Here are our latest reviews of films on DVD from 2011 and earlier.
Alice in Wonderland (1966)
Gregory J. Smalley @ 366 Weird Movies
- Excerpt: Jonathan Miller exhumes a Wonderland without magical beings: the White Rabbit is just a stuffed shirt in a waistcoat, the Cheshire Cat is an ordinary house cat, the drowned animals by the pool of tears are a soggy band of Victorian citizens. By unmasking the story’s anthropomorphic animals, he de-cutifies the fairy tale; the result is, unexpectedly, one of the weirdest and most dreamlike “Alice”s ever put on film.
Chicago
Paulo Peralta @ CinEuphoria [Portuguese]
Chicago (1927)
Marilyn Ferdinand @ Ferdy on Films
- Excerpt: The first version of the media-manipulating murderess from the Windy City features a knockout performance by Phyllis Haver as a beautiful, blonde waste of space named Roxie Hart who really knew how to play to the camera to get an acquittal.
Chronicle of a Summer
David Bax @ Battleship Pretension
- Excerpt: Some of the discussions in Chronicle of a Summer get very serious, even personal. Yet Morin and Rouch never lose a certain sense of loose fun.
Dark Passage
Joshua Brunsting @ The CriterionCast
Figures in a Landscape
Dennis Schwartz @ Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews
Finding Buck McHenry
Dennis Schwartz @ Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews
The Game
Jamie S. Rich @ Criterion Confessions
- Excerpt: For whatever else it is, The Game is a tribute to the art of cinema. It is a romp through motion picture technique, bringing the visceral experience that movies attempt to re-create to its protagonist, establishing its own meta reality, a wheel within a reel.
Hercules vs. Moloch
Roderick Heath @ This Island Rod
- Excerpt: Whereas the bulk of the film is mild, Ferroni’s direction and the mostly blasé film grammar suddenly gains energy, and the film’s entertainment factor kicks up a notch, whenever Moloch and his bizarre cabal enter the film.
The Hollow Earth
Peter Gutierrez @ Unseen Films
- Excerpt: The scene where Peppard manages to lop off one of the “hard carbon” tusks of an ice creature, only to be confronted by a far more jagged and fearsome weapon, is not easily forgotten.
Hollow Man & Hollow Man II
- Excerpt: This is one of cinema’s dumber applications of invisibility. As with Verhoeven’s other films, one wonders if there isn’t an element of satire or social commentary behind the surface stupidity.
I Confess
Marilyn Ferdinand @ Ferdy on Films
- Excerpt: Apart from its wrong man theme, I Confess is as atypical a Hitchcock film as I can think of. In straying from pure genre filmmaking, Hitchcock made a film less susceptible to his personal stamp, but more rich and engaging than anyone might have expected.
Keane
Joshua Brunsting @ The CriterionCast
King of Kings [1961]
Tim Brayton @ Antagony & Ecstasy
- Excerpt: Many of the scenes (especially the ones centered on Pilate and John the Baptist) are as good as anything in the history of the Biblical epic.
Little Fugitive
Joshua Brunsting @ The CriterionCast
Lost Angels: Skid Row Is My Home
Ron Wilkinson @ MonstersandCritics.com
- Excerpt: The notable story of how Los Angeles’ skid row turned itself from a problem into a solution.
A Man Escaped
Joshua Brunsting @ The CriterionCast
Miami Connection
Nanook of the North
David Bax @ Battleship Pretension
- Excerpt: Flaherty was a prospector who had never made a film before Nanook. Still, he shows a preternatural aptitude for not only composition but especially the assembly of images.
Nanook of the North, The Wedding of Palo, and other Films of Arctic Life
- Excerpt: While it may not be as authentic as it seems, Nanook of the North is a landmark film essential to the establishment of the documentary feature that also remains fun to watch. The Wedding of Palo would be tough to recommend on its own, but its inclusion here is fitting and a testament to Nanook’s influence.
Paranoid Park
Paulo Peralta @ CinEuphoria [Portuguese]
The Pink Panther (1963)
Marcio Sallem @ Em Cartaz [Portuguese]
Run Silent, Run Deep
Dennis Schwartz @ Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews
Sexcula
Peter Nellhaus @ Coffee Coffee and more Coffee
- Excerpt: One is also reminded of the old gag applied to several better works: “This movie wasn’t released. It escaped.”
Snabba cash
Solaris
- Excerpt: ‘Solaris’ (1972) has much more in common with something like ‘Life of Pi’ (2012) than your typical sci-fi film…
The Song of Bernadette
- Excerpt: Based on the story of a French girl who claimed to have seen a divine vision in 1858, The Song of Bernadette is a bland vehicle for its bland star, Jennifer Jones. Its slow pace and overt seriousness make Henry King’s The Song of Bernadette a real crawl.
The Sun Shines Bright
- Excerpt: John Ford’s 1953 character piece The Sun Shines Bright has the genial air of a backyard barbeque. Virtually plotless, but overloaded with character, the film is an odd entry in the director’s canon, more laid back than its most comparable companions…
Swing Vote
Paulo Peralta @ CinEuphoria [Portuguese]
Teaching Mrs. Tingle
- Excerpt: Teaching Mrs. Tingle has the look and feel of a WB drama crossed with a television movie. With the exception of Helen Mirren, who gives a typically high quality performance with a passable American accent, the acting is pretty poor.
That Day, On the Beach
Dennis Schwartz @ Dennis Schwartz Movie Reviews
Thunderball
Dustin Freeley @ Movies About Gladiators.com
- Excerpt: The best of the Connery bunch, Thunderball evolves into a noir-style thriller.
