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In this week's Staff Picks, TV Writer Saloni Gajjar and Film Editor Jacob Oller offer a little light and dark, with recommendations for a new streaming comedy and a chance to participate in Noirvember.

The Pradeeps Of Pittsburgh (Prime Video)

There’s a chance the trailer for Prime Video’s...

As a follow up to the excellent "Bram Stoker's Dracula Starring Bela Lugosi" graphic novel, Kerry Gammill and El Garing return for “Mary Shelley's Frankenstein Starring Boris Karloff." A new adaptation that remains faithful to Mary Shelley's original novel, the graphic novel features Boris Karloff's in a new vision for Frankenstein's Monster, and Sara Karloff, daughter of Boris Karloff, served as an executive consultant on the project. I had the pleasure of catching up with her recently to talk about the graphic novel, her thoughts on the 1931 film and Boris Karloff's performance, and her favorite films that star her father. We also have an 8-page preview you can check out below.

What excited you about getting involved in the Mary Shelley's Frankenstein graphic novel project?

Sara Karloff: Having seen the wonderful work they did on the Dracula [graphic novel].

One of the things that really stood out to me,...

To the outside observer it may seem like every single year is called “one of the best years for horror ever,” but I’m going to let you in on a little secret: It’s never a bad year for horror. The entertainment industry damn near runs on scary movies, which are cheap to produce and able to take artistic risks that bigger budget genre films — the ones that have to sell tickets to everybody just to break in — are too timid to even consider. You can always find great horror movies. The trick is knowing where to look.

And that right there is the trick, because smaller movies don’t have huge advertising budgets, and they don’t drive traffic so publications can’t always allocate the resources to cover them. Great horror movies fall through the cracks all the time. Heck, even major theatrical releases don’t get...

Winona Ryder is looking back at how her parents tried to protect her from Hollywood as a child actor.

The actress, who made her feature-film debut in 1986’s Lucas at just 15 years old, shared in a recent interview with AnOther Magazine that instead of relocating to Los Angles, her parents chose to drive seven hours from San Francisco to L.A. each time she got an audition.

She added that school was also a priority in her family, which meant she “had to keep up my grades” to be allowed to go on auditions.

“I couldn’t work if it coincided with school,” Ryder explained. “My parents — who are just my best friends — were very wary of Hollywood. They associated it with Judy Garland’s tragedy, and we never relocated there. That turned out to be such a gift, because I knew a lot of kids who did bear that.

Ride the Black Chariot: A Hitchcockian Horror of Vengeance and Retribution

Hex Studios is excited to announce Black Chariot, an intense and deeply disturbing supernatural horror directed by Lawrie Brewster, inspired by the macabre genius of Alfred Hitchcock. Drawing from Hitchcock’s dark thrillers like Rebecca (1942) and Psycho (1960), Brewster seeks to invoke Hitchcock’s spirit, combined with his love of classic film noir and Val Lewton’s atmospheric slow-burn horrors.

Director Lawrie Brewster shared, “My childhood was spent haunted and mesmerized by the romantic and seductive veil Hitchcock cast over me. It shaped my vision of horror, sensuality, and my understanding of fear and obsession. I am thrilled to finally produce a horror film that combines my love for the genre with inspirations drawn from his incomparable genius. Creating a period film and a love letter to that era, in a portrayal of horror that is as hauntingly beautiful as it is terrifying,...

Welcome to the latest edition of our (semi) regular crowdfunding feature here on Nerdly – Back This! – where we take a look at some of the cool content taking the crowdfunding route on sites such as Indiegogo, Greenlit and Kickstarter. In this edition, we’re spotlighting Black Chariot, the latest film from Hex Studios and director Lawrie Brewster.

Hex Studios’ Black Chariot is an intense and deeply disturbing supernatural horror directed by Lawrie Brewster, inspired by the macabre genius of Alfred Hitchcock. Drawing from Hitchcock’s dark thrillers like Rebecca (1942) and Psycho (1960), Brewster seeks to invoke Hitchcock’s spirit, combined with his love of classic film noir and Val Lewton’s atmospheric slow-burn horrors.

Director Lawrie Brewster shared:

My childhood was spent haunted and mesmerized by the romantic and seductive veil Hitchcock cast over me. It shaped my vision of horror, sensuality, and my understanding of fear and obsession. I am...

Ride the "Black Chariot" - A Hitchcockian Horror of Vengeance and Retribution: "Hex Studios is excited to announce Black Chariot, an intense and deeply disturbing supernatural horror directed by Lawrie Brewster, inspired by the macabre genius of Alfred Hitchcock. Drawing from Hitchcock's dark thrillers like Rebecca (1942) and Psycho (1960), Brewster seeks to invoke Hitchcock's spirit, combined with his love of classic film noir and Val Lewton’s atmospheric slow-burn horrors.

Director Lawrie Brewster shared, “My childhood was spent haunted and mesmerized by the romantic and seductive veil Hitchcock cast over me. It shaped my vision of horror, sensuality, and my understanding of fear and obsession. I am thrilled to finally produce a horror film that combines my love for the genre with inspirations drawn from his incomparable genius. Creating a period film and a love letter to that era, in a portrayal of horror that is as hauntingly beautiful as it is terrifying,...

Horror picture "Longlegs" is proving to be a surprising box office success. A lot of credit must go to indie studio Neon's marketing campaign, which was scary enough to get people paying attention, yet restrained enough to not give the whole movie away.

Starring Maika Monroe as FBI Agent Lee Harker, "Longlegs" follows the hunt for a serial killer, played by a well-disguised Nicolas Cage. Cage's killer character is mercifully kept at a distance or off-screen for most of the movie; the rare times we get an up-close look, it's like we're intruding on something devilish.

Director Osgood Perkins' previous films have felt a bit too empty for me. The procedural core of "Longlegs," though, gives the movie enough of a skeleton that I could appreciate Perkins' craftsmanship without it trying my patience. Is "Longlegs" the scariest movie ever? No, but it is the movie equivalent of a page-turner,...

Janis Paige, who racked up more than 100 film, TV and stage credits over six decades including The Pajama Game, Silk Stockings and Santa Barbara, died June 2 at her home in Los Angeles. She was 101.

Her friend Stuart Lambert told The Associated Press about Paige’s death.

During her long career, Paige toured with Bob Hope and danced onscreen with Fred Astaire, along with originating the Babe Williams role in The Pajama Game on Broadway in 1954. That same year she headlined It’s Always Jan, a CBS sitcom about the problems of single-parenthood during which she usually sang a song. It lasted a single season.

Born Donna Mae Tjaden on September 16, 1922, in Tacoma, Wa, she began singing in talent shows at a tender age and moved to Los Angeles after graduating high school.

Paige made her Broadway debut in 1951 opposite Jackie Cooper in the mystery comedy Remains to Be Seen but...

For this month’s installment of “TV Terrors” we revisit the short-lived animated series “Gravedale High” (aka “Rick Moranis in Gravedale High“), which aired on NBC in 1990.

During the era of Saturday Morning Cartoons, there was always this idea by studios to build on a big star’s name by giving them an animated vehicle. We saw it with Mr. T, Chuck Norris, Macaulay Culkin, and Gary Coleman, as well as comedians like Louie Anderson and Howie Mandel. John Candy got (the still celebrated) “Camp Candy,” while his Sctv colleague Rick Moranis headlined his own animated horror comedy series for kids: “Gravedale High.”

Rick Moranis garnered immense fame and cult status in the eighties and nineties with an iconic comedy career that carried over into big films like Ghostbusters and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. As a means of marketing off his momentum, an animated series was developed by NBC...

98 years walking on this earth and over 70 of those working in the industry that he and we all love. How do you talk about a man who had his hands in everything and gave us so much? He was an honorary Oscar winner and heavily involved in the Academy itself. He gave us New Concorde and New World Pictures. Roger Corman was a master of the independent and low budget film and known lovingly as the King of Cult. He gave countless actors, writers, and directors their start and was still making appearances right up to his passing. Theres so much to go over but I think that the best way to honor the man is to bring this video in on time and underbudget, bonus Corman points if we can re-use some of the footage from this one in another one of our videos. I cant see a more...

Roger Corman, who directed and produced countless B-movies and championed future industry stalwarts Martin Scorsese, Robert De Niro, and Jack Nicholson, died at his home in Santa Monica, California on May 9, Variety reports. He was 98.

“His films were revolutionary and iconoclastic, and captured the spirit of an age. When asked how he would like to be remembered, he said, ‘I was a filmmaker, just that,’” the family said in a statement to the outlet.

For nearly five decades, he dominated the B-movie market, with films that ranged from his early work in the Fifties,...

One of the most distinct characteristics of the new Apple TV+ series “Sugar” is the way it cuts scenes from classic Hollywood films into its present day story of detective John Sugar (Colin Farrell). While the technique is novel, if not experimental, the connections being made are clear: Sugar is a cinephile obsessed with old Hollywood movies, while creator Mark Protosevich’s neo-noir series is steeped in the tropes of these 1940s and 50s black and white films.

The connections are so strong, and the intercutting works so well, the real surprise is that the cinephile Protosevich didn’t script them.

“It was all done after the fact, so I had no idea until I saw it how many [and] which clips [they used],” Farrell told IndieWire, adding he was pleasantly surprised to see himself juxtaposed with some of his all-time favorite films, like “Sunset Boulevard.” “It’s a really fun alignment for me,...

You know you’re getting old when your favorite movie stars are starting to play characters afflicted with dementia. Arriving shortly on the heels of Knox Goes Away, featuring Michael Keaton as a hitman suffering from the condition, is Adam Cooper’s neo-noir thriller starring Russell Crowe as an ex-cop whose mental condition has deteriorated so dramatically that he’s forced to leave notes plastered throughout his apartment, Memento-style. Despite the plot element’s familiarity, it’s still the most intriguing element of Sleeping Dogs, a sluggishly rendered mystery that audiences will have long stopped caring about before it reaches its conclusion.

Crowe plays Roy Freeman, a former homicide detective whose sad state of being is immediately signified not only by those notes offering the simplest of reminders but also the stack of Hungry-Man frozen dinners in his freezer. He’s wearing a large bandage on his head, the remnant...

After Warner Bros. Discovery seemingly dropped the final anvil on the head of “Coyote vs. Acme,” screenwriter Samy Burch is speaking out about the shelved film.

Burch told IndieWire’s Vincent Perella on the red carpet for the 2024 Oscars that the conversation is “ongoing” about whether or not the film will see the light of day.

“As far as I know, it’s ongoing,” Burch said. “I think we’re all pretty heartbroken about it. We hope it will somehow find its home and not end up stuck in a vault for the rest of time. That would be a great resolution.”

While the story outline for the feature was reportedly leaked via Paste Bin in early March 2024, Warner Bros. has yet to officially announce the fate of the completed live-action and cartoon hybrid film. John Cena and Will Forte star in the film which was at first announced as...

Jack Warner had been shouldering in on credit from one of his studio’s top producers. At least that’s what Hal Wallis may have told you after the 1944 Academy Awards when Jack Warner accepted the Casablanca Oscar that some felt should have been palmed by Wallis, the Warner Bros. film’s producer. But who should accept the best picture award? Today it’s the producers, but during Hollywood’s Golden Age it was sometimes the producer, sometimes the studio chief.

Wallis had been with the company for many years, first joining the studio in 1923, their first year of incorporation. Soon, Wallis was managing essential Warner films such as Little Caesar (1931), The Petrified Forest (1936), The Adventures of Robin Hood (1937), Dark Victory (1939), Sergeant York (1941), The Maltese Falcon (1941), Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942), and, of course, Casablanca (1942). Despite being released in late 1942, Casablanca didn’t go into wide release until early 1943 and wasn’t...

Until recently, the oldest entertainment program known to survive on color videotape was NBC’s An Evening with Fred Astaire, broadcast live on October 17, 1958.

But now, a rare color videotape of the Kraft Music Hall Starring Milton Berle that predates the Astaire special by nine days has been discovered. The tape will be shown at the Billy Wilder Theater at the Hammer Museum in Westwood on Saturday, February 24th at 7:30 Pm in a program that is free and open to the public.

“The Berle Kraft tape is the oldest known color videotape of an entertainment program,” said Mark Quigley, the John H. Mitchell Television Curator at the UCLA Film & Television Archive. “Entertainment” is a key distinction. The oldest known color tape is of the NBC Washington studios dedication ceremony on 05-22-1958.

“With the introduction of videotape technology in the broadcast industry starting in 1956, one of...

The creature from Ridley Scott's 1979 horror sci-fi film "Alien" was inspired primarily by the 1976 painting "Necronomicon IV" by Swiss surrealist H.R. Giger. The subject of the painting rests in the middle of what appears to be a semi-metallic, semi-organic womb space of indeterminate function. The subject's lower half narrows and extends not into legs, but into an outsize phallus that stretches up over its head, searching for an organic aperture somewhere in its own cranium. The subject's ribs are visible. Its head, likewise, is decidedly phallic. On one end, it sports a monstrous face with fangs and large black eyes. The back end of its head tapers into something that is undoubtedly a glans. Intestinal tubes extend from the subject's back. 

Like most of Giger's work, "Necronomicon IV" is nightmarish and unsettling. Giger worked in an aesthetic milieu that rested on a matrix where the organic and the mechanical,...

Long before Jigsaw and Annabelle, Ghostface and Samara—going back to even before Freddy and Jason—there were the Universal Monsters. These were the creatures and character designs who were so iconic that they defined what the horror genre was to most moviegoers during the earliest decades of talking pictures. Primarily released in two film cycles by Universal Pictures across the 1930s and ‘40s (plus a few outliers on both sides of this), the legacy of these films and the people who made them endures still. It echoes in Halloween costumes and TV specials, merchandise toys and candies, it’s even informing recent Blumhouse films and Netflix’s Wednesday. Right now, you can go to any Universal theme park and meet the Monsters as un-goodwill ambassadors at “Halloween Horror Nights.”

Yet to return to the original movement of films which were so frightening in their day that they essentially invented...

Boris Karlov, Peter Lorre, and Vincent Price in The Raven. Image: Film Publicity Archive For almost as long as the medium has existed, filmmakers have been turning to the works of Edgar Allan Poe for inspiration. The earliest adaptations of his stories date back to the silent era. Just as...

Boris Karlov, Peter Lorre, and Vincent Price in The Raven.Image: Film Publicity Archive (Getty Images)

For almost as long as the medium has existed, filmmakers have been turning to the works of Edgar Allan Poe for inspiration. The earliest adaptations of his stories date back to the silent era.

Back in 1992 Wes Anderson and Owen Wilson — who had met the University of Texas in Dallas and were roomies — decided to make a movie. But after spending $10,000 and shooting 13 minutes of the crime caper comedy “Bottle Rocket,” they ran out of money. Eventually, the short and the full script made its way to Oscar-winning writer/director/producer James L. Brooks. It just so happened that Columbia had a deal with Brooks to finance a low-budget film selected by the filmmaker. And in 1996, the feature-length version of “Bottle Rocket” was released with Owen Wilson, Luke Wilson and James Caan. Though the film didn’t set the box office on fire, critics realized Anderson was a new and exciting cinematic voice.

Anderson has made 11 feature films — his latest “Asteroid City” came out earlier this year — and has been nominated seven times for an Oscar including three for screenplay, two for animated features,...

Hard to believe, but we’ve not taken a trip into “rom-com” land in 2023. Really? Has this staple been dormant for several months, but with those warmer Spring temps, well, where do most hearts venture? Oh, and since we’re getting nearer to Summer this one’s a hybrid as it’s really a “rom-com-spy-thriller”.This isn’t rare as we’ve seen this played out for at least 30 years, going back to Arnold and new Oscar darling Jamie Lee in True Lies (which inspired a recent CBS TV series). And in the last dozen or so years we’ve had the big “spy reveals” in Knight And Day (Tom Cruise) and Killer (Ashton Kutcher), not to mention the double reveal in Mr. And Mrs. Smith (Bradgilina begins). Well, this new one has a bit of a twist in that the undercover agent is a lady. Plus it also takes...

Bram Stoker's 1897 novel "Dracula" is told in epistolary form, and begins with the character of Jonathan Harker trekking into the Carpathian Mountains to close a real estate deal with a mysterious, elusive Eastern European count. The Count, a small smiling bald man with a mustache, is none other than Dracula, an ancient vampire that feeds on human blood and is in league with Satan. Dracula signs the paperwork, locks Jonathan in his dilapidated castle with a trio of succubi, and takes a ship to England. Jonathan will eventually escape to Budapest, but Dracula is still at large, ready to infiltrate England.

Later in the novel, it will be revealed that Dracula has been psychically convening with a local mental patient named Renfield, currently locked up in a British asylum. Dracula will use Renfield to infiltrate homes and drink his victims' blood. Renfield's role in Stoker's novel is relatively small,...

Boris Karloff: The Man Behind The Monster director Thomas Hamilton on his upcoming series Horror Icons on interviewing Roger Corman: “He not only worked with Vincent Price, he worked with Peter Lorre, Basil Rathbone, Lon Chaney.” Photo: Thomas Hamilton

Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Basil Rathbone, Conrad Veidt, Maria Ouspenskaya, George Zukor, Paul Wegener, Emil Jannings, Brigitte Helm, Gale Sondergaard, Gloria Holden, Claude Rains, Fay Wray, Duane Jones, Max Schreck, Boris Karloff, Colin Clive, Lon Chaney Sr., Lon Chaney Jr, Fw Murnau’s Faust and Nosferatu, Arthur Lubin’s Phantom of the Opera, Rowland V. Lee’s Son of Frankenstein, George Waggner’s The Wolf Man, James Whale’s The Invisible Man, Lambert Hillyer’s Dracula’s Daughter, Robert Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Paul Wegener and Henrik Galeen’s The Golem, Hanns Heinz Ewers and Stellan Rye’s The Student Of Prague, and George Romero’s Night Of The Living Dead...

Thrillers from the Vault – 8 Classic Films

Blu-ray

Mill Creek Entertainment

1941, 1942, 1943, 1951 / B&w / 1.33: 1 / Blu ray

Starring Boris Karloff, Anne Revere, Peter Lorre, Bela Lugosi

Written by Robert Andrews, Edwin Blum, Randall Faye, Arch Oboler

Directed by Edward Dmytryk, Lew Landers, Arch Oboler

This is part two of a review for Mill Creek Entertainment’s Thrillers from the Vault, 8 Classics Films. Part one can be found here.

The Devil Commands is a hell of a title, and it’s a pretty good movie too. Released in 1941, Edward Dmytryk’s spookfest stars Boris Karloff as Julian Blair, a scientist whose experiments are a family affair—his wife Helen is one of his subjects.

Blair achieves his goal—a machine that records thought processes—but on a night he should be celebrating, his wife is killed in a car crash. Something breaks inside Blair and when he discovers that Helen may continue to live on through his invention,...

Burbank, Calif., February 15, 2023 – As part of the year-long centennial celebration for the 100th anniversary of Warner Bros. Studio, three classic and beloved films from the Warner Bros. library – The Maltese Falcon, Cool Hand Luke, and Rebel Without a Cause – will be available for purchase on 4K Ultra HD Disc and Digital this April.

On April 4, The Maltese Falcon and Cool Hand Luke will be available to purchase on Ultra HD Blu-ray™ Disc from online and in-store at major retailers and available for purchase Digitally from Amazon Prime Video, AppleTV, Google Play, Vudu and more.

On April 4, Rebel Without a Cause will be available to purchase on Ultra HD Blu-ray Disc from online and in-store at major retailers. On April 18 it will be available for purchase Digitally from Amazon Prime Video, AppleTV, Google Play, Vudu and more.

The Ultra HD Blu-ray Disc will include each feature film in 4K with Hdr...

No film of the Hays Code era revels in its own perversity quite like Mad Love (1935). Mad science, body horror, insanity, obsession, executions, gaslighting, sadomasochism—it’s all here and presented with unparalleled excellence of craft. Though it may seem tame compared to pre-Code fare like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931), Freaks, and Island of Lost Souls (both 1932), it manages to just barely sneak its lurid subject matter by the censors under a layer of dark humor, exceptional cinematography, and a masterful performance by Peter Lorre in his first American film.

After Dracula proved to be a huge success for Universal, other Hollywood studios became eager to get in on the horror game, though many of these studios felt the genre was beneath them. Metro Goldwyn Mayer was considered the most prestigious of the golden-age studios, famous for its big budget musicals, epic spectaculars, and boasting “more stars than there are in the heavens.

Robert Florey directed and Curt Siodmak wrote it, but Luis Bunuel’s fingerprints are allegedly all over the concept for this earliest and best of the crawling hand movies. Dreamlike and intensely creepy, with a thundering Steiner score and Peter Lorre at his pop-eyed best in a role intended for Paul Henried. In any case, a crawling hand turns up in Bunuel’s later The Exterminating Angel.

The post The Beast with Five Fingers appeared first on Trailers From Hell.

Peter Lorre’s Hollywood debut is one of the weirder pix ever to come from MGM, or maybe anywhere else. One of ace cinematographer Karl Freund’s rare forays into directing, and his last. Gregg Toland photographed it, and years later Pauline Kael would claim he stole a lot of shots from this to use in Citizen Kane!

The post Mad Love appeared first on Trailers From Hell.

Robert Florey’s melancholy melodrama stars Peter Lorre as Janos Szabo, a Hungarian immigrant whose luck goes from bad to worse—scarred in a fire, he’s unable to find work and turns to crime. The film teeters on the edge of tragedy but Szabo eventually finds redemption in the love of a blind woman played by Evelyn Keyes. As was Lorre’s wont, he scares you and breaks your heart, sometimes at the same moment.

The post The Face Behind the Mask appeared first on Trailers From Hell.

The recent passing of David Crosby was an enormous blow to the world of music. As a member of the Byrds, and one of Cosby, Stills & Nash, David Crosby helped revolutionize the folk-friendly arm of the entire 1960s rock scene. Compared to the kid-friendly bubblegum pop of the era, Crosby's work was more touching, emotional, and intelligent. He will be missed. 

Also, Crosby grew up with an Oscar in his house. As it happens, David Crosby's father was none other than the Academy Award-winning cinematographer Floyd Crosby.

Floyd Crosby is not necessarily a household name, but his career as a cinematographer spanned over 30 years. Indeed, Floyd's career got an enormous kickstart in 1931 when he filmed F.W. Murnau's silent semi-documentary "Tabu: A Story of the South Seas." That film aimed to tell the authentic story of life on the island of Bora Bora, and, for the most part, cast only...

Al Brown, the actor best known for his role as Major Stanislaus Valchek in the acclaimed HBO crime series "The Wire," has died at the age of 83. Brown's daughter, Jenny, informed TMZ that he passed away on Friday, January 13, 2023, as a result of Alzheimer's disease. She said that Brown had loved his job and was always happy to chat with fans about his role on the show. 

Created by David Simon, "The Wire" is regularly cited as one of the greatest television shows of all time, despite being routinely snubbed by both the Golden Globes and the Emmys throughout its five-season run. Drawing from Simon's experience as a police reporter, the series explored the relationships between the city of Baltimore, its people, and its institutions, shifting its focus with each new season. Valchek, a commander within the Baltimore Police Department who later rose to the rank of commissioner, was a...

Svengoolie, a.k.a. Rich Koz, has been working as a horror host since 1979, and over the decades his show has grown from airing in select areas – Chicago, Milwaukee, and South Bend, for example – to being broadcast nationwide on the MeTV network. And in 2023, Svengoolie’s show is going to be growing in a different way. It’s going to be 30 minutes longer!

Fangoria broke the news that, staring in January, Svengoolie will now air from 8pm to 10:30 pm (Eastern) on Saturday nights. The show’s timeslot had previously been from 8 to 10. Here are the first batch of movies that will benefit from the show’s extended running time:

The Raven: Saturday, January 7 – 8pm-10:30pm Et

Vincent Price, Boris Karloff, Peter Lorre, Jack Nicholson (1963) – Horror

Inspired by the famous Edgar Allan Poe poem, a magician, who has been turned into a raven, turns to a former sorcerer for help.

The Black Vampire! The most impressive Spanish-language noir restoration yet, Román Viñoly Barreto’s superior serial murder thriller hails from 1953 Argentina. It re-interprets Fritz Lang’s “M” from a different, more emotionally engaging perspective: star Olga Zubarry’s nightclub singer hesitates to tell what she knows about a child-killer, because she might lose custody of her own young daughter. The expressionist noir owes little to Hollywood. Some find it more satisfying than Lang’s classic version. The Film Noir Foundation’s extras are excellent.

El vampiro negro

Blu-ray + DVD

Flicker Alley

1953 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 90 min. / Street Date November 18, 2022 / Available from Flicker Alley / 39.95

Starring: Olga Zubarry, Nathan Pinzón, Roberto Escalada, Nelly Panizza, Pascual Pelliciota, Georges Rivière, Mariano Vidal Molina, Gloria Castilla, Emma Bernal, Lucía Besse.

Cinematography: Anibal González Paz

Production Designer: Jorge Beghé

Film Editors: Jorge Gárate, Higinio Vecchione

Original Music: Juan Ehlert

Written by Román Viñoly Barreto, Alberto Etchebehere

Produced...

You’ll find many mysteries in Mark Mylod’s gourmet horror comedy “The Menu,” not the least of which is the impenetrable enigma of whether or not Mylod even likes gourmet food. The film is full of mouth-watering images of tasty morsels, but the cast is almost exclusively populated by foodies who, according to the screenplay, don’t deserve to live, let alone eat fancy things.

So what’s the point of showing all these yummy comestibles if the movie is going to judge us harshly for wanting them? The biggest joke seems to be on us, the audience for any art. We are consumers, we are fans, and we are arguably unworthy of the enormous talents and unfathomable sacrifices made by the people who serve us. “The Menu” may serve up dark humor and memorable violence, but the daily special is you and me; we’re already in a boiling pot,...

It's hard to understate just how revolutionary John Kricfalusi's "The Ren & Stimpy Show" was to the world of animation. Having worked on stultifying commercial products throughout the 1980s, John K., as he is better known, longed for the old, wilder, more creative days of Termite Terrace (the nickname for Warner Bros. Pictures' animation department from the 1930s through the 1950s). He particularly admired Bob Clampett and aimed to make stranger, more grotesque cartoons. The '80s were a time of product-based cartoon shows like "Transformers," "My Little Pony," and "Alvin and the Chipmunks." Such shows were seemingly only green-lit if they had pre-existing "marquee value" or a product to sell.

The airing of "The Ren & Stimpy Show" kicked the door open for a new generation of creator-based cartoon shows. Original ideas began flooding the marketplace in earnest in the early '90s and cynical, product-forward cartoons series fell by the wayside.

Arsenic and Old Lace

Blu-ray

Criterion

1941 / 1.33: 1 / 118 Min.

Starring Cary Grant, Priscilla Lane

Written by Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein

Directed by Frank Capra

Almost supernaturally handsome, Mortimer Brewster is quite the catch; a celebrated man about town and theater critic who saves his most acerbic reviews for matrimony, Mortimer’s latest bestseller is a typically curdled diatribe called Mind over Marriage. He’s a tough egg to crack but leave it to his childhood sweetheart, a pretty strawberry blonde named Elaine Harper, to cure Mortimer’s gamophobia—and what better time for a nervous bachelor to get hitched than Halloween?

Their honeymoon is just around the corner but first the newlyweds have family business in Brooklyn, home to Elaine and Mortimer’s childhood haunts. They don’t realize just how haunted; the cozy Brewster homestead has been transformed into a makeshift cemetery where bodies are stored away in...

Writer/Director Lucky McKee discusses a few of his favorite movies with Josh Olson and Joe Dante.

Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode

Tár (2022)

Speed Racer (2008)

The Matrix (1999)

Gloria (1980) – Glenn Erickson’s Blu-ray review

The Howling (1981) – Josh Olson’s trailer commentary, Randy Fuller’s wine pairings

Old Man (2022)

Don’t Breathe (2016)

Avatar (2009)

Band of the Hand (1986)

May (2002)

The Piano (1993)

The Crying Game (1992)

Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope (1977)

Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

Star Wars: Episode VI – Return Of The Jedi (1983)

Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace (1999)

Star Wars: Episode II – Attack Of The Clones (2002)

Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge Of The Sith (2005)

The Dark Crystal (1982) – Bernard Rose’s trailer commentary

Cockfighter (1974) – Jon Davison’s trailer commentary

Days of Heaven (1978)

Sweetie (1989)

The Power of the Dog (2021)

Do The Right Thing (1989) – Allan Arkush’s trailer commentary

A History Of Violence (2005)

Se7en (1995)

Straw Dogs (1971) – Josh Olson’s trailer commentary,...

Many of us have people in our lives who just aren’t as into horror as we are. Come October, it is tempting to simply hide away, shunning them for a month as we indulge in our favorite genre, as we no doubt will do at least some of the time. But then, they may be open to getting into the Halloween spirit at least a little bit.

For that, there are a number of terrific movies that take place on and around the holiday that are not out of the question for the squeamish. Some fit comfortably into the horror genre and some are far from it, but all beautifully capture the essence of the season.

So, here are a few of our favorite family Halloween movies to get you and the scaredy cat in your life into the Halloween mood for spooky season…

Arsenic and Old Lace (1944)

Right...

Bloody Disgusting has learned that the Hollywood Forever Cemetery is returning for its 23rd installment of their Day of the Dead Celebration on Saturday, October 29th with two events – “Día de los Muertos” & “Noche de los Muertos” – that will feature cultural performances, live DJ sets from DJ Que Madre and DJ Hamvre, an exhibition from Artist of the Year, Sabino Guisu’s “Zapotec Death Poems”, delicious food & drinks, and more.

This year’s theme is focused on Mayahuel, the Aztec Goddess of Fertility, the Maguey (Agave), and the ruler of the 8th day and the 8th year. She brings us Love, Magic, and Transformation.

Here’s everything you need to know about the two special events…

Día de los Muertos (9:00am – 3:00pm Pst) – a daytime event featuring a children’s plaza and cultural performances, as well as altars, art exhibitions, Aztecs, folkorico dance, traditional dance, children’s plaza,...

(Welcome to The Daily Stream, an ongoing series in which the /Film team shares what they've been watching, why it's worth checking out, and where you can stream it.)

The Movie: "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari"

Where You Can Stream It: Shudder/AMC+

The Pitch: A man recounts the story of how a sleepwalker controlled by a mad doctor carried out murders in his village in this creepy 1920 classic.

German silent films: they've stood the test of time. Written by Hans Janowitz and Carl Mayer and directed by Robert Weine, "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" predates "Nosferatu" by two years and is one of the earliest works of German Expressionist cinema. Film critic Roger Ebert, spotlighting it as one of his "Great Movie" picks in 2009, wrote, "A case can be made that 'Caligari' was the first true horror film."

Told mostly in flashback, this 77-minute story unfolds like a demented dream,...

Ian Fleming's first James Bond novel, "Casino Royale" was published on August 13, 1953. He arrived just in time. In Tony Bennett's and Janet Woollacott's 1987 book "Bond and Beyond: The Political Career of a Popular Hero," the authors point out that Bond's literary function was to lend England -- smarting after the damage of the second World War, and currently embroiled in a Cold War -- a little bit of patriotic panache. James Bond was a tough, get-the-job-done jet-setter who, over the course of his first novel, manages to out-gamble the wicked Le Chiffre, a member of the Russian secret service. It's a simple story, but an exciting one.

"Casino Royale" was adapted to American television in 1954 as part of the anthology series "Climax!" In that version, Barry Nelson played James Bond, now American, against Peter Lorre's Le Chiffre. James Bond would infiltrate movie theaters in 1962 with "Dr. No" starring Sean Connery,...

Henry Silva, an actor with a striking look who often played villains and had credits in hundreds of films including “Ocean’s Eleven” and “The Manchurian Candidate,” died of natural causes Wednesday at the Motion Picture Picture and Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, Calif., his son Scott confirmed. He was 95.

One of Silva’s most memorable roles came in John Frankenheimer’s classic thriller “The Manchurian Candidate” (1962), in which he played Chunjin, the Korean houseboy for Laurence Harvey’s Raymond Shaw — and an agent for the Communists — who engages in a thrilling, well-choreographed martial arts battle with Frank Sinatra’s Major Bennett Marco in Shaw’s New York apartment.

Silva appeared in a number of other movies with Sinatra, including the original, Rat Pack-populated “Ocean’s Eleven” (1960) with Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr., where he was one of the 11 thieves, and 1962 Western “Sergeants 3.”

His death was...

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Henry Silva, the rugged New York actor who portrayed heavies and heroes of various ethnicities in a career highlighted by turns in A Hatful of Rain, The Manchurian Candidate and Johnny Cool, has died. He was 95.

Silva died Wednesday of natural causes at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, his son Scott Silva told The Hollywood Reporter.

Silva also played the Draconian commander “Killer” Kane in Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (1979), just one in a lineup of his bad guys seen in The Tall T (1957), The Bravados (1958), Il Boss (1973), Sharky’s Machine (1981), Above the Law (1988), Dick Tracy (1990) and Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999).

“Henry Silva is one of those guys you most likely will recognize even if you don’t know his name,” onetime Crimespree magazine writer Dave Wahlman wrote in 2016. “His face is something straight...

It may not have Doris Day singing "Que Sera, Sera" like its 1956 remake, but Alfred Hitchcock's original 1934 film "The Man Who Knew Too Much" represents some of the master's best work before he came to Hollywood. It's got the Hitchcock magic, that strange movie logic that doesn't need to make complete sense to be wildly entertaining. Like so many of the movies he made later, it embraces some classic beats: a man on the run, complex international intrigue, and as much suspense as he could wring out of every moment.

It also opens with a moment of surprising levity, following British couple Bob and Jill Lawrence (Leslie Banks and Edna Best) on their holiday in the Swiss Alps. When their French friend Louis (Pierre Fresnay) is mysteriously shot while dancing, he divulges a crucial secret to Jill -- where to find a note with dangerous information about the planned...

Burbank, Calif., September 13, 2022 – Celebrating the 80th anniversary of its 1942 release, the legendary Warner Bros. film Casablanca will be released on Ultra HD Blu-ray Combo Pack and Digital on November 8, it was announced today by Warner Bros. Home Entertainment. Starring Academy Award winners Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, critic Leonard Maltin calls Casablanca “the best Hollywood movie of all time.”

The winner of three Academy Awards® including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay, Casablanca was directed by Michael Curtiz from a screenplay by Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, and Howard Koch. The screenplay is based on “Everybody Comes to Rick’s”, an unproduced stage play by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison. The film was produced by Hal B. Wallis.

The cast also features Paul Henreid, Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre, and Dooley Wilson.

Casablanca was voted the screen’s greatest love story and the #3 film of...

Long before Hannibal Lecter, Patrick Bateman, and Norman Bates, there was Hans Beckert (Peter Lorre in his breakout role), the child murderer at the heart of Fritz Lang's landmark 1931 German Expressionist thriller "M." More than 90 years later, the film is as chilling and upsetting as it ever was, despite never actually showing any of Beckert's horrible, vile deeds onscreen. All it takes is the sound of the character whistling "In the Hall of the Mountain King" to set you on edge.

Much like Alfred Hitchcock's "The 39 Steps" shaped the framework for person-on-the-run thrillers, "M" paved the way for the serial killer genre and variations on the theme. But what's fascinating about the film — aside from Lorre's creepy, clammy turn and the way Lang uses unnatural shadows, eerie reflections, and cramped interiors to create a setting as warped as the killer at the heart of the movie — is its lack of interest in Beckert.

"Aladdin" rode the crest of a powerful creative wave for Walt Disney Animation Studios upon its release in 1992. The musical fantasy was the studio's 31st motion picture and emerged within a renaissance of highly acclaimed animated tales like "Beauty and the Beast," following a decade of poorly-performing animated features. Its story is ostensibly about a street kid who finds a magic lamp, but it's the wild magic-man in the lamp, voiced by the late comedian Robin Williams, who remains the most recognizable character of the whole thing, serving up quick-fire zingers and impersonations of everyone from Peter Lorre to Jack Nicholson.

Dave Itzkoff shares insights on the "Awakenings" star in his 2018 biography "Robin," detailing the creative process behind the role of the genie when Williams joined the "Aladdin" team. While Jeffrey Katzenberg envisioned a swashbuckling historical fantasy like "The Thief of Baghdad," co-directors Ron Clements and John Musker (with encouragement...

Hollywood has a long history of taking stories about other cultures, and, well, white-washing them. In the olden days, they'd straight up just put a white actor in an Asian role, like Mickey Rooney in "Breakfast at Tiffany's" and Peter Lorre as the title character in the Mr. Moto films, which was a series about a Japanese secret agent made in the 1930s, a time notoriously unfriendly to any non-white folks.

In recent times "yellow face" is pretty far in the rearview mirror, culturally speaking, but what we do still see more than we should is recasting, hence the hubbub around the Scarlett Johansson "Ghost in the Shell" adaptation as recently as 2017. Representation has been getting better, much to the chagrin of a lot of very angry YouTubers and Twitch streamers, but it's still no guarantee that we won't get a white cast in an adaptation of material about non-white people.