Long before Jigsaw and Annabelle, Ghostface and Samara—going back to even before Freddy and Jason—there were the Universal Monsters. These were the creatures and character designs who were so iconic that they defined what the horror genre was to most moviegoers during the earliest decades of talking pictures. Primarily released in two film cycles by Universal Pictures across the 1930s and ‘40s (plus a few outliers on both sides of this), the legacy of these films and the people who made them endures still. It echoes in Halloween costumes and TV specials, merchandise toys and candies, it’s even informing recent Blumhouse films and Netflix’s Wednesday. Right now, you can go to any Universal theme park and meet the Monsters as un-goodwill ambassadors at “Halloween Horror Nights.”
Yet to return to the original movement of films which were so frightening in their day that they essentially invented...
Yet to return to the original movement of films which were so frightening in their day that they essentially invented...
- 10/28/2023
- by David Crow
- Den of Geek
Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves
Blu ray
Kino Lorber
1944/ 87 min.
Starring Maria Montez, Jon Hall
Cinematography by George Robinson
Directed by Arthur Lubin
Thanks to George Robinson’s Technicolor photography and Vera West’s kaleidoscopic costumes, death and destruction look pretty as a picture in 1944’s Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. Director Arthur Lubin’s action fantasy is no patch on the Fleischer brothers’ Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba’s Forty Thieves but this Universal Pictures release is a cheerfully unassuming time-killer.
This Arabian Nights fable about a caliph’s son who grows up to lead a band of robbers contains a few nuggets of actual history; the movie’s bloodthirsty villain, Hulagu Khan, was indeed the grandson of the infamous Genghis. Hulagu was a thug who didn’t fall far from the tree; he conquered Baghdad and then decimated it, sending the then storybook city into a spiral.
Blu ray
Kino Lorber
1944/ 87 min.
Starring Maria Montez, Jon Hall
Cinematography by George Robinson
Directed by Arthur Lubin
Thanks to George Robinson’s Technicolor photography and Vera West’s kaleidoscopic costumes, death and destruction look pretty as a picture in 1944’s Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. Director Arthur Lubin’s action fantasy is no patch on the Fleischer brothers’ Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba’s Forty Thieves but this Universal Pictures release is a cheerfully unassuming time-killer.
This Arabian Nights fable about a caliph’s son who grows up to lead a band of robbers contains a few nuggets of actual history; the movie’s bloodthirsty villain, Hulagu Khan, was indeed the grandson of the infamous Genghis. Hulagu was a thug who didn’t fall far from the tree; he conquered Baghdad and then decimated it, sending the then storybook city into a spiral.
- 8/8/2020
- by Charlie Largent
- Trailers from Hell
Sir Carol Reed takes on a movie about insurance fraud in sunny Spain — with a great trio of actors for 1963. Laurence Harvey scams an insurance company and looks forward to continuing to beat the system in a happy life of chicanery; Lee Remick finds her affections turning to Alan Bates, an insurance man who might also be on vacation, or might have come to uncover Harvey’s crime. How does Harvey hide out while waiting for the big payoff in Málaga? He buys a huge white convertible too big to fit through the streets!
The Running Man
Blu-ray
Arrow Academy
1963 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 103 min. / Street Date June 18, 2019 / 39.95
Starring: Laurence Harvey, Lee Remick, Alan Bates, Felix Aylmer, Allan Cuthbertson, Noel Purcell, Ramsay Ames, Fernando Rey, Eddie Byrne, John Meillon, Roger Delgado.
Cinematography: Robert Krasker
Film Editor: Bert Bates
Original Music: William Alwyn
Continuity: Angela Allen
Written by John Mortimer from the...
The Running Man
Blu-ray
Arrow Academy
1963 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 103 min. / Street Date June 18, 2019 / 39.95
Starring: Laurence Harvey, Lee Remick, Alan Bates, Felix Aylmer, Allan Cuthbertson, Noel Purcell, Ramsay Ames, Fernando Rey, Eddie Byrne, John Meillon, Roger Delgado.
Cinematography: Robert Krasker
Film Editor: Bert Bates
Original Music: William Alwyn
Continuity: Angela Allen
Written by John Mortimer from the...
- 6/11/2019
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
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