Reviews of Classic Film, with artwork and news
LAST UPDATE June 24, 2025
Fast Reviews:
The Cat Girl - 1957: A direct lift from Lewton's 1942 The Cat People, this film takes it for granted the psychological dilemmas involved with family legends of shape-changing, and speeds the star (Barbara Shelley) as Leonora Johnson, however reluctant she is about her 'curse,' on toward her destiny of becoming a "cat-woman." What the film lacks in subtlety and imagination it tries to make up for with a more crudely performed exploration of the theme of the earlier Lewton film, which is what its like being a cat-person. Developing the sense of both mental instability and a more obvious sense of threat with lethal cats on the loose, we have Shelley (whose work here is probably the single highest quality element to this production) in a straight-jacket, being shown in terror after commitment to a mental institution, and pulling out all the stops to convince us the pain and terror is real. This was something we didn't see Simone Simon have to face in the moodier 1942 film, but Shelley's anguish and fear over not just becoming a monster but, in effect, losing her identity and sense of self-control, is more palpable than anything Lewton intimated in his template movie.
The Cat Girl doesn't have many more ambitions than to retell Lewton's story and to let Shelley try to hold the center of our attention, and in the latter department does good work. The rest of the cast does its job but without a lot of opportunities to break out of the mold of melodrama, unfortunately. The cinematography and direction is perfectly fine and interesting at times, but hampered by a script that is either too chained to the basic outline of Lewton's original or not inspired enough to break free. Either way The Cat Girl's originality is in filling in the gaps of Lewton's story. Barbara Shelley is the highlight here and puts enough energy into some of the scenes to yank the film up to a higher level, briefly, making this viewer wonder what could've been.
Fast Reviews:
El Vampiro, 1957: If you watch this film and say to yourself "Hey, they must've watched the Christopher Lee Horror of Dracula before making this version" you'll need to switch the order around because El Vampiro was first, released October 4, 1957, predating the Hammer Dracula of June 16, 1958.
Featuring a different kind of dinner-jacketed vampire (Count Lavud here, played by German Robles) that had come before, el Vampiro has an aggressive, leaner and longer-fanged vampire on the hunt, not far from how Christopher Lee updated the character of the king vampire just a half year later from the more static, moody Bela Lugosi style.
Set in a large, rundown Mexican hacienda that is almost, but not entirely, abandoned, the recently arrived Count Lavud has big plans for Marta González (Ariadna Welter) who has come home because of the death of her Aunt Theresa. Marta is young and beautiful and so the Count immediately goes to work on mesmerizing her, making his way to her bedroom at night to effect his power of control over her.
But, we discover Aunt Theresa isn't actually dead. Carrying a large crucifix and a little wild-eyed, she's been running a one-woman counter-attack on Count Lavud from within hidden chambers and passageways in the huge house. Thought dead, her reappearance startles everyone, particularly Marta who has brought along the reluctant Dr. Enrique (Abel Salazar) who she met while in transit home. The doctor is a man of rational thought and science (and sardonic remarks), and the accumulating clues around him that something is deeply amiss and unnatural stirs not just his brain cells but his concern for Marta's safety as events quickly start "going sideways."
German Robles' vampire is tall and aristocratic and poses quite a bit under carefully lit spots around the darkened house, and usually he is the center of our attention. He's quite quick moving at times, something that for 1957 isn't the familiar slow-moving vampire with cape up around the eyes slowly advancing onto the prey, but here something animalistic and dangerous. The Christopher Lee version for Hammer of a year later builds upon this to make the famous vampire even more unpredictable and acting like an immediate threat to everyone on the screen.
Abel Salazar plays the Doctor who is part of the battle against the Count (Salazar is also the producer for el Vampiro). His character of the Doctor is a sometimes comic portrayal and his intentional humour leavens the film. Despite an obviously limited budget for the production, the movie has excellent photography and a beautifully well-done main set. The ruined hacienda where we see most of the film taking place is only partially occupied by humans, the rest of it falling apart and decorated with a lot of cob webs, many the same giant size as what saw in the Bela Lugosi version of 1931 (or, if you look further, the Spanish version, also from 1931).
Director Fernando Méndez tells the story efficiently, effectively, but without much camera ingenuity, and the stunt work is also rather limited, both things probably due to budget constraints. Still, the cast does fine work with what they've got and the concepts that are here are exploited with a bigger budget, the same cast (though expanded considerably) with a larger number of sets in the sequel from a year later El ataúd del vampiro (The Vampire's Coffin) which mostly improves upon the original film and gives us a script that has a lot more humour and some spectacular cinematography.
In a way, the straight-on horror of el Vampiro is like that of the original 1931 Frankenstein, and like the sequel to that film (Bride of Frankenstein, 1935) El ataúd del vampiro presents a more multi-sided story that gives us Abel Salazar again as the doctor, but instead of something like Dr. Van Helsing "a man who knows too much" as in the English language films, the tall and handsome Salazar's Dr. Enrique gives us a sometimes comic performance with some very funny lines.
In the 250 versions of Dracula that have put on film featuring the basic elements of Bram Stoker's original story, or just pure pastiche using the titular character, el Vampiro belongs in the higher rank of quality, despite the humble budget. In the recent Blu Ray edition from Indicator the movie looks exceptionally well preserved and converted for home video.
An original fine print of the original 1977 Star Wars screened at BFI Festival with Kathleeen Kennedy in attendance – Superherohype
The print’s discovery came as a surprise, and quickly led to a stir amongst fans online. George Lucas infamously did not like the very first print of Star Wars (which would later be renamed to Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope), and would tinker with it in the years after its release. Specifically, Lucas added the now infamous opening crawl, and changed the scene in the Mos Eisley cantina, making it so that bounty hunter Greedo shoots at Han Solo first, rather than vice versa...."
Sophia Loren's role in making Greece a place for Hollywood films
She praises the island of Hydra, location of her 1957 film Boy on A Dolphin. Story at Greek Reporter
How Athens keeps alive the tradition of hand-painted movie posters
Story at le Monde
Fast Review: The Adventures of Hajji Baba - 1954: A young John Derek plays the ambitious barber Hajji Baba in early 1800s Persia, full of grandiose plans for his future—much to the laughter of his customers. He makes a wager with the successful traveling merchant Osman Aga (Thomas Gomez) that he will achieve great things (by the end we will see Osman as rich, then destitute, then rich all over again). Soon, circumstances conspire to put the barber in a position where he must either live up to his bold promises—or, well, he's dead.
More on The Adventures of Hajji Baba – 1954
Why Gone with the Wind Is Probably the Highest-Earning Film Ever
And Why the Conditions of Its Success Have Locked It into an Unreachable Position
The Billion-Dollar Caveat: There is a certain school of thought that holds Gone with the Wind (1939) as the all-time earnings champion of the film medium. When adjusted for inflation, ticket prices, distribution reach, and continual re-release revenues, the film retains an accumulated box office total that remains virtually unreachable.
More about Why Gone with the Wind Is Probably the Highest-Earning Film Ever
Pandora's Box
G. W. Pabst directs Louise Brooks as "Lulu" and makes a seminal cinemagraphic icon of German and international cinema.
Review of Pandora's Box - 1929
Fast Reviews
Lover Come Back – 1961: Doris Day and Rock Hudson in another war of the sexes comedy, with Tony Randall along, too, playing a part rather close to the character played by John Williams as Irving La Salle Jr., in the superior advertising world story Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (1957), a film where Tony Randall was the star (paired with Jayne Mansfield). Here, Randall is demoted (or promoted, depending upon your point of view) to actually running an advertising firm, and trying to control and understand the firm's star advertising agent played by Hudson. Meanwhile, a competition with another firm (where Doris Day's character works) bubbles up, and with a twist right out of Pillow Talk (another Day-Hudson comedy), Hudson concocts an alternative identity as a naive' and innocent chemist working on a secret consumer product called "Vip" which Doris Day's hard-working advertising agent desperately wants for her firm.
A colorful film with well-engineered jokes, a bit more smarmy than the other Day-Hudson comedies, and with plenty of scenes in which the humor is derived simply from the camera being aimed right at Doris Day and seeing how she reacts to something (for example, when she and Hudson end up in a striptease place).
Review
Shanghai Express – 1932: The problem with this Josef Sternberg film, though it is beautifully photographed and contains a nice panorama of characters on a dangerous ride by rail through war-torn China, is that the star, Marlene Dietrich, mugs for the camera in ways that seem directly lifted from a primitive silent film. She rolls her eyes frequently as if to help visually to enunciate her dialogue, but the eye rolling seems out of synch and she does gesticulations with her hands that also seem out of synch, as if her English language skills and her mannerisms are operating on two different levels, which is to say, the artifice of Dietrich's acting in Shanghai Express is thick and heavy.
More review of Shanghai Express
4K Disc releases from Eureka in July 2025
4K High Noon – The 1952 Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly film with a booklet, plus a list of documentaries, interviews and commentaries. Eureka Page about High noon
4K The Old Dark House – 1932 Karloff film with Charles Laughton, Melvyn Douglas and Gloria Stuart, also includes audio commentary track with Gloria Stuart. Eureka 4k Old Dark House page - I can remember when seeing The Old Dark House was next to impossible such that a special showing at the Library of Congress around 1983 was considered a major event (that is, for old, hard-to-see movies).
Review: The Amazing Mr. X – 1948
Turhan Bey plays a con-artist-spiritualist who is set upon exploiting the loneliness and gullibility of two sisters, but then is drawn into a much more dangerous plot involving murder – more about The Amazing Mr X
New discs from Criterion in August:
Shoeshine (1946) Vittorio De Sica’s Academy Award–winning film about tough times for small kids in post war Italy: two little boys struggle to save enough money by shining shoes to obtain a horse– Criterion page
Cairo Station (1958) Youssef Chahine film about the people centered around an Egyptian rail station and the conditions showing a "raw populist poetry" - Criterion Page
Review: The City Without Jews – 1924
"Utopia" (which looks exactly like Vienna) is plunged into turmoil when the government, seeking to please powerful anti-Semites in their own country and to also give a windfall of job openings to the rest of the populace, passes a law to expel all the Jews. Unique film made that portrays a future that was only a decade away in reality - More about The City Without Jews, 1924
Blu Ray disc of the 1967 Taming of the Shrew coming
The Franco Zeffirelli version, starring Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, includes commentary tracks, documentaries, and an in-case booklet featuring an essay on the film. Scheduled for release in July from Powerhouse Films
Diary of A Chamber Maid - 1946
Diary of A Chamber Maid – 1946
Paulette Goddard works, survives and then triumphs as a lowly chambermaid on a French country estate, putting up with not only the people around her and their sometimes crazy plans, but also her own short-sighted ambitions.
More about the Jean Renoir film Diary of A Chambermaid, 1946
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