That Guy Dick Miller ★★★★✫ Director: Elijah Drenner Indiecan Entertainment (Official Site) 91 Minutes Release Date: April 3, 2015 (limited) / Available on VOD and DVD May 19, 2015 – That Guy Dick Miller is an affectionate documentary that takes us through the life and career of, well, Dick Miller, the character actor who, for…
If early Hollywood films are any indication, a good 47% of women by volume found themselves abandoned, unmarried and pregnant at some point in their lives. They rarely suffered much by way of social ostracism — there was almost always a progressive aunt or someone willing to pass the child off as their own —…
The Barber ★★★✫✫ Director: Basil Owies ARC Entertainment (Official Site) 95 Minutes Release Date: March 27, 2015 (limited) – It was almost twenty years ago when serial killer Francis Allen Visser, a middle-aged man with a penchant for burying his young, female victims alive, was released from prison, thanks to the many mistakes the cop…
A Wolf at the Door ★★★★½ / ★★★★★ Director: Fernando Coimbra Outsider Pictures (Official Site) 100 Minutes Release Date March 27, 2015 (limited) – It’s a warm and sunny day in Rio de Janeiro when six-year-old Clara (Isabelle Ribas) goes missing from her school. Her panicked mother Sylvia (Fabiula Nascimento) reports it to the police.…
Before they became the kind of actors one gets when one wants to add a little class to an otherwise iffy production, Ben Kingsley and Michael Caine headlined the Sherlock Holmes spoof Without a Clue (1988), a gentle period comedy that cheekily posits that the fictional Holmes both did and did not exist. Without a…
Alfredo Valente portrait of Tallulah Bankhead, 1930s (via)
The Wrecking Crew ★★★½ / ★★★★★ Director: Denny Tedesco Magnolia Pictures (Official Site) 101 Minutes Release Date March 13, 2015 (limited); DVD release June 15, 2015 – It was the 1960s and American pop music, long dominated by the so-called “Brill Building Sound,” had moved across the country. California was where it was at, and…
VANish ★★★★✫ Director: Bryan Bockbrader Dark Sky Films (Official Site) 79 Minutes Available February 24 on VOD, iTunes, DVD and Blu-ray – Bryan Bockbrader’s directorial debut VANish (2015) is a tight little action-horror film with plenty of twists, turns and splatter to entertain even the most jaded of indie movie fans. This ultra low-budget flick…
The history of the Spiderpool is the quintessential Hollywood story, a particularly American brand of fairy tale that begins with excess and eccentricity, wild parties and beautiful women. Like so many American dreams, it was over almost as soon as it began, and what was once celebrated became nothing more than crumbling remnants of exploitation, disappointment and lost dreams.
The Wild Affair (1963) is a charming, light and sophisticated British sex comedy, sadly forgotten despite being incredibly influential in its day. A vehicle for early-60s cinematic It Girl Nancy Kwan, The Wild Affair concerns a young working girl, her hapless fiance, assorted colleagues and the ever-present worry that one has not lived enough before…