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Post by Prime etc. on Mar 15, 2024 5:08:01 GMT
THE SICILIAN CLAN 1969 - A young, ruthless mobster is sprung from a prison van so he can plan an elaborate diamond heist (while seducing the wife of the godfather's son) as a determined police commissioner (who says he wants to quit smoking so of course it ends up being thwarted) closes in on all of them. Alain Delon, Jean Gabin. It keeps you glued.
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Post by louise on Mar 15, 2024 15:35:41 GMT
Oscar (1991). Amusing crime comedy adapted from a French farce but set in 1931 Chicago. Sylvester Stallone is a gangster who promises his dying father (Kirk Douglas) to go straight, but gets involved in all sorts of complications with money and jewellery and underwear and daughters.
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Post by louise on Mar 15, 2024 22:43:21 GMT
The Chase (1946). Interesting drama with Robert Cummings as an unemployed ex serviceman who gets a job as chauffeur to gangster Steve Cochran. Cochran’s beautiful wife (Michele Morgan) is desperate to escape her husband, and asks Cummings to help her, so they run off to Havana with Steve Cochran and his evil henchman Peter Lorre in hot pursuit. And then - things get really strange. A very unusual plot, lots of surprises.
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Post by Lebowskidoo 🦞 on Mar 16, 2024 12:15:58 GMT
My first time seeing Notorious (1946).
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mcclance
Sophomore
@mcclance
Posts: 259
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Post by mcclance on Mar 19, 2024 12:42:47 GMT
Douglas Fairbanks' The Thief of Bagdad on the 100th anniversary of its release.
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Post by Prime etc. on Mar 20, 2024 6:08:54 GMT
DEATH DRUMS ALONG THE RIVER - 1963 - Based on an Edgar Wallace story, about a police officer in Zaire (Richard Todd) investigating a murder and diamond smuggling operation. It was diverting. The sequel COAST OF SKELETONS, I had already seen.
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Post by Lebowskidoo 🦞 on Mar 21, 2024 20:18:04 GMT
Once Upon a Honeymoon (1942)
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Post by Prime etc. on Mar 22, 2024 5:53:52 GMT
Harold Robbins' Stiletto 1969 -For some reason they always put Robbins in front of the title but was really that much of a draw? Seems like he was heavily promoted and then zilch. But that describes this film quite well--a zilch. It stars Alex Cord who was not meant to be a leading man and yet he had a few starring roles in the late 60s including The Brotherhood which was remade a few years later --- Cord was a returning GI who ends up in the family mafia business--and his character was portrayed by Al Pacino in the remake. He was alright in some supporting roles but just not meant for the leading man. In this case Patrick O'Neal is his co-star who is not quite the leading man type either. The plot involves a criminal who gets recruited by the mafia as a hit man and he goes around like James Bond stabbing people in the back with a (take a guess). What makes this film interesting is how many people appear in supporting parts or uncredited who ended up bigger names than Cord or O'Neal. There's Roy Scheider, Lincoln Kilpatrick (playing a character named Hannibal Smith--I love it when a plan comes together), Antonio Fargas, James Tolkan, Olympia Dukakis, Raul Julia, Charles Durning, M. Emmet Walsh--I spotted Diane Muldaur as well--IMDB doesn't have her listed. And Peter O'Toole appears too. It's not a good or even fair movie but memorable for the showcase of familiar faces.
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Post by Prime etc. on Mar 26, 2024 5:48:09 GMT
MYSTERIOUS ISLAND 1961 --Herbert Lom manages to do something that is not easy in a situation like this--he is able to come across as imperial while having a giant seashell on his back. The scene of him coming out of the water I remembered from way back--it may have been the first time I saw him in a movie.
His plan to prevent war seems a little naive though.
I am pretty sure wars happen for reasons other than food scarcity.
Some of the spfx are surprisingly weak-the matte paintings look quite fake but other things are good. I am especially impressed with the pirate ship scene because it looks like the miniature is really on the ocean--if if was a water tank--it sure did have a realistic horizon line. If it was the ocean, they had a very mild current while shooting it.
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Post by Prime etc. on Mar 27, 2024 16:52:08 GMT
4 For Texas - 1963 --Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin
Forgettable comedy western in which Charles Bronson seems to have walked in from a more serious film. Every time he leaves a room, you can hear him uttering a weird laugh which I guess was added as a sound effect to make it fit into the rest of the film. Except there isn't much humor that works on display. Things get desperate when the Three Stooges arrive and are slapped by Grandma Walton (for carrying a nude portrait of Ursula Andress--it is shown uncovered for a couple of seconds). A costly box office dud. Sophie Loren turned down a $1 million to avoid being a part of it.
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Post by Prime etc. on Mar 28, 2024 7:05:42 GMT
ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST 1968 - Has a such a powerful convergence of imagery and sound.
SPOILER
Although some say the story is about how the gunfighter is made extinct by the arrival of civilization-- all the male characters are doomed. They all die or have a fate that suggests extinction. The homesteader, the railroad baron, even Harmonica. Only the woman who will become some kind of den mother for the workers but not a homesteader herself. I am not sure the Cheyenne death scene really works here because we never have any indication he had been shot. I assume they filmed it that way deliberately because they expected to cut it for the American release. If it is removed, then the two characters simply disappear out the door and the focus is on Jill as she walks outside with the water. Not sure that extra scene serves a value for the characters especially Harmonica. It's an unnecessary bromance in my opinion. Because Harmonica's business was concluded with Frank's death and he seemed to be departing on his own--and Cheyenne was going to do the same. The inclusion of it was a kind of sentimental epilogue to punctuate that he would be riding off into oblivion. I haven't seen the US release which removed that scene--but I prefer the US release of The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly. Although some say the story is about how the gunfighter is made extinct by the arrival of civilization-- all the male characters are doomed. They all die or have a fate that suggests extinction. The homesteader, the railroad baron, even Harmonica. Only the woman who will become some kind of den mother for the workers but not a homesteader herself. I am not sure the Cheyenne death scene really works here because we never have any indication he had been shot. I assume they filmed it that way deliberately because they expected to cut it for the American release. If it is removed, then the two characters simply disappear out the door and the focus is on Jill as she walks outside with the water. Not sure that extra scene serves a value for the characters especially Harmonica. It's an unnecessary bromance in my opinion. Because Harmonica's business was concluded with Frank's death and he seemed to be departing on his own--and Cheyenne was going to do the same. The inclusion of it was a kind of sentimental epilogue to punctuate that he would be riding off into oblivion. I haven't seen the US release which removed that scene--but I prefer the US release of The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly.
Then again--without the scene Cheyenne doesn't have closure as the other characters do so I suppose it does make sense in that way.
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Post by Prime etc. on Mar 29, 2024 7:02:51 GMT
CANNON FOR CORDOBA - 1970 - A US western shot in Spain but shows a few Italian influences. George Peppard is a soldier hired for a mission to take down a Mexican rebel leader and doesn't flinch when the brother of a comrade is tortured by fire (I suspect the Harmonica hanging scene was an inspiration). It doesn't re-invent the wheel and I don't find it as satisfying as some lesser known Eurowesterns along a similar plot--and the ending is strangely abrupt, but it is re-watchable (since this is the third time I have seen it). The commentary track for it indicates the film was the bottom feature on a drive-in circuit. While watching I was thinking how this would have been if shot like OUATITW ( Aldo Sambrell, who appeared in that film and just about every European western ever made or imagined shows up in this as well).
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Post by Prime etc. on Mar 31, 2024 7:36:42 GMT
STRAIGHT TIME - 1978 --This didn't go the way I assumed it would. I expected it to be a drama about how hard it is for an ex-con to make it on the outside--but then it took a different turn when Dustin Hoffman freaks out on his obnoxious parole officer (M. Emmet Walsh) and resumes a career of crime. The robbery scenes are intense especially with Harry Dean Stanton as his partner.
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Post by Lebowskidoo 🦞 on Apr 1, 2024 13:29:44 GMT
Black Magic (1949)
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Post by Prime etc. on Apr 2, 2024 6:08:14 GMT
COUNTERPOINT 1967 - Overlooked Charlton Heston film with good reason--it's not bad per se just so odd in idea. He is a orchestra conductor who is captured with his musicians behind enemy lines in WW 2 and gets into a war of wills with Maximilian Schell, who wants him to play a concert. Anton Diffring (who else?) is the evil German who schemes to ruin the show. The banter is unusually witty--everyone seems to have a smart remark ready in reply to something.
"Prostitution isn't the only profession ruined by amateurs."
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Post by Prime etc. on Apr 3, 2024 5:30:24 GMT
THE THOUSAND EYES OF DR. MABUSE - 1960 - First of the 60s Mabuse films (btw--it is pronounced "mabusa") was directed by Fritz Lang and has Gert Frobe as the police official on his trail. In one scene Frobe is drinking a beer and blows the foam off the glass and hits an actor and you can see the guy react as if it wasn't planned. I enjoyed the third film, The Testament of Dr. Mabuse, more than this.
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Post by Prime etc. on Apr 5, 2024 5:28:20 GMT
HEY AMIGO, YOU'RE DEAD! 1970 -- Very generic western with simplistic plot and almost no dialogue and yet the direction is so lively and the cast of unfamiliar actors (the only one I recognized for sure was in Once Upon A Time In the West as the informant who wore a belt and suspenders---"man can't even trust his own pants.") do have interesting faces so even though there's no real acting--it worked enough for me. Interesting case where the faces of the actors are just watchable without them doing much with them.
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Post by brandomarlon2003 on Apr 7, 2024 23:09:00 GMT
Not With My Wife, You Don't (1966) - A 1966 romantic comedy starring George C. Scott, Virna Lisi and Tony Curtis. During the Korean War, Italian nurse Lieutenant Julietta Perodi (Virna Lisi), who has a passion of everything in "twos", falls in love with two United States Air Force pilots, Col. Tom Ferris (Tony Curtis) and Col. "Tank" Martin (George C. Scott). "Julie" marries Ferris after he convinces her that his friend, "Tank" has been killed in an aircraft crash. She soon discovers that Martin is alive, but remains happily married to Ferris until, Martin, her former love, re-enters their lives 14 years later. (Rating: 6/10).
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Post by Prime etc. on Apr 9, 2024 6:01:18 GMT
THE MIDNIGHT MAN - 1974 - Burt Lancaster is an ex-cop and an ex-con who gets hired as a security guard and is soon involved in a murder case (Catherine Bach is the victim--the first time I saw this, I didn't recognize her without the Daisy Duke accent). The story hits on a theme that relates to Chinatown but not quite so extreme and feels like a tv-movie except for the Cameron Mitchell butt shot.
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Post by Prime etc. on Apr 10, 2024 6:09:40 GMT
633 SQUADRON 1964 --One of the films used as a reference for Star Wars and you can tell. The flying scenes are exciting (except for one repeating shot of a toy plane going near some cliffs). There's also a brief interrogation scene with an Ilsa-She Wolf of the SS type of character. I wish they showed more of her. What's interesting is that usually when a soldier is captured, the guy's comrades will say "he is too tough-he'll never talk."
Not the case here. As soon as they learn he is captured--they are thinking--"he is going to talk really fast--we better bomb the place before he does."
Some faith they have in the guy.
Another thing is that one of the pilots (named Singh) is a Sikh I assume, because he wears a turban. But not in the cockpit. He wears a typical flight cap with goggles. During a meeting, we see Singh with the other pilots--and he is the only one wearing his flight cap in the room. I assume this was because they felt it would look strange if he was wearing a turban. I am wondering how he fits the cap over his turban. And that made me think--in Star Trek, Khan Noonian Singh is a Sikh but he does not have a turban. He should also have a ceremonial dagger.
The movie does have Donald Houston, and his last movie was Clash of the Titans where he gets crushed to death by Sir Laurence Olivier.
Anyway, that's the kind of mental digression that can happen when watching a movie alone.
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