Shameless Self Expression

The title elderly rich old lady (Ethel Barrymore) takes a shine to a struggling but snazzy-dressing artist (Maurice Evans), and reluctantly allows his fragile wife (Betsy Blair) to stay after she takes a turn. Before long, Evans has moved himself in and taken over the entire house with his two crass cronies (Angela Lansbury and Keenan Wynn). Barrymore is left helpless in her own abode as Evans and co help themselves to her expensive art collection. Doris Lloyd plays Barrymore’s original maid, John Williams plays a concerned acquaintance of the elderly Barrymore.   Although best-known for his more manly-man films in the war and western genres ( “Gunfight at the OK Corral” , “The Magnificent Seven” , “The Great Escape” , “Last Train from Gun Hill” ), director John Sturges was capable of a lot more than just making ‘guy’ movies. He shows just that in this excellent 1950 crime-thriller, based on a stage play that was filmed before in the 1930s with Basil Rathbone and Aline MacMahon...

Set in Northern France during WWI, George MacKay and Dean-Charles Chapman are young soldiers given a mission (by a general played by Colin Firth) to go behind enemy lines and pass on ‘stand down’ orders to a battalion (that includes Chapman’s brother). The battalion is set to go on a raid, but the Germans are actually expecting them and will ambush them. Mark Strong, Andrew Scott, and Benedict Cumberbatch play other officers the soldiers come across on their journey.   Somewhat short and simplistic, but excellently directed and shot WWI film from Sam Mendes ( “Jarhead” , “Road to Perdition” , the underrated “SPECTRE” ), co-written by Krysty Wilson-Cairns (who has apparently written nine episodes of “Penny Dreadful” ). It’s a small story within the war being told, but it’s an effectively told one. It’s kinda like the climax of “Gallipoli” stretched out to feature length, with superb cinematography by a deservedly Oscar-winning Roger Deakins ( “Jarhead” , “The Assassination of J...

In what is apparently a spin-off to “Knocked Up” (Didn’t see it, not a Heigl fan), Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann play a married couple with kids (played by Maude and Iris Apatow). Both Rudd and Mann are turning 40, but the latter is in denial. The gist of the plot is both Rudd and Mann’s dealing with their middle-age milestone as a birthday party is on the horizon. Jason Segel plays a flirt who was apparently in “Knocked Up” , Albert Brooks and John Lithgow play the respective fathers, Lena Dunham and Chris O’Dowd are Rudd’s co-workers, Megan Fox is an employee of Mann’s.   I finally decided to watch this 2013 ‘dramedy’ from writer-director Judd Apatow ( “The 40 Year-Old Virgin” , the terrific “Funny People” ) at age 41, I guess making me roughly the target age for the subject matter, though I’m currently neither married nor afflicted with children. I must say though, that this is one of the softer recommendations I’m likely to give. Some of this is really quite good, even funny a...

Emile Hirsch is a cop who hasn’t recovered from a past traumatic incident that cost him the love of his life as well as seeing him demoted. Now he’s barely giving a shit and clocking in and out doing piddly police jobs in Puerto Rico. One stormy night he’s asked to get off his complacent, self-pitying ass to go to an apartment building with his eager new partner (Stephanie Cayo) to evacuate a few stubborn residents who don’t want to leave during hurricane weather. One of these residents is dying ex-cop Mel Gibson, who lives with his nurse daughter Kate Bosworth. Meanwhile, a band of would-be thieves (led by David Zayas) are about to storm the complex in search of supposedly buried riches – priceless artwork stashed somewhere in one of the apartments. William Catlett plays an apartment resident already known to the cops for his bizarre behaviour at the supermarket buying waaaaayyyyyyyy too much meat for his ‘pet’.   You might remember  “Twin Falls, Idaho”  from the late 90...

Dr. Victor Frankenstein (Peter Cushing) is saved from the gallows by disabled hangman Karl (Michael Gwynn), whom he has promised a way out of his physically deformed state. Back in Karlsbruck, Frankenstein sets up practice where he serves both the poor voluntarily and also earns a pretty penny from upper-crust clients. Frankenstein and his assistant Hans (Francis Matthews) get to work in transplanting Karl’s brain into a newly configured body. The results are successful…at first. Eunice Gayson plays an assistant at the hospital, while the trio of Michael Ripper, Lionel Jeffries, and Richard Wordsworth play disreputable characters.   Although I’ll take Hammer’s “The Horror of Dracula” over Universal’s Bela Lugosi version any day of the week, it’s a different story with both company’s respective “Frankenstein” flicks. The two James Whale/Boris Karloff films for Universal are unquestionable horror classics, whereas Hammer’s initial “Curse of Frankenstein” is just OK at best. We...