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Corruption
BD - A
guilt-ridden plastic surgeon becomes murderously obsessed with
restoring the beautiful face of his fashion-model fiancée in
this horror film. It was he, in a jealous rage, who accidentally
disfigured her, when he burst into a photography session, got
into a fight with the cameraman and ended up burning her face
with a hot lamp. Now, desperate to restore her, he begins
harvesting the pituitary glands and the facial skin (removed
with a laser) from the severed heads of prostitutes and using
them on her wounded face. It works, but they pay a price and
both become increasingly insane because the "beauty treatment"
is only temporary. One day, an angry band of hippies storms the
doctor's house, for he has killed one of their friends.
Blu-ray Release date: October 8th, 2013
The Last American Virgin
BD - Gary, Rick and David are American
teens with one thing on their mind. They move from party to
party, trying out their latest chat-up lines, which usually ends
in miserable failure for Gary, as he's more interested in
finding true romance than a quick fumble in someone's parents'
bedroom. So when Karen arrives at their school, Gary falls head
over heels in love, but Rick's baser intentions towards her
threaten to break up their friendship for good. Championed by
Eli Roth (Hostel) as one of the most underrated films of its
era, The Last American Virgin is a raucous but also surprisingly
intelligent and sobering look at the hideousness of growing up,
peer pressures, misplaced expectations and unforeseen
consequences.
Blu-ray Release Date: September 16th, 2013
The Stranger
BD - Welles plays a college professor named Charles
Rankin, who lives in a pastoral Connecticut town with his lovely
wife Mary (Loretta Young). One afternoon, an extremely nervous
German gentleman named Meineke (Konstantin Shayne) arrives in
town. Professor Rankin seems disturbed--but not unduly so--by
Meineke's presence. He invites the stranger for a walk in the
woods, and as they journey farther and farther away from the
center of town, we learn that kindly professor Rankin is
actually notorious Nazi war criminal Franz Kindler.
Conscience-stricken by his own genocidal wartime activities,
Meineke has come to town to beg his ex-superior Kindler to give
himself up. The professor responds by brutally murdering his old
associate. If Kindler believes himself safe--and he has every
reason to do so, since no one in town, especially Mary, has any
inkling of his previous life--he will change his mind in a hurry
when mild-mannered war crimes commissioner Wilson (Edward G.
Robinson) pays a visit, posing as an antiques dealer.
Blu-ray
Release Date: October 15th, 2013
The Hitch-Hiker
BD - Ida Lupino, Hollywood's sole female
filmmaker of the 1950s, directs an all-male cast in a taut,
70-minute thriller. Frank Lovejoy and Edmund O'Brien are two war
buddies taking a break from the wives for a Mexican fishing
trip; a hitchhiker they pick up turns out to be a crazed killer
wanted in nine states (William Talman, later the perennially
defeated district attorney on Perry Mason) who forces them at
gunpoint to drive him through the desert. Talman's Everett Myers
is a fascinatingly abstract creation, filmed by Lupino first as
a discorporate flurry of hands and feet, then as a satanic
figure whose grinning, key-lighted face seems to float by itself
in space. With his paralyzed right eye (he sleeps with it wide
open), Myers may represent the return of the fascist evil the
two men confronted during the war; he may also represent
something inherently violent in the American male that, having
been liberated by the war, has to be faced down and defeated by
the two vets before they can return to a normal life. Lupino's
use of the desert setting, rich with associations of nuclear
devastation, seems to look forward to the science fiction films
that would flourish later in the decade.
Blu-ray Release
Date: October 15th, 2013
Prince of Darkness
BD - Master of horror John Carpenter directs
this terrifying battle between mankind and the ultimate evil. A
group of graduate students and scientists uncover an ancient
canister in an abandoned church, but when they open it, they
inadvertently unleash a strange liquid and an evil force on all
of humanity. As the liquid turns their co-workers into zombies,
the remaining members realize they have released the most
unspeakable horror of them all. Terror mounts as the team must
fight to save the world from a devilish fury that has been
contained for over seven million years.
Blu-ray Release Date:
September 24th, 2013
Shadows
BD - John Cassavetes’ directorial debut revolves around
an interracial relationship between Lelia (Lelia Goldoni), a
light-skinned black woman living in New York City with her two
brothers, and Tony (Anthony Ray), a white man. Their
relationship crumbles when Tony meets Lelia’s brother Hugh (Hugh
Herd), a talented dark-skinned jazz singer who struggling to
find work, and discovers that Lelia is actually black. Shot on
location in Manhattan with an amateur cast and crew, Cassavetes’
Shadows is a visionary work and a landmark in the history of
American independent film.
Blu-ray Release Date: October
22nd, 2013
Faces
BD - The disintegration of a marriage is dissected in John
Cassavetes’ searing Faces. Shot in high-contrast 16mm black and
white, the film follows the futile attempts of captain of
industry Richard (John Marley) and his wife, Maria (Lynn
Carlin), to escape the anguish of their empty marriage in the
arms of others. Featuring astonishingly powerful, nervy
performances from Marley, Carlin, and Cassavetes regulars Gena
Rowlands and Seymour Cassel, Faces confronts suburban alienation
and the battle of the sexes with a brutal honesty and compassion
rarely matched in cinema.
Blu-ray Release Date: October 22nd,
2013
A Woman Under the Influence
BD - John Cassavetes’ devastating
drama details the emotional breakdown of a suburban housewife
and her family’s struggle to save her from herself. Starring
Peter Falk and Gena Rowlands (in one of the greatest and most
harrowing screen performances of the 1970s) as a married couple,
deeply in love, yet unable to express their love in terms that
the other can understand, A Woman Under the Influence is an
uncompromising examination of mental illness and an honest
portrayal of domestic life. A benchmark film of the American
independent cinema—a heroic document from a true maverick
director.
Blu-ray Release Date: October 22nd, 2013
The Killing of a Chinese Bookie
BD - Perhaps a film that should
be not be over-analyzed but rather allowed to wash over you with
its gritty realism. John Cassavetes's first attempt at a
crime-thriller failed miserably at the box office and was re-cut
to a shorter more condensed version which was released two years
later. It's this short version that is most readily available in
VHS and on the Pioneer 'Pan and Scan' DVD (see review below).
Initially dismissed by many critics it has now come to the
stature of a postnoir masterpiece. Cassavetes employed his usual
cast (gruesome Timothy Carey and Seymour Cassel) and ad-hoc
improvisation which gave 'The Killing of a Chinese Bookie' its
realistic deconstructionist atmosphere. Typical of Cassavetes'
style, the film is relentless in its demands on the viewer,
never clearly revealing plot details, but inferring them as if
we were a stranger on the diner stool next to the characters.
Blu-ray Release Date: October 22nd, 2013
Opening Night
BD - Broadway actress Myrtle Gordon (Gena Rowlands)
rehearses for her latest play, about a woman unable to admit
that she is aging. When she witnesses the accidental death of an
adoring young fan, she begins to confront the personal and
professional turmoil she faces in her own life. Featuring a
moving performance by Rowlands (and with some scenes shot on
stages with live audiences reacting freely to the writing and
performing), John Cassavetes’ Opening Night exposes the drama of
an actress who at great personal cost makes a part her own.
Blu-ray Release Date: October 22nd, 2013
And Then There Were None
BD - Based on the classic novel by
mystery author Agatha Christie that was later adapted as the
Broadway hit Ten Little Indians, And Then There Were None begins
with ten characters, each with a skeleton in his or her closet,
on a remote island off the English coast. They soon realize that
they have been brought there by an insane judge, who has tried
each of them for criminal behavior in the past, and who now
feels it is his duty to render proper justice for each. The
struggle to stay alive begins as each "guest" is eliminated in a
fashion that corresponds to the titular nursery rhyme.
Blu-ray Release date: August 27th, 2013
Marathon Man
BD - One of the '70's most memorable contributions
to the suspense genre, Marathon Man (1976) is notable on many
levels. The film brought together two of the leading exponents
of screen acting for their respective generations--Dustin
Hoffman and Laurence Olivier--to combine their talents for a
taut and solid thriller. Directed at a breathless clip by
British veteran John Schlesinger, the film boasted some of the
most harrowing sequences committed to celluloid at its time, and
they have lost none of their power over the subsequent years.
Blu-ray Release date: September 10th, 2013
Time Bandits
BD - In Terry Gilliam’s fantastic voyage through
time and space, a young boy named Kevin (Craig Warnock) escapes
his gadget-obsessed parents to join a band of time-traveling
dwarves. Armed with a map stolen from the Supreme Being (Ralph
Richardson), they plunder treasure from Napoleon (Ian Holm) and
Agamemnon (Sean Connery)—but the Evil Genius (David Warner) is
watching their every move! Featuring a darkly playful script by
Gilliam and costar Michael Palin, Time Bandits is all at
once giddy fairy tale, revisionist history lesson, and satire on
technology gone awry.
Blu-ray Release Date: August 26th, 2013
Plunder Road
BD - Plunder Road is a one-of-a-kind film noir
beautifully shot in scope by the great cinematographer Ernest
Haller (Gone with the Wind,
Mildred Pierce). On a dark rainy
night, five men stage a well-planned U.S. Mint train robbery and
walk away with ten million in gold bullion. To throw the cops
off the track, the gang split up the massive haul into three
concealed truckloads and go off to three different directions
hoping for a perfect getaway. No big stars, just a great cast of
character-actor greats; Gene Raymond, Wayne Morris, Elisha Cook
Jr., Stafford Repp and Steven Ritch. Soap opera legend Jeanne
Cooper (The Young and the Restless) co-stars as Raymond's gun
moll. Wonderfully directed by cult favorite, Hubert Cornfield
(The Night of the Following Day).
Blu-ray Release date:
September 24th, 2013
Shack Out on 101
BD - Check into a hotbed of lethal cloak and
dagger in Shack Out on 101. An attractive waitress (Terry Moore)
at a seaside caf‚ gets caught in a web of treacherous intrigue
when she discovers that her workplace is a secret station for
spies. It seems that the caf‚ is close to an experimental lab
that harbors national defense secrets and a frantic ring of
sinister spies have come to steal them. It's now up to the
desperate waitress and a network of undercover FBI agents to
stop the diabolical scheme, but not before they all stop along
the way for a sizzling round of passion and romance. The stellar
cast includes Hollywood legend Lee Marvin (Point Blank), Frank
Lovejoy (The Americano), Keenan Wynn (The Mechanic) and Whit
Bissell (He Walked by Night). Stylishly directed by cult
director Edward Dein (Curse of the Undead) and beautifully shot
in glorious black-and-white by the great Floyd Crosby (High
Noon).
Blu-ray Release date: September 24th, 2013
The Medusa Touch
BD - In The Medusa Touch Brunel (Lino Ventura),
a French detective on temporary assignment with Scotland Yard,
investigates a mysterious series of disasters. The uncanny
events begin happening shortly after writer John Morlar (Richard
Burton) was hit over the head by an unknown intruder and
rendered comatose. Slowly, Brunel begins to connect the strange
things that are happening in the world with the deranged dreams
of the comatose Morlar. He gets the final clue he needs from
Morlar's reluctant psychiatrist, Dr. Zonfield (Lee Remick), who
holds the key to Morlar's past. Once it is discovered that
Morlar has the ability to think horrible thoughts and make them
come true, Brunel and Zonfield must take off with dispatch to a
London cathedral, where the Queen is scheduled to make an
appearance -- but Morlar is thinking about the cathedral, and it
is crumbling fast. Well-liked in Britain, this movie did not do
well in the U.S.
Blu-ray Release date: October 1st, 2013
The Americano
BD - The Americano is Glenn Ford, a
north-of-the-border cowboy working in Brazil. Ford has been
assigned to deliver a cargo of Brahma bulls to a South American
ranch. His progress is impeded by homicidal land-grabber Frank
Lovejoy and jovial bandido Cesar Romero. Those are merely the
human obstacles; there are also piranhas and jungle predators to
contend with. Ford also finds tie to romance Ursula Theiss and
Abbe Lane. Luxuriously location-photographed in Technicolor, The
Americano was one of the larger-budgeted directorial efforts of
exploitation king William Castle.
Blu-ray Release date:
September 24th, 2013
The Sweet Hereafter
BD - Atom Egoyan's haunting adaptation of
the Russell Banks novel The Sweet Hereafter was the Canadian
filmmaker's most successful film to date, taking home a Special
Grand Jury Prize at the 1997 Cannes Film Festival and scoring a
pair of Academy Award nominations, including Best Director.
Restructured to fit Egoyan's signature mosaic narrative style,
the story concerns the cultural aftershocks which tear apart a
small British Columbia town in the wake of a school-bus accident
which leaves a number of local children dead. Ian Holm stars as
Mitchell Stephens, a big-city lawyer who arrives in the interest
of uniting the survivors to initiate a lawsuit; his maneuvering
only drives the community further apart, reopening old wounds
and jeopardizing any hopes of emotional recovery. Like so many
of Egoyan's features, The Sweet Hereafter is a serious and
painfully honest exploration of family grief; no character is
immune from the sense of utter devastation which grips the film,
not even the attorney, whose interests are in part motivated by
his own remorse over the fate of his daughter, an HIV-positive
drug addict. The Alliance Blu-ray Release Date: June 19th,
2012
The Big Combo
BD - Police Lt. Leonard Diamond (Cornel Wilde) is
criticized by his superior Capt. Peterson (Robert Middleton) for
his obsessive but fruitless investigation of organized crime
boss Mr. Brown (Richard Conte). Peterson calls it a waste of the
taxpayers' money motivated by Diamond's love for Brown's
girlfriend Susan Lowell (Jean Wallace). Watched at all times by
henchmen Mingo (Earl Holliman) and Fante (Lee Van Cleef), and
masochistically drawn to Brown, Susan is unable to walk away
from him. She overdoses on pills in a suicide attempt and, in
her delirium, utters the name "Alicia." Diamond follows up on
that new lead, and as he gets closer to defeating his adversary,
the arrogant and sadistic Brown retaliates by capturing and
torturing Diamond. Meanwhile Brown's former boss but now
humiliated underling, Joe McClure (Brian Donlevy), believing
that Brown has gone too far in his personal vendetta against
Diamond, tries to enlist Mingo and Fante in overthrowing him.
However, they remain loyal, and, in a chillingly silent scene
visually punctuated by flashes of gunfire, they shoot the deaf
McClure after Brown removes his hearing aid. Though
superficially a story of good vs. evil, Joseph H. Lewis's film
noir presents a complex world, visually captured by John Alton's
stark photography, in which the lines between good/evil and
love/hate are not always clear.
Blu-ray Release date:
September 24th, 2013
The Kick - Martial arts action set in Thailand. After
emmigrating from Korea to open a taekwondo gym in Bangkok,
martial arts master Mun (Cho Jae-hyeon) hopes that his family,
all taekwondo experts, will eventually take over the running of
the gym. But when son Tae Yang (Tae-joo Na) foils a gang's
attempt to steal a priceless antique dagger, the family find
themselves under threat from the gang's leader, who swears
bloody revenge. DVD Release Date: October 7th, 2013
Showgirls 2 - It's Sunset Boulevard meets Whatever Happened to
Baby Jane meets Mommy Dearest... in a G-String! Las Vegas
stripper Penny Slot (Rena Riffel) sets out on an adventure to
become the star dancer on a TV series. With fame and fortune in
her eyes, she tries to find the pot of gold at the end of the
rainbow but instead finds danger in a town more wicked than Sin
City. There is a price to pay for success, sacrifices to be made
at every imaginable level and it all comes down to one thing -
How Bad Do You Want It? Find out in Rena Riffel's epic and
outrageous homage to the Showgirls legacy. DVD Release Date:
September 17th, 2013
In the Fog - It is 1942 and the western edge of the USSR is
under German occupation. In the region, local partisans are
waging a brutal battle against their foreign enemies. Sushenya,
an innocent rail worker, is arrested with a band of saboteurs
when a train is derailed not far from his village. The German
officer decides to set him free rather than hang him with the
others, but rumors of Sushenya's treason spread quickly and
partisans Burov and Voitik seek revenge. Captured by the
partisans, Sushenya is led through the forest where they are
ambushed. Soon he finds himself one-on-one with his wounded
enemy, forced to make a moral choice under immoral
circumstances. From the critically acclaimed director of MY JOY.
DVD Release Date: September 17th, 2013
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