Recently Watched Films

An all-star cast before they were stars. C. Thomas Howell, Matt Dillon, Ralph Macchio, Patrick Swayze, Rob Lowe, Emilio Estevez, Tom Cruise, Diane Lane, and then throw in Leif Garrett and Tom Waits, and that's a hell of a lot of star power. Throw in Francis Ford Coppola as director, and you have one hell of a good teen gang movie. The soundtrack is also excellent, all present and correct for the mid-60s setting.

Decent but uneven 70s cop flick. A few big names, and a couple of big-names-in-the-making in the cast. The first third is pretty good comedy-drama, the second third falls a bit flat, and the final third is where a lot of the action is. I read the Ed McBain book many years ago (who also happens to be the screenwriter Evan Hunter), and I hate to have to say it because it's such a worn cliché, but the book was better.

Do you have a favourite method of er... revenge? I particularly like the locusts myself. The second one is also worth a look, but not quite as good. And Vincent Price did a comedy mad scientist movie called Dr Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine, which is loaded with slapstick comedy but falls a bit flat.

Darkly comic, sometimes slapstick, an absolute farce and 100% hoot. 

And also:

Disney Revisited #3:

Strictly speaking, number 3 should be Fantasia, but since I've never cared for that movie or have any desire to see it again, I've gone straight onto Dumbo. 

Dumbo is considered a problematic movie today because of the crows and their racial stereotyping (though many including black people have defended the crows). One of the shorter Disney features, Dumbo hits the nostalgia factor well enough, but I never felt that it was one of the best Disney movies, though the pink elephants sequence is excellent. For some reason my memory of that part placed it in the much later The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, so I was quite surprised when it came along in this movie. 

Further exploring Kubrick. I've gone from mixed feelings on him over the last year or so to having a great appreciation for his work. This one was really good, much more so than I anticipated. It's a three hour movie, but it really didn't feel like it. 

Feels like John Landis tried to do with vampires what had previously worked well were werewolves in An American Werewolf in London, but the results aren't as good. Special effects are generally poor, giving the vampires ridiculous glowing eyes. The cross genre with a gangster film is an interesting idea but not executed as well as I'd have liked to have seen. Overall it was entertaining though. 

Not seen this in a very long time. The premise to the story is silly, but there's some great mountain climbing action in it. And there's really not much more to say than that.