Joan Crawford delivers a critically acclaimed performance as Mildred Pierce a woman clawing her way to success to provide her daughter with everything she lacks. No sacrifice is too much - ending her middle class marriage climbing to the top of a male-dominated business world and marrying a man she doesn't love - but is murder a step too far? Based on a novel by James M. Cain (The Postman Always Rings Twice Double Indemnity) Mildred Pierce is a stylish film noir which rejuvenated screen icon Joan Crawford's career and earned her an Academy Award for Best Actress.
This CinemaScope treatment of Frank Loesser's hit Broadway musical Guys and Dolls is a deeply rewarding visual and musical experience. Frank Sinatra turns in one of his best screen performances running a close second to Marlon Brando and Jean Simmons, looking adorable and singing sweetly. In essence this is a piece of photographed theatre mounted on a handsome scale. The striking set designs and a brilliantly executed soundtrack are courtesy of two Broadway craftsmen Oliver Smith and conductor Jay Blackton. Photographer Harry Stradling brings a meticulous eye for detail when his camera stationed on the auditorium side of the frame, peers into Miss Adelaide's bathroom cupboard as she views the lines of medicine bottles in her celebrated "lament". Sinatra, in his vocal prime, sings a new number to Adelaide (Vivian Blaine)--arranged by Nelson Riddle--and Brando and Simmons strike chords in all their scenes from their opening duet "I'll Know" through to their evening out at a Havana bistro where she gets pie-eyed on a Bacardi milk-shake, tipsily wondering "If I were a Bell". Stubby Kaye also from the Broadway cast recreates the show-stopping "Sit Down You're Rockin' the Boat". Michael Kidd's choreography for "Luck Be a Lady" is razor-sharp and superbly captured in the CinemaScope format, though the formalised staging of the opening ought to have been rethought for this medium. The biggest pity is that Loesser amended some of his lyrics and replaced several tunes from his original score with inferior material. On the DVD: The DVD trailer hosted by Ed Sullivan makes much of the $1,000,000 cheque producer Samuel Goldwyn paid for the rights and the previews of the picture he obtained for his weekly television show. There's no denying that the remastered stereophonic soundtrack captures the Broadway sound to thrilling effect without it being overglamorised. The picture looks splendid too--never settle for the compromise version we've endured all these years on television! --Adrian Edwards
Hollywood legends Marlon Brando Frank Sinatra Jean Simmons and Vivian Blaine (from the original Broadway cast) are dazzling in this masterpiece unleashing a spectacular song-and-dance show that's loaded with entertainment. The slickest big-time New York City gamblers Sky Masterson (Brando) and Nathan Detroit (Sinatra) can't resist making or taking a bet on anything. So when a pretty missionary (Simmons) sets up shop in the neighbourhood Nathan stakes a grand that Sky can't sed
Great Guns (Dir. Monty Banks 1941): Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy join the army to protect their country...but who will protect the army from them? In Great Guns the comic team play a chauffeur and a gardener whose hypochondriac employer (Dick Nelson) a wealthy young man with little experience is drafted. Convinced that he needs them in order to survive in the service they join up as well. Of course the Texas cavalry post to which they're all assigned is made far worse for the wear by the presence of these well-meaning troublemakers and there is never a dull moment in this classic featuring two of the cinema's most revered comic actors! Jitterbugs (Dir. Malcolm St. Clair 1943): Considered the best of the Laurel and Hardy projects filmed at Twentieth Century Fox this energetic musical comedy also introduces singer Vivian Blaine. Stan and Oliver star as a traveling two-man jitterbug band who operate out of a dilapidated jalopy and form an unlikely partnership with a likable con man (Bob Bailey). When the trio joins a carnival they meet Susan a naive young singer (Vivian Blaine) whose mother has been swindled by grifters. Suddenly chivalrous the three orchestrate a sting operation using disguises - with Laurel dressed as Susan's disheveled aunt and Hardy as a rich Texan - to get the woman's money back. Although things don't go as planned the inimitable comedy duo provide nonstop laughs from start to finish in this delightful caper. The Big Noise (Dir. Malcolm St. Clair 1944): The zany antics of legendary comedians Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy come to life in this romp about two phony private detectives. The duo play janitors accidentally hired as sleuths to protect a new super-bomb destined for the War Department in Washington D.C. However the bomb's inventor has loaded his house with crazy contraptions that entrap and confuse the protectors. Meanwhile next door is the biggest threat of all - a gang of crooks determined to get their hands on the inventor's deadly creation. Through a series of crazy misadventures our heroes end up in a remote-controlled airplane along with the bomb and head straight for trouble.
The inventor of a secret weapon and its prototype are abducted leaving the wartime Allies in dire need of assistance. Sherlock Holmes is called and begins to do battle with Professor Moriarty who will later become his arch-enemy...
This value-for-money Zombie Double Feature is billed as "Flesh Creepers, Volume 1", and offers a double billing of George A Romeros classic Night of the Living Dead (1968) and Steve Sekelys rather less fondly remembered Revenge of the Zombies (1943). Night of the Living Dead is a masterpiece, but it has also slipped through a copyright loophole which means it has been issued on video and DVD by a great many distributors in as many variant versions. This one isnt ruined by colorisation or dodgy new footage as a couple of rival releases are, but it is soft-looking print, free of censor cuts but very washed-out-looking. The background notes inexcusably get the date of the film wrong, crassly tagging it "think Blair Witch 1964", and mention the existence of extras-filled special DVD editions, which rather rubs in the fact that this no-frills effort has none of the commentaries or documentaries found on other releases. Revenge of the Zombies is a sluggish hour-long wartime B-picture, with John Carradine underplaying for once as a Nazi scientist creating an army of zombies (ie: a handful of shuffling extras) in the Louisiana swamplands. Comedy relief Mantan Moreland has the best moments and the trudging-around-the-backlot zombies ("things walkin aint got no business to be walkin") are fun, but it isnt especially good of its kind. On the DVD: The Zombie Double Feature presents both films in "horrorscope", which means letterboxing and blurry image. The only extra is a list-like essay about the habits of flesh-eating zombies in Romero films.--Kim Newman
This box set features 'Woman In Green' 'Secret Weapon' 'Dressed To Kill' and 'Terror By Night'. The Woman In Green: A sequence of strange murders baffles the police. Holmes is called onto the scene and discovers the existence of a blackmail ring that uses a female hypnotist to further their skulduggery. Secret Weapon: The inventor of a secret weapon and its prototype are abducted leaving the wartime Allies in dire need of assistance. Sherlock Holmes is called a
The inventor of a secret weapon and its prototype are abducted leaving the wartime Allies in dire need of assistance. Sherlock Holmes is called and begins to do battle with Professor Moriarty who will later become his arch-enemy...
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