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Entries tagged with 'Fox'
Posted Sep. 18, 2008,
Charlie Chan (Vol.5) on DVD!
By Dennis Dermody
Out on DVD is a great box set: Charlie Chan (Volume 5) The folks at 20th Century Fox have saved the best for last in this seven-movie volume of Charlie Chan mysteries, which star Sidney Toler as the famed Honolulu detective, based on the books by Earl Derr Biggers. They may have been B-movies but they all have great production values, crackling pace and plenty of suspense.
Charlie Chan’s Murder Cruise (1940) has the detective chasing a fiendish strangler aboard a luxury cruise to San Francisco. In Charlie Chan In Panama (1940), can Chan thwart a nefarious spy from blowing up the Panama Canal? Dead Men Tell (1941) is about a treasure map cut in four pieces that causes a killer to masquerade as the ghost of a pirate on a gloomy old ship. Look for TV Superman George Reeves as a shady suspect. In Charlie Chan In Rio(1941), the murder of a beautiful nightclub singer tests Chan’s skills in solving the crime. Murder Over New York (1940) is a top notch saboteur thriller set in Manhattan with a wily villain blowing up military planes with a new chemical weapon. Look for one of The Three Stooges to pop up during a lineup after the police chief asks for “every Hindu in town roundedup!” In the exciting Charlie Chan At The Wax Museum (1940), Chan is nearly lured to his death when he is asked to participate in a radio show at a creepy wax museum which is the lair of Dr. Cream who does facial surgery on criminals to change their identities. Castle In The Desert (1942) may be one of my favorites -- wherein Chan is stranded out in the Mojave desert at a mysterious castle owned by the female descendent of the notorious Borgia poisoning family. Her scientist husband has half his face covered by a mask because of a hideous scar. And Chan’s “number 2” son Jimmy (Sen Yung), on leave from the army, joins his “pop” to try to trap the killer. This movie has all the “old dark house” tropes and is just great fun.
Posted Jul. 28, 2008,
Tyrone Power: Matinee Idol Collection!
By Dennis Dermody
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Out this week is a spectacular ten film box set: The Tyrone Power Matinee Idol Collection.The impossibly handsome Tyrone Power was 20th Century Fox’s dreamboat matinee idol from 1937 to 1952. He was cast in swashbuckling adventures, sparkling comedies, dramas, and through the course of his varied career proved himself a surprisingly good actor in such films as The Razor’s Edge, Nightmare Alley, The Sun Also Rises and Witness For The Prosecution.
This “Matinee Idol” set illuminates many other facets of that pretty face -- starting with hi first scene-stealing role in Ladies Dormitory (1936). Loretta Young was frequently paired with Power and three films featuring the duo, are included: Cafe Metropole (1937), a sophisticated comedy with Adolphe Menjou in which Tyrone Power poses as a Russian prince; Second Honeymoon (1937) wherein Power and Young play a divorced couple still in love with each other; and Love Is News (1937) in which Power plays a crafty newspaperman writing a series of scathing articles about a spoiled rich girl (Young) until she turns the tables on him by announcing her engagement to him to the press which turns his life upside down. Tyrone even remade this with Gene Tierney in the heiress role in That Wonderful Urge (1948), which is also part of this fun box set.
Posted Mar. 5, 2008,
Hammer DVDs: The Nanny and The Strangler of Bombay!
By Dennis Dermody
Got the word that come summer Sony is releasing a box of action adventures from the British studio most known for the Christopher Lee Dracula films, Hammer. The box is supposedly going to include the bloodthirsty Stranglers of Bombay, Terror of the Tongs, Pirates of Blood River and Devil Ship Pirates. Also on April 8, Fox is releasing the excellent 1965 Hammer thriller starring Bette Davis -- The Nanny. In that film Bette is definitely Auntie Maim!