Jacqueline Bisset’s in a heck of a fix. Her hubby Alan Alda has been seduced by promises of fame and fortune from creepy concert genius Curt Jurgens, and is responding to weird overtures from Curt’s daughter Barbara Parkins. The pianist’s mansion is stuffed with occult books, and he displays an unhealthy interest in Alda’s piano-ready hands. Do you think the innocent young couple could be in a diabolical tight spot? Nah, nothing to worry about here.

The Mephisto Waltz

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1971 / Color /1:85 widescreen / 115 min. / Street Date April 18, 2017 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Alan Alda, Jacqueline Bisset, Barbara Parkins, Brad(ford) Dillman, William Windom, Kathleen Widdoes, Pamelyn Ferdin, Curt Jurgens, Curt Lowens, Kiegh Diegh, Berry Kroeger, Walter Brooke, Frank Campanella.

Cinematography: William W. Spencer

Film Editor: Richard Brockway

Original Music: Jerry Goldsmith

Written by Ben Maddow from a novel by Fred Mustard Stewart

Produced...

No Highway in the Sky

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1951 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 99 min. / Street Date February 7, 2017 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring : James Stewart, Marlene Dietrich, Glynis Johns, Jack Hawkins, Janette Scott, Niall MacGinnis, Kenneth More, Ronald Squire, Elizabeth Allan, Jill Clifford, Felix Aylmer, Dora Bryan, Maurice Denham, Wilfrid Hyde-White, Bessie Love, Karel Stepanek.

Cinematography: Georges Périnal

Film Editor: Manuel del Campo

Original Music: Malcolm Arnold

Written by: R.C. Sherriff, Oscar Millard, Alec Coppel from the novel by Nevil Shute

Produced by: Louis D. Lighton

Directed by Henry Koster

A few years back, whenever a desired title came up on list for a Fox, Columbia or Warners’ Mod (made-on-demand) DVD, my first reaction was disappointment: we really want to see our favorites released in the better disc format, Blu-ray. But things have changed. As Mod announcements thin out, we have seen an explosion of library titles remastered in HD.

Giuseppe Verdi’s magnificente “Requiem Dies Irae” is the grand glue that makes Battle Royale the genre masterpiece that it is. Greg McLean’s The Belko Experiment, written by Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn (also writer of Dawn of the Dead and director of SLiTHER), is clearly inspired by the 2000 Japanese adaptation; it takes place during a twisted social experiment […]...

Expatriate Francis Lederer is a cultured menace in UA's revisit of the Dracula myth, made just before Hammer Films staked its claim on the horror genre. Avid Hitchcock fans may find the storyline very familiar, when European cousin Bellac strikes up a 'special' relationship with his American cousin Rachel. The Return of Dracula Blu-ray Olive Films 1958 / B&W / 1:85 widescreen / 77 min. / Street Date October 18, 2016 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95 Starring Francis Lederer, Norma Eberhardt, Ray Stricklyn, Virginia Vincent, John Wengraf. Cinematography Jack MacKenzie Film Editor Sherman A. Rose Original Music Gerald Fried Written by Pat Fielder Produced by Arthur Gardner, Jules V. Levy Directed by Paul Landres

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

The Levy-Gardner-Laven producing combo, minus Arnold Laven this time out, assemble what was probably their most successful drive-in cheapie for United Artists. Promoting their secretary Pat Fielder to screenwriter, they had already done okay with a contemporary, non-Gothic vampire story...

For the 50th Anniversary of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966) Team Experience is celebrating with a four part miniseries. Begin with Part 1 "What. A.Dump!" or Part 2 "Firing Squads & Flop Sweat" if you missed them.

Pt 3 by Kyle Stevens

[Kyle's book "Mike Nichols: Sex, Language, and The Reinvention of Psychological Realism" is available for purchase.]

01:04:30 We pick up with Nick and George, left alone. Nick ceases peacocking for a moment since the ladies have gone, and, for George, this is the moment to assert dominance. For Albee, their tête-à-tête is an allegorical showdown between biology and history, nature and nurture: what they are, what people are, and who gets to say. Albee is on George’s side:

To take the trouble to construct a civilization, to build a society based on principles of, uh, principle. You make government and art and realize that they are, must be, both the same. You bring things to the saddest of all points, to the point where there is something to lose.

"Oh great brothers of the night who rideth upon the hot winds of hell, who dwelleth in the Devil's lair; move and appear." These words are heard quoted from The Satanic Bible by none other than creative consultant and Church of Satan leader Anton Lavey to set the mood for the 1977 supernatural road thriller The Car.

Director Elliot Silverstein never reaches the suspense or perspicacious intensity that Spielberg mastered in Duel and doesn't deliver the excessive thrills and excitement of Roger Corman's Death Race 2000, but The Car some how manages to offer enough impressive stunts, eccentric characters and stylish atmosphere to succeed as a moderately entertaining 98 minutes of vehicular mayhem.

In The Car, James Brolin mustered enough charisma to channel a poor man's Roy Scheider as Chief Deputy Wade Parent—leading the crusade against the demonic death machine with the assistance of his deputy Luke Johnson, played by Ronny Cox.

In the wake of the terrible attacks in Paris, I found myself listening to a lot of French music and thinking about the Leonard Bernstein quote going around on Facebook: "This will be our reply to violence: to make music more intensely, more beautifully, more devotedly than ever before." This list came to seem like my natural response. A very small response, I know. This list is chronological and leaves off people I should probably include. The forty [note: now forty-one] composers listed below are merely a start.

Léonin Aka Leoninus (c.1135-c.1201)

The Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris in the 1100s was a major musical center, and Léonin (the first named composer from whom we have notated polyphonic music) was a crucial figure for defining the liturgical use of organum, the first polyphony. Earlier organum was fairly simple, involving parallel intervals and later contrary motion, but the mid-12th century brought...

To Purchase Click on Poster

<---Look at this amazing Blue Velvet poster making the web rounds. [Hat tip Mnpp]. I so love painted movie posters and it's only 7 bucks. Click on photo to go to the artist's site.

Links

El Desio Pedro Almodóvar blogging from the set of Silencio (!!) with two photos

Dissolve Today in Ballsiest News: Nate Parker (Beyond the Lights) who we just celebrated as a Born in '79 Hottie is directing and starring in a feature biopic of Nat Turner, a slave who led a bloody massacre against white captors in 1831. But here's the ballsy part: they're naming it Birth of a Nation (!) 

Vanity Fair Don Hertzfeldt (World of Tomorrow) says being an artist should be your full time job. Hear hear! Start donating to creatives you believe in or purchasing their work. Life is not free. 

Mubi "Psychopolitical Realism in Mad Max: Fury Road" - provocative piece

Far Flung...

As you know, music plays a huge part in the filmmaking process and plays with our emotions while we are watching the movie. Music heightens our senses and adds to the quality of film. When it comes to horror movies, the music is supposed to scare us, make us feel uneasy, and gives us moments of panic and fear. Director Martin Scorsese said the following about music and film:

“Music and cinema fit together naturally. Because there’s a kind of intrinsic musicality to the way moving images work when they’re put together. It’s been said that cinema and music are very close as art forms, and I think that’s true.”

Just the other day the main theme song from Halloween started playing on the radio, and it freaked my kids out to the point that they were in tears. It was sad but kind of funny at the same time.

CBC Radio 2, hosted by Tom Allen, has put together a fantastic look at how the medievel chant, "Dies Irae" (meaning the song of death) has wormed its way from 600 Ad into the films of today including John Williams' score for Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope, Dimitri Tiomkin's score for Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life, Howard Shore's score for The Lord of the Rings and even inspired Mike Oldfield's "Tubular Bells", which are heard at the beginning of William Friedkin's The Exorcist. The following video takes you through the history of the chant from its beginnings to Hector Berlioz's 1820 "Symphonie Fantastique" and Sergei Rachmaninoff's 1940 "Symphonic Dances". Even Hans Zimmer's score for Disney's The Lion King makes an appearance. Check out the video below. yt id="dLgvKwOYniY" width="500" One of the world's oldest songs isn't about love, sex or even power.

Italian director Paolo Sorrentino’s “La Grande Bellezza” (The Great Beauty) (2013)

Paolo Sorrentino’s The Great Beauty has two small yet important facets in common with Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life. Both films begin with a profound quote that provides a key to the viewer for a full understanding of the film that follows. Both films use the music of “Dies Irae” (Requiem for my Friend, which includes Lacrimosa 2) by Zbigniew Preisner (the talented composer of Kieslowski’s Dekalog and The Three Colors trilogy) and Henryk Gorecki’s 3rd Symphony.

Just as Mallick used an interesting quote from the Book of Job, the opening quote for The Great Beauty is from Sorrentino’s favorite author Louis-Ferdinand Céline’s Journey to the End of the Night.

The quote is “To travel is very useful, it makes the imagination work, the rest is just delusion and pain. Our journey is entirely imaginary,...

An ambassador, Neil Wardh (Alberto de Mendoza), and his wanton wife, Julie (Edwige Fenech), arrive in Vienna for business in the midst of a vicious killing spree that has everyone in a panic. Julie's return to the city rouses memories of former lover Jean (Ivan Rassimov) and their sadomasochistic relationship. It also helps that her husband is utterly dull, busy, and inattentive. The restless Julie has a dark secret that only Jean knows about: blood frightens her, but it also arouses her unimaginably. Julie's cruel ex-boyfriend stalks her and sends unnerving love letters, but she finds comfort at swinging parties and in the arms of another man, George (George Hilton). As the city's body count begins to rise, and a mysterious caller threatens to expose her adulterous and kinky secrets, Julie suspects she's next and that Jean is behind the murders and madness. She escapes to Spain with George for a fresh start,...

Many movies lend themselves to dramatic interpretations, but none as rich and far-ranging as Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining. In Rodney Ascher’s new film Room 237, we hear from people who have developed far-reaching theories and believe they have decoded the hidden symbols and messages buried in the late director’s film. Recently, I got the chance to sit down with director Rodney Ascher, as well as producer Tim Kirk in a small roundtable discussion about the film. Check it out below.

What do you think it is about this movie that has inspired so many people to study it after 30 years?

Rodney Ascher: I think a big part of it is that The Shining is that it’s a puzzle that’s missing a few pieces. Even at the simplest level of story, there’s huge gaps in at, and what goes on in it. The central event in the film,...

This isn't the first time I've professed my love for Scandinavian metal, mostly due to that area's predominance of huge, cinematic production styles and lyrical themes drawing from ancient folklore and dark fantasy. It probably won't be the last time I mention that either. One of my more enjoyable finds from the mighty Norse lands is Norwegian five-man power metal outfit Tellus Requiem, whose style ventures beyond solid melodies and anthemic refrains (although they do handle those very well) and into the neoclassical arrangements, long-form songwriting and grand-scale storytelling that are progressive metal's stock in trade. Like many prog-metal bands on both sides of the Atlantic, Tellus Requiem draws strength from key members' backgrounds in classical music, often composing on an operatic scale in the mode of Dream Theater or Symphony X, but never resorting to orchestral passages as a mere backdrop for the metal elements, a habit pretty common in European symphonic metal.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Quentin Tarantino’s revision of world history continues with his singular, ultra-violent blaxploitation-film-cum-spaghetti-western Django Unchained, a passionate love letter to mid-1960s cinema that might feel lesser compared to most of the director’s filmography, but compensates for its flaws with the trademark wit and explosive action we’ve come to expect from a Qt picture.

The narrative begins in 1858 Texas, two years before the start of the American Civil War, as Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz), a dentist-turned-bounty-hunter, frees a slave named Django (Jamie Foxx) with the hope that the slave can lead him to a tasty bounty he’s chasing. In return, Schultz promises to help Django rescue his enslaved wife Broomhilda (Kerry) from eccentric plantation owner Calvin J. Candie (DiCaprio) by posing as a businessman.

For better and for worse, this is every bit the Tarantino flick that fans will expect; it is...

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Composed by Howard Shore

WaterTower Music

December 11, 2012

In 2001, Peter Jackson and his intrepid cast and crew transported audiences around the world to a land that, up until that point, only existed in novels and decades old animated films. That land was Middle Earth, and now, nearly ten years later, Jackson has reteamed with much of the same company, as well as some new faces, to bring us the beginning of his own prequel trilogy with The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. A significant part of what made The Lord of the Rings such an enthralling trilogy came down to Howard Shore’s astounding and expansive score. The composer is one of the many to return and while his music here doesn’t quite take the series in entirely new directions, after all this is building up to a story we already know with music we’ve already heard,...

Shortly after 9/11, and very definitely as a personal response to that event, I wrote an article about Requiems for Cdnow, where I worked at the time (just a few blocks away from Ground Zero; fortunately our workday started at 10 Am, so I wasn't there yet that day, but in the weeks that followed there were days where, if the wind came from the wrong direction, we would go home early, it made us so sick). In the years since, I have written about music composed in response to that tragedy, such as John Adams's On the Transmigration of Souls. But now I find myself being drawn back to the Requiem idea. Here's a much-expanded take on it.

This roughly chronological list confines itself to works with a sacred basis, though the 20th century yielded secular Requiems, most notably Paul Hindemith's When Lilacs Last in the Door-yard Bloom...

In our era of Existential angst, ain’t it time that we make time to laugh at our messy human selves? If you’re ready for a good dose of some of that and just in time for New York Comic Con this weekend, join the folks at the much-lauded Brick Theater in Williamsburg, Brooklyn with the award-winning Impetuous Theater Group’s production of Crystal Skillman’s Action Philosophers!, directed by John Hurley, based upon the comic books of the same name written by Fred Van Lente (married to the playwright) and illustrated by Ryan Dunlavey (reviewed here plus interview with Fred last year). First mounted for the Comic Book Theater Festival in June, this retooled upgrade has 50% new cast.

You’d think that turning a truly comic book into a comedy would be a piece of cake! Wrong-o-roonie! As the dynamic duo of Skillman & Hurley discovered, it’s a challenge.

Projekt Records are known worldwide for their exotic repertoire of darkwave, gothic, atmospheric, ethereal and dark pop artists, and I've reviewed a wide assortment of those talents on these pages. One of the more haunting albums to emerge from Projekt's camp lately is the Italian duo Atrium Animae, whose beautifully spooky sound returns in the form of their debut album Dies Irae. Turn the page for a mini-review of this ghostly creation... The group's name is loosely translated from Latin as "The Gate of the Soul" – lining up perfectly with their sound, which calls to mind mystic rituals conducted by moonlight. The team of Massimiliano Picconi (instruments) and Alessia Cicala (vocals) draw heavily on...