The Most Dangerous Game (1932; Ernest B. Schoedsack and Irving Pichel) GRADE: B+ By Daniel Barnes Based on a widely adapted 1924 short story by Richard Connell, the 1932 chiller The Most Dangerous Game is the film that producers Ernest B. Schoedsack and Merian C. Cooper made right […]
Burn! (1969; Gillo Pontecorvo) Grade: B+ By Mike Dub Throughout the 1960s, Marlon Brando became increasingly active in social issues. Though his popularity was plummeting, he sought to make art that was relevant to the changing cultural landscape. The Ugly American (1963) is a well-intentioned (though drab) warning against […]
How I Live Now (2013; Kevin MacDonald) GRADE: C+ By Daniel Barnes This barely released drama from The Last King of Scotland director Kevin MacDonald is an odd-duck hybrid of a teenage summer romance and an apocalyptic nightmare. How I Live Now has some impressive ambitions, but mostly […]
The Night of the Following Day (1968; Hubert Cornfield) GRADE: D- Inert, pretentious, would-be nail biter featuring Marlon Brando in his weird, pre-Godfather down period as a hepcat kidnapper. He pairs with Mafia hard man Richard Boone to snatch and ransom the daughter of a wealthy American businessman. […]
The Chase (1966; Arthur Penn) GRADE: B+ By Daniel Barnes In most if not all of his best roles, the Nebraska-born Marlon Brando was an easy avatar for everything anti-heroic about America. A Streetcar Named Desire and The Wild One boosted him to prominence as a post-WWII, hyper-sensitive […]
Variety (1983; Bette Gordon) GRADE: B By Mike Dub Bette Gordon’s 1983 independent thriller Variety is a sharp, ambitious thriller. It deserves to mentioned alongside other vivid films about the alienated abyss of the old New York City – the ugly, dangerous, vile New York City that is nostalgically eulogized […]
