Previews and Reviews that are Z's Views
Jim Thompson’s crime classic The Killer Inside Me is coming from IDW as a five issue miniseries.
The Killer Inside Me is adapted by writer Devin Faraci, artist Vic Malhotra, colorist Jason Millet and letterer Christa Miesner with variant covers by Robert Hack.
The Frozen Ghost (1945)
Director: Harold Young
Screenplay: Bernard Schubert and Luci Ward from an original story by Harrison Carter and Henry Sucher
Stars: Lon Chaney Jr., Evelyn Ankers and Milburn Stone.
The Pitch: “It is time for another Inner Sanctum Mystery!”
Tagline: “Nameless Terror!..creeping from the walls of a Museum for Murder!”
The Overview: Beware of Spoilers…
The famous Hypnotist Gregor the Great [Chaney] mistakenly believes he killed an audience member during his act by using his mental powers. When it is shown that the man died of natural causes, Gregor is still shaken.
Gregor ends up at a woman friend’s wax museum where things really get strange… his woman friend disappears and is thought to be dead and Gergor is the main suspect. Will Gregor find the person(s) behind her disappearance and clear his name? Will those watching the movie even care?
Rating:
If you’re a Tom Whalen, Judge Dredd or nice art fan, then you might be interested in this limited edition Judge Dredd print.
I’m not the biggest fan of 3D movies, I thought that James Cameron’s Avatar in 3D worked really well. Since T2 is my favorite Terminator movie, I may just have to check it out in 3D when it’s released. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention — I like this poster!
Rocky (1976)
Director: John G. Avildsen
Screenplay: Sylvester Stallone
Stars: Sylvester Stallone, Talia Shire, Burt Young, Carl Weathers, Burgess Meredith, Tony Burton, Joe Spinell, Thayer David, Frank Stallone and Stan Shaw.
The Pitch: “Hey, the screenwriter wouldn’t sell without starring in it, but for a million bucks we should be able to make a small profit.”
Tagline: “His whole life was a million to one shot.”
The Overview: Beware of Spoilers…
Rocky Balboa [Stallone] is a collector for a neighborhood loan shark [Spinell] and a small-time boxer. Rocky has a thing for Adrian [Shire], the sister of his best friend Paulie [Young] but she’s so shy, he’s getting nowhere fast.
When the Heavyweight Champion of the World, Apollo Creed [Weathers] learns that his scheduled opponent won’t be able to fight him in Philadelphia and no other top contenders are ready to take the fight on short notice, Creed comes up with a gimmick. He’ll give a local fighter a shot at the title. Because Creed likes Balboa’s Italian Stallion moniker, he decides to give Rocky the title shot.
Rocky reluctantly takes the fight — no one has ever gone the distance with Creed — and feels even if loses but is standing at the end, then he’ll have proved he isn’t just another bum from the neighborhood.
On the surface Rocky is a boxing movie but at the heart is a love story, a tale of relationships and a man’s desire to prove his worth.
Rocky premiered at the perfect time for me. I was 17 years old and had followed Stallone’s career since Lords of Flatbush. To see Sly getting his shot (after turning down a huge payday for the screenplay and not starring in the film), and to see the film be the perfect combination of cast, director, editing and score resonated with me. Rocky became my all-time favorite movie on the first viewing and has remained so.
Often when reviewing or rating Stallone films I have to qualify my rating because of Stallone being my favorite actor. I don’t have to do that with Rocky. Rocky is that great of a movie winning the Academy Award for Best Picture of the Year as well as many other awards and nominations.
Rating:
I could not pre-order this one fast enough! Looks like a real fun ride, Daddy-O.
VIOLENT LOVE #1
Story By: Frank J. Barbiere
Art By: Victor Santos
Cover By: Victor Santos
Variant Cover By: Victor Santos
Published: November 9, 2016
SERIES PREMIERE Daisy Jane and Rock Bradley were two of the most notorious bank robbers in the American Southwest. And then they fell in love. Join FRANK J. BARBIERE (FIVE GHOSTS, The Revisionist) and VICTOR SANTOS (THE MICE TEMPLAR, Polar) for a pulp-infused criminal romance oozing with style and action! Double-sized debut issue!
Source: Image Comics & Comicosity & Bleeding Cool.
Casablanca (1942)
Director: Michael Curtiz
Screenplay: Julius J. Epstein and Philip G. Epstein and Howard Koch and Casey Robinson (uncredited) from the unproduced play Everybody Comes to Rick’s by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison
Stars: Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid, Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre, and Dooley Wilson.
The Pitch: “Hey, why don’t we make a romance picture with Bogie?”
Tagline: “They had a date with fate in Casablanca!”
The Overview: Beware of Spoilers…
Casablanca in 1941 is a popular last stop to escape Nazi Germany which is taking over countries throughout Europe. Rick Blaine [Bogart] runs the most popular nightclub in Casablanca and has let it be known he “risks his neck for nobody”. Everyone is welcome in his “Cafe Americana” club so it is not unusual to find escaping refugees (hoping to secure letters of transit), those preying on the refugees, Nazis, partisans, pickpockets, and gamblers there.
Rick’s life is complicated when Lazlo [Henried] a world renowned Nazi resistance fighter shows up in Casablanca one step ahead of the Nazis. Lazlo is accompanied by his wife, Ilsa [Bergman] who we discover was Rick’s love in pre-war Paris. On the day they were to leave Paris (before the Nazis takeover), Ilsa mysteriously left Rick. She was the love of his life and now she’s back… but with another man. And not just any man.
Rick has two letters of transit which could be used to save Ilsa and Lazlo at great risk to his own life… but Rick “risks his neck for nobody”. Rick is bitter over Ilsa leaving without a word but he still loves her. Perhaps Rick could save Ilsa and himself…
It’s rare to find a movie as perfect as Casablanca. Every scene sings. It’s perfectly cast, expertly directed and improves with each new viewing.
Rating:
Wolverine art by Dan Panosian
ComicBookMovie.com presents 10 Amazing Facts You Probably Didn’t Know About Wolverine. Here are three of my favorites…
10. His Claws Weren’t Originally Part Of Him
Wolverine has a lot of cool powers, including enhanced senses and the ability to heal from pretty much any injury. However, the pièce de résistance is obviously his six deadly claws. Creator Len Wein originally had some very different ideas for those though, and among his earliest ideas was that Logan would be a wolverine who had somehow mutated into a humanoid creature, similar to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
As if that wasn’t already weird enough, the now iconic claws would have been revealed as gloves with the claws attached to them, robbing Wolverine of arguably his most recognisable feature (and that classic “Snikt!” sound). It wasn’t until years later that we would learn those those claws were actually part of his skeleton before being coated in Adamantium.
7. Hugh Jackman Wasn’t Bryan Singer’s First Choice
After seeing Hugh Jackman play Wolverine almost countless times, it’s now hard to picture anyone else in the role (and with his final appearance as Logan set for next year, replacing him will be a huge challenge for 20th Century Fox). However, while this may now be hard to believe, Jackman wasn’t actually X-Men director Bryan Singer’s first choice to play the character.
It was Russell Crowe who both the filmmaker and the studio really wanted in the role, but he had no interest in joining the comic book adaptation. It was then that Dougray Scott was chosen to play Wolverine, but when scheduling conflicts forced him to drop out just weeks before the cameras started rolling, the unknown Jackman was chosen at the last minute, a decision Singer wasn’t initially that pleased with. Needless to say, it all worked out for the best!
4. Later Versions Were Modeled After Clint Eastwood
As you’ve now no doubt already realised, Wolverine was very much a work in progress when he was first introduced. Having decided against making the hero an angry teenager with clawed gloves, Marvel portrayed Logan as being a little rougher around the edges after he joined the X-Men. However, while his appearance had already been settled on, it’s Chris Claremont and Frank Miller who deserve the lion’s share of credit for the version of Wolverine we all know and love today.
Just like he did with Daredevil, Miller played a huge role in redefining how readers viewed Logan by taking inspiration from Clint Eastwood. That’s something which we’ve also been able to see on the big screen with Hugh Jackman, while Miller can also be credited with dreaming up the iconic line, “I’m the best there is at what I do, but what I do best isn’t very nice.”
The Longmire Season 5 Trailer is Here!
The Jungle Captive (1945)
Director: Harold Young
Screenplay: Dwight V. Babcock and M. Coates Webster
Stars: Otto Kruger, Vicky Lane, Amelita Ward and Rondo Hatton
The Pitch: “Isn’t it time to make another Ape Woman movie?”
No Tagline:
The Overview: Beware of Spoilers…
The third in the Paula DuPree, Ape Woman trilogy. Seems there were a lot of mad scientist doctors back in the 40’s and their life goal was to turn a gorilla into a woman. Pretty sick, huh?
In this outing Dr. Stendahl (Kruger) has his minion, Molach the Brute (Hatton) steal the Ape Woman’s body from the morgue. Of course Molach isn’t called the Brute because of his brainpower and he kills the morgue attendant in the process. This puts the cops on the trail of the murderer.
Once Stendahl has the body, he’s ready to perform his experiment to bring her back to life. Of course he needs the blood of a woman. Naturally he decides to kidnap and use the blood of his female lab assistant (Ward) rather than a woman with no connections to him.
As the cops close in on him, Stendahl must face off against Molach (who has fallen in love with the lab assistant), the lab assistant’s fiance, the cops and the Ape Woman. It’s like the Mexican standoff at the end of Reservoir Dogs if the Reservoir Dogs standoff wasn’t suspenseful.
Rating:
We have a pretty high ratio of Monkees fans here, so I’m hoping that that same group gets a kick out of this interview about their new album on their 50th (50th!) anniversary.
Source: AARP magazine.
The Bandit (2016)
Director: Jesse Moss
Screenplay: N/A
Stars: Mike Henry, Robert L. Levy Robert L. Levy, David Needham, Hal Needham, Burt Reynolds and Paul Williams.
The Pitch: “We could make a documentary about the making of ‘Smokey & the Bandit’… or a documentary about Hal Needham… or we could do both!”
Tagline: “Old Legends Never Die”
The Overview: Beware of Spoilers…
The Bandit is a well done documentary that takes us behind-the-scenes on the making of Smokey and the Bandit with a focus on Hal Needham the stuntman turned director who came up with the idea and got his best buddy, Burt Reynolds to star in the film.
Rating: 4 of 5 stars.
How about the…
VFX Mash-up of Fast & Furious 7 with Star Wars. In this scene Dom faces off against Shaw in an epic street level duel. And the weapons of choice are Lightsabers.
King of the Underworld (1939)
Director: Lewis Seiler
Screenplay: George Bricker and Vincent Sherman from a story by W.R. Burnett
Stars: Humphrey Bogart, Kay Francis and James Stephenson.
The Pitch: “We could put Bogart in that crime story by WR Burnett…”
Tagline: “Ruthless Killer vs. Lady Doctor ! It’s red-blooded action all the way!”
The Overview: Beware of Spoilers…
Carol Nelson (Francis) is a doctor as is her husband. Things are going well until her husband accidentally gets involved with gangsters led by the notorious Joe Gurney (Bogart). When her husband is killed in a police shootout, they believe that Carol is also involved with the gangsters.
In order to clear her name Carol comes up with a dangerous plan to take down the entire gang.
Rating:
Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 10 Cool Things About Body Heat. Here are three of my favorites…
2. CHRISTOPHER REEVE TURNED DOWN THE ROLE OF NED.
“I put myself down too much,” Reeve told The Washington Post of the missed opportunity. “I didn’t think I’d be convincing as a seedy lawyer.” Reeve later regretted the decision, but was happy that his friend, William Hurt, was cast in the role instead.
5. IT WAS SHOT IN FLORIDA—AND IT WAS VERY, VERY COLD.
The film was shot during a cold Florida winter. Turner and Hurt had to put ice cubes in their mouths before each take so their breath wouldn’t show. Their sweat was sprayed on. When the two shot their sex scene, the crew was dressed in duffel coats and scarves.
8. IT WAS MICKEY ROURKE’S BIG BREAK.
Mickey Rourke had already appeared in 1941 (1979) and Heaven’s Gate (1980), but told Larry King that his breakthrough came from playing Teddy Lewis in Body Heat. When Rourke got the one-day gig, he was able to quit his job as a bouncer at a transvestite nightclub.
