The Hitch-Hiker (1953)

It’s all a matter of time. You hear about a film, you see it pop up (particularly if it’s in the public domain – so everywhere, public access TV, crappy DVDs, free on YouTube), and know that at some point you’ll eventually see it. The Hitch-Hiker (1953) was always beckoning on the side of the […]

Cyber Tracker (1994)

Don ‘The Dragon’ Wilson is a name I know from the video store shelves, a direct-to-video action star on the lower circle of action heroes. Like Jeff Speakman or Olivier Gruner, these were recognisable names but I never saw any of their flicks. Until now. Cyber Tracker (1994) is a sci-fi martial arts thriller that […]

The Mission (1999)

Johnnie To is someone whose movies I’ve wanted to dig into more, with him and his company Milky Way having an international reputation for Hong Kong action cinema. Though To has a prolific and diverse output of genres, people tend to talk most about his crime movies, usually about cops and triads. I’ve seen a […]

Galveston (2018)

I’m an easy mark for a neo-noir thriller and Galveston (2018) intrigued me because it was directed by Melanie Laurent. Best known as Shosanna in Inglorious Basterds, Laurent has directed several films in France and this is her only English-language American film (so far), an adaptation of a novel by Nic Pizzolatto, the creator of […]

A Better Tomorrow (1986)

The iconic image from A Better Tomorrow (1986) is Chow Yun-Fat as the triad gangster Mark wearing dark sunglasses and lighting a cigarette with a flaming bank note, a counterfeit note incidentally. Lesser known is the sight of Yun-Fat wearing a pilly sweater with a pattern of beaded colours in a night club and still […]