Darren

Alfred Hitchcock Presents: Breakdown (Review)

Posted on May 14, 2012 by Darren

As part of the “For the Love of Film” blogathon, I’ll be taking a look at Alfred Hitchcock’s contributions to his celebrated anthology series Alfred Hitchcock Presents. I’ll be looking at some of the episodes of the classic show that he directed. The “For the Love of Film” blogathon this year is raising money to keep one of Hitchcock’s earlier works, The White Shadow (which he wrote, edited, designed and assistant-directed), available on-line and streaming for free. It’s a very worthwhile cause and you can donate here.

Breakdown is an interesting concept, but one that feels like it has been adapted into the wrong medium. Most of the story centres around an executive who survives a car crash, paralysed. We are treated to his inner monologue as various people come along and interact with him. Adapted by Francis M. Cockrell and Louis Pollock from the latter’s short story, I can’t help but feel the concept might have worked better as a radio play than in television. Still, the idea is solid, and Joseph Cotton gives a nice central performance. It just feels a bit clunky for a television adaptation.

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: alfred hitchcock, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, anthony hopkins, art, Blogathon, helen mirren, hitchcock, Joseph Cotton, Love of Film, Psycho, United States, White Shadow | 2 Comments »

X-Men: Inferno – Excalibur (Review/Retrospective)

Posted on May 13, 2012 by Darren

With our month looking at Avengers comics officially over, we thought it might be fun to dig into that other iconic Marvel property, the X-Men. Join us for a month of X-Men related reviews and discussion.

This weekend, we’re taking a look at one or two of the smaller Inferno crossovers. These issues are collected in the crossovers companion book.

It’s actually quite impressive to think of the mythology-building that Chris Claremont was responsible during his incredible run on Uncanny X-Men. The X-Men had, of course, been confined to reprints for years before Len Wein revived the concept in Giant-Sized X-Men #1, but Claremont guided Marvel’s merry mutants to the heights of success. I think it’s entirely appropriate that the first issue in his last arc, X-Men #1, remains the biggest-selling comic book of all time – cementing Claremont’s impact.

Even though many people would argue the X-Men only really exploded during the speculation bubble of the nineties, it’s remarkable just how much Claremont and his collaborators were expanding the line. By the end of the eighties, Uncanny X-Men had accumulated several satellite books. Of those, Claremont had the pleasure of working with renowned artist Bill Sienkiewicz on New Mutants, while Excalibur paired the scribe with Alan Davis, one of the most respected artists in the business.

What possessed them to come to New York?

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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: Captain Britain, chris claremont, Claremont, inferno, joss whedon, Kitty Pryde, Len Wein, Madelyne Pryor, uncanny x-men, x-men | 3 Comments »

Alfred Hitchcock Presents: Lamb to the Slaughter (Review)

Posted on May 13, 2012 by Darren

It’s amazing to think of the talent involved in some of these Alfred Hitchcock Presents episodes. Obviously the director himself was the host and directed seventeen episodes, but he also had a star-studded cast on hand for a great many installments. That said, there was just much talent behind the camera. Robert Altman, Sydney Pollack and William Friedkin were among the other directors to work on the series, and author Roald Dahl contributed some episodes as well. Dahl contributed the much-loved Man From The South, featuring Peter Lorre and Steve McQueen, but he also offered this wonderful little murder tale about an especially inventive killing.

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: alfred hitchcock, Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho, anthony hopkins, Barbara Bel Geddes, Blogathon, hitchcock, lamb to the slaughter, Love of Film, roald dahl, robert altman, steve mcqueen, toby jones, White Shadow, William Friedkin | 6 Comments »

X-Men: Inferno – Fantastic Four (Review/Retrospective)

Posted on May 13, 2012 by Darren

This weekend, we’re taking a look at one or two of the smaller Inferno crossovers. These issues are collected in the crossovers companion book.

I have to admit, one of the best things about these companion books collecting the tie-ins to mammoth crossovers like Acts of Vengeance or Inferno is that way that they seem to capture a particular moment in time. In the Inferno collection alone, you get a taste of Walt Simonson’s Avengers, Ann Nocenti’s Daredevil and Chris Claremont’s Excalibur. I will confess that I am woefully poorly versed in the history of The Fantastic Four, arguably Marvel’s “first family.” The issues collected here, for example, are my first sampling of Steve Englehart’s tenure on The Fantastic Four.

A good old fashioned death trap!

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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: Act of Vengeance, Ann Nocenti, Avenger, chris claremont, Englehart, inferno, kang, kang the conqueror, Keith Pollard, Madelyne Pryor, marvel, Marvel Comic, silver surfer, Steve Englehart, uncanny x-men, walt simonson, x-men | 1 Comment »

Alfred Hitchcock Presents: Revenge (Review)

Posted on May 13, 2012 by Darren

Good evening. I’m Alfred Hitchcock, and tonight I’m presenting the first in a series of stories of suspense and mystery called – oddly enough – Alfred Hitchcock Presents. I shall not act in these stories, but will only make appearances, something in the nature of an accessory before and after the fact: to give the title to those of you who can’t read, and to tidy up afterwords for those who don’t understand the ending.

– Hitchcock lays down the rules

It’s interesting to look back at Hitchcock as a director who had an exceptional gift for working with material that might be derided as “trashy.” Certainly, if one divorces the subject matter from the director himself, a significant amount of his work can be seen as somewhat exploitative, inside genres that are traditionally dismissed by those more serious and elitist film commentators. (Indeed, one could argue that Psycho laid the foundation for the much-maligned “slasher” genre.) I’ve actually found this a significant appeal in examining Hitchcock’s work. Like many of the very best directors ever to work in film, he has a knack for elevating his subject matter beyond the expectations of the genre. I think that his anthology television show, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, is especially fascinating, because it illustrated the director taking an entire medium far more serious than many of his contemporaries.

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: alfred hitchcock, alfredhitchcock, Anthony Hopkin, anthony hopkins, art, Blogathon, dustin hoffman, helen mirren, hitchcock, Love of Film, martin scorsese, Movie, Psycho, Ralph Meeker, Vera Miles, White Shadow, Wrong Man | 7 Comments »

X-Men: Inferno – Avengers (Review/Retrospective)

Posted on May 12, 2012 by Darren

This weekend, we’re taking a look at one or two of the smaller Inferno crossovers. These issues are collected in the crossovers companion book.

In many ways, Chris Claremont’s Inferno can be read as something of a practice run for John Byrne’s Acts of Vengeance. Both were massive crossovers that spread across a significant portion of Marvel’s publishing line, demanding writers to tie their stories in to these big and over-arching events. While Inferno‘s reach was arguably more modest than that of Acts of Vengeance, it seemed that the demonic invasion of New York could not be contained to the X-Men books, and ended up impacting titles as diverse as The Fantastic Four and Daredevil. Walt Simonson’s Avengers tied into Inferno as well, making an interesting attempt to launch a new team against the backdrop of an X-Men event.

Meet the new team…

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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: Act of Vengeance, Avenger, captain america, chris claremont, Edwin Jarvis, Franklin Richards, Gilgamesh, inferno, List of vehicles in Marvel Comics, Madelyne Pryor, marvel, marvel comics, Simonson, walt simonson, x-men | Leave a comment »

X-Men: Inferno – Daredevil (Review/Retrospective)

Posted on May 12, 2012 by Darren

This weekend, we’re taking a look at one or two of the smaller Inferno crossovers. These issues are collected in the crossovers companion book.

From what little I’ve read of Ann Nocenti’s Daredevil, I really like it. My experience of her work on the title has been mainly limited to crossovers and tie-ins, but Nocenti has always managed to put her own spin on events – rather than feeling like a satellite title to Mutant Massacre or Fall of the Mutants, her connected issues felt like Daredevil stories staring at a world gone completely mad. It’s a subtle distinction, but one that too few authors remember in this era of event-driven comics. Inferno is no different, as Nocenti manages to take a massive and unfolding X-Men crossover and make it work for her own narrative and characters.

This city’s really going to hell…

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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: Ann Nocenti, Avenger, black widow, chris claremont, Comics, daredevil, frank miller, john romita, joss whedon, karen page, marvel universe, Matt, Miller, new york, Nocenti, uncanny x-men, x-men: inferno | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Critters 3

Posted on May 11, 2012 by Darren

I have a confession to make. I have never seen a Critters film before. They were always sitting there on the lower shelves of the horror section in the shop where I used to rent DVDs, but I just never picked one up. I can’t quite explain why – that sort of trashy horror-comedy would probably have seemed right up my street, but I guess I was probably more fascinated with the more iconic horror monsters and menaces. Anyway, my better half has always had a bit of affection for Leonardo DiCaprio, and when we discovered that his first big screen role was as a kid in Critters 3, I suggested that we could watch both watch it. And, I’m surprised to admit, it was nowhere near as bad as I thought it was going to be.

Laugh it up, fuzzball…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: art, arts, Comedy horror, Critters, critters 3, DiCaprio, DVD, entertainment, film, Frances Bay, george lucas, horror, jonah hill, Jordan Belfort, Leonardo diCaprio, martin scorsese, Movie, Movies, new york, nightmare on elm street, non-review review, review, Wolf of Wall Street | 2 Comments »

X-Men: Inferno (Review/Retrospective)

Posted on May 11, 2012 by Darren

I don’t like Inferno. There, I said it. There have been dry patches in Claremont’s Uncanny X-Men run before, and some would argue that his work following Inferno would be quite esoteric, but Inferno has always represented, to me at least, the creative low-point of Claremont’s Uncanny X-Men run. That doesn’t mean that I can’t appreciate it for what it is, or acknowledge the care with which the writer crafted it, but it is just too much of a big random mess to really enjoy it. It’s a disjointed crossover that resolves the long-running Madelyne Pryor mystery that Claremont had been weaving through the book, but also features demons and goblins for some reason. It’s just a great big mess.

There’s a Storm comin’…

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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: Act of Vengeance, chris claremont, Claremont, cyclops, dark phoenix saga, Empire State Building, games, inferno, Jean Grey, John Carter, Louise Simonson, Madelyne Pryor, Mister Sinister, Orphan Maker, Tina Turner, uncanny x-men, video games, wolverine, x-men, x-men: inferno | 5 Comments »

Jameson Cult Film Club: The Blues Brothers

Posted on May 11, 2012 by Darren

We’re on a mission from God.

– Elwood Blues

If ever a movie lent itself to the Jameson Cult Film Club experience, I think that The Blues Brothers is it. Hosted by the Jameson Cult Film Club as a way of celebrating cinema, the events see the team trying to bring the movies to life, offering a rather immersive experience. It’s a wonderful way to honour classic films, and I think that The Blues Brothers really embodies the best type of film for that sort of adaptation. After all, it is a movie so famed for its cult status and audience participation that John Landis and Dan Ackroyd actively recruited fans from screenings to appear in Blues Brothers 2000. Second to The Rocky Horror Picture Show, The Blues Brothers is a movie were the energy and exuberance really can’t be confined to the screen, and I think that’s why the team were able to do such a wonderful job with it.