The Breakfast Club: Criterion Collection
April 4, 2018
John Hughes’ movies were a cultural touchstone for an entire generation of young people in the 1980s. With Sixteen Candles (1984), Pretty in Pink (1986), and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986), he had an uncanny ability to tap into how teenagers felt...
The Player: Criterion Collection
May 31, 2016
The 1980s was a tough decade for Robert Altman. After enjoying so much creative freedom in the 1970s it all came crashing down with Popeye (1980), a big budget adaptation of the comic strip of the same name. It was plagued with production problems and...
The Friends of Eddie Coyle: Criterion Collection
April 27, 2015
The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973) is one of those forgotten films from the 1970s. It’s a melancholic story of small-time criminals working on the fringes of Boston’s underworld. It’s not exactly the kind of feel-good story that lights up the box...
The Uninvited: Criterion Collection
November 4, 2013
The Uninvited (1944) was based on the best-selling novel Uneasy Freehold by Dorothy Macardle and marked the directorial debut of Lewis Allen who had cut his teeth in the theater with successful productions in London’s West End and on Broadway before...
The Blob: Criterion Collection
April 23, 2013
The Blob (1958) is one of the classic monster movies made during the 1950s. Common origins for a lot of creatures from these kinds of movies were either as a result of atomic energy or from outer space. Irvin S. Yeaworth Jr.’s movie opts for the latter...
Repo Man: Criterion Collection
April 16, 2013
“Not many people got a code to live by anymore,” says Bud (Stanton), the veteran repo man to his protege, Otto (Estevez) near the beginning of Alex Cox’s Repo Man (1984). This film is all about personal codes and philosophies. It seems...
The Fall of the Essex Boys
February 8, 2013
The Fall of the Essex Boys is the latest collaboration between producers Jonathan Sothcott and Simon Phillips, and easily represents their best work so far. Hot on the heels of The Rise & Fall of a White Collar Hooligan (2012) Essex Boys is headed...
Vamps
November 16, 2012
For awhile director Amy Heckerling had a good run of films in the 1980s and 1990s, responsible for two stone cold classics – Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982) and Clueless (1995) – and several popular comedies – National Lampoon’s European Vacation...
Le Havre: Criterion Collection
August 9, 2012
Aki Kaurismaki is arguably Finland’s most famous export – a filmmaker that favors understated stories of basic human decency, usually involving the working class. His films also celebrate life and the right to live it however one wants. His latest...
Deadly Intent
December 12, 2011
Deadly Intent (1989) is one of those forgettable thrillers you happen to catch on television late one night, enticed by the cast of interesting character actors, and then promptly fall asleep partway through because it is so predictable. It was directed...
