Lots of stuff to point you to this week! First up is my article at Spectrum Culture on 3:10 to Yuma (1957 & 2007) for their Re-Make/Re-Model feature. The 1957 film is an absolute classic — I’d love to say “undisputed,” but nothing in the world of cinema is undisputed. It’s philosophical chaos! Madness reigns!
Ahem.
The two leads in each film give masterful performances, though for my money, Glenn Ford is the stand out. The remake, while flawed, is worthwhile. Let me put it this way: There are worse ways to make film than by getting a grew together and saying, “Okay, we’ll use John Ford location shots, Surtees camera angles and fill it with Peckinpah violence. Huh? Whaddya think?”
I’m pretty excited about this article, so please, check it out!
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Films From Beyond the Time Barrier is celebrating its second anniversary! Brian has a terrific celebratory post featuring a Diabolic Dual Personality Double Feature about everyone’s favorite dual-personality sociopath, Jekyll and Hyde. Go on over and wish Brian a happy second!
Meanwhile, at Thrilling Days of Yesteryear, Ivan is asking readers to help decide which serial he’s going to do next for Serial Saturdays! See, he is a normal human being, which is why in the time it’s taken me to finish Phantom Creeps, he’s done three serials, maybe four, plus wallpapered the hallway and dug up a few old stumps in the back yard. Braggart.
But he’s also giving away VCI’s new box set release Dick Tracy: The Complete Serial Collection, containing all four Tracy film serials on DVD. You want to enter that giveaway! Email him by midnight Sunday to get in on this offer. Details here!
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Also this week at Spectrum Culture Online, my review for the documentary Who Bombed Judi Bari? is up.
Bari, for those unfamiliar with her, was an environmentalist who, in 1990, was protesting the harvesting of old wood redwoods by companies using unethical business practices. She and a fellow activist were bombed as they drove her car to a protest, and the FBI and local police immediately put the blame on them. Charges were ultimately dropped, but the struggle didn’t end there. This documentary catalogues the most comprehensive list of news articles, reports and evidence available for the case, all narrated by Bari’s videotaped testimony several years after the bombing, and just months before she died from cancer.
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Have a good week, everyone! A schedule post should be up in a few days, and next week, the finale of The Phantom Creeps. It’s okay, I’ve calmed down since last week, I promise I won’t scream so much.
See, he is a normal human being, which is why in the time it’s taken me to finish Phantom Creeps, he’s done three serials, maybe four, plus wallpapered the hallway and dug up a few old stumps in the back yard. Braggart.
Rah-ha-ha-ha-ha!!! My diabolical scheme to make everyone forget it took me two freakin’ years to get through Jungle Queen a success! (Not to mention the little sabbatical I took between episodes #29 and #30 of Mondays…)
I could also mention that Scott C. is still working on Batman (1943)…but that would be unseemly of me.
Saaay, that’s right! I really should be teasing Scott as we speak.
I gotta tell you, if you’d asked me about Jungle Queen, I would have said it was about 8 months or so. Two years. I had no idea.
I’m pretty excited about the serial I’ve got ready for the next one, and I’m going to try my damndest to do it in under a year this time. Progress!
Thanks for the mention of Film From Beyond’s 2nd anniversary — there’s virtual cake for anyone who stops by in the next week or so. :)
It’s hard to imagine anyone disputing 3:10 to Yuma’s classic status, but then, there are lots of contrary folks out there (I should know, I’m one of them — but not as far as 3:10 is concerned). I saw the remake when it came out, and was disappointed after all the glowing reviews. Had to go back and see the original to remind myself what good filmmaking is all about.
Glenn Ford is one of my all-time favorite actors. Just got his biography, Glenn Ford: A Life not too long ago (by his son, with the assistance of Patrick McGilligan, who of course has done some amazing film biographies — Hitchcock, Fritz Lang, etc.). Looking forward to it.
Now that’s a bio I’d like to read. Ford apparently had a hell of an affair with Judy Garland, between his marriages to Eleanor Powell and Kathryn Hays. Mel Torme makes fun of him in that awful book The Other Side of the Rainbow, but in hindsight I think it’s telling that Ford didn’t trust Torme and it turns out Torme COULDN’T be trusted.
The remake did disappoint me some, mainly in the pandering to a modern audience and indulgence in stereotypes that were dated when the original was released, but there were worthwhile moments.
And now for delicious virtual cake!