June can essentially be summed up by Charles Dickens' "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times," intro from A Tale of Two Cities. Ended up watching some great and terrible fims over this period.
Best discoveries were mostly new releases. Phil Tippett's Mad God, S.S. Rajamouli's RRR and David Cronenberg's Crimes of the Future were my personal highlights. Other flicks that entertained me were Riot in Cell Block 11, Dogs Don't Wear Pants, The Sadness and Beavis & Butt-Head Do the Universe.
Managed to cram in all seventeen episodes of the cult television series The Prisoner along the way, too. Seen some episodes in the past, but never the whole lot before. Can't believe a show this bizarre and cerebral was once prime time television back in the day. Really does feel like we are living in an intellectual dark age right now.
Tinkered with the blog's design again. Way more readable on both 4K and 1440p monitors and doesn't burn out people's retinas.
Film:
A Trip to the Moon (Georges Méliés, 1902)
Riot in Cell Block 11 (Don Siegel, 1954)*
Curse of the Crimson Altar (Vernon Sewell, 1968)
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (Luis Buñuel, 1972)
So Sweet, So Dead (Roberto Bianchi Montero, 1972)
Murder in a Blue World (Eloy de la Iglesia, 1973)*
The Island of the Fishmen (Sergio Martino, 1979)
Trancers (Charles Band, 1984)
The Monster Squad (Fred Dekker, 1987)
Road House (Rowdy Herrington, 1989)
Trancers II: The Return of Jack Deth (Charles Band, 1991)
Fortress (Stuart Gordon, 1992)
Trancers III: Deth Lives (C. Courtney Joyner, 1992)*
Savage Harvest (Eric Stanze, 1994)*
Trancers 4: Jack of Swords (David Nutter, 1994)*
Hot Summer Nights (Elijah Bynum, 2018)*
Dogs Don't Wear Pants (J.-P. Valkeapää, 2019)*
Limbo (Soi Cheang, 2021)*
A Banquet (Ruth Paxton, 2022)*
Beavis & Butt-Head Do the Universe (Mike Judge, John Rice & Albert Calleros, 2022)*
Crimes of the Future (David Cronenberg, 2022)*
Firestarter (Keith Thomas, 2022)*
Mad God (Phil Tippett, 2022)*
RRR (S.S. Rajamouli, 2022)*
The Sadness (Rob Jabbaz, 2022)*
The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent (Tom Gormican, 2022)*
Watcher (Chloe Okuno, 2022)*
Television:
The Prisoner - Season 1 (Patrick McGoohan, 1967 - 1968)*
Cursed Films - Season 1 (Jay Cheel, 2020)*
*First time viewings.
Dada Debaser Notes:
- Over a hundred and twenty years old, and A Trip to the Moon still looks unique to this day.
- Didn't have the willpower to watch the rest of the Trancers sequels. They are terrible.
- Soi Cheang's Limbo lacks real depth, but is blessed with truly stunning cinematography and production design; it's what separates it from the multitude of other nineties style serial killer films.
- As much as I fanboy over Boris Karloff and Christopher Lee, Barbara Steele in her iconic make-up and clobber which is featured in Curse of the Crimson Altar, is the biggest highlight for me.
- Not seen Stuart Gordon's sci-fi prison flick Fortress since it first came out. Forgotten how much fun it is.
- Ought to add Dogs Don't Wear Pants to my Alternative Valentine's Day Movies list.
- Rose Paxton's A Banquet failed to keep me invested in it. Felt like an episode of Nigella Bites at times with all the fancy food scenes. Most middle-class movie of the month.
- Shudder's Cursed Films mini-series was largely underwhelming and heavily reliant on loosely related filler in each episode.
- It might not be a perfect giallo, but I do love So Sweet, So Dead. The obvious day for night scenes don't really hinder it for me, plus that ending is so good.
- Rob Jabbaz's The Sadness does indeed share similarites to the comic book Crossed, but they both exist because of George A. Romero's The Crazies (1973), innit? Definitely not a Hollywood type film. Not seen eye socket sex since A Serbian Film (2010).
Blog game Claudio "Tinkerman" Ranieri.
ReplyDeleteBest thing I watched this month was season 2 of that Aussie show Wanted. Some good 60s movies on Talking Pictures too:
Murder In Eden
The Scarlet Web
Smokescreen (starring pre-Porridge Harry Grout)
Lots of great movies on Talking Pictures. Keeping missing most of them, including Caroline Munro’s Cellar Club, all the time, though. That site you linked before was a god send. That’s how I got to catch Curse of the Crimson Altar this month.
ReplyDeleteGrouty was in Straw Dogs and played Winston the Ogre in Time Bandits. 😀
And Mr. Helpmann in Brazil.
ReplyDeleteYou seen both Cushing Dr. Who movies are getting a double-bill cinema release this month? I might go even tho it's likely to be full of pudwhappers.
Studiocanal released Dr. Who and the Daleks 4K disc for a whoppin' £49.99 on amazon. The sequel out this month for the same price as well. Must be some sort of anniversary.
ReplyDeleteMight be worth braving the anoraks and watching Daleks' Invasion Earth 2150 A.D. for The Cush, Bernard Cribbins and a future Earth looking like the 1960s.
Talking Pictures pulling at my heart strings. Death Line last night and House of Whipcord tonight.
Hah I watched House Of Whipcord. Bet that was a raincoat brigade favourite back in the 70s.
ReplyDeleteKing Cribbins. Gonna tell my kid link text is Thomas Bangalter from Daft Punk.
One of the few positive things I have to say about Nu Who was Cribbens being in it for a while and giving us the crying gif.
ReplyDeleteTop 3 Pete Walker movies: The Flesh and Blood Show (1972);Frightmare (1974);and House of Whipcord (1974).
Also, the Lee and Price banter while Cushing watches in the background in Pete Walker's House of the Long Shadows (1983) exemplifies Ice-T Bitches 2 perfectly.
Hah. I caught House Of The Long Shadows on Talking Pictures recently. Very enjoyable.
ReplyDeleteFFS I made a right pig's ear of that hyperlink above 🙈
It's the only good film with all three actors together in it. They also appeared in Scream and Scream Again (1970), which was an awful movie.
ReplyDelete