The Pied Piper (1972)

Director: Jacques Demy

Writer: Robert Browning, Jacob Grimm, Wilhelm Grimm, Andrew Birkin, Jacques Demy, Mark Peploe

Composer: Donovan

Starring: Michael Hordern, David Leland, John Hurt, Diana Dors, Roy Kinnear, Donald Pleasence

More info:  IMDb

Tagline:  Come children of the universe, let Donovan take you away, far far away.

Plot:  In 1349, while the Black Plague threatens Germany, the town of Hamelin hires a wandering pied piper (Donovan) to lure rats away with his magic pipe, but then refuses to pay for his services, causing him to lure the town's children away.

My rating:   7/10

Will I watch it again?   No.

I really need to read Grimm's fairy tales because I LOVE dark tales involving bad things happening to children largely because, for as long as I can remember, that subject is a big taboo that Hollywood doesn't dare tread (you know, killing children and such).  As I watched this I started to remember bits and pieces of the story from when I read it as a kid forty or so years ago.  This flick looks great and it's well-acted.  For a non-actor, pop music sensation Donovan does pretty well.  Naturally, this being the early 70s and written and performed by Donovan, the songs are all of their time and not sounding hundreds of years old, so hearing 70s folk tunes in a movie set in the mid-1300s is weird.  Michael Hordern kills it as local doctor/wizard-type.   I enjoy a good picture set in Europe way back when.  The Plague is near, people are on edge and bad people continue to do bad things.  I liked the last half hour the most, probably because that's when it's at its darkest.  I would've preferred a much darker ending but you can't have everything.   There are lots of known actors which are worth watching this for.  It's a good watch.

The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T. (1953)

Director:  Roy Rowland

Writers:  Dr. Seuss, Allan Scott

Composers:  Friedrich Hollaender, Heinz Roemheld, Hans J. Salter

Starring:  Peter Lind Hayes, Mary Healy, Hans Conried, Tommy Rettig, Jack Heasley, Robert Heasley, Noel Cravat

More info:  IMDb

Tagline:  Bringing a new dimension of screen entertainment! The first musical Wonderama!

Plot:  A young boy travels to an imaginary world where, assisted by his family's plumber, he must save other piano playing kids like himself from the dungeons of his dictatorial piano teacher who also mind-controls his mother.

My rating:  5.5/10

Will I watch it again?   No.

It looks like this is the only feature Dr. Seuss wrote and I can see why.  I read that after test screenings, lots of scenes and songs were scrapped and more were written and shot for the finished product.  I haven't a clue as to what was cut but if this is what they were happy with then what the hell did they want in the first place?  It doesn't take long at all after the opening credits before we're in Bart's vivid imagination, and there's no doubt from the look and feel of the picture that this is from the fertile, creative mind of Dr. Seuss.  I'm guessing the target audience would've been children 8 and under, something the family could go to without the fear of seeing boobs or something scandalous.  The sets are colorful, minimal and strange.  The songs, and there are a lot of songs, aren't memorable enough to walk out of the theater humming.  I can't think of a single tune.  Maybe it's because there are so many.   I can't think of any way to make this better.  It feels low budget but it doesn't look it.  Those sets don't build themselves.  I was bored but the colorful visuals and constant sound kept me from nodding off. 

The Magic Serpent (1966)

Original title: Kairyu Daikessen

Director: Tetsuya Yamanouchi

Writers: Masaru Igami, Mokuami Kawatake

Composer: Toshiaki Tsushima

Starring: Kiroki Matsukata, Tomoko Ogawa, Ryutaro Otomo, Bin Amatsu, Nobuo Kaneko, Sen Hara, Kensaku Hara, Masataka Iwao, Seizo Fukumoto, Akira Shioji

More info: IMDb

Plot:  In ancient Japan, a good lord is killed and his throne is taken by the trecherous Yuki Daijo and his wizard friend Oroki-maru. The young prince Ikazuki-maru is rescued from the jaws of death by a magic bird sent by a wizard. Ten years later, Ikazuki-maru embarks on an adventure to avenge his parents and the wizard's death with his magic powers he learned from the wizard. He kills Yuki Daijo but then must battle Oroki-maru in a battle to the death.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

What sets this apart from the kaiju flicks of the day is the setting feudal Japan.  There's very little man-in-suit monster action and nearly all of it is saved for the last 15 minutes when two giant monsters fight to the death until a giant fucking spider shows up to finish the job!  There are some batshit crazy things going on in between the monster stuff that bookends the film.  There was a point where the weirdness started to get old.  It's worth a look but I can't see watching it again.  It's an interesting side not to the giant monster pictures of that era.

The People That Time Forgot (1977)

Director: Kevin Connor

Writers: Edgar Rice Burroughs, Patrick Tilley

Composer: John Scott

Starring: Patrick Wayne, Dough McClure, Sarah Douglas, Dana Gillespie, Thorley Walters, Shane Rimmer, Tony Britton, John Hallam, David Prowse

More info: IMDb

Tagline: The 7th continent - A lost world shut off by a wall of ice, roamed by beasts unknown to science, ruled by men lost to history, doomed to vanish in a chaos of leaping flames!

Plot: In 1919, a British expedition in the Antarctica region is searching for a lost American explorer and finds a hidden prehistoric world instead.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

I'm not buyin' this at all.  How the hell could time forget people like this?

It certainly wasn't called the THE CLEAVAGE THAT TIME FORGOT, that's for sure.  Almost a year ago today I watched THE LAND THAT TIME FORGOT (1975).  That was an OK picture.  I figured this one would be along the same lines of quality and it is.  It's more of the same with great looking exteriors, adequate acting and cheesy dinosaur effects.  They would've done themselves better had they stop motion dinosaurs instead of people in dino suits.  The action starts within minutes as our heroes fly to the land the time forgot and get attacked by a pterodactyl.  Then it's a hop, skip and a 30 minute jump to get to the evil skull lair where they find Bowen (McClure) who's been there since the last picture.  Fight some bad guys and escape before the island volcano destroys everything.  It's a very simple story but they managed to make a reasonably entertaining kiddie flick.  John Scott's theme is great.  It would've been nice to see what he could've done with it if they'd given him more money to hire a larger orchestra.  Patrick Wayne (John's son) does well in the lead and he'd go on to play a much bigger fantasy role that same year in SINBAD AND THE EYE OF THE TIGER.  At least that film had the budget it deserved.  I guess you could say that about this one, too.  Like LAND, the MGM print of this is anamorphic widescreen (looking goo, too) and the sole extra is the theatrical trailer (also anamorphic wide).

Dark Stories 2: Tales from Beneath (2002)

Directors: Jonathan Brough, Brad McGann, Stuart McKenzie, Neil Pardington, Christine Parker, Robert Sarkies

Writers: Jonathan Brough, Brad McGann, Stuart McKenzie, Neil Pardington, Christine Parker, Robert Sarkies

Composer: ???

Starring: ???

More info: IMDb

Plot: A collection of short films.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again?  No.


Good luck finding any information about this video more than what's listed above.  The DVD looks like a VHS transfer and the credits were so fuzzy I couldn't make out who was in the cast on some of these.  This is a collection of six short films by New Zealand filmmakers. In that way you could consider this an anthology but there isn't anything tying them together so you just watching the films with their credits rolling after each one.  Some are horror-ish while others have elements of fantasy, comedy, drama and so on.  It's worth watch because some of the stories have interesting ideas and are well executed.  But with the good you also get some that might not be to your liking.   Like a lot of anthologies, it's a mixed bag.  As I said, the picture quality was pretty bad.  These films look more like they were made a decade earlier so maybe they were just released in 2002?  I wouldn't mind seeing it again but only if a really nice copy showed up.  Otherwise, I'll just be movin' on.

Dr. Strange (1978)

Director: Philip DeGuere Jr.

Writer: Philip DeGuere Jr.

Composer: Paul Chihara

Starring: Peter Hooten, Clyde Kusatsu, Jessica Walter, Anne-Marie Martin, Philip Sterling, John Mills, June Barrett, Sarah Rush, Ted Cassidy

More info: IMDb

Tagline: In Every Age And Time, One Of Us Is Called To Join The Battle.

Plot: A psychiatrist becomes the new Sorcerer Supreme of the Earth in order to battle an evil Sorceress from the past.

My rating: 4/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

This TV movie feels like it was made with the potential of becoming a series.  As history points out...it didn't.  Thankfully.  It's dreadfully boring.  There's drama, hospital drama, fantasty-ish drama, romance drama and then finally in the final third the comic book business moves fast enough for Dr. Strange to become his supernatural namesake and then he battles Morgan LeFay (played by Jessica Walters whom I didn't recognize, shame on me for missing that).  That's the big fight at the end and it's over all too quickly.  The whole picture is a ticket to Yawnsville.  It's not even good as a TV movie.  Apparently it aired against ROOTS (1977) and the ratings weren't good.  I can't imagine the ratings would've been much better if it aired against commercials.  Ugh.

The Thief of Baghdad (1978)

Director: Clive Donner

Writers: Andrew Birkin, AJ Carothers

Composer: John Cameron

Starring: Roddy McDowall, Kabir Bedi, Frank Finlay, Marina Vlady, Pavla Ustinov, Daniel Emilfork, Ian Holm, Terence Stamp, Peter Ustinov, Marina Sirtis

More info: IMDb

Tagline: Ride the Magic Carpet into an Arabian Nights wonder-world, re-created in the splendor of magik-motion!

Plot: A resourceful thief helps a handsome Prince fight an evil wizard, and win the hand of a beautiful Princess.

My rating: 4/10

Will I watch it again? No.

This is oh so dreadfully boring.  The effects are what you'd expect for late 70s TV and they don't hold up.  It's not their fault, I know, but it's hard to watch.  The cast puts in a good effort but the pacing kills it.  It's an exercise in patience at an hour and forty-two minutes in length.  It feels more than twice that.  The film music nerd that I am, Cameron's score was hard on my ears.  The main theme is so generic that it sounds like it was written by a novice.  To make matters worse, it's repeated ad nauseam whenever there's a need for a heroic action cue.  I couldn't even recommend this to fans of McDowell and Ustinov (both of which I'm a big fan of and the only reason I watched this).  Oddly, co-writer Birkin went on to write some great stuff like THE NAME OF THE ROSE (1986), THE MESSENGER: THE STORY OF JOAN OF ARC (1999) and PERFUME: THE STORY OF A MURDERER (2006). 

First Knight (1995)

Director: Jerry Zucker

Writers: Lorne Cameron, David Hoselton, William Nicholson

Composer: Jerry Goldsmith

Starring: Sean Connery, Richard Gere, Julia Ormond, Ben Cross, Liam Cunningham, Christopher Villiers, Valentine Pelka, Colin McCormack, Ralph Ineson, John Gielgud

More info: IMDb

Tagline: Their greatest battle would be for her love.

Plot: Lancelot falls in love with Guinevere, who is due to be married to King Arthur. Meanwhile, a violent warlord tries to seize power from Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table.

My rating: 7/10

Will I watch it again?  Yes.

I put off watching this for more than twenty years because, despite my love for Sean Connery, I didn't like the casting of Gere as Lancelot.  That just rubbed me the wrong way.  I'd listened to Goldsmith's fine score a few times but I just couldn't do until now.  I can't believe I'm saying this but Gere does a fine job.  After a few minutes I adjusted to him, settled into the film and let it take me for a ride and one I enjoyed.  I don't think you could ask for a better King Arthur than Connery.  That man's the shit and he brings a lot of weight to the role.  I was afraid the romance angle would get too mushy but it didn't.  It felt just right but then it's also sprinkled in with enough adventure, action and intrigue that the balance feels right.  It's a good costume drama adventure that takes the viewer on a fun little adventure in a time that's long been romanticized.  I'm pleasantly surprised.

The Hunt for Gollum (2009)

Director: Chris Bouchard

Writer: Chris Bouchard

Composers: Adam Langston, Andrew Skrabutenas, Chris Bouchard

Starring: Adrian Webster, Arin Alldridge, Patrick O'Connor, Rita Ramnani, Gareth Brough, Jason Perino, Christopher Dingli, Matthew Cunningham, Max Bracey, Dan Styles

More info: IMDb

Tagline: Not all who wander are lost...

Plot: Strider must hunt down Gollum to keep the Ring secret.

My rating: 7/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

Technically, this is very impressive.  From the score to the acting, makeup effects, editing, fight choreography and so on.   Story-wise, it does what it set out to do.  I could be completely wrong about this but this seems to be at odds with the LOTR Jackson pictures.  I wasn't sure exactly when this fit in but then I'm not so deep into the books and whatnot that I can challenge superfans to a duel.  I've seen the movies many times but that doesn't qualify me for much of anything.  Anyway, this is a remarkably well made fan film that shouldn't be avoided by fans of the Jackson films. 

Captain Nemo and the Underwater City (1969)

Director: James Hill

Writers: Pip Baker, Jane Baker, R. Wright Campbell

Composer: Angela Morely

Starring: Robert Ryan, Chuck Connors, Nanette Newman, Luciana Paluzzi, John Turner, Bill Fraser, Kenneth Connor, Allan Cuthbertson, Christopher Hartstone

More info: IMDb

Tagline: Inspired by JULES VERNE

Plot: When Captain Nemo saves the passengers of a sinking ship and takes them to his Utopian underwater city he discovers that not all of his guests agree to remain there forever.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

These fantasical pictures always get my hopes up and I'm almost always disappointed.  Typically it's because the story drags in multiple spots and boredom sets in.  Other similarities include known movie stars in the cast, lavish and colorful sets and an egomaniacal villain.  Check, check and check.  The special effects are above par in NEMO.  This one has something the others don't...groovy outfits to sex up the ladies!

That wouldn't even get the fish wet, much less the gals.  Keep the threads but I do like how this film has more of a steampunk look than others of its kind.  Plus we spend most of the time in this fantastical underwater city.  I'm at a loss to suggest what could've been done to pep this thing up with some energy except have some outdoor scenes instead of the entire film existing on a set.  As lavish as it is, it gets stale after a while.  Like all of these pictures, I want to like them a lot more but they get slow and dull and with a subject as vibrant as this, it should've been more entertaining.

Ragewar (1984)

AKA: The Dungeonmaster

Directors: David Allen, Charles Band, John Carl Buechler, Steven Ford, Peter Manoogian, Ted Nicolaou, Rosemarie Turko

Writers: Charles Band, Allen Actor, Rosemarie Turko, John Carl Buechler, David Allen, Jeffrey Byron, Peter Manoogian, Ted Nicolaou

Composers: Richard Band, Shirley Walker

Starring: Jeffrey Byron, Richard Moll, Leslie Wing, Gina Calabrese

More info: IMDb

Tagline: He is the overlord of strange beasts and stolen souls ...

Plot: A demonic wizard challenges a modern-day computer programmer to a battle of technology vs. sorcery, with the programmer's girlfriend as the prize.

My rating: 5.5/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

It seemed like a good idea until I got a ways into it.  Seven challenges are directed by seven directors and they're presented as challenges to a man trapped in a computer fantasy world.  The low budget is stretched as far is it could be so I can't hold that against them.  It's a reasonable effort but it hovers in mediocrity.  Unless I blinked at the wrong moment, it's never explained how Paul and Gwen (Byron and Wing) are sucked from modern day into this bizarre fantasy world or how they got out.  Is it a dream?  Does Paul's computer take them ala TRON (1982)?  That's kind of important, even for a low budget picture.  I liked the stop motion rock creature in the first challenge but it doesn't last long like the rest of the stories.  It's only 74 minutes long to begin with.  The opening was nice and mysterious and it provides the only nudity in the film.  It's a shame this isn't better because with more care in the story, this could've been good enough to have cult status of a good kind and be one of those hidden gems that few people know about.  It's still an interesting film.  Oh, and listen for Shirley Walker's nice bits of score.

Tom Thumb and Little Red Riding Hood vs. the Monsters (1962)

Original title: Caperucita y Pulgarcito contra los Monstruos

AKA: Little Red Riding Hood and the Monsters

Director: Roberto Rodriguez

Writers: Fernando Morales Ortiz, Adolfo Torres Portillo

Composer: Raul Lavista

Starring: Maria Gracia, Cesareo Quezadas 'Pulgarcito', Jose Elias Moreno, Manuel 'Loco' Valdes, Santanon, Ofelia Guilmain, Armando Gutierrez, Miguel Inclan Hijo, Alfredo de Soto, Elvira Lodi

More info: IMDb

Tagline: Now...the famous characters of the fairy tale world...together for the first time!

Plot: Caperucita, the Wolf and the Ogre are captured by the Witch Queen, accused of treason by the Vampire. Caperucita, followed by a host of old and new characters begin the adventure to rescue their friends.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

Way back when American producer K. Gordon Murray bought the U.S. for Mexican made kiddie films and had them dubbed in English, giving him the nickname of "King of the Kiddie Matinee".  This is the first one of these pictures I've seen and, as you probably would expect, it's hit and miss.  The miss is it's incredibly silly and obnoxious as it was made for, well, small children.  But the hits are worth watching this for.  The large lavish sets are fantastic.  The colors pop beautifully for this children's fairy tale.  It's like real life isn't that colorful but it's what you'd expect for a fantasy world such as this.  There's some real horror going on, too.  If this were remade today and it played to the horror element that exists in this 1962 version, you could really get some scary shit going on.  The dragon fight at the end gets a little hairy when the flames get way too close to the actors.  I wouldn't be surprised if someone got hurt.  The songs are fine.  The audio is bright and tinny so when the children are running around screaming in terror (normally that's music to my ears), it's so shrill it hurts.  It's only an hour and twenty two minutes long and I bet if you took out the boring bits you could whittle this down to a fun forty five minutes.  The whole thing is on YouTube below so watch away...

The Throne of Fire (1983)

Original title: Il Trono di Fuoco

Director: Franco Prosperi

Writers: Giuseppe Buricchi, Nino Marino

Composers: Carlo & Paolo Rustichelli

Starring: Sabrina Iani, Pietro Torrisi, Harrison Muller, Beni Cardoso, Pietro Ceccarelli, Dan Collins, Stefano Abbati, Roberto Lattanzio, Isarco Ravaioli, Amedeo Leonardi, Gianlorenzo Bernini

More info: IMDb

Tagline: A time of sword and sorcery...when evil forces ruled the land!

Plot: A mighty hero battles the son of Satan and his evil witch ally to save a kingdom from being taken over by the duo.

My rating: 5.5/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

It helps that the print I saw was anamorphic widescreen and it looked fantastic.  That helps.  Everything about it is OK.  It's probably slightly above average except for the score.  The synthesizer-emulating-an-orchestra score is at times dreadful.  Surely they could've done something else.  There's a theme or two that sometimes works but by and large there are too many moments of musical WTF.  The three leads are well cast.  They did a good job and I love the bad guy's outfit. 

It's the kind of picture where it looks like everyone is putting in a good effort despite the probable low budget and that goes a long ways.  I didn't see any incompetence on the screen.  I would've preferred some nudity, any nudity (naturally), and some blood, gore and some raw violence but this was most certainly made for the family crowd.  It's a shame they didn't make a harder version for the then-budding VHS rental market.  It's not a boring picture but it's not an exciting one, either.  It's a tame fantasy with clearly marked good looking heroes and villains.

Phoenix the Warrior (1988)

AKA: She Wolves of the Wasteland

Director: Robert Hayes

Writers: Robert Hayes, Dan Rotblatt

Composer: Dan Radlauer

Starring: Persis Khambatta, Kathleen Kinmont, Peggy McIntaggart, James Emery, Sheila Howard, Nina Jaffe, Courtney Caldwell, Skyler Corbett, Laurie de Nuccio

More info: IMDb

Tagline: Women Rule.

Plot: Big hair, big guns, big personalities, and a serious lack of wardrobe. She-Wolves of the Wasteland, a post-apocalyptic story that features women--lots and lots of women--who leave little to the imagination as they battle each other in various junkyards and gravel pits to determine the fate of the entire world.

My rating: 5/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

This is a pretty decent example of the direct to video flicks we used to rent in the 80s.  Get your friends together with some junk food and kill a Friday or Saturday night watching cheesy crap like this.  It's low budget and the acting is bad to mediocre, the villains over do it and you can clearly see where the influences come from.  There is some action but the slow spots drag the film down.  The one on one combat is clumsy and the picture would've benefited from having the film sped up a little during these scenes and having some good foley for the punches landing would've done wonders to give these scenes more impact and fun.  Still, you get this around the 15 minute mark:

Don't get too excited because that's it for nudity.  You think they would've scattered more in throughout the movie but nooooooo.  It's OK but movies like this suffer most from pacing.  While there is enough going on to somewhat maintain 85 minutes, some tightening of some scenes and possible excising of others could make this more fun and easier to watch.  When you're gorging yourself on chips and soda it's 2 am, it's easy to fall asleep on pictures like this one.

A Thief in the Night (1972)

Director: Donald W. Thompson

Writers: Donald W. Thompson, Russell S. Doughten Jr.

Composer: ??? Stock music?

Starring: Patty Dunning, Mike Niday, Colleen Niday, Maryann Rachford, THom Rachford, Duane Coller, Russell S. Doughten Jr., Clarence Balmer, Betty D. Jackson, Gareld L. Jackson, Jared McAdams

More info: IMDb

Tagline: ...and there will be no place to hide.

Plot: The story of Patty, a young woman caught up in living for the present with little concern for the future. She meets and marries a young man and her life seems great, until one moment she awakens to find her husband gone and the radio reporting millions of people have mysteriously disappeared. As dramatic, earth shaking events begin to unfold around her, Patty realizes she is living in the end times spoken of in biblical prophecy.

My rating:  5/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

Ya know what this movie could've used a lot more of?  Titties.  There's not even one.  I thought for a moment that maybe the thief in the night took all of them but then I remembered that the movie wouldn't have them because it's a Christian propaganda picture.  Too bad Russ Meyer didn't make this; it would've been a lot more fun and it would probably convert a lot more people the Church of Boobs.  I'd get out of bed on a Sunday morning for a sermon at that church.  This is the LEFT BEHIND before LEFT BEHIND was a thing.  Like a lot of propaganda, it's heavily naive, optimistic in all the right places and pessimistic in all the right places.  Being how I don't believe in any of this nonsense, I'm rootin' for the cool kids who want to have fun.  Probably because this is a combination of low budget religious propaganda from the early 70s, the dialogue is often cornball as shit.  This might just be something you could have a good time with if you watched it with some non-believers (or, shit, believe away but make sure you're all...) drinking, laughing and talking to the screen.  That might be a good time.  Me?  I had this running on my monitor while I did office stuff.  Even then I found it often slow, boring and preachy.  This is the first of a dozen religious scare propaganda movies that Thompson wrote and directed.  I was hoping this would be more campy and outrageously silly and stupid but there's too much padding to maintain an hour's worth of cheesy entertainment.  When it comes to technical aspects, the sound library score is goofy and appropriate, the camera moves enough to keep the picture from feeling static (and the editing helps in this area as well) and the acting isn't all that bad at times and every once in a while I laughed, intentionally or not.  Still, no bare boobs.  This picture needed some sex.  It'd be a fun project to take something like this and delete some stuff and smut it up.  My time is short on this planet and there won't be some great editing booth in the sky waiting for me when I leave so I'll just imagine what it would be like and move on.

Flesh and Fantasy (1943)

Director: Julien Duvivier

Writers: Ellis St. Joseph, Oscar Wilde, Laszlo Vadnay, Ernest Pascal, Samuel Hoffenstein, Ellis St. Joseph

Composer: Alexander Tansman

Starring: Edward G. Robinson, Charles Boyer, Barbara Stanwyck, Betty Field, Robert Cummings, Thomas Mitchell, Charles Winniger, Anna Lee, Dame May Whitty, C. Aubrey Smith, Robert Benchley, Edgar Barrier, David Hoffman

More info: IMDb

Tagline: The motion picture above all!

Plot: Two men discuss the occult, introducing three weird tales: 1) Plain, bitter Henrietta secretly loves law student Michael. Then on Mardi Gras night, a mysterious stranger gives her a mask of beauty that she must return at midnight. 2) At a party, palmist Podgers makes uncannily accurate predictions, later telling skeptic Marshal Tyler that he will murder someone. The notion obsesses Tyler, with ironic consequences. 3) High wire artist Gaspar dreams of falling, then loses his nerve. He recognizes Joan from his dreams, and falls for her. Will any of his dreams, involving Joan and disaster, come true?

My rating: 8/10

Will I watch it again?  Yes.

Astounding.  This is what you get when Universal releases a picture that's produced and made by Europeans.  It's a star-studded Hollywood cast but in a much more sensitive, stylish and dark picture than what American audiences were getting.  This is very much akin to THE TWILIGHT ZONE before that became a thing at the end of the 50s.  The first story about an unattractive woman wearing a Mardi Gras mask for the evening to find happiness is a dark romance.  It's beautifully filmed. The lighting and makeup on Henrietta (Field) is very well done.  When she gets close to finding what she wants there's a moment of sadness that had me welling up a little.  I was surprised at how much punch this little story has.  The second story is the best by far and it's very, very dark.  This is the horror story of the lot and it's a real peach.  Robinson kills in this role.  He's so friggin' good.  What he does after a palm reader tells him he's going to murder someone is amazing.  I didn't see where this was going but then I was along for the ride and what a journey this one is!  The special effects with Marshall (Robinson) talking to himself are outstanding.  It's most impressive and it adds another level of strange horror to the already grim story.  The ending is great and it takes us right into the final tale without the need for the two men telling stories that are the reason these stories are here. 

This one is probably the least fantastical and exciting.  I suspect it's the last story because it stars Boyer who also produced the picture.  It's still a good thriller with an unexpected ending which I liked.  The ONE thing that hurt this film was the score for the first segment and partway into the second one.  It's wildly upbeat and cheerful which completely goes against the events on the screen.  It's so bad that it feels like it was lifted from another movie by someone as a joke who wanted to ruin it.  Everything else about the visuals and story is dark and it required nothing more than simple music to help set the tone.  He finally got it right in the second and third stories but that first one is a real head scratcher for why he chose to go that fluffy.  This is a top notch fantasy/horror anthology with a great cast and it's one that shouldn't be missed.

Don Juan DeMarco (1994)

Director: Jeremy Leven

Writer: Jeremy Leven

Composers:  Michael Kamen, Robert John Lange

Starring: Marlon Brando, Johnny Depp, Faye Dunaway, Geraldine Paihas, Bob Dishy, Rachel Ticotin, Talisa Soto, Tommy 'Tiny' Lister, Selena

More info: IMDb

Tagline: The story of the man who thought he was the greatest lover in the world... and the people who tried to cure him of it!

Plot: A psychiatrist must cure a young patient that presents himself as Don Juan, the greatest lover in the world.

My rating: 8.5/10

Will I watch it again?  Yes, and again, and again, and again...

I adore this movie. It's funny, tender, romantic and special.  The three leads nailed it.  It's my favorite Depp performance and Brando and Dunaway make such an adorable couple.   It's a modern fairy tale of sorts and it really doesn't matter if Don DeMarco's (Depp) story is true or not or if he really believes it's real.  It's real enough and it inspires others which is OK by me.  The score is gorgeous.  I've probably listened to the soundtrack a few hundred times over the past twenty something years.  This is one of those pictures that gets me all choked up and stuff which means I've mostly ever seen it alone.  It's not that I'm ashamed, I'm not, but like HEAVEN CAN WAIT (1978), it's one of those movies I prefer to watch alone to allow myself as much uninterrupted immersion as possible.  The New Line DVD is a flipper disc with the fullscreen version on one side and the non-anamorphic widescreen version on the other.  Extras-wise you get the Bryan Adams music video, the theatrical and international trailers (both fullscreen) and the isolated music score. 

Sword of the Valiant: The Legend of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (1984)

Director: Stephen Weeks

Writers: Stephen Weeks, Howard C. Pen, Philip M. Breen

Composer: Ron Geesin

Starring: Miles O'Keeffe, Cyrielle Clair, Leigh Lawson, Sean Connery, Trevor Howard, Peter Cushing, Ronald Lacey, Lila Kedrova, John Rhys-Davies, Wilfrid Brambell, Bruce Lidington, Douglas Wilmer, Brian Coburn, David Rappaport, Emma Sutton, THomas Heathcote, John Serret, Mike Edmonds, Peter Firth

More info: IMDb

Tagline:  Men of iron...blades of steel

Plot: Gawain was a squire in King Arthur's court when the Green Knight burst in and offered to play a game with a brave knight. No knights stand to defend their king's honor. Except for the valiant Gawain. After being quickly knighted Gawain plays the game, but learns that it's all a trick, and he has lost. But the Green Knight shows mercy, letting Gawain grow a year older before having to face the consequences. Gawain journeys across the land, learning about life, saving damsels, and solving the Green Knight's riddle.

My rating:  6/10

Will I watch it again?  Probably not.

What a cast!  The first half hour is fast paced, exciting and fun.  Connery has one hell of an entrance.  The green glitter on his face and green hair was a bit much but who the hell cares, it's Sean Fucking Connery.   The picture stays fun for a little while after Gawain begins his quest but sadly there are a few too many slow, drab spots.  Connery pops in for a few seconds here and there which helps a lot.  There's a little bit of humor but not enough.  The special effects aren't too shabby.  I'm curious as to what the budget was.  It's a good looking picture with some nice locations, costumes and so on.  And that cast is fantastic!  The ONE big issue I have is the horrid synthesizer score.  It's really bad and hurts the picture.  If the filmmakers had sprung more on the score by getting a better composer and using an orchestra it would've helped this picture a lot.  A LOT.  The really low IMDb score is unjust.  It's not that bad of a film.  The actors are all bringing it.  Connery could've easily phoned it in but he didn't.  He's as robust as ever and plays the part with much vigor.  The same goes for many others.  John Rhys-Davies plays an over-bearing Baron and he relishes in the tyrannical role.  He's awesome!  It's too bad he's also barely in the film.  There are a lot of familiar faces here that you've seen before which adds to the fun when someone new hits the screen for the first time.