Wednesday, December 20, 2023

Best Old Films Discovered in 2023

For every recent film misfire, there will always be the assurance of an older gem awaiting discovery.

At the risk of it sounding cliched, these older films really were an educational experience: I was clueless about Peter Watkins's mock-documentaries; wrong about writing off Sidney Hayers; and completely slept on the brilliance of apocalyptic eighties thrillers The Quiet Earth and Miracle Mile until this very year.

Discoveries of 2023:

The Sadist (James Landis, 1963)

The Thrill Killers (Ray Dennis Steckler, 1964)

The War Game (Peter Watkins, 1965)

The Bride Wore Black (François Truffaut, 1968)

Targets (Peter Bogdanovich, 1968)

Blind Beast (Yasuzō Masumura, 1969)

The House That Screamed (Chicho Ibáñez Serrador, 1969)

Red Sun (Rudolph Thome, 1970)

Punishment Park (Peter Watkins, 1971)

Revenge (Sidney Hayers, 1971)

Full Circle AKA The Haunting of Julia (Richard Loncraine, 1977)

The Lady in Red (Lewis Teague, 1979)

Samurai Reincarnation (Kenji Fukasaku, 1981)

Calamity of Snakes (William Cheung Kai, 1982)

The Quiet Earth (Geoff Murphy, 1985)

Miracle Mile (Steve De Jarnatt, 1988)

The Hot Spot (Dennis Hopper, 1990)

Croupier (Mike Hodges, 1998)

Freeway II: Confessions of a Trickbaby (Matthew Bright, 1999)

Pusher II (Nicolas Winding Refn, 2004)

Hotel Coolgardie (Pete Gleeeson, 2016)

Honourable Mentions: Chained Girls (Joseph P. Mawra, 1965); If Footmen Tire You, What Will Horses Do? (Ron Ormond, 1971); Black Magic Rites AKA The Reincarnation of Isabel (Renato Polselli, 1973); Deadly Strangers (Sidney Hayers, 1975); Dr. Caligari (Stephen Sayadian, 1989); Hitcher in the Dark (Umberto Lenzi, 1989); Kolobos (Daniel Liatowitsch & David Todd Ocvirk, 1999); Night of the Rat (David R.L, 2015); Maniac Driver (Kurando Mitsutake, 2021).

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4 comments:

  1. Kelvin Mack10zieDecember 20, 2023 at 11:35 AM

    Glad you've joined #QuietEarthHive.

    🍻 for the The Sadist and Hotel Coolgardie recommendations.

    Off top, these were my favourite old discoveries:

    Where Has Poor Mickey Gone?
    The Comedy Of Terrors
    Chimes At Midnight
    The Onion Head
    Dance Craze
    Extreme Prejudice
    The Vagrant
    Tape
    Another Round

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  2. SpartanDecember 20, 2023 at 5:25 PM

    Some of those films were on Talking Pictures, am I right? That channel has a better film selection than all other Freeview stations combined.

    Like a few of the other films I listed, I never got round to doing a review of The Quiet Earth. Need to make amends next year.

    Really want to see The Vagrant and Dance Craze.

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  3. Kelvin Mack10zieDecember 20, 2023 at 7:03 PM

    Yeah, a steady diet of Talking Pictures.

    Just been to see Godzilla Minus One. Pretty much concur with your review. Gotta love a monster movie about grassroots community activism and the sweet taste of revenge. Movie hit even harder for me after being subjected to that corny Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire trailer beforehand.

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  4. SpartanDecember 20, 2023 at 8:55 PM

    Kong and Godzilla running together in that trailer is hilariously dumb. Even funnier is the fact that close to a billion must have been spent on American Godzilla movies and none of them have or will be as good as Godzilla Minus One with its $15M budget.

    ReplyDelete