Eight years after the release of London After Midnight, Tod Browning remade the film as Mark of the Vampire with Lionel Barrymore as Professor Zelin, a variation on Chaney’s inspector from the original film. It is also the next film up in John Landis’ Monsters in the Movies, a coffee table tome that I am…
Tag: murder
London After Midnight (1927) – Tod Browning
Tod Browning’s London After Midnight has been lost, burned in a fire that cleared out a percentage of the MGM vault in 1965. That doesn’t stop it from making it into John Landis’ brilliantly enjoyable Monsters in the Movies, available from DK Canada. A reconstructed version, created from film stills, and a script was released…
Dracula’s Daughter (1936) – Lambert Hillyer
John Landis Monsters in the Movies, available from DK Canada, keeps the fangs coming with this next title from the Vampire section of his book. This 1936 film is supposed to pick up shortly after the close of 1931’s Dracula (despite the fact that it was set in the 19th century, and this film is…
Murder, My Sweet (1944) – Edward Dmytryk
Dick Powell doesn’t quite have the narration patter down of a hard-boiled private investigator, especially not for the one he’s playing, Philip Marlowe, still, this is a great little film-noir bringing another incarnation of Raymond Chandler’s iconic character to the silver screen. And he handles the actual dialogue with his co-stars well, it’s just the…
Star Trek: The Next Generation (1994) – Masks, and Eye of the Beholder
Captain’s log: stardate 47615.2 Joe Menosky pens this less than stellar episode that sees Data (Brent Spiner) taking on the role of the villain in the story. This story first aired on 21 February, 1994. The Enterprise comes across a comet that contains a hidden 87 million year old alien archive which begins to redesign…
The Big Red One (1980) – Samuel Fuller
Samuel Fuller wrote and directed the final film recommendation from the Great Movies – 100 Years of Film book following my screening of Saving Private Ryan. This title closes out my time with it. The tagline for the film says it best, “The real glory of war is surviving.” And that is what the heart…
Miami Vice (1984) – Heart of Darkness, and Cool Runnin’
Following the series premiere the first episode following the opener was as edgy and dark (while being as colourful, vibrant and music-filled as Brother’s Keeper). Heart of Darkness (not quite dissimilar to Joseph Conrad’s original story) was written by A.J. Edison, and first aired on 28 September, 1984. Sonny Crockett (Don Johnson) and Ricardo Tubbs…
Star Wars: Phasma (2017) – Delilah S. Dawson
It’s been awhile since I dived into a Star Wars novel, but I got my hands on Phasma, a novel about one of the new characters introduced in the new Star Wars Trilogy and found myself swept up in the canon tale of who she is, what drives her, and how far she is willing…
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1993) – Rules of Acquisition, and Necessary Evil
Station log: stardate unknown Ira Steven Behr pens this episode from a story by Hilary Bader that first aired on 17 November, 1993. Pel (Helene Udy) is a Ferengi who has arrived on the station to serve in negotiations between the Ferengi Alliance and civilisations in the Gamma Quadrant. Pel, however, is a female posing…
Throne of Blood (1957) – Akira Kurosawa
The next recommendation from the Great Movies – 100 Years of Film book following my screening of Kurosawa’s Ran is another classic film from the legendary director, Throne of Blood. Toshiro Mifune, Akira Kubo and Isuzu Yamada star in this action-fantasy-drama. Mifune stars as Taketoki Washizo, while Kubo stars as his childhood friend, and fellow…
The Mind Reels 