Jake Paltrow and Noah Baumbach’s 2016 documentary, De Palma, stands among my 10 favorite films of last year, with my only criticism being that it stops after 93 minutes. Anyone else who was left wanting more (and more and more) may find that itch somewhat scratched by Douglas Keesey’s Brian De Palma’s Split-Screen: A Life … Continue reading Reading Material: Short Ends 4/30/17
Officially or not, The Unliving (aka Tomb of the Werewolf, in a shorter cut) is the 12th and final entry in the cycle of films starring Spanish-horror icon Paul Naschy as the lycanthropic Count Waldemar Daninsky. We say “or not” because Naschy neither wrote nor directed it. Hell — and this is not a complaint … Continue reading The Unliving (2004)
Saddled with writer’s block, novelist Howard Hansen (Ted Prior, Sledgehammer) makes his way into a Chinese curio shop, where he plunks down big bucks on a jar containing a one-eyed brain monster floating in icky water. Naturally, this wise purchase helps him to concentrate so he can finish knocking out his latest book. It also … Continue reading Possessed by the Night (1994)
As fun as Marvel’s big-screen Thor is, you can always rely on The Asylum to make a movie that’s more fun, even if only in terms of sheer cinematic insanity. For a few years now, these straight-to-video kingpins have been churning out “mockbusters,” suspiciously similar, low-budget rip-offs (for lack of a better word) of current … Continue reading Almighty Thor (2011)
One would expect Ruggero Deodato, the director of the notoriously nihilistic Cannibal Holocaust, to bring something different to an Italian cop film. In Live Like a Cop, Die Like a Man, he does just that: basic disregard for human life. Enjoy! The best part of this crime story comes right out of the gate, as … Continue reading Live Like a Cop, Die Like a Man (1976)