was prompted to create a new category for Best Make-up for the Oscars.

In addition to writing and directing the film, David Lynch provided the musical direction and sound design. During its depiction of the final moments of Merrick's life, the film uses "Adagio for Strings" by Samuel Barber. This has been partly responsible for a resurgence in the piece's popularity (it would be later used in the 1986 Oscar-winning Vietnam war film, Platoon).

Actor Frederick Treves, great nephew of the surgeon, appears in the opening sequences as an Alderman trying to close down the freakshow.

The Elephant Man was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Picture, Actor in a Leading Role (John Hurt), Art Direction-Set Decoration, Costume Design, Director, Film Editing, Music: Original Score, and Writing: Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium.

It was also won the BAFTA Award for Best Film as well as other BAFTA Awards for Best Film, Best Actor (John Hurt) and Best Production Design, and was nominated for four others: Direction, Screenplay, Cinematography and Editing.

technorati tags:The Elephant Man,classic movies, cult classic films, cult classic movies, cult dvd, cult films, cult movie, cult videos, dvd, dvds movies, film, film actor, film directing, film production, movie, movie cinema, movie film, movie films, movies cult, movies dvd, movies film,

Election

2007-04-15T17:29:00.001-05:00

Election is a 1999 film adapted from a critically acclaimed 1998 novel of the same name by by Tom Perrotta. The plot revolves around a three-way election race in high school that satirizes high school life and politics. The film received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay, as well as a Golden Globe nomination for Witherspoon in the Best Actress category.

It stars Matthew Broderick, Reese Witherspoon and Chris Klein and is set in suburban Omaha, Nebraska and is the story of Jim McAllister (Broderick) and Tracy Flick (Witherspoon). McAllister is a high school teacher whose enthusiastic involvement with various school-related functions masks his frustration with other aspects of his life. Tracy is an overachiever whose obsession with getting into a good college masks both a vindictive, manipulative and sexual side, Tracy is currently holding a nomination in her school election, McAllister believes she does not deserve the title, and tries his best to stop her winning the election.

The film gained much attention commercially and critically in 1999, mainly because of word-of-mouth and high critical praise, while it failed to become a major box office success, home video and DVD issues where popular, and the film acheived a cult status. Following its release, the movie has received various rankings, Election is ranked #61 on Bravo's 100 Funniest Movies, Witherspoon's performance as Flick was ranked at #45 on the list of the 100 Greatest Film Performances of All Time by Premiere Magazine, and #9 on Entertainment Weekly's list of the 50 Best High School Movies.

technorati tags: cult movie,cult horror movies,cult classic movies,cult videos,sci fi movies,top 10 movies,cult movies,movies cult,cult classic films,cult films

The Eiger Sanction

2007-04-09T12:14:00.002-05:00

The Eiger Sanction is a 1975 action thriller film based on a 1972 novel by American author Dr. Rodney William Whitaker, under the pen name Trevanian. The film was directed by Clint Eastwood who also starred as Dr. Jonathan Hemlock.

Dr. Jonathan Hemlock, professor of art and expert mountaineer, is a retired government assassin called upon to return to work for two more sanctions, or assassinations. He's used the small fortune he made from previous sanctions to amass a small but impressive art collection, made up primarily of stolen pieces smuggled into the U.S. from Europe.

His boss is "Dragon", an ex-Nazi pure albino confined to semi-darkness and kept alive by blood transfusions. Dragon wants him to sanction two men responsible for the death of another government agent, a man who was also a friend of Hemlock's. But Hemlock refuses, insisting he is retired and uninterested in the work, regardless of the personal turn it has taken. Dragon will not be denied, however, and he arranges for Hemlock's illicit art collection to be seized by the IRS unless he cooperates. One of the targets is a member of an international climbing team about to ascend the north face of the Eiger in Switzerland, a treacherous route which has claimed many lives.

Hemlock goes to train in Arizona with his friend, Ben Bowman, then both decamp to Switzerland to join the climbing team. There is, of course, much conflict within the team, mainly due to clashing egos. The expedition eventually sets out, but encounters extremely bad conditions. Eventually rescued from the railroad that runs through the mountain, Hemlock finds the target of his mission, but it is not the one he expected.

This film has developed a cult following because of the authentic mountain climbing sequences at the end of the film. Since the film was made in 1975, there were no CGI effects used — all the mountain climbing was real. Clint Eastwood did all his own stunts, saying that he couldn't expect a stuntman to risk his life if he wasn't ready to risk his own. Many rock climbers, mountaineers, and even critics who didn't like the film praise these scenes for their realism, and have said they make the film worth watching.

technorati tags: cult movie,cult classic movies,cult videos,top 10 movies,cult movies,movies cult,cult classic films,cult films

Eegah!

2007-04-07T14:33:00.002-05:00

Eegah! (also known as Eegah! The Name Written in Blood) is a 1962 film starring Arch Hall Sr. as Robert Miller, Arch Hall Jr. as Tom Nelson, Richard Kiel (who portrayed the character Jaws in the James Bond films The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker) as Eegah, and Marilyn Manning as Roxy Miller. The movie was directed by Arch Hall Sr. (writing and directing under the pseudonym "Nicholas Merriweather," and acting under the pseudonym "William Watters"), and was also written by Hall and Bob Wehling. The film was featured on an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000, and was one of the films listed in Michael Medved's book The 50 Worst Films Ever Made.

This film was featured on the movie-mocking cable television show Mystery Science Theater 3000 in 1993. The MST3K version has been released on DVD by Rhino Home Video. The DVD contains both the aired MST3K episode and the original uncut version of the film.

One of the goofs from this episode later became a stock MST3K gag: Robert Miller's voice calling out "Watch out for snakes!" to Tom and Roxy sounding like he's off camera and his lips not moving. This prompted Tom Servo to shout in a muffled, garbled tone, "Watch out for snakes!" at several points in the film (and several films they mocked after that, including Mitchell).

In the published episode guide to the series, The Mystery Science Theater 3000 Amazing Colossal Episode Guide (ISBN 0-553-37783-3), the cast considers the shaving scene from Eegah, in which Eegah lolls his tongue around and laps up shaving cream, to be one of the most disgusting things they've witnessed during their time on the show.

Ray Dennis Steckler (aka Cash Flagg), who directed and starred in another movie shown on MST3K, The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!?, had a minor role in Eegah! as Mr. Fishman.

technorati tags: cult movie,cult horror movies,cult classic movies,cult videos,sci fi movies,top 10 movies,cult movies,movies cult,cult classic films,cult films

Edward Scissorhands

2007-04-05T17:50:00.005-05:00

Edward Scissorhands is a 1990 film directed by Tim Burton and co-written by Burton and screenwriter Caroline Thompson. It stars Johnny Depp as Edward Scissorhands, Winona Ryder as Kim Boggs, and Dianne Wiest as Peg Boggs. Vincent Price also has a role in the film; his last performance before his death. The film centers Peg Boggs who meets a young, shy, quirky and bizarre looking man named Edward - with hands made of scissors - and adopts him into her own 'typical American' family.

The movie is a fable set in an exaggeratedly stereotypical vision of American suburbia that intentionally combines clichés from both the 1950s and the late 1980s. It also has a central theme of the isolated, misunderstood major character, a theme that recurs in much of Burton's work. Further, many of the motifs and themes of the 1931 film Frankenstein are referenced in Edward Scissorhands.

The genesis of Edward Scissorhands came from a childhood drawing of director Tim Burton, which reflected his feelings of isolation and being unable to communicate. After making Batman, he found that Warner Bros. unreceptive to the idea, but 20th Century Fox were interested. He hired Caroline Thompson to write the screenplay, having been impressed by her short story First Born, about an abortion that comes back to life.

Tom Cruise was initially interested in playing the lead role. In 1989, Johnny Depp read the script and "wept like a newborn". Meeting Burton and producer Denise Di Novi in Los Angeles, California, he and Burton got on very well. A few weeks later Burton hired Depp in the role.

The plot of Edward Scissorhands bears resemblances to Mary Shelley's novel, Frankenstein, in as much as Edward is an artificially created man; however, such similarities to the novel are limited.

For example, both Edward and Frankenstein's monster are "monstrous", yet Edward's Creator adored him and wished to give him all he desired. This stands in contrast to the case of Shelley's Frankenstein in which the creator abandoned, despised, and hated his creature.

Instead, the film bears closer similarities to later adaptations of the original Frankenstein story. In particular, Edward's appearance, with black clothing, shambling, almost mechanical gait, and pale, scarred face, resembles that of the Frankenstein monster in the 1954 Hammer Films version. Additionally, the plot roughly follows that of the 1931 motion picture Frankenstein in that Edward, a creature without malice or knowledge of deception, is naïve to the selfish, malicious, deceitful, and fearful nature of his human hosts. As a result, Edward's innocent mistakes are interpreted as malicious acts by the people of the neighborhood leading to his ultimate downfall in which those who Edward had trusted and loved reveal their underlying fear and misunderstanding along with their selfish motivations for befriending him (such as availing themselves of his artistic abilities).

As well, the final scene involving the confrontation with townspeople at Edward's castle is undeniably an homage to the original 1931 Frankenstein.

In the book, Frankenstein, the monster's maker pursues his creation into the arctic wastes of snow and ice to an unstated and therefore ambiguous end, which is echoed in Edward's retreat to his father's house, where he works ice into snow, presumably forever.

The appearance of Edward resembles that of Cesare from the 1920 movie The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

Similarities and common plot developments are also seen between Edward Scissorhands and the classic story Beauty and the Beast; in both, a misunderstood and visually frightening (but nonetheless emotionally sensitive) "beast" earns the affection of the lead female character (in these cases also an ingénue) while becoming the object of the townspeople's derision and hatred. From there, it is easy to find a parallel between Edward Scissorhands and Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical version of The Phantom of the Opera. Though Erik the Phantom is a considerably less benign character than Edward, the climax of Edward Scissorhands, in which Kim breaks a scissored implement from one of the inventor's machines as proof to the lynch mob of Edward's "death", bears a striking resemblance to the final moments of The Phantom of the Opera, in which the character Meg Giry produces the Phantom's mask when announcing to the assembled mob (and the audience) that the unhappy man is not gone forever, but to live in isolation away from the rest of society.

Edward Scissorhands was apparently inspired in part by the 19th Century German children's nursery character 'Shock-headed Peter', from the book Struwwelpeter authored by Heinrich Hoffman. Struwwelpeter was a moral fable about the benefits of good grooming. Peter is a slovenly child who refuses to wash or allow his nails to be cut or his hair to be combed. Peter's frightful appearance is mirrored in the plight of the feral Edward Scissorhands, unable to groom himself due to his predicament, and having similarly messy hair and sharp scissors where Peter had untamed fingernails. Another tale from Struwwelpeter, The Story of Little Suck-a-Thumb, features the Scissorman, a sort of Boogeyman in the form of a tailor, who uses his shears to cut off the thumbs of children who suck their thumbs.

In 2005, choreographer Matthew Bourne staged a contemporary dance interpretation of Edward Scissorhands at Sadler's Wells, London. The production is currently on tour in the US and Canada. In Bourne' version Edward is the result of a boy who was struck by lightning while playing with scissors and his subsequent Techno-Corporeal reanimation by his scientist father. Despite these changes, Burton gave his blessing to Bourne's version. The ballet has received positive reviews.

In terms of memorabilia and collectibles, numerous action figures have been designed in commemoration of Edward Scissorhands with its rise in nostalgic popularity. McFarlane Toys produced a realistic and highly detailed Edward Scissorhands figure in 1999 as part of its third Movie Maniacs series. That same year, a Japanese company released its own Edward figure. Mezco has also released a stylized, four-figure Mez-Itz box set as well as two 9" rotocast figures in 2005 and 2006.

http://www.squidoo.com/cult-movies

technorati tags: cult movie,cult horror movies,cult classic movies,cult videos,sci fi movies,top 10 movies,cult movies,movies cult,cult classic films,cult films

Eddie and the Cruisers

2007-04-04T16:24:00.001-05:00

Eddie and the Cruisers was a movie released in 1983, followed by one sequel, Eddie and the Cruisers II: Eddie Lives in 1989. The film stars Tom Berenger, Michael Pare and Ellen Barkin, directed by Martin Davidson. The screenplay by Martin Davidson and Arlene Davidson was based on the novel by P. F. Kluge. The film was marketed with the tagline "Rebel. Rocker. Lover. Idol. Vanished."

The movie is about a 1960s rock 'n roll band called Eddie and the Cruisers. The band makes a name for itself while playing regularly at a Somers Point, New Jersey club called TonyMart's. It is there that they meet Frank "Wordman" Ridgeway, whom Eddie hires to be the band's keyboard player and lyricist.

With Ridgeway's help the band stops playing cover songs and releases an album of original material, Tender Years, that becomes a hit. The band spends a year recording their next album, A Season in Hell. The album is a culmination of all that Eddie has ever hoped to do with music, different from anything that anyone else had ever done at that point. It strikes the head of their record company, Satin Records, as too strange to release.

In the early morning hours after Satin refuses to release the new album, Eddie's car goes over the side of the Raritan Bridge. His body is never found, and he is declared dead.

Almost 20 years later, Satin re-releases the band's first album, which becomes a surprise hit, climbing higher on the charts than the original ever did. This is where the movie begins, with the editors of a television show deciding to do a story on the band, with an attempt to bring light to the band's second album, which disappeared from the vaults of Satin Records the day after Eddie supposedly died.

Though the namesake of the movie is the band's lead singer, the movie revolves around the other members of the Cruisers, especially Frank Ridgeway, and their memories of the band. All of the members have by now moved on with their lives, and are mostly not involved in the music business at all. Much of the movie takes place in flashback, prompted by the television reporter, Maggie Foley. Tensions building within the Cruisers during the flashback sequences coincide with Frank becoming more open about the story with Maggie.

The story's climax involves Eddie's girlfriend, Joann Carlino, completing the one piece of the flashback puzzle that Frank could not: what happened the night that Satin refused to release the band's second album?

After storming from the studio, Eddie brought her to the Palace of Depression, a makeshift castle made of garbage and junk that he visited often as a child. She reveals that it was in fact her that took the master tapes for Season in Hell from Satin Records, hiding them in Palace of Depression, where she felt they belonged.

Frank and Joann go back to Palace of Depression to retrieve the master tapes. After returning to Joann's house, she receives a phone call that she believes to be from Eddie, who has been missing for almost 20 years, and with whom she remains in love. Frank hides outside and watches as a blue chevy, identical to Eddie's old car, arrives at the house, and a voice that sounds like Eddie's calls to her. Before Joann can reach the car, Frank pulls the driver from behind the wheel, who turns out to be the band's old manager, who was using the trickery to obtain possession of the master tapes. They give him the master tapes for Season in Hell, which he promises to release under a deal that will benefit all of them.

The movie closes with Maggie's story about the band, being viewed on televisions in a store window and watched by a crowd outside. The credits roll as a song from Season in Hell is premiered for the first time, and as the lights from the television dim, the crowd walks away, leaving only one person standing at the window. His reflection appears in the store window, revealing him to be the long-lost Eddie Wilson, much older.

Ed Wood

2007-04-01T13:19:00.001-05:00

Ed Wood is a biopic directed by Tim Burton, starring Johnny Depp as the cross-dressing cult movie maker Edward D. Wood Jr. The film, shot in black and white, was made in 1994 and based in large part on Rudolph Grey's biography Nightmare of Ecstasy. The film focuses on the period in Ed's life when he made his best-known films, and also his relationship with Bela Lugosi (played by Oscar winner Martin Landau), the down-on-his luck actor who had starred as Dracula in the film of the same name. Though a box office failure at the time of its release, it was critically hailed and has subsequently been voted onto IMDB's "top 250" by its users. It also resulted in a 1994 Best Supporting Actor Academy Award win for Martin Landau.

Ed Wood spans a period of six years in which he made his most famous movies, starting with the autobiographical Glen or Glenda (1953) and climaxing with the release of his most famous film, Plan 9 From Outer Space (1959).

Johnny Depp – Ed Wood, Jr.
Martin Landau – Bela Lugosi
Sarah Jessica Parker – Dolores Fuller
Bill Murray – Bunny Breckinridge
Patricia Arquette – Kathy O'Hara
Jeffrey Jones – Criswell
Lisa Marie – Vampira
George "The Animal" Steele – Tor Johnson
Juliet Landau – Loretta King
Vincent D'Onofrio – Orson Welles
Korla Pandit – himself (as organist in party scene)
The film includes cameo appearances from actors who had worked with Wood on Plan 9 From Outer Space. Conrad Brooks (who played one of the comic policemen) appears as a bartender, and Gregory Walcott (who played the hero) appears as one of the potential financiers of Bride of the Monster. In addition, Paul Marco, the other comic policeman, can be spotted in the background. The two men are played by Max Casella and Brent Hinkley. Also, prolific voice actor Maurice LaMarche did uncredited dubbing for Vincent D'Onofrio as Orson Welles. LaMarche is known for his Orson Welles impression.

Juliet Landau, who plays Loretta King, is Martin Landau's daughter.

This is the only Tim Burton film to date that does not have a music score by Danny Elfman; the soundtrack for Ed Wood was by Howard Shore. However, it has been confirmed that Elfman will not be scoring Sweeney Todd.

The DVD edition of Ed Wood initially had difficulty reaching store shelves in North America due to unspecified legal issues. In February 2004, a DVD was shipped to stores, only to be recalled again without explanation—though some copies quickly found their way to collectors' venues such as eBay. The DVD was finally released on October 19, 2004, minus the transvetitism-themed featurette "When Carol Met Larry", which is highly speculated was the reason for the legal woes. (Others claimed that Burton thought the featurette mocked transvestites, counter to the themes of the film.) However, on the Dutch edition of the DVD (and probably the entire German 2-region) this featurette is present.

Another theory states that the producers did not have the legal right to release a film including the song "Que Será Será" on DVD. The song barely plays in the background of one scene, but is featured prominently in the cut sequences included.

Yet another theory is that it was due to a deleted scene where Lugosi refers to 'those bastards at Universal'. This is supported in that this scene can only be found as an Easter egg on the final DVD release.

technorati tags: cult movie,cult classic movies,cult videos

Eating Raoul

2007-03-29T15:48:00.001-05:00

Eating Raoul is a 1982 black comedy about a conservative married couple living in Hollywood who take to killing people for their money. It was directed by Paul Bartel and written by Bartel and Richard Blackburn. The writers also commissioned a single issue comic book based on the movie for promotion; it was created by underground comics creator, Kim Deitch.

On April 13, 2004, the long out of print cult classic was released on DVD by Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment.

Paul and Mary Bland are a wine dealer and a nurse, respectively, who grieve over their low statuses in life and dream of someday opening a restaurant.

After Mr. Bland is fired from his job at a wine shop (shortly after an unrelated in-store shooting), the couple are left relatively penniless and the chances that they will ever realize their dream quickly diminish. Their strife is exacerbated by the fact that they live in an apartment building that is a regular site of orgies and bondage parties.

After a "swinger" wanders drunk into their apartment and tries to rape Mrs. Bland, Mr. Bland kills him by hitting him with a frying pan. They take his money and put him in the trash compactor. Later on, they kill another swinger along the same lines, and realize that they could actually make money by killing "rich perverts," and proceed to do so, getting advice on infiltrating the swinging lifestyle from one of the apartment's orgy regulars, Doris the Dominatrix.

After finding a flyer attached to their car for cheap lock installation, they decide, for the safety of Mr. Bland's wine collection, to have the locks on their apartment door changed.

The locksmith's name is Raoul, a Latino man who moonlights as a cat burglar, robbing the homes and apartments of his clients. He breaks into the Blands' apartment the night after installing their locks, only to stumble across the corpse of the Blands' latest victim, a Nazi fetishist, who has also decorated the apartment in Nazi paraphernalia before he was killed.

Paul catches Raoul and the two strike a deal: Not only will Raoul keep the Blands' secret, he tells them that he knows a place where he can "exchange" the corpses for cash. The Blands accept, and Raoul goes to work for them (he sells the corpses to a dog food company), also secretly stealing the victims' cars and selling them.

One night shortly after, Mr. Bland leaves to buy groceries (and a new frying pan, since Mary is "a bit squeamish about cooking with the one we use to kill people") and Mrs. Bland is left alone in the house. Their next customer, a hippie Vietnam veteran, arrives while Paul is gone, and when Mrs. Bland explains that he missed his appointment, he tries to rape her. Raoul wanders in, sees the hippie attacking Mrs. Bland and strangles him to death with his belt. Raoul then offers Mary marijuana and they have sex.

This affair goes on for a while, with Raoul beginning to convince Mary to run away with him. After Raoul tries to run Paul down in his van, Paul hires Doris the Dominatrix to pose as a variety of people (including an immigration agent and a sexual health counselor) to try and get rid of Raoul (by making him believe he is being deported and feeding him salt peter, respectively). None of these plans work, however, and Raoul arrives in the Blands' apartment with a gun and prepares to kill Mr. Bland. He informs Paul that he and Mary will be getting married, and then brings Paul into the kitchen so that he and Mary can both kill him together; instead, Mary kills Raoul with a frying pan.

Mary and Paul then realize that they are going to be having a man over for dinner who wants to invest in their restaurant venture, and that the man is expecting to be served a sampler of the Blands' proposed menu. With no food left in the house, and little time before the investor's arrival, Paul and Mary cook Raoul and serve him up for dinner. The investor is impressed; the last shot of the film is a smiling Paul and Mary in front of their brand new restaurant, with the caption, "Bon Appétit."

technorati tags: cult movie,cult classic movies,cult videos

Easy Rider

2007-03-27T15:51:00.001-05:00

Easy Rider is a 1969 road movie, written by Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper and Terry Southern. It was produced by Fonda and directed by Hopper. Southern also came up with the title of the movie, which borrows the slang term easy rider (which in this context refers to a man who is supported financially by a girlfriend who is a prostitute).

The film tells the story of two young men, Wyatt (played by Fonda) and Billy (Hopper), who "went looking for America but couldn't find it anywhere."

Along with Arthur Penn's Bonnie and Clyde, Easy Rider helped kick-start an artistic renaissance in Hollywood during the late sixties and early seventies. The major studios realised that money could be made from low-budget films made by directors with artistic intentions. Heavily influenced by the French New Wave, the films of the so-called "Hollywood Renaissance" came to represent a generation increasingly disillusioned with their government and the world.

Despite being shot in the first half of 1968, between Mardi Gras and the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, the film did not have a US debut until July of 1969.

Hopper received the "first film award" (Prix de la premiere oeuvre) at the 1969 Cannes Film Festival. It was also nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Jack Nicholson) and Best Writing, Story and Screenplay Based on Material Not Previously Published or Produced.

The film was #88 on the American Film Institute's list of 100 Years, 100 Movies, and has been selected for preservation in the United States' National Film Registry.

Easy Rider has been cited and parodied many times since. A scene from the film Starsky & Hutch features the titular characters dressed as Wyatt and Billy, riding motorcycles to The Weight. Author Philip K. Dick mentions Easy Rider in his story A Scanner Darkly, in which a character sees the movie in a vision induced while tripping on a reality distortion field created by Scrizer. The movie was also mentioned in the book Steal This Book by Abbie Hoffman; he urged all readers, yippies and hippies to make sure the rest of America didn't fall for the image of the Yippies, hippies, and their kind as a group with a (sic) "Easy Rider take-no-crap" image.

Both The Band and Crosby, Stills, & Nash were considered for the soundtrack. However, during editing, Hopper used various music from his own record collection. When CSN viewed a rough cut of the film, they assured Hopper that they couldn’t do any better than what he already had.

Bob Dylan was asked to contribute music, but was reluctant to use his own recording of It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding), so a version performed by Byrds frontman Roger McGuinn was used instead. Also, instead of writing an entirely new song for the film, Dylan simply wrote out the first verse of “Ballad of Easy Rider” and told the filmmakers, “Give this to McGuinn, he’ll know what to do with it.” McGuinn completed the song and performed it in the film.

technorati tags: cult movie,cult classic movies,cult videos,top 10 movies,CULT MOVIES,movies cult,cult classic films,cult films,cult dvd

cult movie

Napoleon Dynamite

2007-03-24T14:03:00.001-05:00

Napoleon Dynamite is the feature film debut of director Jared Hess, based on his earlier short film, Peluca. Napoleon was filmed in the summer of 2003 in and around Preston, Idaho.

It made its debut at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2004 and was released to theaters in June 2004. It won Best Feature Film at the U.S. Comedy Arts Festival the same year. The film's budget was only $400,000. When they were sold to a professional company with advertising they gave them another $100,000 to shoot the scene seen at the end of the movie, after credits. The DVD was released on December 21, 2004.

In 2005, it won 3 MTV Movie Awards, for Breakthrough Male Performance, Best Musical Performance, and Best Movie. This film is number 14 on Bravo's "100 Funniest Movies."

On May 16, 2006, Fox released a collector's edition of the film in collectible packaging in Region 1 (Paramount holds the rights in most countries outside of the US and Canada).

Preston, Idaho is a real town located near the Utah border, and is predominantly Mormon. Since the release of Napoleon Dynamite, it has become a tourist attraction of sorts, with the school, Preston High School, being a main feature. In April 2005, the Idaho state legislature approved a resolution commending the filmmakers for producing Napoleon Dynamite, specifically enumerating the benefits the movie has brought to Idaho, as well as for showcasing various aspects of Idaho's culture and economy.On June 24-25, 2005, Preston held a Napoleon Dynamite Festival, celebrating the film. An estimated 6,000 people attended the two-day event. About one year later on July 8, 2006, Preston held another festival, but it was not as successful as the previous year. The film displays some quirky references to Mormon popular culture. Napoleon uses euphemisms, like gosh, heck, and flip, that are characteristic of (though hardly exclusive to) Latter-day Saint circles; examples would include the lines, "What the flip was Grandma doing at the sand dunes?" and "Heck yes; I'd vote for you."

Napoleon is seen wearing a t-shirt that reads "Ricks College", the former junior college located in Rexburg, Idaho now known as BYU Idaho. In the DVD extras, there is an interview with Jon Heder in which he jokes that perhaps Napoleon and Deb may be "sealed for time and all eternity" — a reference to the Latter-day Saint belief in "eternal marriage" or "sealing" performed in the Church’s temples. The principal's reference to "Juarez" — where he assumes Pedro is from — may be a reference to Ciudad Juárez, a city on the U.S.-Mexico border. Characters, even those intended to be the popular girls, do not wear shorts any shorter than knee-length. Fashions in LDS culture tend to be more modest than those of popular culture. Napoleon goes to Deseret Industries, a thrift store operated by the LDS Church, to buy his famous suit. At the same time, the director seems to have taken care to not project an overt presence of Latter-day Saint/Mormon culture. Crosses and statue images pertaining to other Christian churches are placed prominently in some scenes, particularly at Pedro's house, which is full of Roman Catholic iconography.

While the film is set in the present day, it contains many parachronisms. For example, the music playing at the school dance is from the 1980s, featuring "Forever Young" by Alphaville and Cyndi Lauper's "Time after Time". Other vestiges of earlier decades include fashion trends that reflect those of the 70s and 80s, and the top-loading VCR in the Dynamite residence that resembles those from the early 1980s. Throwbacks to the 1990s come from music by the Backstreet Boys when the two girls were dancing to Max Martin and Jay Orpin's "Larger than Life" and Jamiroquai used in the choreography of Summer and Pedro's skits (their song "Canned Heat" is used for the scene in which Napoleon dances). Also, the TV resembles a model of the early 1990s and some of the shows resemble 1999 pop culture, especially the exercise commercials. The type of imitation Tupperware Uncle Rico is seen selling door-to-door has not been available for purchase for many years. Kip does use the Internet for dating and Rico uses it to purchase a "time machine". However, the style of computer is arguably from the mid to late 1990s and he is using a dial up internet service that charges users by the minute, a practice uncommon in the US since the late 1990s. The music playing in the Pontiac is roughly contemporary to the film's 2004 release. Finally, Napoleon's school ID card, as shown in the opening credits, clearly reads "2004/2005", unambiguously setting the movie in the present day, despite the film's abundance of elements suggesting otherwise.

Duck Soup

2007-03-21T10:59:00.001-05:00

Duck Soup is the 1933 Marx Brothers' anarchic comedy film written by Bert Kalmar, Harry Ruby, Arthur Sheekman, and Nat Perrin and directed by Leo McCarey. It starred what were then billed as the "Four Marx Brothers" (Groucho, Harpo, Chico, and Zeppo) and also featured Margaret Dumont, Raquel Torres, and Louis Calhern. It was the last Marx Brothers film to feature Zeppo.

Popular belief holds that Duck Soup was a box office failure, but this is not the case. Even though it did not do as well as Horse Feathers, it was the sixth-highest grossing film of 1933, according to Glenn Mitchell in The Marx Brothers Encyclopedia and Simon Louvish in his biography of the Marx Brothers, Monkey Business. The musical introduction to Groucho's character is similar to the ones in Animal Crackers and Horse Feathers, and audiences at the time may have seen it as a rehash, though modern audiences do not necessarily make this association. Although Groucho's opening number did not become connected with him closely as did the Animal Crackers numbers, its biting satire resonates:

The last man nearly ruined this place,
He didn't know what to do with it;
If you think this country's bad off now,
Just wait till I get through with it!

A possible reason for the film's bad reception might be because of the time frame in which it was released: in the midst of the Great Depression of 1929-1939. Audiences were taken aback by such preposterous political disregard, buffoonery and cynicism at a time of political crisis. (This film quote, spoken by Groucho, was reportedly especially detested: "And remember, while you're out there risking life and limb through shot and shell, we'll be in here thinking what a sucker you are!")

The people of the city of Fredonia, New York protested the film because they feared that the similar-sounding Freedonia hurt their city's reputation. The Marx Brothers responded with, "Change the name of your town. It's hurting our picture."

Years later, Arthur Marx, Groucho's son, described Irving Thalberg's assessment of the film's failure during a National Public Radio interview:

Thalberg said the trouble with Duck Soup is you've got funny gags in it, but there's no story and there's nothing to root for. You can't root for the Marx Brothers because they're a bunch of zany kooks. Thalberg says, "You gotta put a love story in your movie so there'll be something to root for, and you have to help the lovers get together."

The supposedly necessary love story, included in later Marx films, is often seen as an intrusion, and the early films are seen as being "pure" comedy. Duck Soup is now seen as a classic political farce. The film was #85 on American Film Institute's 100 Years, 100 Movies and #5 on its 100 Years, 100 Laughs, and has been selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry. It is consistently on the Internet Movie Database's list of top 250 films. In 2000, readers of Total Film magazine voted Duck Soup the 29th greatest comedy film of all time. It is also one of the earliest films to appear on Pulitzer Prize-winning film critic Roger Ebert's list of Great Movies.

American literary critic Harold Bloom considers the end of Duck Soup one of the greatest works of American art produced in the 20th century.

technorati tags: cult movies

Drop Dead Fred

2007-03-18T14:34:00.001-05:00

Drop Dead Fred is a 1991 comedy fantasy film released by New Line Cinema. Rik Mayall stars as Drop Dead Fred, the imaginary friend of Elizabeth, played as an adult by Phoebe Cates. The supporting cast includes Marsha Mason, Tim Matheson, Carrie Fisher, and Ashley Peldon as young Elizabeth.

Elizabeth Cronin returns to live at home with her mother after losing her money, car, job and husband in her lunch hours.

In her room, she finds a jack-in-the-box, which held her imaginary friend, Drop Dead Fred, captive since she was a child. Unlike Elizabeth who is wholesome, sweet, and innocent, Fred is a troublemaker that often causes problems for Elizabeth. Of course, since Drop Dead Fred is imaginary, Elizabeth is actually the one creating havoc for herself. We learn that Fred exists to serve as an outlet for Elizabeth whose mother was abusive and demanding.

Elizabeth is taken to a psychiatrist (Alycia Lutz), who prescribes drugs to get rid of Fred. Furthermore, she reconciles with her husband, only to find out he's still cheating on her. Right before she takes the last pill to get rid of Fred, in an imaginary sequence, Fred leads her to decide to stop allowing her mother and husband to control her life. She moves out with the jack-in-the-box and begins a new life. Fred tells her that she no longer needs him, and she reluctantly agrees, kissing him goodbye, and he disappears.

The final scene has her talking with a real childhood friend Mickey. His daughter runs nearby them, in trouble for making a mess, which she blames on Drop Dead Fred. Fred is not truly gone; he's moved on to another child. The daughter sets up a prank with Fred: hanging her nanny from a tree.

cult classic movies

The Driller Killer

2007-03-17T13:18:00.002-05:00

The Driller Killer is a 1979 horror movie directed by and starring Abel Ferrara. It is notable for being one of the first video nasties in the United Kingdom, in addition to being banned in Germany.

In 1982, the UK distributors of Driller Killer, Vipco (Video Instant Picture Company), took out full page advertisements in a number of movie magazines depicting the video's violently explicit cover. This resulted in a large number of complaints to the Advertising Standards Agency.

Soon, due to the release of other graphic horror movies such as Cannibal Holocaust, a large campaign to curb violent movies, blaming them for the rate of youth crime, was underway in the UK. Ultimately, Driller Killer was banned under the Video Recordings Act of 1984. It also gained notoriety for being banned in Germany. The movie was not officially released uncut in the UK until 2002. Many cut versions of the movie still exist, which show scenes of drilling into heads and abdomens blacked-out. The uncut version of the movie does show certain parts blanked out using the colour red, most notably the final scene; however, this is intentional and done for theatrical effect.

Ironically, being labelled a video nasty did Driller Killer more good than harm, as despite its low production quality and being critically panned even by horror movie reviewers, its place on the list virtually guaranteed it a cult following.

The director and star claims that one half of the film was shot in 1978, while the other half was filmed in 1979, thus explaining a lack in continuity and costume design (as well as makeup).

In 2007, it was announced that the film will be remade by british filmmaker Andrew Jones. The remake will relocate the story from New York to London and is set to feature a mostly british cast.

Swedish Crustcore band Driller Killer took their name from the movie.
Danish Psychobilly band Nekromantix, UK hardcore band Disorder, and US death metal band Mortician all wrote songs inspired by the film, all entitled "Driller Killer". The latter also included a sample from the film in their song.

cult movies

Dressed to Kill

2007-03-15T14:49:00.002-05:00

Dressed to Kill is a 1980 horror film written and directed by Brian de Palma. It starred Michael Caine, Angie Dickinson and Nancy Allen. The original music score is composed by Pino Donaggio. The film is marketed with the tagline "Brian de Palma, master of the macabre, invites you to a showing of the latest fashion... in murder."

The film was the target of mild controversy when it became known that the nude body in the opening scene, taking place in a shower, was not that of Angie Dickinson but of a Playboy model. This controversy stemmed mostly from Dickinson's status at the time as being a mature, still-slender and shapely, sex symbol; the provocative shower scene - and the film - originally seemed to cash in on the idea that this nude body was that of its star. However, this revelation of a body-double (a theme later explored by director DePalma in his 1984 release, "Body Double") seemed to do no harm to its box office performance.

Dream a Little Dream

2007-03-13T17:22:00.003-05:00

Dream a Little Dream is a 1989 teen film directed by Marc Rocco and stars Jason Robards, Corey Feldman, Piper Laurie, Meredith Salenger, Harry Dean Stanton and Corey Haim. It was filmed in Wilmington, North Carolina. Released in 1,019 theaters, it accumulated $5,552,441. This is also the third film featuring the two Coreys.

The film's sequel Dream a Little Dream 2 was released in 1995.

Bobby Keller (Corey Feldman) is a high school student who, while taking a short cut through a backyard in his neighborhood, collides with Lainie Diamond (Meredith Salenger), whom he has been obsessing over recently despite the fact she is the girlfriend of his friend Joel. At the time of the incident, an elderly man named Coleman Ettinger (Jason Robards) is performing a meditation exercise in the yard with his wife Gena (Piper Laurie), thinking that if he can enter a dream state voluntarily he will be forever young, thus being able to spend a longer life with his younger wife. However, the collision forces a body switch between characters.

Bobby wakes up in his bedroom to find Dinger (Corey Haim) and his parents asking him if he's okay, but Bobby has no idea who these people are. Coleman is trapped in Bobby Keller's body; he leaves the house to find his wife but returns when he cannot find her or make any sense of the situation. Coleman then plays the role of Bobby when he returns and just wants to go to sleep to see if his dreams will give him any clue to what happened. The real Bobby greets him, who appears to be trapped in Coleman's dream.

The real Bobby claims to know how to swap them back but feels that it's not in his best interests to do so. He warns Coleman that if he cannot fix the problem then he will lose his wife forever.

Coleman must then figure out how to switch back to his own body within a few days or forever be trapped. However, Lainie doesn't know what has happened to her as it appears that Gena Ettinger has only partially swapped with her, so Keller has little time to convince her of the real situation before she will be lost forever.

The soundtrack that accompanies Dream a Little Dream was one of the most popular soundtracks of the late 1980s. It was popular for its unique mix of 1980s rock and classic music. Some songs featured are "Dreams To Remember" by Otis Redding, "Into The Mystic" by Van Morrison, "Time Runs Wild" by Danny Wilde, "It's The End Of The World As We Know It" by R.E.M., "The Future's So Bright, I Gotta Wear Shades" by Timbuk 3, and Michael Damian's "Rock On" where its video clip actually had Corey Feldman, Meredith Salenger and Corey Haim in it.

Mickey Thomas, the lead singer of the popular '80s band Starship, recorded the film's titled theme song and its duet version with Mel Torme for the soundtrack. The duet version also plays at the end of the film. Thomas appears as the teacher Mr. Pattison in this film.

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

2007-03-10T17:41:00.001-05:00

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (commonly shortened to Dr. Strangelove) is a 1964 film directed by Stanley Kubrick. Loosely based upon the Cold War thriller novel Red Alert (also known as Two Hours to Doom) by Peter George, the source material was refashioned as a black comedy by screenwriter Terry Southern. Dr. Strangelove satirizes the fragile nature of the Cold War conflict and the doctrine of mutual assured destruction. The film opens at the fictional Burpelson Air Force Base, where the insane General Jack D. Ripper has just ordered a first strike nuclear attack on the Soviet Union, and proceeds to follow the President of the United States, his advisors, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and a Royal Air Force (RAF) officer as they try to recall Ripper's bombers in order to prevent a nuclear apocalypse.

In 1989 the United States Library of Congress deemed the film "culturally significant" and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry. Additionally, it was listed as #26 on the American Film Institute's "100 Years, 100 Movies" and #3 on its "100 Years, 100 Laughs."

During the filming, Stanley Kubrick and George C. Scott had differences of opinions regarding certain scenes. However, Kubrick got Scott to conform based largely upon his ability to beat Scott at chess (which they played frequently on the set).
The photographic mural in General Ripper's office is actually a view of Heathrow Airport, London.
The opening titles, by Pablo Ferro, proclaims, "BASE ON THE BOOK RED ALERT BY PETER GEORGE". The spelling error wasn't noticed until the final print had been made.
"Peace is Our Profession" was the actual motto of the Strategic Air Command.
Major Kong's B-52, The Leper Colony, has a designation similar to the name of a B-17 in the movie 12 O'Clock High. In that movie, "Leper Colony" is crewed by the worst airmen in the 918th Bombing group.
"Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye", a traditional Irish anti-war song shares the same tune with the American patriotic song "When Johnny Comes Marching Home" and the "The Animals Went in Two by Two". The tune is used to accompany the B-52 flight.
Among the nuclear explosions used for the final sequence are footage of the Trinity test, the bombing of Nagasaki, shot BAKER of Operation Crossroads, a test from Operation Sandstone, and, lastly, one of the massive hydrogen bomb tests from Operation Redwing.
The doomsday weapon in the film (a "cobalt-thorium G-bomb") was inspired by the real idea of a cobalt bomb, conceptualized by nuclear pioneer Leo Szilard, founder of Council for a Livable World.
The shadow of the B-17 Flying Fortress camera plane used to shoot polar terrain over Greenland for the movie can be seen on the ground in a couple of exterior shots of Major Kong's B-52 Stratofortress.

Dr. Phibes Rises Again

2007-03-09T18:05:00.001-05:00

Dr. Phibes Rises Again (1972) was the second Dr. Phibes movie, a sequel to The Abominable Dr. Phibes. It was directed by Robert Fuest, and starred Vincent Price as Dr. Anton Phibes.

The moon rises at a predestined angle and awakens the sleeping Dr. Phibes three years after the events of the previous movie. To his dismay, he finds that his house has been demolished and his papyrus scrolls stolen, the scrolls he needs to find the Pharaoh's Tomb in Egypt, where the River of Life flows. After identifying the source of the papyrus theft, he packs and leaves for Egypt with his assistant Vulnavia (now played by Valli Kemp, since the original actress, Virginia North was pregnant at the time; however, this was not a problem since the character was drenched in acid at the end of the first film). His primary goal is still the awakening of his dead wife, Victoria.

The thieves of Phibes' scrolls suffer an attrition problem as Inspectors Trout and Waverly chase Phibes across the world. The party is led by Beiderbeck (Robert Quarry, best known for playing Count Yorga). Although he looks young, he is several hundred years old and wants to find the River of Life in order to stay alive and be with his lover Diana forever. This time Phibes' murders all have an Egyptian theme to them; for example, one character is sand-blasted to death. Other deaths include someone being stung to death by scorpions, being eaten by an eagle (in the original script impaled by a gold eagle in the same way a doctor in The Abominable Dr. Phibes was impaled by a golden unicorn), and a golden snake piercing someone's skull.

At the climax, Beiderbeck sacrifices his life in order to save Diana. The film ends with Phibes riding a raft down the River of Life with Victoria, while singing "Somewhere Over the Rainbow". It is left ambiguous whether Victoria is resurrected or not, although a picture inside the DVD shows her in the raft with her eyes open and smiling at the camera.

Due to copyright difficulties, Price's rendition of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" was replaced on the original VHS release by background music lifted from elsewhere in the film. For prints shown in theaters and on television, the original ending is always intact. The original music is restored on the DVD edition. (Several other American International Pictures from this period suffered a similar fate when released for home video, having their original scores replaced. For example: Witchfinder General and Scream and Scream Again.)

The film was rushed into production after the success of the first. The script, penned by Fuest, suffered due to budget restraints, as well as studio meddling (it was them who forced Vulnavia to return, Phibes was originally to have a new assistant, as well as many parts and plot points getting edited out, leaving some viewers confused.) It did not help that Vincent Price and Robert Quarry did not get along well behind the scenes. Some other actors from the original film, such as Terry Thomas, appeared in different roles.

Opinion on this film is divided, and generally it is considered as good as the first Phibes outing.

This was to be followed by a third Dr. Phibes movie, The Brides of Phibes or Phibes Resurrectus. It would have had Phibes protecting his secret of eternal life from a group of Nazis, who he would kill off one by one. His wife would also be brought back to life.

A sequence which exists in several proposed sequels had the Clockwork Wizards, Phibes' band, attacking people. Many scripts had Victoria being resurrected, and showed her as a very kind, loving soul that Anton is very gentle around. But one had her as a vicious control freak who was worse than he was.

Price also talked in an interview of a script he characterized as "Dr. Phibes in the holy land", which he enjoyed, but American International wasn't interested in producing it.

One script, penned by the people who wrote the original Phibes screenplay, had Phibes facing a group of Satanists lead by Dr. Vesalius' now adult son. Some of the deaths were incredibly elaborate; a Hoover device which sucked out people's organs and someone being covered in butter and fed to a lobster. The film ended with Vesalius thrown into an acid pit, Vulnavia committing suicide, and Victoria coming back to life only to be killed again. It ended with Phibes taking his own life and the words "Keep on trucking" appearing on a large screen. The screenplay, much like the initial draft of the Phibes script, is generally devoid of humour and is more vicious, which may be why it was passed over.

Another plan for a sequel was The Seven Fates of Dr. Phibes in this, Phibes resurrects Victoria, and the two search for seven small statues that will fulfill their ultimate plan, with assistance from Vulnavia (who is described as looking different, suggesting another actress would play the part.). Sections of the film take place in Athens, and there is even a labyrinth at one point. To obtain these statues, they kill people in styles based on Greek mythology (a Trojan horse, Cyclops, Cerberus, Minotaur, etc.) Trout and Waverly appear again, though at one point Trout leaves the police and later rejoins it. There is the usual banter between them ("When in Crete, do as the cretins do." "I thought you already did, sir.") Seven Fates would have revealed Vulnavia's identity as the Greek Goddess Athena), and featured footage of Phibes before his accident. There is again a Satanic character, who like Beiderbeck and Vesalius, is in many ways Phibes' equal but he concedes defeat and lets Phibes kill him, crying, "It is better to rule in hell then serve in heaven." People suggested for the role were Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing or Donald Pleasence. This film would have ended with Phibes getting his own face and voice back. Athena would then break her silence saying, "Come, Children of Zeus. You do not belong here in this age. This time has no place for you. You are of a different race now, and must take leave of moral worlds to find your home among the sky and stars. Come with me, now, it is time." Then Phibes, Victoria and Athena ascend into Heaven via a flying organ, which would once more play Somewhere Over the Rainbow. Waverly, shocked, exclaims, "This isn't possible, and if I'm wrong, may God strike me down." He is then struck by a bolt of lightning, while Phibes' laugh echoes.

A treatment of this film still exists, and Vincent Price gave it his approval, but his declining health, among other factors, prevented it from being made.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

2007-03-07T12:13:00.001-05:00

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was a classic 1920 horror silent film based upon Robert Louis Stevenson's famed novella The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and brought to life by actor John Barrymore.

The film was directed by John S. Robertson and co-starred Nita Naldi.

This story of split personality, has Dr. Jekyll a kind, and charitable man who believes that everyone has two sides, one good and one evil. Using a potion, his personalities are split, creating havoc. Silent movie, with original organ score.

Henry Jekyll is a doctor of medicine, but he is also an "idealist, philanthropist." When he is not treating the poor in his free clinic, he is in his laboratory experimenting. Sir George Carew, the father of his fiancée, Millicent, is "piqued" by Dr. Jekyll. "No man could be as good as he looks," Carew says. Following dinner one night, Carew taunts Dr. Jekyll in front of their friends, Edward Enfield, Dr. Lanyon and Utterson proclaiming "In devoting yourself to others, Jekyll, aren't you neglecting the development of your own life?" "Isn't it by serving others that one develops oneself," Jekyll replies. "Which self? Man has two - as he has two hands. Because I use my right hand, should I never use my left? Your really strong man fears nothing. It is the weak one who is afraid of experience. A man cannot destroy the savage in him by denying its impulses. The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. With your youth, you should live - as I have lived. I have memories. What will you have at my age?"

And thus the seed is sown, and Jekyll begins his experiments. As he observes, "Wouldn't it be marvellous if the two natures in man could be separated - housed in different bodies? Think what it would mean to yield to every evil impulse, yet leave the soul untouched!" Finally, Jekyll develops a potion that turns him into a hideously evil creature that he calls Edward Hyde. As this creature, he is not recognizable as Dr. Jekyll, and, so, to facilitate the comings and goings of Hyde, he tells his servant, Poole, that Hyde is to have "full authority and liberty about the house."

Jekyll thus begins to live his double life. Hyde sets up a room in one of the seediest parts of London. He brings in a girl from the dance hall, Gina, to live with him there and frequents opium dens, dance halls, and bars - any place that satisfies his evil desires. Although Jekyll has developed a potion that will also return him to his original appearance and character as Dr. Jekyll, each time he takes the potion to become Edward Hyde, he worsens. He not only looks more evil, he becomes more evil, as well.

Millicent Carew is worried about the absence of her fiancé, so Sir George goes to call on Jekyll to see what is the matter. Although Jekyll is not home when he calls, Sir George encounters Hyde in the street just as he knocks a small boy to the ground injuring him. To make recompense for his actions, he goes and gets a check which he returns to the boy's father. Carew notices that the check has been signed by Dr. Jekyll. He confronts Poole who tells him the story of Edward Hyde. It is so unfortunate that Dr. Jekyll turns into Edward Hyde.

In the meantime, Hyde/Jekyll has returned to the lab and, after drinking the potion, returns to his original self. Sir George finds him in the lab and demands to know his relationship with "a vile thing like Hyde?"

"What right have you to question me - you who first tempted me?" says Jekyll. Sir George angrily retorts that unless Jekyll is forthcoming with an explanation, he must object to his marriage to Millicent. This angers Jekyll to the point that he suddenly becomes Hyde, right in front of Sir George's eyes, without benefit of the potion. Sir George runs into the courtyard where Hyde catches him and clubs him to death with his walking stick. Hyde runs to his apartment and destroys any evidence that may link him to Jekyll. He eludes the police by only minutes and returns to his lab where he is able to drink the potion that restores him as Jekyll.

In the ensuing days, as Millicent grieves, Jekyll is tortured by his misdeeds. Soon, the drug needed to make the potion that will return him as Dr. Jekyll is depleted and cannot be found in all of London. Jekyll stays locked up in his lab fearing he may become Hyde at any moment. Millicent finally goes to see him, but just as she is about to enter the lab, he becomes Hyde. He lets her in , locks the door and grabs her in his arms. Suddenly, he starts convulsing. Millicent runs from the lab and when Lanyon, Utterson and Poole come in, they find Hyde sitting in a chair having just died and, as he died, his appearance returned to that of Dr. Jekyll.

Dr. Caligari

2007-03-05T20:40:00.001-05:00

Dr. Caligari is a 1989 cult film by Stephen Sayadian starring Madeleine Reynal, Laura Albert, Gene Zerna, David Parry and Jennifer Balgobin.

Mrs. Van Houten (Albert) is suffering from bizarre hallucinations. Her husband sends her to a clinic run by Dr. Caligari (Reynal), a striking German woman in pink spandex who has some strange ideas about personality, therapy, and power drills.

The Doom Generation

2007-03-03T13:26:00.001-05:00

The Doom Generation is a film by director Gregg Araki. Released in 1995 it stars Rose McGowan, Johnathon Schaech and James Duval as two teenage and a 20-something punk drifters who get involved in a ménage à trois. It is the second of a trilogy of films known as the Teenage Apocalypse Trilogy, the first being Totally F**ked Up and the last Nowhere.

The film, low-budget and independently produced, was highly praised by the gay and lesbian community for its casual portrayal of fluid sexuality. It was Araki's first movie that dealt with heterosexual relationships. However, critics panned the picture for its extremely graphic violence and explicit sexuality.

The film features cameos from a number of celebrities including Parker Posey, Heidi Fleiss, Christopher Knight (from "The Brady Bunch"), Margaret Cho, Perry Farrell, Amanda Bearse, industrial band Skinny Puppy and gay adult film stars Zak Spears and Rex Chandler.
Every time the characters buy something in the film, it adds up to $6.66. Also, the street address of most of the locations visited is 666.
Rose McGowan's character's name, Amy Blue, has been co-opted by the British alternative band.

Donnie Darko

2007-03-02T11:51:00.002-05:00

Donnie Darko is a 2001 psychological thriller, containing elements of science fiction and small traces of horror, directed and written by Richard Kelly. It is about an intelligent, troubled teenager named Donald ("Donnie") J. Darko who is encouraged by an anthropomorphic rabbit to commit seemingly random acts of vandalism. Themes addressed in the film include existentialism, nihilism, sacrifice, deus ex machina, time travel, love, The American Dream, and fear. The movie presents paradoxes that aren't fully explained, as well as a cryptic storyline open to multiple interpretations.

The film was a flop upon its release in the US, but has found strong DVD sales and is now generally considered a cult classic, ranking 106th on the IMDb Top 250.
Publicly screened for the first time at the Sundance Film Festival, critic Andy Bailey billed Darko as a "Sundance surprise" that "isn't spoiled by the Hollywood forces that helped birth it."

Although critically acclaimed, the film debuted in U.S. theatres in October, 2001 to a tepid response. Shown on only 58 screens nationwide, the film grossed $110,494 in its opening weekend. By the time the film closed in U.S. theatres on April 11, 2002, it had grossed $517,375.

Despite the poor showing at the box office, the film had attracted a devoted fan base. Donnie Darko was originally released on DVD in March of 2002. During this time, the Pioneer Theatre in New York City's East Village began midnight screenings of Darko that continued for 28 consecutive months.

Strong DVD sales led Newmarket Films to release a "Directors Cut" on DVD in 2005. Bob Berney, President of Newmarket Films, described the film as "a runaway hit on DVD," citing US sales of more than $10 million. That same year, composer Michael Andrews and singer Gary Jules found their piano-driven cover of the Tears for Fears' hit "Mad World," featured in the film as part of the end sequence, at the top of the UK music charts.

Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead

2007-03-01T12:34:00.002-05:00

Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead is a 1991 comedy film directed by Stephen Herek. Christina Applegate (Married... with Children) stars as a teenager whose mother leaves for a two-month summer vacation in Australia, putting all five siblings in the care of an elderly babysitter. When the babysitter dies, Applegate, as the eldest, assumes the role as head of household to keep the freedom of having no parents around. She fakes a resume to get a job in the fashion industry, but proves capable and lucky enough to succeed.

The film is a classic teen fantasy, where the teen is thrust into the role of adult, to great success.

Although released in 1991, Don't Tell Mom is often considered the last of the 1980's-style teen comedies, and has become a cult classic. A modest box-office success at the time of its release, it is a perennial favorite on television and cable TV.

The film also features Joanna Cassidy, Keith Coogan, Josh Charles, Danielle Harris, and a then-obscure actor named David Duchovny, later of The X-Files fame.

Doll Graveyard

2007-02-28T11:23:00.001-05:00

Doll Graveyard is a 2005 movie by Full Moon Features. It was directed by Charles Band.

An abusive stepfather forces his stepdaughter to bury her four handmade dolls in their backyard. After the girl accidentally falls in and breaks her neck, the stepfather buries her with the dolls. Years later, the dolls rise from the grave seeking revenge.

The four dolls are: an African warrior, a German soldier, a baby girl, and a samurai.

Dolemite

2007-02-27T10:46:00.002-05:00

Dolemite is a 1975 blaxploitation feature film, and is also the name of its principal character, played by Rudy Ray Moore, who co-wrote the film. Moore had developed the alter-ego as a stand-up comedian and released several comedy albums using this persona. The film was directed by D'Urville Martin, who appears as the villain Willie Green. The film is generally seen to have taken the blaxploitation genre beyond what previous films such as Shaft had done, playing black stereotypes to a highly exaggerated extent. Unlike many blaxploitation films, however, Dolemite was written and directed by Black people.

Often seen as more of a parody than a true blaxploitation film, Dolemite is usually appreciated in much the same manner as Plan 9 From Outer Space [citation needed], amusingly inept by any true cinematic standards, though that may well be the point. A minor but often cited flaw with the film is the tendency for the boom microphone to appear on screen for extended periods of time. It has attained something of a cult status, earning it a following and making it more well known than many of its counterparts. It has been parodied on the sketch comedy show MADtv.

The Human Tornado, an often neglected sequel, was released in 1976. This sequel took the humor of low-budget production further, with the absurdly choreographed fight scenes played at fast speed.

UPDATE: Comedian Rudy Ray Moore, better known as "Dolemite", reportedly died on Sunday at the age of 71 from diabetes complications, according to media reports.

Dogma

2007-02-26T10:57:00.001-05:00

Dogma is a 1999 comedy film, written and directed by Kevin Smith, who stars in the film along with Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, Linda Fiorentino, Alan Rickman, Bud Cort, Salma Hayek, Chris Rock, Jason Lee, Jason Mewes, George Carlin, Janeane Garofalo, and Alanis Morissette.

Brian O'Halloran and Jeff Anderson, the stars of Smith's Pro Wrestling Debut: film Clerks, have cameo roles, as do Smith regulars Scott Mosier, Dwight Ewell, Walt Flanagan and Brian Johnson.

The religous satire of the Catholic Church throughout the film caused organized protests and much controversy in many countries, which resulted in long delays in releasing it and also at least three serious death threats against Smith. It is said that Dogma has serious anti-Catholic characteristics.

Aside from some scenes filmed on the New Jersey shore, most of the film was filmed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

The film was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Screenplay as well as a Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America honor for Best Screenplay.

This film was rated R by the MPAA “for strong language including sex-related dialogue, violence, crude humor and some drug content”.

Although there was no opposition to the film while the actual filming and pre-production was taking place, the following months of post-production and publicity were plagued with controversy over a perceived anti-Christian message read into the film.

In an interview Smith said "You gotta find the line and then cross it"

Over time, the filmmakers received over 300,000 pieces of hate mail, which Smith posted on his website. Among these were "two-and-a-half" death threats. Smith explained this in his movie An Evening with Kevin Smith: One of the letters was threatening to start with, then became more friendly further on. The Catholic League (U.S.) in particular attacked Disney and Miramax, the original distributors, for being anti-Catholic. The film was originally scheduled to come out in November of 1998, but was pushed back to November of 1999 in the hopes the controversy would die down. When that didn't work, Disney sold the film's distribution rights to Lions Gate Films.

When the film actually came out, Kevin Smith and his friend Bryan Johnson participated in a protest at the Sony Multiplex in Eatontown, New Jersey, carrying a sign which read "Dogma is Dogs**t." A news crew captured the incident and broadcast an interview with a disguised Smith on the evening Channel 12 news.

cult movies

Docking the Boat

2007-02-25T19:54:00.001-05:00

Att angöra en brygga (English title: Docking the Boat, or sometimes: To Go Ashore) is a Swedish dark comedy film from 1965 directed by Tage Danielsson.

A group of friends are to celebrate the summer on a small island in the Stockholm Archipelago. The plan is to eat crayfish and drink snaps. Some are already in the house on the island and the rest of the group arrives by boat, but they experience great difficulties while trying to come ashore. An eccentric, Hollywood-obsessed, hot-tempered hermit living on the island doesn’t make the situation better.

The film stars Gösta Ekman, Monica Zetterlund, Hans Alfredson, Lars Ekborg and Birgitta Andersson have acquired a mild cult following in Sweden for their acting in this film. Monica Zetterlund also performed the theme song.