Shock Corridor (1963)

Diving deeper into the world of director Samuel Fuller, I finally watched Shock Corridor (1963), which I remember Martin Scorsese playing clips of in his Personal Journey Through American Cinema docu-series (now on Kanopy, which this film is available to stream too). Shot over ten days in one location, this low budget thriller follows journalist […]

The Bad Sleep Well (1960)

Unboxing DVDs that I’ve had in storage for several years, I didn’t realise I had this copy of Akira Kurosawa’s The Bad Sleep Well (1960). So I finally watched it and it was excellent. Set in post-war Japan, it unravels the revenge plot set in motion by Nishi (Toshiro Mifune) who is climbing the ranks […]

Spirits Of The Dead (1968)

Following Lewis Rice O’Donnell’s recommendation, I watched Spirits Of The Dead (1968; Italian: Tre passi nel delirio, French: Histoires extraordinaires), a omnibus film of three stories based on the work of Edgar Allan Poe by different directors. The first starring Jane Fonda and directed by her then-husband Roger Vadim is about a debauched countess who becomes obsessed […]

Blood And Black Lace (1964)

Continuing the exploration of Italian director Mario Bava’s films, I watched Blood and Black Lace (1964), which really impressed upon me how creepy red mannequins are. A stylish murder mystery set in a fashion house where models are killed one by one. The use of bold colours, wind effects and shadows is pretty great, definitely […]

Day Of Anger (1967)

Riz Ortolani’s jazzy, bombastic, memorable score to Day Of Anger (1967; I giorni dell’ira) was used in a key sequence of Tarantino’s Django Unchained and is known from the soundtrack. Sitting down to watch this Lee Van Cleef spaghetti western, there’s also a similar plot to Django with an older, experienced gun fighter Talby (Van […]