10 GREAT CHRISTOPHER PLUMMER PERFORMANCES

My favorite moment of this year’s Oscar telecast occurred when a sprightly 82-year-old Christopher Plummer took the stage in a beautiful velvet suit to accept his Best Supporting Actor award. He was incredibly gracious and gave one of the best speeches of the night. It was obvious that the Canadian actor hadn’t lost any of …

TELEFILM TIME MACHINE: THAT CERTAIN SUMMER (1972)

Just three short years after the Stonewall riots took place in New York ABC made television history when they aired THAT CERTAIN SUMMER (1972), the first gay-themed made-for-TV movie. This landmark telefilm is often left out of discussions about gay cinema but its significance shouldn’t be underestimated. This surprisingly smart and sensitive drama is well worth revisiting …

Tunes & Tomes: Favorite 2020 Albums & Books

Some favorite albums from 2020 Tami Nelison – Chickaboom! Tami Nelison is a Canadian powerhouse of talent. Stumbled on a track from this album last year while scrolling through Youtube and was hooked. A combination of golden-age country, rockabilly raunch & sweet soul. Neilson writes and performs all her own songs with a band that …

World on Fire: Four Favorite 2020 Film Releases

For whatever reason (Pandemic fatigue? Regurgitated film plot fatigue?) I wasn't very impressed with most of the new releases I watched this year. Halfway through screener season I just gave up and stopped watching new movies because I was bored. Despite my misgivings about the year in general there were a handful of films released …

SPY GAMES: The Looking Glass War (1969)

One of the best films I saw last year was Tomas Alfredson’s TINKER TAILOR SOLIDER SPY (2011) based on John Le Carré’s novel of the same name. It stars Gary Oldman in a career defining performance that’s earned him an Oscar nomination. I hope Oldman takes home the award but I’m not here to talk about TINKER …

POLITICS, PROTEST & PROGRESS IN THE STRAWBERRY STATEMENT

Stuart Hagmann’s THE STRAWBERRY STATEMENT (1970) is often dismissed today as a dated relic of the early 1970s. During its initial release, it was singled out for being exploitive and failing to be a straightforward adaptation of the book it was based on. Many critics claimed that Hagmann’s direction was erratic and too creative for its own …

FRANKENSTEIN CREATED SUSAN DENBERG

Susan Denberg (aka Dietlinde Ortrun Zechner) was blond, beautiful, and unapologetically curvaceous. A German-Austrian Kim Novak look-alike with strong sex appeal and an endearing screen presence. Like Novak, Denberg dated Sammy Davis Jr. while some of her other romantic conquests included Stuart Whitman, Sidney Poitier, Charles Bronson, Jim Brown, and director Roman Polanski. Following a …

FRANKENSTEIN: THE TRUE STORY (1973)

Film buffs tend to have obsessions. We fuss and fawn over particular actors and directors while attempting to see everything they ever appeared in or produced. One of my own personal obsessions isn’t an actor or a director but it’s a tale I enjoy seeing reimagined over and over again in different languages and in …

In the Trenches with James Whale: FRANKENSTEIN (1931)

THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935) is commonly considered the best of James Whale’s two Frankenstein films and while I absolutely love Elsa Lanchester’s iconic performance as the hissing she monster, I prefer the original. There are a number of reasons why I tend to gravitate towards FRANKENSTEIN (1931) over its sequel. First and foremost, it takes itself more seriously and …

MIND OVER MATTER: THE SORCERERS (1967)

Michael Reeves Since director Michael Reeves's unfortunate death in 1969 at the age of 25 his life has become the stuff of cinematic legend. His reputation as a sort of Byronic hero who challenged the British film establishment was secured when he died much too young due to an accidental drug overdose leaving behind just …

A Boris Karloff Double Feature

When I’m feeling low I tend to gravitate towards what I like to call “comfort viewing” and my comfort viewing is classic horror films. During the cold winter months, cozying up on the couch with a warm beverage and a couple of creaky old black and white horror movies can make even the worse week …

Revisiting & Reappraising THE TERROR (1963)

Like any horror film fan worth their salt and of a certain age, I’ve seen badly beat-up and butchered prints of The Terror on TV and video numerous times. The film suffered the unfortunate fate of falling into the public domain decades ago so it became a staple of late-night television and was repeatedly released …

DRACULA VS. SPANISH DRACULA

Tod Browning’s DRACULA (1931) is rightly hailed as a horror classic while the Spanish-language version directed by George Melford was assumed lost and went largely unseen by modern audiences following its initial release until it was restored and distributed on home video in 1992. Both films were shot at the same time using the same …

What Ever Happened to Jennifer?

Jennifer’s gone missing. She was supposed to be looking after her uncle’s sprawling estate, which appears to have been abandoned since the Great Depression, but no one has seen her in weeks. Did she run off with an unknown lover? Did she swindle an undisclosed sum of money from her previous boss and head to …

Pastoral Suspense: DEADLY STRANGERS (1975)

Today Sterling Hayden is best remembered by film lovers for his memorable roles in a number of classic noirs and westerns that air on TCM regularly as well as subsequent standout parts in Kubrick’s DR. STRANGELOVE: OR HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE BOMB (1964), Coppola’s THE GODFATHER (1972) and Altman’s THE LONG GOODBYE (1973). Late in life tall and brawny actor …