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Riz Ortolani (1926- 2014)
RIP to the great and prolific Italian film composer Riziero "Riz" Ortolani, who has passed away at the age of 87. Best-known for his Grammy-winning and Oscar-nominated hit song "More" (written for...
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Finally, MAN OF STEEL
Henry Cavill as the MAN OF STEEL.I didn't care for the way it looked from afar, so I'd put off seeing Zack Snyder's MAN OF STEEL till this evening. Then it hit me: this thing's a reality, it is going...
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Something Weird's Mike Vraney (1957-2014)
Only two days into the New Year came the startling news that Mike Vraney, the founder of Something Weird Video, had died at the age of 56 after a long and private bout with lung cancer. The...
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Indiegogo Campaign Ends Tonight!
Back on November 27 of last year, I announced on this blog that Donna and I were undertaking a Kickstarter campaign to raise the money we needed to finance the digitization of VIDEO WATCHDOG's entire...
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RIP Our Friend, Ann Carter (1936-2014)
I was informed this afternoon by her daughter, Carol Newton Brown, that her mother, the former child actress Ann Carter passed away on January 27 after a long battle with cancer, at the age of 77. We...
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Eric Rohmer's Horror Movie
Though I have not often written about him or his particular importance to me, Eric Rohmer has always been one of my favorite filmmakers. His literary, beatific films about love and communication,...
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BLOOD AND ROSES German Import: Some Frame Grabs
Annette Stroyberg Vadim as Carmilla Karnstein in BLOOD AND ROSES.Roger Vadim's BLOOD AND ROSES (... Et mourir de plaisir, 1961) was one of the most widely-seen European horror imports of its period,...
View ArticleGODZILLA: The Bigger, Better "We're Screwed" Machine
Today the official GODZILLA trailer was unveiled and it looks very impressive. But, as I watched it, I found myself reflecting on how, each year, billions are spent to bolster our military while other...
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You'd Drink Too: Here's To June Squibb
June Squibb in Alexander Payne's NEBRASKA.I love Bruce Dern. I have always loved Bruce Dern, and I took notice of him early, when he was terrorizing Teresa Wright on THE ALFRED HITCHCOCK HOUR. He's...
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It's the 12th Annual Rondo Award Nominations!
The 12th Annual Rondo Award nominations have been posted and, to my surprise and great pleasure, VIDEO WATCHDOG and I are once again among the nominees - me with five nominations of my own, and VIDEO...
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RIP Calvin Floyd (1931-2014)
Leon Vitali (BARRY LYNDON) as Victor Frankenstein in Calvin Floyd's TERROR OF FRANKENSTEIN.Producer Jeffrey C. Hogue has written to inform me of the passing last week of Swedish-born...
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First Look: VIDEO WATCHDOG #176
Now at the printer! We'll start shipping when it returns in a couple of weeks.
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Catching Up With Five Mean Years
Last week, I decided to fill a gap in my Greil Marcus collection by acquiring his book THE DOORS : A LIFETIME OF LISTENING TO FIVE MEAN YEARS, which I was able to pick up in hardcover from an Amazon...
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Some Forbidden Swedish Cinema
An instance of PERFORMANCE-like decadence from Mai Zetterling's NIGHT GAMES.Last night I treated myself to an evening of forbidden Swedish cinema (forbidden in the sense that it's not commercially...
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My First Animated Skeleton
This bizarre artwork is a detail from the dust jacket of the US hardcover edition of Ngaio Marsh's 1949 mystery novel A WREATH FOR RIVERA. When I was a kid, my mother and grandmother sometimes took me...
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Quick Look: SORCERER on Blu-ray
Still an editing nightmare that spends its first hour elliptically globe-hopping to introduce four losers we never get to know, William Friedkin's SORCERER arrives on Blu-ray with jungle foliage newly...
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He Introduced Spider-Man to the World
RIP Dick Ayers, the great Silver Age pencil and ink man who contributed most importantly to the Marvel Age of Comics, who has passed away at the age of 90. Ayers did his own work for titles as...
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10 Cultish Reasons to Vacation with MR. HOBBS
Twilight Time, the extra-mile label that issues limited pressings of major studio films on Blu-ray with isolated music tracks, recently issued Henry Koster's comedy MR. HOBBS TAKES A VACATION (1962) in...
View ArticleVW 177 Nearing Completion
Donna, John and I are putting the finishing touches on VIDEO WATCHDOG 177, which is going to be a special Italian Crime issue consisting of new contributor George Pacheco's overview of the...
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First Look: VIDEO WATCHDOG 177
The next issue of VIDEO WATCHDOG - now at the printer - will be a Eurocrime special with extensive coverage of the poliziotteschi (po-leet-zio-tess-ky, or Italian cop movie) genre. I'm always a little...
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