Amazon.co.uk Review
The word “vampire” is never mentioned in Near Dark, but that doesn’t stop this 1987 cult favourite from being one of the best modern-era vampire films. It put then-unknown director Kathryn Bigelow on Hollywood’s radar and gave choice roles to Aliens costars favoured by Bigelow’s ex-husband James Cameron–Lance Henriksen is the leader of a makeshift family of renegade bloodsuckers, nocturnally seeking victims in rural Oklahoma; his immortal gal pal is Aliens and T2 alumnus Jenette Goldstein; and Bill Paxton is the group’s deadliest leather-clad ass kicker. Fellow traveller Jenny Wright lures Okie farm boy Adrian Pasdar into the group with a love bite and he’s soon turning toward vampirism with a combination of frightened revulsion and relentless desire. With Joshua Miller as the youngest vampire, Near Dark is Bigelow’s masterpiece of low-budget ingenuity–a truck-stop thriller that begins well, gets better and better (aided by a fine Tangerine Dream score) and goes out in a blaze of glory. –Jeff Shannon

Near Dark

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Black comedies don’t come much blacker than cult favourite, Harold and Maude (1972), and they don’t come much funnier either. It seems that director Hal Ashby was the perfect choice to mine a load of eccentricity from the original Colin Higgins script, about the unlikely romance between a death-obsessed 19-year-old named Harold (Bud Cort) and a life-loving 79-year-old widow named Maude (Ruth Gordon). They meet at a funeral, and Maude finds something oddly appealing about Harold, urging him to “reach out” and grab life by the lapels as opposed to dwelling morbidly on mortality. Harold grows fond of the old gal–she’s a lot more fun than the girls his mother desperately tries to match him up with- -and together they make Harold and Maude one of the sweetest and most unconventional love stories ever made. Much of the early humour arises from Harold’ s outrageous suicide fantasies, played out as a kind of twisted parlour game to mortify his mother, who has grown immune to her strange son’s antics. Gradually, however, the film’s clever humour shifts to a brighter outlook and finally arrives at a point where Harold is truly happy to be alive. Featuring soundtrack songs by Cat Stevens, this comedy certainly won’t appeal to all tastes (it was a box-office flop when first released), but if you’re on its quirky wavelength, it might just strike you as one of the funniest films you’ve ever seen. –Jeff Shannon, Amazon.com

Harold and Maude

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Amazon.co.uk Review
The “lost” sleeper hit of 1980 has since become one of the most revered cult movies of all time, largely due to its bawdy, irreverent story about the art and artifice of filmmaking and an outrageously clever performance by Peter O’Toole. As megalomaniacal film director Eli Cross, O’Toole plays a larger-than-life figure whose ability to manipulate reality is like a power-trip narcotic. The focus of his latest mind game is a fugitive (Steve Railsback) recruited to replace a stuntman killed during a recent on-set accident. In return for protective sanctuary, the fugitive takes a crash course in stunt work but soon discovers that he’s the paranoid player in a game he can’t control, with the dictatorial director making up the rules. Or is he? The Stunt Man is a game of its own, played through the fantasy of filmmaking, and half the fun of watching the movie comes from sharing the stuntman’s paranoid confusion. Barbara Hershey has a smart, sexy supporting role as a lead actress who won’t submit to her director’s seemingly devious behaviour; but it’s clearly O’Toole who steals the show. Director Richard Rush adds to the movie’s maverick appeal–in a career plagued by struggles against the mainstream studio system, Rush hasn’t made a better movie before or since. The Stunt Man clearly represents the potential of his neglected talent. –Jeff Shannon

The Stunt Man

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Amazon.co.uk Review
Having proven itself as a favourite film of children around the world, Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory is every bit as entertaining now as it was when originally released in 1971. There’s a timeless appeal to Roald Dahl’s classic children’s novel, which was playfully preserved in this charming musical, from the colourful carnival-like splendour of its production design to the infectious melody of the “Oompah-Loompah” songs that punctuate the story. Who can forget those diminutive Oompah-loompah workers who recite rhyming parental warnings (“Oompah-loompah, doopity do…”) whenever some mischievous child has disobeyed Willy Wonka’s orders to remain orderly?

Oh, but we’re getting ahead of ourselves … it’s really the story of the impoverished Charlie Bucket, who, along with four other kids and their parental guests, wins a coveted golden ticket to enter the fantastic realm of Wonka’s mysterious confectionery. After the other kids have proven themselves to be irresponsible brats, it’s Charlie who impresses Wonka and wins a reward beyond his wildest dreams. But before that, the tour of Wonka’s factory provides a dazzling parade of delights, and with Gene Wilder giving a brilliant performance as the eccentric candyman, Wonka gains an edge of menace and madness that nicely counterbalances the movie’s sentimental sweetness. It’s that willingness to risk a darker tone–to show that even a wonderland like Wonka’s can be a weird and dangerous place if you’re a bad kid–that makes this an enduring family classic. –Jeff Shannon Amazon.co.uk Review
Starring Gene Wilder in the title role, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory may not be the most faithful Roald Dahl adaptation to hit the big screen, but there’s a strong argument that it’s the best. Even Tim Burton and Johnny Depp, with their 2005 release Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, couldn’t come close to this 1971 musical version.

Even nearly four decades later, it’s a surprisingly dark yet ultimately utterly joyful film, as Charlie Bucket finds his golden ticket and gets to join four gruesome children on a tour of the factory of the film’s title. What’s more, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory is packed with toe-tapping, memorable musical numbers, a terrific cast of young performers, and a memorable lead performance from Wilder. His Willy Wonka is a complex creation, veering unpredictably between likeable and quite sinister. And it’s a performance that sticks in the mind long, long after the credits have rolled.

The Blu-ray release sadly doesn’t present the copious extra material in high definition, but the main feature has benefited from a solid improvement. It’s a bright, colourful and imaginative film for long periods, and the transfer work is up to the job. There are moments where the material shows its age a little, but this is a good upgrade from the DVD edition, and the picture and audio both show genuine improvements. It’s also the finest way to own what’s undoubtedly the best version of the book to make it to the big screen to date. As fine an actor as Johnny Depp is, his Willy Wonka simply doesn’t hold a candle to Mr Wilder’s…. –Jon Foster

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

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By any rational measure, Alan Parker’s cinematic interpretation of Pink Floyd’s The Wall is a glorious failure. Glorious because its imagery is hypnotically striking, frequently resonant and superbly photographed by the gifted cinematographer Peter Biziou. And a failure because the entire exercise is hopelessly dour, loyal to the bleak themes and psychological torment of Roger Waters’ great musical opus, and yet utterly devoid of the humour that Waters certainly found in his own material. Any attempt to visualise The Wall would be fraught with artistic danger, and Parker succumbs to his own self-importance, creating a film that’s as fascinating as it is flawed. The film is, for better and worse, the fruit of three artists in conflict–Parker indulging himself, and Waters in league with designer Gerald Scarfe, whose brilliant animated sequences suggest that he should have directed and animated this film in its entirety. Fortunately, this clash of talent and ego does not prevent The Wall from being a mesmerising film. Boomtown Rats frontman Bob Geldof (in his screen debut) is a fine choice to play Waters’s alter ego–an alienated, “comfortably numb” rock star whose psychosis manifests itself as an emotional (and symbolically physical) wall between himself and the cold, cruel world. Weaving Waters’s autobiographical details into his own jumbled vision, Parker ultimately fails to combine a narrative thread with experimental structure. It’s a rich, bizarre, and often astonishing film that will continue to draw a following, but the real source of genius remains the music of Roger Waters. –Jeff Shannon

Pink Floyd: The Wall

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Amazon.co.uk Review
Having proven itself as a favourite film of children around the world, Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory is every bit as entertaining now as it was when originally released in 1971. There’s a timeless appeal to Roald Dahl’s classic children’s novel, which was playfully preserved in this charming musical, from the colourful carnival-like splendour of its production design to the infectious melody of the “Oompah-Loompah” songs that punctuate the story. Who can forget those diminutive Oompah-loompah workers who recite rhyming parental warnings (“Oompah-loompah, doopity do…”) whenever some mischievous child has disobeyed Willy Wonka’s orders to remain orderly?

Oh, but we’re getting ahead of ourselves … it’s really the story of the impoverished Charlie Bucket, who, along with four other kids and their parental guests, wins a coveted golden ticket to enter the fantastic realm of Wonka’s mysterious confectionery. After the other kids have proven themselves to be irresponsible brats, it’s Charlie who impresses Wonka and wins a reward beyond his wildest dreams. But before that, the tour of Wonka’s factory provides a dazzling parade of delights, and with Gene Wilder giving a brilliant performance as the eccentric candyman, Wonka gains an edge of menace and madness that nicely counterbalances the movie’s sentimental sweetness. It’s that willingness to risk a darker tone–to show that even a wonderland like Wonka’s can be a weird and dangerous place if you’re a bad kid–that makes this an enduring family classic. –Jeff Shannon Amazon.co.uk Review
Starring Gene Wilder in the title role, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory may not be the most faithful Roald Dahl adaptation to hit the big screen, but there’s a strong argument that it’s the best. Even Tim Burton and Johnny Depp, with their 2005 release Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, couldn’t come close to this 1971 musical version.

Even nearly four decades later, it’s a surprisingly dark yet ultimately utterly joyful film, as Charlie Bucket finds his golden ticket and gets to join four gruesome children on a tour of the factory of the film’s title. What’s more, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory is packed with toe-tapping, memorable musical numbers, a terrific cast of young performers, and a memorable lead performance from Wilder. His Willy Wonka is a complex creation, veering unpredictably between likeable and quite sinister. And it’s a performance that sticks in the mind long, long after the credits have rolled.

The Blu-ray release sadly doesn’t present the copious extra material in high definition, but the main feature has benefited from a solid improvement. It’s a bright, colourful and imaginative film for long periods, and the transfer work is up to the job. There are moments where the material shows its age a little, but this is a good upgrade from the DVD edition, and the picture and audio both show genuine improvements. It’s also the finest way to own what’s undoubtedly the best version of the book to make it to the big screen to date. As fine an actor as Johnny Depp is, his Willy Wonka simply doesn’t hold a candle to Mr Wilder’s…. –Jon Foster

Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory

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Amazon.co.uk Review
Tremors didn’t actually break any new ground (even though its tunnelling worm monsters certainly did), but it revved up the classic monster-movie formulas of the 1950s with such energetic enthusiasm and humour that it made everything old seem new again. It’s also got a cast full of enjoyable actors who clearly had a lot of fun making the film, and director Ron Underwood strikes just the right balance of comedy and terror as a band of small-town rednecks battles a lot of really nasty-looking giant worms. The special effects are great, the one-liners fly fast and furious between heroes Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward (and yes, that’s country star Reba McEntire packin’ awesome firepower), and it’s all done with the kind of flair one rarely associates with goofy monster flicks like this. –Jeff Shannon, Amazon.com

Tremors

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Invasion of the Body Snatchers is considered one of the best science fiction films of the 1950s and 1960s. The classic paranoid thriller was widely interpreted as a criticism of the McCarthy era, which was characterised by anti-Communist witch-hunts and fear of the dreaded blacklist. Some hailed it as an attack on the oppressive power of government as Big Brother. However viewers interpret it, this original 1956 version of Invaders of the Body Snatchers (based on Jack Finney’s serialised novel The Body Snatchers) remains a milestone movie in its genre, directed by Don Siegel with an inventive intensity that continues to pack an entertaining wallop.

Dr. Miles Bennell (Kevin McCarthy) is unconcerned when the townsfolk accuse their loved ones of acting like emotionless impostors. But soon the evidence is overwhelming–Santa Mira has been invaded by alien “pods”, which are capable of replicating humans and taking possession of their identities. It’s up to McCarthy to spread the word of warning, battling the alien invasion at the risk of his own life. Look closely and you’ll find future director Sam Peckinpah (an uncredited cowriter of this film) making a cameo appearance as a meter reader! –Jeff Shannon

Invasion of the Body Snatchers

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The comedic genius of This Is Spinal Tap is confirmed by the fact that a majority of studio executives were utterly clueless about its brilliance. As a first-time director and cowriter, Rob Reiner must have felt simultaneously frustrated and elated, knowing that the obtuseness of movie executives was a clue to his debut project’s potential greatness. Now, of course, the clarity of hindsight and the rarity of superior satire have turned This Is Spinal Tap into one of the funniest documentary spoofs of all time. Reiner and the members of “Tap” (Christopher Guest, Michael McKean, Harry Shearer) couldn’t have picked a better target for their satire, because heavy metal music in the early 1980s was already a borderline case of self-parody. From the bizarre, premature deaths of the band’s drummers to the backstage squabbles over sexist cover art and meddling groupies, this movie scores about a hundred comedic bull’s-eyes for lampooning every possible aspect of rock pomposity in the age of Kiss. It’s a virtual bible of rock & roll irreverence, so accurate in its observations that it’s become a tour-bus classic for real bands around the world. On the one-to-ten scale of satirical inspiration, This Is Spinal Tap is like the modified amplifiers that Christopher Guest so hilariously demonstrates: this one goes to 11. –Jeff Shannon

This Is Spinal Tap

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It’s silly, it’s superficial, it’s so desperately earnest about its tale of time-spanning love that you almost wish for a cheap flatulence gag just to break the solemn mood. But there is something so unabashedly gushy and entertaining about Somewhere in Time that you can’t begrudge its enduring popularity. The film has become a staple of romantic-movie lovers since its release in 1980, and endless showings on cable TV have turned it into a dubious classic of sorts–a three-hanky weepy that anyone can enjoy as a guilty pleasure or a beloved favourite, with no apologies necessary. In his first film after the star-making success of Superman, Christopher Reeve stars as a contemporary playwright who visits a posh hotel and sees the portrait of an actress (Jane Seymour) who had performed there in 1912. He becomes obsessed with this beautiful woman and learns all he can about her, and then discovers a method of hypnotically transporting himself backward in time to meet her. “Is it … you?” she says upon seeing the lovestruck playwright, and it’s clearly a mutual attraction. But even the slightest reminder of the playwright’s modern time can jar him from his seemingly real existence in the past, so his wonderful love affair is constantly just a step from being stolen away. Based on Richard Matheson’s novel Bid Time Return, this flaky film may strain one’s tolerance for plot holes and corny romance, but it’s hard to deny its lasting appeal–and let’s face it, guys, it’ll make wives and girlfriends swoon if they are in a tearjerker mood. –Jeff Shannon

Somewhere in Time

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