DVD Reviews

Jack Hill is BACK in a BIG way! For anyone who “hates” on exploitation film auteur Jack Hill’s The Swinging Cheerleaders for its objectification of women – namely cheerleaders – there’s a need for a brief lesson in film and cultural history.  Made during the 1970s, Hill’s movie was a very ...

Let’s first address the elephant in the room: that unappealing title of the new film from Paul Thomas Anderson called Licorice Pizza. It comes from a now-defunct Southern California record store chain that enjoyed its heyday in the ‘70s. Perfectly appropriate for the weird ...

A minister-turned-serial killer in one of the most beautiful films ever made by Hollywood?  Sure.  Why not?  When the results of exaggerated set designs and a directing style reminiscent of early silent cinema are as good as they are in The Night of the Hunter, no one is going to complain  ...

Now, this right here is the KA-RAZY chop Saki kung-fu that I miss about the action flicks from the 1980s!   Written, directed and starring Taiwanese martial arts legend John Liu (The Secret Rivals, Invincible Armor) , New York Ninja is truly a one-of-a-kind martial arts film as a mild-mannered sound ...

t’s time to go back . . . back to the park.   With the arrival of Jurassic World: Dominion imminent in early June, re-visiting the world that Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park has created is a no-brainer and what better way to do it than in Ultra HD?!  Thankfully, Universal has provided fans with all ...

Was he trying to kiss or kill her on that hilltop?  The verdict is still out as Suspicion makes its debut on blu-ray thanks to the efforts of the Warner Archive Collection. Alfred Hitchcock’s adaptation of Francis Iles's novel Before the Fact - which is as dissimilar as they...

Are you ready to take a chance again?! Written and directed by Colin Higgins (The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, 9 to 5) and featuring the debut of Chevy Chase in a feature film (when he left SNL in ‘76), Foul Play - while originally dismissed by a lot of print critics at the time of its release ...

Despite its stellar cast made up of no fewer than five Oscar winners, three Oscar nominees, more than a handful of Emmy winners and nominees, and a crew stuffed with its fair share of industry recognition, Amsterdam is one of the biggest disappointments to come down the pike in quite some  ...

You can’t say that Hitchcock didn’t warn audiences of Hitler.  He made several films with Hitler’s world view overhanging the shadows in each frame.  But, after a decade in Hollywood, Alfred Hitchcock took that warning to a new level and gave audiences the ultimate romance between a ...

Exploitation flicks don’t get any nastier than this!  You've been warned.  If there is any thread of humanity left within you, you'll just stop reading now and go about your day.  Nothing to see here. Still here?  Goooooood.  Then you already know just how absolutely AWESOME this film is and, yeah, there's plenty to see.  I don't know  ...

On its surface, Where the Crawdads Sing appears to be a rather maudlin murder mystery wrapped within the sappy folds of a modern YA romance. But a calculated look beneath its mucky veneer reveals something much more compelling. Something much deeper than even its swampy setting  ...

“I know what happens in those mystery pictures!  A guy walks over to a perfectly ordinary door he opens it up and - ZOWIE! - out falls a body right on its kisser!” And, of course, a body falls to the ground!  When it comes to getting the tone of horror comedies right, you have to sometimes go ...

Primal terror has never looked this good before! Writer/Director Joe Dante (Gremlins) humorously takes on America’s culture of violence with 1981’s The Howling.  Manically led by a charging performance from Patrick Macnee (BBC’s The Avengers), The Howling and Dante – alongside Jon  ...

So, you think you’re carrying some emotional baggage? Wait until you see the giant gorilla-proof hardside suitcase of emotional trauma Lulu, the retired military dog, and former Army Ranger Briggs (Channing Tatum) are toting around in the new road trip buddy film called Dog. Masking many ...

Sandra!  Junior?  SANDRA! Junior? SAAAANNNNNDRA! Having successfully stolen the show in 1941’s One Night in the Tropics, the comedy duo of Bud Abbott and Lou Costello - who were big on radio but untested on film - were quickly signed by Universal Pictures ...

“You made two mistakes.  One was getting up and the other was making fun of Shirley Temple.” Directed by David Berlatsky and starring Gary Conway as a decorated World War II veteran who returns home to try to save his farm from being taken over by the bank, The Farmer, a ...

2022 has been an incredibly good year for horror hounds. With such jewels as X, Prey, The Black Phone, Bodies Bodies Bodies, Nope, and most recently Pearl having already scared up plenty of attention this year, it’s quite an unexpected surprise that we get yet another gem to add to  ...

THE POST SAVES EARL WILLIAMS!  Hear all about it in His Girl Friday, now available on blu-ray thanks to the Criterion Collection.  Directed by Howard Hawks and starring Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell with standout performances from ...

"The motion picture that follows is a fable. In it there are many nudists but only one monster. In life, it is generally the other way around." Brain dead dialogue?  Plenty of female flesh?  Monster madness?  Where do I sign up?! AGFA and Something Weird, those cool-headed ...

It is not your average revenge flick. Nor is it what you would expect from director Henri Verneuil and star Jean-Paul Belmondo for what was their seventh picture together. There are no jaw-dropping stunts from the screen legend, and in fact there is hardly any exciting action in this  ...

If you ever get a hankering for some solid improvisational comedic skills on display throughout a major motion picture, look no further then director Leo McCarey’s slapstick comedy, The Awful Truth.  It might have been his first film for Columbia Pictures, but that didn’t stop McCarey from  ...

Fishing with grandpa was never as wild and as out there as in this slasher satire!  That’s right, Gorehounds and Guppy Heads, Blood Hook is back to get you in the mood for some more summertime hijinks . . . and this time all the muskie madness and mutilations are completely uncensored!  Whoop  ...

I think that everyone knows that those early teen years were…confusing…to say the least. Everyone has had their own traumatizing experiences from that time (whether you choose to remember them or not). However, there is a sense of comfort knowing that we all went through it and  ...

Sometimes it takes meeting the wrong person to finally get to the right person.  That’s one of the territories in Holiday, an often overlooked romantic comedy from 1938 which deals with clashing values and what it means to truly live as pie-in-the-sky dreamers mix drinks with the aristocrats  ...

007 who?  The Man From Hong Kong has all that you crave! Operating as if Inspector Fang Sing Leng (Jimmy Wang Yu) was the one and only James Bond, The Man From Hong Kong blows its action sky high and delivers a spirited action-adventure flick that could only come out of the pages of ...

“Whatever you plan on happening, never happens. Stuff you would never think of happens.” No matter how much many of us like to pretend that we have our lives under control, the simple fact of the matter is: we don’t…and we probably never will. It is not that we are necessarily doing anything ...

It’s the simplest twist of fates as Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard return to do battle with the supernatural in The Ghost Breakers!  Voodoo, ghosts, and island-bound zombies!  Add in a criminally underrated performance from Willie Best and you have the makings of another REEL CLASSIC! ...

Independent films don’t get any more baadasssss than with Melvin Van Peebles at the helm.  Recognize that right now and we can remain on speaking terms.  The collective black consciousness is alive and well in his filmography and, thankfully, his independent output left a lasting mark on pop ...

Ladies and gentlemen, the world of horror has a new scream queen. Her name is Mia Goth. With a dozen or so high-profile roles over the last decade, the youthful ingenue is certainly no newcomer to the biz, but her two latest films – Ti West’s X which released earlier this year and now its  ...

Swamp gators (with their mouths taped shut as evidenced by this crisp 4K handling!), dead lawyers, and mighty sums of money!  Such frightful delights await those that can stay sane in the Norman clan.  ...