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Exclusive: Tom Blyth (Billy the Kid), Chris Diamantopolous (Red Notice), Jordyn Denning (Pam & Tommy), Zach Villa (Good Mourning with a U) and Jay Mohr (The Cleaning Lady) have signed on to star in the comedy Discussion Materials, marking the feature directorial debut of TV writer, director and producer Alfredo Barrios Jr.

The offbeat comedy is based on the bestselling book Discussion Materials: Tales of a Rookie Wall Street Investment Banker by Bill Keenan. It follows Bobby Sanders (Blyth), a hustling and quick-talking former pro hockey player-turned-junior banker who navigates the quirky and somewhat surreal world of high finance as he confronts life’s meaning within this gilded cage.

Diamantopolous will play Masterson, the bank’s most-feared managing director, with Denning as Michelle, the brilliant and highflying corporate attorney Bobby falls for. Villa will portray Danny, an investment banking analyst whose financial brilliance is only matched by his insatiable libido, with Mohr as Abernathy,...

One of Max Ophüls’ best American movies is this razor-sharp ‘domestic film noir’ with excellent acting and a premise that was probably too sordid-real for 1949: cheap crooks blackmail an ordinary housewife trying to protect her family. Joan Bennett confronts the crisis head-on, facing down James Mason’s unusually sympathetic ‘collector.’

The Reckless Moment

Region free Blu-ray

Powerhouse Indicator

1949 / B&W / 1:37 full frame Academy / 82 min. / / Street Date April 22, 2019 / available from Powerhouse Films UK / £17.00

Starring: James Mason, Joan Bennett, Geraldine Brooks, Henry O’Neill, Shepperd Strudwick, David Bair, Roy Roberts, William Schallert.

Cinematography: Burnett Guffey

Film Editor: Gene Havlick

Original Music: Hans Salter

Written by Henry Garson, Robert Soderberg; Mel Dinelli, Robert E. Kent, from a story by Elisabeth Sanxay Holding

Produced by Walter Wanger

Directed by Max Ophüls

Nobody forgets Joan Bennett’s film noir appearances — she has a dark, moody quality that even Dario Argento appreciated. In The Woman in the Window...

Originally released as Hollow Triumph (easily the more poetically layered metaphor of a moniker), Steve Sekely’s 1948 film noir classic The Scar lapsed into public domain and has been floating around in various subpar transfers for several decades.

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Director Steve Sekely’s hardboiled film noir leans heavily on the talents of star-producer Paul Henreid and camera ace John Alton — the three of them whip up the best gimmick-driven noir thriller of the late ‘forties. Strained coincidences and unlikely events mean nothing when this much talent is concentrated in one movie. It’s also a terrific show for star Joan Bennett, who expresses all the disappointment, despair and angst of a noir femme who knows she’s in for more misery.

The Scar (Hollow Triumph)

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1948 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 83 min. / Street Date April 18, 2017 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Paul Henreid, Joan Bennett, Eduard Franz, Leslie Brooks, John Qualen, Mabel Paige, Herbert Rudley, George Chandler, Robert Bice, Henry Brandon, Franklyn Farnum, Thomas Browne Henry, Norma Varden, Jack Webb.

Cinematography: John Alton

Film Editor: Fred Allen

Original Music: Sol Kaplan

Written by Daniel Fuchs from a...

Noir if I can help it! Sultry Lizabeth Scott out-'fatals' every femme we know in this wickedly ruthless tale of unadulterated female venality. Rough creep Dan Duryea meets his match, as do other unfortunate males that get between Liz and a plump bag of blackmail loot. The Film Noir Foundation's restoration is a valiant rescue job, for a worthy 'annihilating melodrama.' Too Late for Tears Blu-ray + DVD Flicker Alley / FIlm Noir Foundation 1949 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / 102 min. / Street Date May 17, 2016 / 39.95 Starring Lizabeth Scott, Don DeFore, Dan Duryea, Arthur Kennedy, Kristine Miller, Barry Kelley Cinematography William Mellor Art Direction James Sullivan Film Editor Harry Keller Original Music Dale Butts Written by Roy Huggins from his story Produced by Hunt Stromberg Directed by Byron Haskin

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Who's doing good work for film preservation? The Film Noir Foundation has racked up some impressive rescues and restorations in the last fifteen years or so,...

What's contemporary Europe got that we ain't got? Powerful, serious filmmaking like that by Christian Petzold, starring the impressive Nina Hoss. Their sixth collaboration is a loaded narrative that takes some pretty wild narrative themes -- plastic surgery, hidden identities -- and spins them in a suspenseful new direction. Phoenix Blu-ray The Criterion Collection 809 2014 / Color / 2:39 widescreen (Super 35) / 98 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date April 26, 2016 / 39.95 Starring Nina Hoss, Ronald Zehrfeld, Nina Kunzendorf, Imogen Kogge. Cinematography Hans Fromm Film Editor Bettina Böhler Original Music Stefan Will Written by Christian Petzold, Haroun Farocki from ideas in the book Le retour des cendres by Hubert Monteilhet Produced by Florian Koerner von Gustorf, Michael Weber Directed by Christian Petzold

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

I had seen only one Christian Petzold feature before this one. 2012's Barbara is an excellent Deutsche-Millennial thriller starring Barbara Hoss as an East German doctor trying to do...

This is one of Spencer Tracy and Elizabeth Taylor's best, written and directed by the classy MGM team of director Vincente Minnelli and writers Frances Goodrich & Albert Hackett. It inspired a decade's worth of TV family sitcoms and set the benchmark for weddings for generations. Great fun and solid sentiment without mugging or exaggeration. Father of the Bride Blu-ray Warner Archive Collection 1950 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 93 min. / Street Date May 10, 2016 / available through the WBshop / 21.99 Starring Spencer Tracy, Elizabeth Taylor, Joan Bennett, Don Taylor, Billie Burke, Moroni Olsen, Melville Cooper, Leo G. Carroll, Rusty Tamblyn, Tom Irish, Frank Cady, Carleton Carpenter. Cinematography John Alton Film Editor Ferris Webster Original Music Adolph Deutsch Written by Frances Goodrich, Albert Hackett from the novel by Edward Streeter Produced by Pandro S. Berman Directed by Vincente Minnelli

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

There's almost no point in reviewing Father of the Bride, as one doesn't need insights,...

DVD Release Date: March 11, 2014

Price: DVD $11.98

Studio: Film Chest

Paul Henreid takes his scar seriously in Hollow Triumph.

The under-appreciated 1948 film noir crime drama Hollow Triumph arrives from Film Chest with a full high-definition restoration taken from the original 35mm film elements.

When med school dropout-turned-master criminal John Muller (Paul Henreid, Casablanca) puts together a major casino heist, not everything goes as planned. The cops don’t know he was behind it, but, unfortunately, Rocky Stansyck (Thomas Browne Henry, Earth vs. the Flying Saucers), a vindictive gangland casino owner, figures it out. In order to “disappear,” Muller assumes the identity of a psychiatrist, Dr. Bartok (Henreid again, in a dual role), requiring him to scar his face to match Bartok’s … resulting in unforeseen consequences.

Also known as The Man Who Murdered Himself and The Scar, the film co-stars Joan Bennett (Secret Beyond the Door) and Eduard Franz and is...

The Scar

Written by Daniel Fuchs

Directed by Steve Sekely

USA, 1948

It can be quite strange how an original idea conjured up at the outset of a new project can go awry. A clever concept is one thing, but building a cohesive, interesting story around it is a much taller challenge. A good, imaginative story, when mishandled by creative team members not on the same page, can sour very quickly, the fate nearly suffered by the 1948 noir The Scar, also known as Hollow Triumph in the United Kingdom upon its theatrical release.

John Muller (Paul Henreid), a brilliant man who studied psychology and all ailments afflicting the mind, has been released from prison after serving a term for practicing without a license with a job opportunity at a medical supplies company. From the moment he walks out of the prison’s walls, John concocts a heist that will land himself...

Paul Henreid: Hollow Triumph aka The Scar tonight Turner Classic Movies’ Paul Henreid film series continues this Tuesday evening, July 16, 2013. Of tonight’s movies, the most interesting offering is Hollow Triumph / The Scar, a 1948 B thriller adapted by Daniel Fuchs (Panic in the Streets, Love Me or Leave Me) from Murray Forbes’ novel, and in which the gentlemanly Henreid was cast against type: a crook who, in an attempt to escape from other (and more dangerous) crooks, impersonates a psychiatrist with a scar on his chin. Joan Bennett, mostly wasted in a non-role, is Henreid’s leading lady. (See also: “One Paul Henreid, Two Cigarettes, Four Bette Davis-es.”) The thriller’s director is Hungarian import Steve Sekely, whose Hollywood career consisted chiefly of minor B fare. In fact, though hardly a great effort, Hollow Triumph was probably the apex of Sekely’s cinematic output in terms of prestige...

This Friday, San Francisco's Roxie Theater begins two weeks of unfiltered B-movie goodness when "I Wake Up Dreaming: The Haunted World of the B Film Noir" unleashes some of the nastiest film noir of the 40's and 50's, coming in not so long after the fog of Noir City 7 rolled over.

There's plenty of things to like about San Francisco. The view, the vibe, the history... But for a noir fan, it's a place I had come to know as and will always associate with the nooks and crannies depicted in hardboiled crime stories. Where else, I ask, would you get two stirring film noir festivals only a few months apart, but in Sam Spade's chosen city?

As the program guide itself notes, the films shown are "the doomed and forgotten, rough and ready step-children of Hollywood’s lower depths; poverty row gems that, in many ways, capture the true,...