Last Man Standing (Walter Hill)
Very entertaining action film. It’s also another rehash of Hammett’s Red Harvest but credited as a remake of Yojimbo. It combines the 30’s gangster films with westerns. And the action scenes are filmed in the John Woo Hong Kong style. Recommended.
Ghost Cat of the Cursed Pond 1968
One of the many Japanese classic Horror movies involving felines & bodies of water. Very beautifully shot, chilling at times & very enjoyable to watch.
A woman’s husband is brutally murdered in front of her. Instead of marrying the man who killed her husband she kills herself by drowning her & her pet cat. What comes next is a series of hauntings, murders & demonic possessions. Based on a classic Japanese ghost tale that still haunts many Japanese to this day, I highly suggest this or any the similar early J-Horrors
[quote=“korano, post:3881, topic:1923”]Last Man Standing (Walter Hill)
Very entertaining action film. It’s also another rehash of Hammett’s Red Harvest but credited as a remake of Yojimbo. It combines the 30’s gangster films with westerns. And the action scenes are filmed in the John Woo Hong Kong style. Recommended.[/quote]
I love Walter Hill, but I did not enjoy this movie much. Maybe I need to give it another go, but man, I don’t know, it just didn’t do it for me. I can’t agree it was even very entertaining.
[quote=“korano, post:3881, topic:1923”]Last Man Standing (Walter Hill)
Very entertaining action film. It’s also another rehash of Hammett’s Red Harvest but credited as a remake of Yojimbo. It combines the 30’s gangster films with westerns. And the action scenes are filmed in the John Woo Hong Kong style. Recommended.[/quote]
I’m with the Big Smokedown on this one
Dissapointing film (and I usually like Walter Hill too)
[quote=“I…I…Idiot, post:3882, topic:1923”]Ghost Cat of the Cursed Pond 1968
One of the many Japanese classic Horror movies involving felines & bodies of water. Very beautifully shot, chilling at times & very enjoyable to watch.
A woman’s husband is brutally murdered in front of her. Instead of marrying the man who killed her husband she kills herself by drowning her & her pet cat. What comes next is a series of hauntings, murders & demonic possessions. Based on a classic Japanese ghost tale that still haunts many Japanese to this day, I highly suggest this or any the similar early J-Horrors[/quote]I don’t know anything about these old Japanese horror films.
I’ve got one called “House” on the way though.
Hausu from 1977? Haven’t seen it but heard it good & very weird.
Shatter (Carreras / 1974)
A Hammer / Shaw Brothers co production should be a perfect combo for me and, in truth, I did rather enjoy it. But it is not the film it could be nonetheless. I’m not sure Whitman was the right choice for the lead role. He is mostly unconvincing, either as a top drawewr hitman or someone that Lily Li would fall in love with moments after meeting him. But never mind, there’s plenty to enjoy anyway. Ti Lung does a fair Bruce Lee impression, Peter Cushing gets a rare outing in a non horror contemporary setting, Anton Diffring gets to play a bad German (who ever heard of such a thing?) and the funky seventies soundtrack makes you think you might be watching an over long episode of The Professionals. Plus, I love Hong Kong as a backdrop for a movie. I’ve been there a number of times but every time I see it on screen I itch to go back.
So, not top draw by any standard but pleasurable enough for an hour and a half spent indoors on a shitty British winter day.
[size=12pt]Carnival of Souls[/size] (1962) Herk Harvey
End up watching the all movie last night.
I’ve already seen a few minutes on TV and read about it, so I was pretty much curious to see it, (Romero says this film was a major influence on him). The film cult status is well deserved, the story its simple, the ending is also predictable (at least to me it was), but the film is all about atmosphere, one of the best I’ve seen on creating a creepy environment, let’s not forget it’s a 1962 film, only much later films similar to this one (if there’s such) would start to appear.
This was the only non short/documentary or educational film that the director has made, but in cinematographic terms and camera handling he really know his trade.
I won’t say nothing about the history its all very simple, I can say however that its one of those films that more than any words, really got be watched, and yes the film is really scaring and not funny scaring.
4.5 Stars
The Line-Up - Don Siegel 1958
One of Siegel’s best films with Eli Wallach in the lead as a slightly psychopathic killer. 8/10
The Big Combo - A very tough film noir which I liked a lot. Every scene with Richard Conte is electrifying, just the way he delivers his dialogue.
[size=12pt]Cosa avete fatto a Solange[/size] (What have you done to Solange - 1972, Massimo Dallamano)
I wanted to see this in order to compare it to the director’s Bandidos.
I’m not an expert on gialli, I’ve only seen a handful of them, but from this handful, this is certainly the best. It’s compelling, well-written and well-acted. I usually do not like Fabio Testi, but he’s quite good in this one.
The plot turns out to be rather typical, but I read the movie was based on a Edgar Wallace novel, and those detective writers always come up with rather typical, and - if you think about it - rather silly plots. In real life, Scotland Yard would’ve arrested the killer a few hours after his first murder. Anyway, I didn’t mind, those plots are part of the show. The inspector is by the way played by the always charming German actor Joachim Fuchsberger. He was probably chosen because he had often layed a Scotland Yard detective in German Edgar Wallace adaptations (in the previous decades).
The movie is set in London, and I had the idea the dialogues were written in English too, by Italians, they often sound unnatural, very ‘studied’.
Watching this movie, it’s quite understandable that Dallamano was often accused of voyeuristic and perverted tendencies.
Casa d’appuntamento/French Sex murders (1972) Ferdinando Merighi
Funny I also was in Giallo mode or tried to at least, cause this one didn’t take my attention form the invoices
Pretty dull and boring movie, quite a risk saying this, if you look at the female cast (Neri, Bouchet in a small part, Ekberg, Evelyn Kraft, only Fenech seems to be missing) all gorgeous babes, but nothing could save this one, even the sleaze parts are bad, with everyone trying to cover themselves, I couldn’t stop a few laughs when Martell in a dramatic and violent scene, tries to cover his private parts.
We know the murder almost from start, the murder scenes are stupidly done. Bogart lookalike Sacchi is the best actor in the film go figure, Peter Martell would be a fine actor for soap operas and soap spaghetti’s but that’s all, and the all thing is to boring to mention, the end then is hilarious the bad lived near the Eiffel Tour ahahah that’s pedigree I guess.
Robert Sacchi made a living out of looking like Bogart, its no different in this chunky film, they real made a effort for the guy to look like Bogard, always in a raincoat and being the narrator of the film… just whistle baby.
A waste of time
I love how this thread is as much about discussing films we’ve watched as it is inspiring other to watch these films. I keep seeing movies posted here & then posted later by other users. That’s what places like this are all about.
Yep, lots of inspiration. I’m always looking for solid recommendations.
Kuroneko 1968
Probably the best of the early J-Horror flicks I’ve seen. Not a ton of dialgoue but very atmospheric.
A man goes off to war leaving his wife & mother behind. They are senselessly butchered & burnt to a crisp. They soon reappear as creepy animal-like ghosts who haunt the local woods, butcher samurai’s & drink their blood. I highly recommend this to anyone looking to get into the genre. Very creepy for it’s day.
Amoureuse - Jacques Doillon, 1991
With Charlotte Gainsbourg and Yvann Attal. Very French, very good. I always liked Doillon’s decent way of filmmaking and the naturalness of the acting in his films. Here the dialogues are a bit more artificial, but it works very well. 9/10
Felt like a Bava fix so popped in Blood and Black Lace which did the trick nicely. 
[size=12pt]Jaws 2[/size] (1978, Jeannot Szwarc)
Two great shark attacks, otherwise mediocre stuff, more interesting for all the problems and conflicts during production than the film itself
Spielberg refused to direct it, Dreyfuss refused to star in it, and Scheider was more or less forced by Universal to repeat his role as chief Brody: he had left the set of The Deer Hunter and owed the company a lucrative part (he was cast for the Robert De Niro part!).
Then the original director (John D. Hancock) gave up because the studio didn’t like his work and changed all plans. In the first script, co-written by Hancock’s wife, Amity had been a sort of ghost town, and mayor Vaughn had not been able to interrupt his building plans because the mafia was involved in the project, and he owed them a lot of money. Moreover Mrs. Brody (Lorraine Gary) was working for him, and would therefore be forced to choose between her work and her marriage. This could have given the script some punch, but the studio feared the audience wouldn’t like such a dark story.
Then Szwarc was called in, a relatiely unknown, but promising young director. He proved to be also a very difficult character: problems arose between him and Scheider and at one point, it actually came to blows.
Anyway, Schwarz did a decent job. The film is well-directed (those two great shark attacks will blow you out of your chair). If the film doesn’t work, it’s not his fault: in the final film Mrs Brody still works for Vaughn, but there’s no mafia and no real conflict, her conversations with Scheider are uninteresting and so is the rest of what’s happening. It lacks punch, we’ve seen it all before, and it was more fun the first time around.
[quote=“Stanton, post:3896, topic:1923”]Amoureuse - Jacques Doillon, 1991
With Charlotte Gainsbourg and Yvann Attal. Very French, very good. I always liked Doillon’s decent way of filmmaking and the naturalness of the acting in his films. Here the dialogues are a bit more artificial, but it works very well. 9/10[/quote]
Apart from La pirate, which lets face it its not a great film, I think that besides that one, the only Doillon’s film I’ve seen was Le petit criminel and that one I liked. This one seems something for me to take a view at
[quote=“scherpschutter, post:3898, topic:1923”][size=12pt]Jaws 2[/size] (1978, Jeannot Szwarc)
Spielberg refused to direct it, Dreyfuss refused to star in it, and Scheider was more or less forced by Universal to repeat his role as chief Brody: he had left the set of The Deer Hunter and owed the company a lucrative part (he was cast for the Robert De Niro part!).[/quote]
Shit didn’t know that, I just can’t imagine an actor like Scheider in a film like the Deer Hunter, but I guess is pretty easy thing to say now.