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Jane Russell heats up an Arizona mining town but she’s just trying to help her new husband with his ethnic identity issues, Jeff Chandler. Superb color cinematography (forget the B&W photos here) and beautiful desert locations help, but the real appeal is seeing Russell and gorgeous co-star Mara Corday in all their glory.

Foxfire

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1955 / Color / 2:00 widescreen / 92 min. / Street Date , 2019 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Jane Russell, Jeff Chandler, Dan Duryea, Mara Corday, Barton MacLane, Frieda Inescort, Celia Lovsky, Eddy Waller, Robert F. Simon, Charlotte Wynters, Robert Bice, Arthur Space, Beulah Archuletta, Dabbs Greer, Grace Lenard, Vici Raaf.

Cinematography: William Daniels

Film Editor: Ted. J. Kent

Original Music: Frank Skinner

Written by Ketti Frings, from the novel by Anya Seton

Produced by Aaron Rosenberg

Directed by Joseph Pevney

A medium-wattage relationship soap, Foxfire is an Eisenhower-era blueprint for consensus attitudes about race and class...

This classy Fox production was considered the epitome of sick film subject matter in the pre- Psycho year of 1959, the true story of jazz-age thrill killers Leopold & Loeb. Dean Stockwell and Bradford Dillman are the nihilistic child murderers; Orson Welles stops the show with his portrayal of Clarence Darrow, going under a different name.

Compulsion

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1959 / B&W / 2:35 widescreen / 103 min. / Street Date March 7, 2017 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Orson Welles, Dean Stockwell, Diane Varsi, Bradford Dillman, E.G. Marshall, Richard Anderson, Robert F. Simon, Edward Binns, Gavid McLeod, Russ Bender, Peter Brocco.

Cinematography: William C. Mellor

Film Editor: William Reynolds

Original Music: Lionel Newman

Written by Richard Murphy from a novel by Meyer Levin

Produced by Richard D. Zanuck

Directed by Richard Fleischer

Movies about serial killers and psychos with exotic agendas were much different before Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho, which hit America in 1960 like a thrown brick.

Otto Preminger looks at police corruption and comes up with a classy noir starring Dana Andrews as a rogue cop and Gene Tierney as the woman whose father he accidentally frames for murder. With Karl Malden, Gary Merrill and velvety-slick B&W cinematography by Joseph Lashelle. Where the Sidewalk Ends Blu-ray Twilight Time Limited Edition 1950 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / 95 min. / Ship Date February 9, 2016 / available through Twilight Time Movies / 29.95 Starring Dana Andrews, Gene Tierney, Gary Merrill, Bert Freed, Tom Tully, Karl Malden, Ruth Donnelly, Craig Stevens. Cinematography Joseph Lashelle Art Direction J. Russell Spencer, Lyle Wheeler Film Editor Louis R. Loeffler Original Music Cyril J. Mockridge Written by Ben Hecht, Robert E. Kent, Frank P. Rosenberg, Victor Trivas from the novel Night Cry by William L. Stuart Produced and Directed by Otto Preminger

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Want to see an example of a gloriously polished studio production, a film noir...

Germany's Explosive Media company has a serious itch for American westerns, and they have a trio of new releases. One is a minor Hollywood classic with major graces, from the late 1950s. A second sees an American producer based in England filming in Italy with a rising international star, and for the third an established American star goes European  to stay in the game. The best thing for Yankee buyers? The discs are Region-free.

Gunman's Walk, Land Raiders, A Man Called Sledge Three Westerns from Explosive Media Blu-ray Separate Releases 1958-1970 / Color Starring Van Heflin, Tab Hunter; George Maharis, Telly Savalas; James Garner

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

The majority of American studios now choose not to market their libraries for digital disc, and license them out instead. Collectors unwilling to settle for whatever's on Netflix or concerned about the permanence of Cloud Cinema, find themselves increasingly tempted by discs from Europe,...

Director Michael Bay aught to be quite pleased with how well Transformers: Age of Extinction is performing in its opening weekend. Friday was especially good as it pulled in an estimated $41.3M Friday (which includes the $8.75 late nights). That puts the fourth film in the franchise on pace for $103M weekend, and if the numbers hold up would be the biggest opening of 2014 - beating Marvel's Captain America: The Winter Soldier ($95M). Now, come enjoy some sensational Transformers: Age of Extinction concept art that artist, Robert Simon, worked on. The images include alternate designs for Lockdown and ship, as well as designs for Bumblebee and Optimus Prime. Lockdown Designs Click Here - More Lockdown Designs Lockdown Ship Designs Click Here - More Lockdown Ship Designs Transformers: Age Of Extinction - The film begins after an epic battle that left a great city torn,...

Here’s another installment featuring Joe Dante’s reviews from his stint as a critic for Film Bulletin circa 1969-1974. Our thanks to Video Watchdog and Tim Lucas for his editorial embellishments!

Nurses‑make‑out saga is passable fodder for drive‑ins, with mild nudity values for ogling by the soft‑core male contingent. Rating: R.

This sequel to the recent and fairly successful The Student Nurses again mixes TV soap opera plotting, youth clichés and sex, but this time out the formula fizzles. Exuding a general aura of familiarity, the dreary New World Pictures release will have to settle for lower‑berth dual billing in those situations where its forerunner paid off. Best prospects are in drive‑in slottings. The writing‑directing chores herein were entrusted to George Armitage, a Roger Corman protégé (he wrote Gas‑S‑S) making his directorial bow. Apart from one or two mild attempts at parodying the genre,...

As (500) Days Of Summer (2009) director Marc Webb's The Amazing Spider-Man swings into cinemas, with The Social Network and Never Let Me Go wunderkind Andrew Garfield wearing the red and blue pyjamas and Zombieland actress Emma Stone bringing Peter Parker's girlfriend Gwen Stacy to life while Rhys Ifans goes all Jekyll and Hyde on them as Doctor Curt Connors and The Lizard, it already feels as though Sam Raimi and Tobey McGuire's well received trilogy of barely a decade ago is 'old' Spidey.

However, nearly thirty years before The Evil Dead auteur finally put a human (as opposed to animated) version of our favourite webhead on the big screen, Spidey had made his live action debut on the small screen in 1974 in a series of short skits on the popular children's show The Electric Company. Played by puppeteer Danny Seagren, these three minute sketches which spanned a three year period...