The Standoff at Sparrow Creek (dir. Henry Dunham, 2018) There has been a mass shooting at a police funeral. Members of a militia meet at their warehouse headquarters in the aftermath of this incident. They soon discover evidence that points to one of them as the responsible party. Militia member and embittered former cop Gannon … Continue reading The Standoff at Sparrow Creek
Author: oliveresque
Crimewave (1985)
Crimewave (dir. Sam Raimi, 1985) Overall, Crimewave was a lesson about abject failure--no matter how you slice it, the film was a dog, and everyone involved can pretty much line up to take forty whacks. As filmmakers, we failed to execute a misguided concept and our studio refused the benefit of any doubt. Bruce Campbell, … Continue reading Crimewave (1985)
Kiss of Death (1947 and 1995)
Kiss of Death (dir. Henry Hathaway, 1947) Kiss of Death (dir. Barbet Schroeder, 1995) People hate informers. We most commonly associate this sentiment with organized crime, whether we’re talking about the culture of silence found in the Italian omerta or in that ever popular dictum of what snitches will get. It’s wider than that, though. … Continue reading Kiss of Death (1947 and 1995)
Detour (1945)
Detour (dir. Edgar G. Ulmer, 1945) Is there anything more hopeless than a doomed piano player? Nightclub musician Al Roberts (Tom Neal) is hitchhiking across the country. His girlfriend Sue Harvey (Claudia Drake) left him and New York for Los Angeles. Roberts, having nothing left in the city, decides to follow her. Drifting down the … Continue reading Detour (1945)
Undertow (1949)
Undertow (dir. William Castle, 1949) Sometimes you are reminded that film noir was only elevated by critics, and like anything has its fair share of mediocrities or outright failures. Undertow is neither, exactly, but manages to be something as bad: forgettable. Middling mobster Tony Reagan (Scott Brady) was run out of Chicago for having an … Continue reading Undertow (1949)
D.O.A.
D.O.A. (dir. Rudolph Maté, 1949) D.O.A. (dir. Rocky Morton and Annabel Jankel, 1988) A man, shot from behind, walks into a police station. We follow him as he goes through the building, turning into the Homicide Division offices. He approaches a pair of detectives and declares, “I want to report a murder.” The lead detective … Continue reading D.O.A.
The Killers
“The Killers” (Ernest Hemingway, 1927) The Killers (dir. Robert Siodmak, 1946) The Killers (dir. Andrei Tarkovsky, Marika Beiku, and Aleksandr Gordon, 1956) The Killers (dir. Don Siegel, 1964) I’ve never been an especially big fan of Hemingway. I like The Sun Also Rises. Elements of A Farewell to Arms and For Whom the Bell Tolls … Continue reading The Killers
The Maltese Falcon
The Maltese Falcon (Dashiell Hammett, 1930) The Maltese Falcon (dir. Roy Del Ruth, 1931) Satan Met a Lady (dir. William Dieterle, 1936) The Maltese Falcon (dir. John Huston, 1941) Hammett gave murder back to the kind of people that commit it for reasons, not just to provide a corpse; and with the means at hand, … Continue reading The Maltese Falcon
Under the Volcano
Under the Volcano (Malcolm Lowry, 1947) Under the Volcano (dir. John Huston, 1984) Malcolm Lowry’s 1947 novel follows Geoffrey Firmin, an alcoholic British consul in Cuernavaca, Mexico, on the last day of his life, the second of November in 1938. It is the Day of the Dead, when the deceased are remembered by the living, … Continue reading Under the Volcano
Mad Love (1935)
Mad Love (dir. Karl Freund, 1935) The second adaptation of Maurice Renard’s Les Mains d’Orlac, a 1920 novel about a disfigured pianist who receives a hand transplant from a murderer and begins killing against his will, Mad Love is likely best known for two things: Peter Lorre as the bald, sinister surgeon Dr. Gogol and … Continue reading Mad Love (1935)
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