Van Johnson in Action Of The Tiger is available on Blu-ray From Warner Archive. Ordering information can be found Here
Van Johnson is Carson, a mercenary sea captain willing to do anything if the price is right, in this Cold War adventure set amidst the wilds of Greece and Albania. French bombshell Martine Carol makes her English-language feature-film debut as Tracy, the wealthy Frenchwoman able to pay Carson’s price and induce him to undertake a daring rescue mission inside Communist Albania. But their troubles are just beginning when they cross the border, and the mission grows larger and more complicated when their group is taken captive by guerrillas, led by the rogue Trifon (a scene-stealing Herbert Lom). Playing a loutish, drunken first mate is a young Sean Connery, working with action director Terence Young for the first time. Five years later, Connery and Young would make film history with the franchise-defining Dr.
Van Johnson is Carson, a mercenary sea captain willing to do anything if the price is right, in this Cold War adventure set amidst the wilds of Greece and Albania. French bombshell Martine Carol makes her English-language feature-film debut as Tracy, the wealthy Frenchwoman able to pay Carson’s price and induce him to undertake a daring rescue mission inside Communist Albania. But their troubles are just beginning when they cross the border, and the mission grows larger and more complicated when their group is taken captive by guerrillas, led by the rogue Trifon (a scene-stealing Herbert Lom). Playing a loutish, drunken first mate is a young Sean Connery, working with action director Terence Young for the first time. Five years later, Connery and Young would make film history with the franchise-defining Dr.
- 4/19/2020
- by Tom Stockman
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Van Johnson steps into adventure-guy shoes more suitable for Humphrey Bogart in this European-shot thriller. Daring Martine Carol provides the sex appeal as the mystery dame who entices Johnson to smuggle a man out of Red Albania. The movie is practically a proto- James Bond film: it’s directed by Terence Young, includes Sean Connery and Anthony Dawson in the cast list, and features a fight in a gypsy camp. But Herbert Lom steals the show from them all as a monocle-wearing, oversexed gypsy bandit who can’t abide Commies. Oh, and the disc has special treat in store for discerning, high-toned art-movie intellectuals: this is the film’s hotter Continental version.
Action of the Tiger
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1957 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 93 min. / Street Date April 14, 2020 / available through the WBshop / 21.99
Starring: Van Johnson, Martine Carol, Herbert Lom, Gustavo Rojo, José Nieto, Helen Haye, Anna Gerber, Anthony Dawson, Sean Connery,...
Action of the Tiger
Blu-ray
Warner Archive Collection
1957 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 93 min. / Street Date April 14, 2020 / available through the WBshop / 21.99
Starring: Van Johnson, Martine Carol, Herbert Lom, Gustavo Rojo, José Nieto, Helen Haye, Anna Gerber, Anthony Dawson, Sean Connery,...
- 4/4/2020
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Jean-Luc Godard, the subject of a film showcase at this year’s Lumière Film Festival in Lyon that includes his latest film, “The Image Work,” remains a hot commodity for Paris-based sales group Wide.
The company, which is attending the fest’s International Classic Film Market with a strong heritage film lineup, recently signed a number of new deals for Godard’s 1962 drama “Vivre sa vie” in major markets in Asia. Wide sold the newly restored 4K version of “Vivre sa vie,” which stars Anna Karina, to Japan’s Zazie Film and Alto Media in South Korea as well as to the China Film Archive.
“We see that the Asian market is really looking into the classics,” said Maxime Montagne, Wide’s head of business affairs and acquisitions, noting that China in particular is looking to put together a catalog of important classics.
The China Film Archive also picked up...
The company, which is attending the fest’s International Classic Film Market with a strong heritage film lineup, recently signed a number of new deals for Godard’s 1962 drama “Vivre sa vie” in major markets in Asia. Wide sold the newly restored 4K version of “Vivre sa vie,” which stars Anna Karina, to Japan’s Zazie Film and Alto Media in South Korea as well as to the China Film Archive.
“We see that the Asian market is really looking into the classics,” said Maxime Montagne, Wide’s head of business affairs and acquisitions, noting that China in particular is looking to put together a catalog of important classics.
The China Film Archive also picked up...
- 10/20/2018
- by Ed Meza
- Variety Film + TV
The Barefoot Contessa
Blu-ray
Twilight Time
1954 / Color / 1:78 widescreen / 130 min. / Street Date December 13, 2016 / Available from the Twilight Time Movies Store 29.95
Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Ava Gardner, Edmond O’Brien, Marius Goring, Rossano Brazzi, Valentina Cortese, Elizabeth Sellars, Warren Stevens, Enzo Staiola, Mari Aldon, Bessie Love.
Cinematography: Jack Cardiff
Original Music: Mario Nascimbene
Written, Produced and Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz
As a teenager, many of my first and strongest movie impressions came not from the movies, but from certain critics. I memorized Robin Wood’s analysis before getting a look at Hitchcock’s Psycho. Raymond Durgnat introduced me to Georges Franju and Luis Buñuel, and I first learned to appreciate a number of great movies including The Barefoot Contessa from Richard Corliss, a terrific critic who championed writers over director-auteurs.
The Barefoot Contessa is a classically structured story, in that it could work as a novel; it’s told from several points of view.
Blu-ray
Twilight Time
1954 / Color / 1:78 widescreen / 130 min. / Street Date December 13, 2016 / Available from the Twilight Time Movies Store 29.95
Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Ava Gardner, Edmond O’Brien, Marius Goring, Rossano Brazzi, Valentina Cortese, Elizabeth Sellars, Warren Stevens, Enzo Staiola, Mari Aldon, Bessie Love.
Cinematography: Jack Cardiff
Original Music: Mario Nascimbene
Written, Produced and Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz
As a teenager, many of my first and strongest movie impressions came not from the movies, but from certain critics. I memorized Robin Wood’s analysis before getting a look at Hitchcock’s Psycho. Raymond Durgnat introduced me to Georges Franju and Luis Buñuel, and I first learned to appreciate a number of great movies including The Barefoot Contessa from Richard Corliss, a terrific critic who championed writers over director-auteurs.
The Barefoot Contessa is a classically structured story, in that it could work as a novel; it’s told from several points of view.
- 1/6/2017
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
The great film historian Kevin Brownlow, who has devoted large sections of his life to restoring Abel Gance's 1927 epic Napoleon, takes a dim view of this one. And indeed Austerlitz, a.k.a. The Battle of Austerlitz, has several strikes against it, belongs to several categories of film maudit all at once. It's a late film by a seventy-one-year-old director whose best work, by universal consensus, was in the silent era; it's a kind of belated sequel, the further adventures of Napoleon Bonaparte; it's a Salkind production.Incidentally, viewing the lavish sets for this movie, we can see how the Salkinds, those roving multinational mountebanks, ran up the unpaid studio bills in Yugoslavia which kept Orson Welles from building the elaborate vanishing sets he had planned for The Trial (starting realistic, it would have ended up playing in a featureless void), necessitating the repurposing of a disused Parisian railway station.
- 12/1/2016
- MUBI
William Cameron Menzies. William Cameron Menzies movies on TCM: Murderous Joan Fontaine, deadly Nazi Communists Best known as an art director/production designer, William Cameron Menzies was a jack-of-all-trades. It seems like the only things Menzies didn't do was act and tap dance in front of the camera. He designed and/or wrote, directed, produced, etc., dozens of films – titles ranged from The Thief of Bagdad to Invaders from Mars – from the late 1910s all the way to the mid-1950s. Among Menzies' most notable efforts as an art director/production designer are: Ernst Lubitsch's first Hollywood movie, the Mary Pickford star vehicle Rosita (1923). Herbert Brenon's British-set father-son drama Sorrell and Son (1927). David O. Selznick's mammoth production of Gone with the Wind, which earned Menzies an Honorary Oscar. The Sam Wood movies Our Town (1940), Kings Row (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). H.C. Potter's Mr. Lucky...
- 1/28/2016
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Michel Galabru (right) and Louis de Funès in 'Le gendarme et les gendarmettes.' 'La Cage aux Folles' actor Michel Galabru dead at 93 Michel Galabru, best known internationally for his role as a rabidly reactionary politician in the comedy hit La Cage aux Folles, died in his sleep today, Jan. 4, '16, in Paris. The Moroccan-born Galabru (Oct. 27, 1922, in Safi) was 93. Throughout his nearly seven-decade career, Galabru was seen in more than 200 films – or, in his own words, “182 days,” as he was frequently cast in minor roles that required only a couple of days of work. He also appeared on stage, training at the Comédie Française and studying under film and stage veteran Louis Jouvet (Bizarre Bizarre, Quai des Orfèvres), and was featured in more than 70 television productions. Michel Galabru movies Michel Galabru's film debut took place in Maurice de Canonge's La bataille du feu (“The Battle of Fire,...
- 1/5/2016
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Glenda Jackson: Actress and former Labour MP. Two-time Oscar winner and former Labour MP Glenda Jackson returns to acting Two-time Best Actress Academy Award winner Glenda Jackson set aside her acting career after becoming a Labour Party MP in 1992. Four years ago, Jackson, who represented the Greater London constituency of Hampstead and Highgate, announced that she would stand down the 2015 general election – which, somewhat controversially, was won by right-wing prime minister David Cameron's Conservative party.[1] The silver lining: following a two-decade-plus break, Glenda Jackson is returning to acting. Now, Jackson isn't – for the time being – returning to acting in front of the camera. The 79-year-old is to be featured in the Radio 4 series Emile Zola: Blood, Sex and Money, described on their website as a “mash-up” adaptation of 20 Emile Zola novels collectively known as "Les Rougon-Macquart."[2] Part 1 of the three-part Radio 4 series will be broadcast daily during an...
- 7/2/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Honorary Award: Gloria Swanson, Rita Hayworth among dozens of women bypassed by the Academy (photo: Honorary Award non-winner Gloria Swanson in 'Sunset Blvd.') (See previous post: "Honorary Oscars: Doris Day, Danielle Darrieux Snubbed.") Part three of this four-part article about the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Honorary Award bypassing women basically consists of a long, long — and for the most part quite prestigious — list of deceased women who, some way or other, left their mark on the film world. Some of the names found below are still well known; others were huge in their day, but are now all but forgotten. Yet, just because most people (and the media) suffer from long-term — and even medium-term — memory loss, that doesn't mean these women were any less deserving of an Honorary Oscar. So, among the distinguished female film professionals in Hollywood and elsewhere who have passed away without...
- 9/4/2014
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
German filmmaker Max Ophüls directed such acclaimed titles as The Earrings of Madame de... and La Ronde, but his last film, Lola Montès, stands out from the rest. For one, it's the only Technicolor movie he made, with vibrant colors popping on the screen. Secondly, the flashback technique he chose to use in this film irked his production company so that they altered the cut shown to audiences in 1956. In recent years, a cut much closer to Ophüls' original vision has been restored and released to the public. Finally, Lola Montes has all the best qualities of an Ophüls film -- in CinemaScope.
This fictionalization of the life of historic figure Montes, an Irish dancer/courtesan who enchanted such men as Franz Liszt and King Ludwig I, has a ringmaster (Peter Ustinov, speaking French!) as a sort of narrator, with Ms. Montes (Martine Carol) walking a tightrope and performing death-defying...
This fictionalization of the life of historic figure Montes, an Irish dancer/courtesan who enchanted such men as Franz Liszt and King Ludwig I, has a ringmaster (Peter Ustinov, speaking French!) as a sort of narrator, with Ms. Montes (Martine Carol) walking a tightrope and performing death-defying...
- 6/26/2013
- by Elizabeth Stoddard
- Slackerwood
As Divas no Brasil / Divas in Brazil In As Divas no Brasil / Divas in Brazil, Brazilian author Evânio Alves narrates numerous little-known stories — some tragic, some humorous, some downright bizarre — about international film, music, stage, and even opera and ballet (female) stars during their visit to the South American nation. According to Alves, the reasons for the divas' visits to Brazil have been varied. For instance, Madonna's reasons for dropping by have been professional (record-breaking shows a few years ago), personal (she was dating Brazilian model Jesus Luz), and socially conscious (as a representative of the Ngo "Success for Kids"). Eleonora Duse and Vivien Leigh performed The Lady of the Camellias on the Rio de Janeiro stage; the former in the mid-1880s, the latter in the early 1960s. Margot Fonteyn danced at Rio's Teatro Municipal, while Marlene Dietrich performed a cabaret act that, as attested by images found in Divas in Brazil,...
- 3/30/2012
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Anna Magnani in (what looks like) Luchino Visconti's Bellissima At the end of Giuseppe Tornatore's Best Foreign Language Film Oscar winner Cinema Paradiso, small-town projectionist Philippe Noiret has died and the Nuovo Cinema Paradiso has become a pile of rubble. The bratty Italian boy Salvatore Cascio has grown into the classy Frenchman Jacques Perrin (like Noiret, dubbed in Italian), a filmmaker who sits to watch a mysterious reel of film the deceased projectionist had left him. It turns out the reel contains clips from films censored by the prudish local parish priest, whose family values found kisses, embraces, and bare breasts and legs a danger to society. Now, who's doing all that kissing, embracing, and breast/leg-displaying in that film reel? (Please scroll down for the Cinema Paradiso clip.) Here are the ones I recognize: Silvana Mangano and Vittorio Gassman in Giuseppe De Santis' Bitter Rice (1949); Mangano...
- 2/14/2012
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Paulette Dubost, known as the "Dean of French Cinema," and an actress in films directed by Jean Renoir, Marcel L'Herbier, Jacques Tourneur, Julien Duvivier, Max Ophüls, Preston Sturges, François Truffaut, Louis Malle, and Marcel Carné, died of "natural causes" on Sept. 21 in the Parisian suburb of Longjumeau. The Paris-born Dubost had turned 100 years old on October 8, 2010. Dubost's show business career began at the age of seven, performing various duties at the Paris Opera. Following some stage training, her film debut took place in 1931 in Wilhelm Thiele's Le bal, which also marked the film debut of Danielle Darrieux (who's still around and still active). Ultimately, Dubost's film career was to span more than seven decades, during which time she was featured in over 140 movies. She is probably best remembered as the adulterous chambermaid Lisette in Jean Renoir's 1939 comedy-drama La règle du jeu / The Rules of the Game, considered by...
- 9/25/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Well folks, it’s been a while, but Netflix has finally added several more Criterion Collection films to their Watch Instantly streaming options. Back in December we saw a rather large group of films added, with each following month adding fewer and fewer Criterion films. This past week has seen the addition of 8 films (one on April 1st, and 7 on the 3rd), all of which you should add to your Queue.
We recently reported that Jean Luc Godard’s Breathless would be re-released in theaters with a new transfer this month as part of the TCM Classic Film Festival, with a general release at the end of May in New York, and a national roll out afterwards. You can now see the film that made our writer James McCormick’s Top Ten Jean Paul Belmondo Film list, via Watch Instantly. It will be interesting to see if this print of...
We recently reported that Jean Luc Godard’s Breathless would be re-released in theaters with a new transfer this month as part of the TCM Classic Film Festival, with a general release at the end of May in New York, and a national roll out afterwards. You can now see the film that made our writer James McCormick’s Top Ten Jean Paul Belmondo Film list, via Watch Instantly. It will be interesting to see if this print of...
- 4/3/2010
- by Ryan Gallagher
- CriterionCast
Over the weekend My Lovely Wife and I attended a delightful barbecue in scenic Prospect Heights, Brooklyn. The hosts and most of the guests were all normal people—that is, not critics. Save for one, an uncle of one of the hosts, a fairly well-known and well-regarded (mostly) literary critic with whom I'm on pretty friendly terms. Truth to tell, C., as I'll call him, still kind of intimidates me a bit. Thus, I sat on my cute little pet theory that Edmund White's City Boy and Patti Smith's Just Kids are such apt companion pieces that they may well be two sides of the same coin, on discovering that while C. adored Patti's book just as I did, he positively loathed White's memoir. Things got a little touchier when film entered the conversation. Turns out C. hates Preminger—except he only knows the post-Advise and Consent '60s stuff.
- 3/23/2010
- MUBI
Chicago – When Max Ophuls’s “Lola Montes” was released in theaters in France in December of 1955, it caused an international scandal. Much to the dismay of its director, the producers of the film mangled it, pulling and going to town in the editing bay like a bull in a china shop. They cut out some scenes, translated German dialogue into French, remixed the sound, and even re-edited the film’s chronology.
Blu-Ray Rating: 4.0/5.0
It wasn’t until over a decade later when another producer bought the rights to “Lola Montes” and reverted the film as close to its original form as possible. Now, forty years later, a version faithful to what Ophuls intended with his final film has hit Blu-ray from the esteemed Criterion Collection. With a gorgeous transfer - the first time the film has been seen in color - and spectacular special features, it’s a must-own for Francophiles.
Blu-Ray Rating: 4.0/5.0
It wasn’t until over a decade later when another producer bought the rights to “Lola Montes” and reverted the film as close to its original form as possible. Now, forty years later, a version faithful to what Ophuls intended with his final film has hit Blu-ray from the esteemed Criterion Collection. With a gorgeous transfer - the first time the film has been seen in color - and spectacular special features, it’s a must-own for Francophiles.
- 2/25/2010
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
Two years after completing his final film, 1955’s Lola Montès, Max Ophüls died not knowing whether it would ever be seen in the form he intended. Based on the true story of a notorious 19th-century sex symbol, Lola Montès takes place mainly in a circus, where Lola (played by Martine Carol) is the featured attraction, and where The Ringmaster (played by Peter Ustinov) tells her life story to the paying throng, while high-wire tricks and clown acts whirl in the background and serve as illustration. As The Ringmaster talks, Lola disappears into her own memories of ...
- 2/17/2010
- avclub.com
With President’s Day weekend behind us it’s now time to think about some late Valentine’s Day presents. In case you want to pick up something extra for your valentine or you completely forgot to get something at all, a great movie on Blu-ray or DVD makes a perfect gift. Fortunately, there’s some new ones coming out this week just in time.
Among this week’s selection we’re interested in are new to Blu-ray movies such as Law Abiding Citizen, Halo Legends, the Dirty Harry Collection, Contempt, Akira Kurosawa’s Ran and debut of TV series Barnaby Jones and the latest installment of Cannon. Also, Martin Scorsese’s Goodfellas (pictured above with Joe Pesci, Ray Liotta and Robert De Niro) gets the 20th Anniversary treatment with a new Blu-ray release.
Movies
Black Dynamite ~ Michael Jai White (Blu-ray and DVD)
Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever ~ Michael Bowen,...
Among this week’s selection we’re interested in are new to Blu-ray movies such as Law Abiding Citizen, Halo Legends, the Dirty Harry Collection, Contempt, Akira Kurosawa’s Ran and debut of TV series Barnaby Jones and the latest installment of Cannon. Also, Martin Scorsese’s Goodfellas (pictured above with Joe Pesci, Ray Liotta and Robert De Niro) gets the 20th Anniversary treatment with a new Blu-ray release.
Movies
Black Dynamite ~ Michael Jai White (Blu-ray and DVD)
Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever ~ Michael Bowen,...
- 2/17/2010
- by Joe Gillis
- The Flickcast
Lola Montès (1955) is "Max Ophüls's final masterpiece," declares Josef Braun, "mangled upon its initial release, newly restored in all its unspeakable gorgeousness, and now available from the Criterion Collection.... The project was originally meant to be more modest, but as the producers insisted on hoisting such intrusions as Technicolor, Cinemascope and sex goddess Martine Carol upon Ophüls — who utilized each of these items masterfully — Lola Montès increasingly became a kind of critique of itself. As Marcel Ophüls, the director's son, said, the more they tried to turn the project into a grandiose commercial spectacle, the more Lola Montès became a movie about grandiose commercial spectacle."...
- 2/16/2010
- MUBI
Release Date: Feb. 16 Director: Max Ophuls Writers: MaxOphuls, Cécil Saint-Laurent, Annette Wademant Cinematographers: Christian Matras Starring: Martine Carol, Peter Ustinov Studio/Run Time: Criterion, 115 mins. Way back in the early 2000s, the films of German-born, Paris-based director Max Ophuls languished out of print. While the French nouvelle vague and its insouciant modernity, guns, dames and jittery jump cuts remained much feted, discussed and repackaged, Ophuls and his fin de siècle Europe, aristocratic mores, women on the verge of nervous breakdowns and loooooong tracking shots fell out of sight. He might’ve remained in darkness were it not for the...
- 2/16/2010
- Pastemagazine.com
My experience with Lola Montes director Max Ophuls was zero prior to my first screening of Criterion's new Blu-ray edition of his final directorial feature. As a result, while watching the special features and listening to the fascinating audio commentary included, I realized the work of Ophuls cannot be judged by watching one film. It's also my impression he's a director whose signature will be found on most all of his films, leading me to believe the more of his films I see, the more I will appreciate what I am watching. While I enjoyed Lola Montes, and noticed plenty of directorial control as well as an obvious auteur style, I still felt I was missing something.
In September of 2008, Criterion released The Earrings of Madame de..., La ronde and Le plaisir on DVD, three of Ophuls most recognized films with The Earrings of Madame de... probably being his most loved.
In September of 2008, Criterion released The Earrings of Madame de..., La ronde and Le plaisir on DVD, three of Ophuls most recognized films with The Earrings of Madame de... probably being his most loved.
- 2/16/2010
- by Brad Brevet
- Rope of Silicon
DVD Playhouse—February 2010
By
Allen Gardner
Hunger (Criterion) Harrowing true story of imprisoned Ira member Bobby Sands (Michael Fassbender) and his 1981 hunger strike protesting the British government’s refusal to recognize him, and other Ira members as political prisoners. Director Steve McQueen delivers the story with true filmmaking panache, mixing startling imagery that blends both stunning beauty and stomach-churning horror. Fassbender is absolutely brilliant in the lead. Not for the faint-of-heart, but not to be missed or, particularly, ignored. Also available on Blu-ray disc. Bonuses: Interviews with McQueen and Fassbender; Short documentary; 1981 episode of BBC series “Panorama” that covers the Ira hunger strike; Trailer. Widescreen. DTS-hd audio on Blu-ray.
Adam (20th Century Fox) Quirky romantic comedy about an eccentric, borderline Asperger’s Syndrome, astronomy buff (Hugh Dancy) who is drawn out of his self-imposed shell by a beautiful and sympathetic neighbor (Rose Byrne). Charming film with engaging performances by the two leads,...
By
Allen Gardner
Hunger (Criterion) Harrowing true story of imprisoned Ira member Bobby Sands (Michael Fassbender) and his 1981 hunger strike protesting the British government’s refusal to recognize him, and other Ira members as political prisoners. Director Steve McQueen delivers the story with true filmmaking panache, mixing startling imagery that blends both stunning beauty and stomach-churning horror. Fassbender is absolutely brilliant in the lead. Not for the faint-of-heart, but not to be missed or, particularly, ignored. Also available on Blu-ray disc. Bonuses: Interviews with McQueen and Fassbender; Short documentary; 1981 episode of BBC series “Panorama” that covers the Ira hunger strike; Trailer. Widescreen. DTS-hd audio on Blu-ray.
Adam (20th Century Fox) Quirky romantic comedy about an eccentric, borderline Asperger’s Syndrome, astronomy buff (Hugh Dancy) who is drawn out of his self-imposed shell by a beautiful and sympathetic neighbor (Rose Byrne). Charming film with engaging performances by the two leads,...
- 2/15/2010
- by The Hollywood Interview.com
- The Hollywood Interview
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