The Killer is legendary action filmmaker John Woo’s masterpiece. To be clear, when I say that, I’m of course referring to Woo’s 1989 film called The Killer. His new 2024 movie also called The Killer, which is being promoted as a self-directed remake of his own work, is something different entirely. The new version of… Read More La Femme Redundant | The Killer (2024) on Peacock
A couple weeks ago, a local community event space put up a makeshift screen and hosted a viewing of Luc Besson’s 1997 sci-fi epic The Fifth Element in my neighborhood. Although admittedly not, on a technical level, the best cinematic experience I’ve had in my life, and certainly not up to my usual home theater… Read More A Visual History of The Fifth Element (1997) on Home Video
Two decades following its debut, the 1956 Invasion of the Body Snatchers saw its reputation elevated from a cheesy B-movie to a respected science-fiction classic. What Hollywood saw in that was an opportunity for a remake. Of course, the inherent irony of remaking a famous story about evil clone duplicates practically begs for dismissive comparisons… Read More Can’t Stay Awake Forever | Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) Arrow Video Blu-ray
Likely the quintessential 1950s sci-fi B-movie, Invasion of the Body Snatchers could easily have disappeared into obscurity if not for the efforts of producer Walter Wanger and director Don Siegel. Hired by the studio to churn out quick and cheap filler for a forgettable double feature, the creators instead delivered a film with such a… Read More They’re Already Here! | Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) 4K Ultra HD
While technically his third feature film as director, Terry Gilliam’s 1981 Time Bandits was only his second outside of Monty Python and, in most fans’ eyes, the first that truly marked him as an auteur in his own right. As a surprise box office smash (a top-ten money earner for the year on the short-list… Read More You Stick with These Boys, You Have a Great Future | Time Bandits (1981) Criterion Collection Blu-ray
Upon its belated release in this market in 2004, Zhang Yimou’s Hero set a milestone as the first foreign-language film to open at the top of the American box office. That achievement was notable in a few respects, not least of which is that the movie was already two-years-old by that point and a good… Read More How Swift Thy Sword | Hero (2002) ViaVision Imprint Asia Limited Edition Blu-ray
Originally intended as a direct-to-video production, the 1992 crime thriller One False Move received so much advance praise from critics that distributor I.R.S. Releasing (the short-lived film branch of music label I.R.S. Records) opted to give it a limited theatrical run first. While the movie ultimately made only a pittance at the box office, it… Read More Welcome to Star City, Boys | One False Move (1992) Criterion Collection 4K Ultra HD
For a movie infamous as a box office disaster, one still widely disparaged by both general viewers and fans of the book it was based on, David Lynch’s 1984 adaptation of Dune has had a remarkable shelf life on home video. Over the past four decades, numerous distributors around the world have licensed the film… Read More He Who Controls the Spice Controls the Universe | Dune (1984) ViaVision Limited Edition Blu-ray
Three and four decades, respectively, since they each debuted, producer Jerry Bruckheimer’s Bad Boys and Beverly Hills Cop action franchises both returned with belated fourth entries in 2024. Bad Boys was apparently deemed still fresh enough to merit another theatrical release, but former box office juggernaut Beverly Hills Cop wound up relegated to a Netflix… Read More Some Things Never Change | Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F (2024) on Netflix
When the time came to make a sequel to their smash hit Beverly Hills Cop, producers Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer knew they’d have to step up their game. In the three short years between the two films, audiences had already been conditioned (by Simpson and Bruckheimer in particular) to expect a greater sense of… Read More Can Never Have Too Much Firepower | Beverly Hills Cop II (1987) 4K Ultra HD
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