Stormy Monday (1988)

Acquired this from Arrow Video on Blu-Ray a whim and I really dug it. Stormy Monday (1988) is only 95 minutes long but it moves slow, luxuriating in the neo-noir atmosphere it creates in Newcastle, England. Wet streets, neon signs and dime-store archetypes. Oh, and the quartet of lead actors are all looking incredibly foxy, […]

Doberman Cop (1977)

Aside from being referenced in True Romance and starring in Kill Bill Vol. 1, I’d not actually seen any Sonny Chiba films. So I took a chance on Doberman Cop (1977; Doberman Deka), which is based on a manga, and has Chiba playing a cop from Okinawa, trying to solve the murder of a young […]

Youth Of The Beast (1963)

Always great when a film from an older decade feels contemporary in its energy. Youth Of The Beast (1963; Yajū no seishun) is very snappy and vibrant, a Yazuka gangster movie about a mysterious stranger Joe (Joe Shishido – who I only discovered now had cheek implants to help his career and thus his very […]

Black Moon Rising (1986)

Black Moon Rising (1986) had a video cover that was always in my mind’s eye and even though it was scripted by one of my favourite directors, John Carpenter, took me a very long time to actually see what it was all about. Turns out that it’s a great Eighties super-car B-movie that has everything […]

Le Cercle Rouge (1970)

Being a huge fan of the stylish classic Le Samourai, I’ve been very remiss in not seeking more of director Jean-Pierre Melville’s other films. When I saw a DVD copy of Le Cercle Rouge (1970) available for cheap, I snapped it up and settled in. Now if you thought Alain Delon was impeccably handsome in […]