What ELSE (other than KUNG FU) has everyone been watching?

[Secret Executioner]

Just finished watching Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1932). Excellent film! Probably the best version of this film ever made.

Great choice here. I have a DVD set with 2 versions, but this one is the better. The other one (1941) may have bigger names in the cast, but it's much more polished and not as thrilling as the 1932 movie. Still a very good movie though. And for some reason, there's also a Bugs Bunny cartoon in which the Looney Tunes character encounters Dr. Jekyll (can't remember the title).

[MasterBetty]

Great choice here. I have a DVD set with 2 versions, but this one is the better. The other one (1941) may have bigger names in the cast, but it's much more polished and not as thrilling as the 1932 movie. Still a very good movie though. And for some reason, there's also a Bugs Bunny cartoon in which the Looney Tunes character encounters Dr. Jekyll (can't remember the title).

That's the same DVD I have.

[TibetanWhiteCrane]

The Invention of Lying

I love Gervais, office, extras, podcast, xfm radio show, stand up shows etc. but this movie was just pure fucking torture! Unfunny, poorly written, poorly acted.... well, pretty much poorly everything. The concept itself is sorta novel, and in a short film, or a series of sketches it might have worked. But it just can't sustain itself for the duration of a feature lenght film. Especially not one as poorly executed as this.

Recently saw Ghost Town as well, and while nowhere near as much of a stinker as this, it was no price for sure. Maybe Gervais lost the golden touch, maybe he is in a slump (haven't seen Derek yet). Or maybe he just needs Merchant at his side. His last funny stuff was Life's Too Short... so it may be the latter.

[masterofoneinchpunch]

...Recently saw Ghost Town as well, and while nowhere near as much of a stinker as this, it was no price for sure. Maybe Gervais lost the golden touch, maybe he is in a slump (haven't seen Derek yet). Or maybe he just needs Merchant at his side. His last funny stuff was Life's Too Short... so it may be the latter.

Of course comedy is subjective, but I ended up really liking this film and it was among my top 20 of 2008 (so don't forget that this and Lying came before Life's Too Short). Most of the people I lent it too liked it as well so I thought it acquited itself well. A rather dry and witty take on "I see dead people."

[masterofoneinchpunch]

some comments I had on:

Shenandoah (1965: Andrew V. McLaglen)

One has to be careful about reviews and comments. Some reviews have taken to task that fact that conscription was used for the Conferderate armies and that the boys would have been taken in the army regardless. This ignores the amount of pacifists that were in the area.* But I am not always looking for exact historical fidelity when watching a film.

This is directed by Andrew V. McLaglen, the son of actor Victor McLaglen (The Informer, The Quiet Man), who has a good collections of westerns under his belt including 96 episodes of Gunsmoke and the later The Rare Breed which he would direct next with Jimmy Stewart. Overall I like the film; it probably is more ambitious than effective with the use of the Civil War as a metaphor to the Vietnam War. But Stewart is effective as the family patriarch and overshadows many of the other actors, especially his kids. I can watch anything with Stewart in it.

One plot point I can admit was exasperating and a bit idiotic: allowing the kid to war the Southern civil war hat all the time. Obviously this became an important aspect of the film, but I was just annoyed that no one that it might be a stupid thing to wear.

* http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Shenandoah_Valley_During_the_Civil_War. The conscription laws were also widely controversial and not always adhered too because of the conflict of state’s rights. http://civilwardailygazette.com/2012/09/27/the-confederates-second-conscrition-act/

[Neon Samurai]

Stepping into reality show hell but I've been really getting into Bar Rescue of late. The one where Jon has to save a tacky pirate bar is one of the funniest things I've seen in a long time!

[Sheng]

THE SPOOK WHO SAT BY THE DOOR (1973)

Bit like a visualisation of the first Last Poets album this abrasive, anguished and madly compelling revolutionary fable might be 40 years old, but its still a mind-blowing watch! Based on Sam Greenlee’s classic novel of the same name and competently directed by Ivan Dixon, it goes further then any other motion picture into examining the dynamics of white racism and the-then prevalent black siege mentality and brink-of-the-abyss doom. The race riot Dixon staged in Gary, Indiana (which had to fill in for Chicago’s Southside) looks chillingly real and the devastatingly revealing dialogue sequences between “spook” Dan Freeman (Lawrence Cook in the role of his life!) and his CIA superiors still provide a lotta food for thought...

Entirely plausible theories why SPOOK was pulled from the theatres back in the day after just a couple of weeks and who conspired to make it disappear still abound in the here & now, 80-plus screenwriter/co-producer Greenlee himself never tires to discuss them (check a more recent interview with this remarkably clear-headed and still Southside-lodging brother:

)

If one film screams for a carefully restored HD remaster plus a truckload of explanatory extras its this one!

THE BLACK POWER MIXTAPE (2011)

One of the most impressive documentaries I’ve seen in a long time. Lost footage from Swedish TV of the Black Power movement lensed between 1967 and 1975, amongst it highly perceptive interviews with an incarcerated Angela Davis talkin’ about the unavoidable necessities of armed self-defence and Stokely Carmichael, the latter revealing a lot about his formative years by simply pickin’ up the mic and interviewing his own mum!

What gives this a contemporary edge are the newly recorded spoken interludes and musings by the likes of Erykah Badu, Talib Kweli, Sonia Sanchez, Last Poets member Abiodun Oyewole, Roots drummer Questlove and professors John Forte (the Ex-Fugee) and Robin Kelley.

And when Talib Kweli remarks dryly that after just watching a Stokely Carmichael feature at home he got picked up and questioned by security agents you can’t help thinking about the almost totalitarian might of today’s power structure in the light of the recent Snowden disclosures.

SUPERFLY (1973)

Ain’t seen this in more than two decades, but boy, the clothes, the Caddies, the cool, the coke-snorting and, uh, Curtis live on stage makes this – despite its weak-ass action sequences – still an absolutely essential guilty pleasure. Not forgetting what probably qualifies as the best movie soundtrack of all times!

Audio-commentary on the Warners disc by Todd Boyd puts things nicely into perspective by placing the flick into an African-American reference frame.

DANGEROUS ENCOUNTER – FIRST KIND (1980)

Just as great as I remembered it from first seeing it in the early 90’s – and then some! Tsui Hark’s really pulling all the stops here in this totally unhinged, ultra-dark crime-thriller. His madcap direction is all over the place and there’s just so many insanely inspired ideas, editing choices and trippy camera angles. Yes, the rhythm is kinda jerky at times, the grotesquely goofy gwailos are a hoot and there’s some logic-defying moments in there as well, but all in all this is still a hell of movie and it hasn’t really aged as much as I had feared. Pretty graphic animal cruelty might make it unpalatable to some people though...

The fairly decent, widescreen, English subbed print that German company ‘Asia Paradise’ put out a couple of years ago appears to be a boot (at least according to ofdb); I could imagine the suckers stole it from the French disc (that also seems to be the source of the short Lo Lieh interview that supplements the package).

[massa_yoda]

Nightfall

This is a beautifully shot film that makes good use of its locations. Wow, loved the look of everything. The movie itself is a little bloated and has a long, drawn out ending and an improper conclusion to Simon Yam's arc. But if their goal was to keep me interested to the end, they definitely accomplished that. There's also a stand out scene where Yam and Nick Cheung have a fight on a cable car. This scene alone is worth checking out. I felt like it should have been in another movie because of the energy in that one scene alone.

Not bad overall, just needed to be tightened up a little.

[DiP]

Running Out of Time (1999) - J. To at his commercially best. To see his entire mechanism at work and kept intact combined with a good storyline and conventional filming elements is still amazing to watch. As much as To layers his style all over the screen to great effect, he smartly emphasizes the cast as much and gives everyone growth and time to develop. Lau Ching Wan, Andy Lau, Hui Siu Hung, Waise Lee; heck even Yoyo Mung and Lam Suet (the great comic relief as always) only limited to playing small but crucial roles. Great HK classic from the late 1990s. Rating: 9.6/10

Running Out of Time 2 (2001) - J. To takes a whole different approach with a story he pretty much reprises here and opts for ironical elements and a bit more artistic style of direction. The result is a quite light and a bit more comedy-esqued follow-up with some memorability among the various characters situated in the storyline. Despite the new vibe, the primary character chemistries (Lau's interactions with Cheng, Lin, and Hui) and action set-pieces were the usual traits and layered nicely with enough time and backstories to be fully engrossed into. Overall, I enjoyed it very much for being what it was. Rating: 7.3/10

The Fog (1980) - Being a big fan of Carpenter's Halloween I didn't expect much out of this movie but I now considerer it one of Carpenter's definite movies in his career. And among his underrated ones too. This is prime example of exceptional horror film-making where the story and characters are center of attention rather than having violence as the selling point. The creative combination of contemporary and period movie elements in the story is an absolute driving force, setting out something original and still keeping the scary factor intact. The cast was appropriate enough but no one ended up doing anything remarkable for me, apart from the radio hostess. Lee Curtis was alright but at least she was toned down here compared to Halloween where she had a whole lot of screen-time screaming all over the place. Rating: 8/10

[Sheng]

EAST MEETS WEST (2011)

OK, Jeff Lau films are an acquired taste and to make sense outta the man’s patented nonsense can be rewarding at times, but this is simply one wacked-out, inane, cluttered and over-stylized mess of a movie. And that’s even by the director’s own loony standards! Cast is admittedly well chosen, Karen Mok, Kenny Bee, William So, Eason Chan et al display some good chemistry here and even though most of the jokes misfire there are a few genuinely amusing and insightful moments midway through, but for the most part the silly love story just grates and the FX and CG work that descends on us once the main actors transform themselves into the Eight Immortals is pretty unbearable.

Took me three attempts to thread myself into the film’s zany helter-skelter rhythm, a chore that isn’t made easier when you’ve gotta put up with subtitles on Kam & Ronson’s far from stellar BD that zoom by fast as lightning and make following the flick in the first half only possible if you freeze-frame almost every other scene. If I didn’t have a fairly high tolerance for ol’ time Jeff Lau goofiness I would have given up around the 20 minute mark...

TRIAD (2012)

Director Daniel Chan’s attempt to reboot familiar HK mobster tropes hasn’t generated more than a lukewarm critical response, but I found it to be quite a passable, stylishly shot crime thriller, albeit a very predictable one. Plenty of bloody action here, mostly of the cleaver slashing street and bar brawl variety, but its all choreographed a tad too unimaginatively. Still, despite the average action sequences, several trite Cantopop (or rather Cantorock) montage sequences and the familiarity of the whole narrative arc the final resolution is a cool and pretty unexpected one. TRIAD’s rookie cast (William Chan, Derek Tsang and Edward Tsui, son of Shaw Brothers regular Norman Tsui) couldn’t be called charismatic by any stretch of the imagination, but vets like Chan Wai Man, Patrick Tam and Irene Wan were a joy to watch. Its also worth stating that this is a HK film through & through, shot with an all-HK cast mainly around Yau Ma Tai, Jordan, Portland and Temple Street and certainly one that doesn’t look like its pandering to Mainland sensitivities.

HK Emperor BD looks great and comes with a short but thankfully subbed “Making Of” feature.

[Secret Executioner]

I think I may change my mind and write an essay on Block-Heads instead of Swiss Miss as it also has very interesting material. Concerning the essay mentionned previously, I'm not sure I'll be able to post it because the teacher asked us to send it by email but also to put it on turnitin.com which apparently checks plagiarism on the Web.

Finally posted the essay in the World Cinema forum. I know, been a while, but it's there. And it's on the hilarious Block-Heads.

The Fog (1980) - Being a big fan of Carpenter's Halloween I didn't expect much out of this movie but I now considered it one of Carpenter's definite movies in his career. And among his underrated ones too. This is prime example of exceptional horror film-making where the story and characters are center of attention rather than having violence as selling points. The creative combination of contemporary and period movie elements in the story is an absolute driving force, setting out something original and still keeping the scary factor intact. The cast was appropriate enough but no one ended up doing anything remarkable, apart from the radio hostess. Lee Curtis was alright but at least she was toned down here compared to Halloween where she had a whole lot of screen-time screaming all over the place. Rating: 8/10

Great film indeed, though I don't remember much of it (been a while since I last watched it). I must say I MUCH prefer this one over Halloween.

[Sheng]

JOURNEY TO THE WEST (2013)

Stephen Chow’s re-enactment of the Monkey King legend, nothing less than a box office supernova on the Mainland, was something of an unexpected disappointment for me. Yes, with Shu Qi, Huang Bo and Wen Zhang the three principle leads were brilliantly chosen and the film kicks into gear immediately with a pretty hilarious JAWS spoof where Chow’s insidious dark humour works incredibly well (though the sea monster that’s happily munching swimmers in the waters around an ancient Chinese stilt village isn’t a shark but some sort of an oversized coelacanth!). But after this grand opening things go rapidly downhill. Roughly told in four segments JOURNEY TO THE WEST seems to loose steam the longer it lasts. And when the last act rolled around and the Monkey King morphed into some sort of intergalactic King Kong in the midst of mind-numbing CGI-designed mayhem (that looked as cheap and gaga as if it was lifted straight out of some wacked-out computer game!) I felt that the tremendous promise the film hinted at in its first half hour or so had all but dissipated.

FLOATING CITY (2012)

Commendable, but way too slow moving and laboriously narrated socio-drama based on the real life-story of Bo Wah Chuen, who originated from the humblest of origins – a mixed-race member of the Tanka boat people minority (“Egg people”, as the English subs would have it) – and rose through the ranks of the Imperial East India Company to become one of the Colony’s most successful businessmen.

Despite generally good acting performances (Aaron Kwok, Josie Ho and in particular the always wonderful Paw Hei Jing) and some decent art direction that betrays the deft hand of a master filmmaker (Yim Ho, one of the main forces of HK’s new wave in the early 80s and M.I.A. in the past decade or so) the film looks seriously under-funded, sometimes resembling a TV drama. Meaning we’re getting lots of tight frames, facial close-ups, concentration on miniscule details to illustrate different time periods (FLOATING CITY spans a whopping five decades), in other words all the common devices if you’re struggling with budget constraints, plus some pretty substandard, tacky looking CG vista shots that really drag the project down a few notches.

Still, FLOATING CITY touches on some very valid chapters of colonial HK history, illuminates the repulsiveness of British elitism, the brazen hubris of the colonizers and their casual, but all-pervading racism that was still very much evident as late as the 1970s, but it feels like its just randomly scanning moods and events. As a whole the film never fully connects, never gets into gear, never really makes clear why and how Bo Wah Chuen made it to the very top, concentrating instead almost entirely on the “Who am I” factor, i.e. the man’s search for identity. Therefore it feels like a sketchy and haphazard portrait of the man and his era, at times also an overtly maudlin and sentimentalized one, an elegy that only sporadically manages to engage.

[Secret Executioner]

Hitman The Cobra - yeah, that same old German DVD again... But hey, I really like this film

[Takuma]

Tamburine Buttocks (Brazil, 2012) [sapporo Short Fest] – 1.5/5

Brazilian ass-play movie celebrates the beautiful sound of a hand slapping an ass. Thank God it only runs 2 minutes.

Flytopia (UK, 2012) [sapporo Short Fest] – 2/5

Sex, horror and flies in one of the most off putting, yet occasionally imaginative short film. A man is tormented by thousands of flies which appear to have taken him as their target. CGI well utilized, a pair of bare (non-CGI) breasts also included.

Asian Delight (Netherlands, 2013) [sapporo Short Fest] – 1.5/5

A Dutchman introduces his collection of old Chinese pornographic art to a static camera. Slight information value aside, a poor short documentary with very few cinematic merits.

Foxes (Ireland, 2012) [sapporo Short Fest] – 2.5/5

A partly effective psychological thriller about a woman who becomes crazy. The use of allegory and play between real and fantasy comes off a bit clumsy, partly because of over-emphasized music and sound effects.

The Mass of Men (UK, 2012) [sapporo Short Fest] – 3/5

A man arrives at unemployment office 3 minutes late, only to hear he will be severely punished for it. Then things get out of hand. Award winning short film is “typical” British “everyday misery drama”, though well made.

Land of My Dreams (Portugal, 2013) [sapporo Short Fest] – 4/5

Mom and daughter travel Portugal by car and make their by arranging outdoor strip shows. A stylish and moody Almodovar esque drama with plenty of bare skin. Runs 20 minutes.

The Dickslap (France, 2012) [sapporo Short Fest] – 4.5/5

A video store clerk tries to save his loved one from a Chinese porno kung fu master Ti Kong, who cripples (and occasionally kills) women with his giant dick. A terrific midnight short movie that is in equal parts a thriller, comedy, love story, and a martial arts film. Ti Kong’s cock is an instant cult hit – like something out of a Yoshihiro Nishimura movie – and the film is filled with small tributes to old school kung fu films.

[Secret Executioner]

Been watching some concerts lately:

Alice In Chains - MTV Unplugged

Alice Cooper - Brutally Live

Genesis - Live At Wembley Stadium

[masterofoneinchpunch]

Well I thought I would start early with a horror watch. For October I will watch more horror films than usual, but I wanted to watch this for several years.

Shutter (2004: Banjong Pisanthanakun, Parkpoom Wongpoom):

In some ways the emotional aspects reminded me of A Tale of Two Sisters (2003) while the horror aesthetics had a Ju-on (2002) and Ringu feel (1998). Like all of those films this would also be remade as an American film (2008; I have not seen this).

The set-up is simple: a young couple accidently hits a young female that was wandering in the middle of the road and leave the crime scene unreported. When they go back to see what happened to the victim, there was no report of a crime and none of the local hospitals had taken in a hit and run victim. Soon the boyfriend Tun, who is a photographer, starts to have eerie phantasm-like images haunting his pictures as well as both are having nightmares (some of the photographs used in the movie are real “unexplained” pictures.) Soon it will no longer be only in their dreams.

So far my favorite Thai horror film, though I really have not seen that many of them (probably better to me than The Eye , which is good, though the ending was a bit too much and technically it is more of a Hong Kong film.) I like when the plot of a horror film actually makes sense.

Semi Spoilers below:

You really do not feel sorry for Tun after you realize his connection to the ghost. In fact he really does not deserve any haunting (really she’s too good for him.) The flip photography scene was awesome. There are a few scenes like that which I have not seen before.

[Takuma]

Cold Blood (France, 2013) [sapporo Short Fest] – 2.5/5

A well written and captivating French thriller suffers from stiff acting and unusually poor digital video which makes the film feel too much of a home video. Nevertheless, at 15 minutes it’s quite a passable viewing.

Gravity (France, 2012) [sapporo Short Fest] – 2.5/5

CGI filled fantasy went beyond my heels. A black man chases a runner who causes fractions in buildings by pulsing some kind of electronic waves. Catch the man and you can levitate. At the same time in a parallel universe a woman is pulling the moon towards earth with chains. Hmmm….

Romy, I'm Shy (Germany, 2013) [sapporo Short Fest] – 4/5

Superbly stylish short documentary about photographer Juergen Vollmer. Mixes 1960’s rock music, fantastic photographs, and interesting stories, including how the Beatles’ gt their famous hairstyle. A couple of pairs of bare breasts included too!

MeTube: August Sings Carmen 'Habanera' (Austria, 2013) [sapporo Short Fest] – 3/5

Off-the-wall, youtube inspired video works best not spoiled. Although this type of stuff has become all too common to truly surprise viewers, one could nevertheless read a big “WTF” on most viewers’ faces during the screening.

Cargo (Australia, 2013) [sapporo Short Fest] – 3/5

Zombie short follows a father trying to take his cargo – a newborn baby – to safety zone before he himself turns into a zombie. Forgettable, but decently made short film.

Armadingen (Germany, 2011) [sapporo Short Fest] – 4.5/5

A masterful 25 minute film follows an elderly couple living in the countryside in isolation and waiting for the world’s end as a giant asteroid approaches earth. Well acted, beautifully put together and poignant movie. Also includes fantastic miniature special effects work. Only the ending is not fully satisfactory. A strong contender for the best film of 2011.

[AlbertV]

Howling (Korea, 2012): A murder mystery film starring my favorite Korean actor, Song Kang-Ho, as a grizzled veteran detective who teams up with a rookie female detective (Lee Na-Yeong) as they investigate a series of murders where the victims have animal bites on their necks. And before you can say "werewolf", it's not the case at all, but the tension that builds up and the eventual connection was definitely quite a surprise. Based on a novel by Asa Nomami.

[Sheng]

THE TRUTH ABOUT JANE AND SAM (1999)

I’d classify this as one of Derek Yee’s ‘lesser’ efforts. Squeaky-clean yuppie / yellow press journo / Singapore transplant from a class-conscious family (Peter Ho Yun Tung) bumps into a pill-poppin’ ne’er-do-well street hussy (Taiwanese songbird Fann Wong) and after some mildly amusing culture-clashing she fixes up, moves into his flat and they inevitably fall for each other. The melancholic narrative is finely tuned and the film does exude an undeniable charm at times, but with its raised index finger anti-drugs message it also comes across a wee bit too didactic and predictable. You can certainly sniff the final teddy bear hug of the happily reunited couple from halftime, in other words. The always appreciated Chin Kar Lok and Cheng Pei Pei appear in supporting roles and for me its always a treat to see older actors like the incomparable Wei Wei again (playing Fann Wong’s granny here in the stilt-village of Tai O on Lantau island), fifty-one years after the lady had the lead-role in Fei Mu’s SPRING IN A SMALL TOWN, which most critics of Chinese cinema still consider to be the best Chinese language film of all times...

DOUBLE TAP (2000)

This grippingly tense and well paced thriller was Derek Yee protege’s Law Chi Leung first directional work. The late Leslie Cheung is brilliantly casted as a psychotic, suicidal marksman and AC Philip Kwok orchestrated the two major shoot-outs in the gun club and inside a densely populated mall with as lot of flash and pulse-racing intensity. The final CG-assisted slo-mo showdown between Cheung and Alex Fong inside the mall cinema was a bit off a let-down though.

Kam & Ronson’s recent BD has been justifiably praised for its picture being “real HD”, subs do not appear to be always accurate though and are also a bit too small.

[TibetanWhiteCrane]

HANNA D- THE GIRL FROM VONDEL PARK 1984

Wow... the Italian-French sleazoid knock-off of the fantastic Christiane F- Wir Kinder Vom Bahnhof Zoo. But while that was a finely crafted, powerful and dark cautionary tale, this was just straight up exploitation... I felt like taking a shower after this. For those looking for some seedy euro trash cinema, this is just the ticket though.

[TibetanWhiteCrane]

SO SWEET, SO DEAD 1972

Decent Giallo, blood and boobs are present, black gloved killer, colorful 70's vibe, but something was missing... gotta watch it again to figure it out.

[Takuma]

No One Lives (USA, 2012) [bD] – 3.5/5

Ryuhei Kitamura’s second American movie is his best film since Versus. The b-film is woodenly acted and lacking much credibility, but directed with insane drive. It’s a one-idea film, but it’s a darn good idea and carries the 86 min film. Watch it without knowing anything more about it!

Samurai Cop (USA, 1989) [DVD] – 3.5/5

Sylvester Stallone’s bodyguard Matt Hannon stars as a mullet hero in an inept action movie that has become a laughing stock. The train wreck excels with unbelievable acting performances as tons of quotable dialogue, though action scenes are lame. Unlike the majority of great cult classics Samurai Cop is a film where all the glorious merits are indeed accidental.

”They call him Samurai. He speaks fluent Japanese. He was trained by the masters in Japan.”

The Toxic Avenger (USA, 1984) – 2/5

Classic Troma film is an amateurish comedy with a couple of relatively mild splatter effects. It has a nice nostalgic aura to it, but as a trash/exploitation movie it’s neither very ballsy nor well executed. Could use losing 20 minutes from its running time. Best suited for children who can overlook the flaws and find the violence shocking.

I remember when I was 10 or 11 and my friend spoke highly of the film. I can imagine for an elementary school student it must have been the coolest “forbidden” movie ever.

[masterofoneinchpunch]

I thought it would be nice to start the month of October with a documentary on a legend of horror.

“Biography” Bela Lugost: Hollywood’s Dark Prince (1995: Kevin Burns) TV

Arts and Entertainment’s (A&E) long running serious Biography (1987 - ) have done quite a few episodes so it is easy to find one on a favorite actor or director. If you are new to Bela Lugosi then this is a good place to start.

While narrator Richard Kiley is the omnipresent voice throughout, you do get nice interviews with Bela Lugosi Jr., Ray Walston, Martin Landau (IMDB does not have him listed) and Robert Wise (Wise directed his in the Val Lewton production The Body Snatcher which is one of my favorite horrors.) I thought they could have got more people to interview, but these were nice to watch. While they tended to sentimentality they ultimately avoided a hagiography, though with Lugosi’s life I thought it would have been difficult to tell his life that way without giant omissions.

I found it interesting to note that Bela’s son states that he has trouble going through the Ed Wood films. I thought that the son might be bitter, but he comes off as very respectful. I also find it fascinating that Bela was one of the first movie stars to rehab and publically combat drug addiction. Ultimately this did not lead to better roles, but Bela worked until his death.

Fate is fickle. Lon Chaney was headed for the role of Dracula, even though Bela had perfected the character on stage. Lon’s death did not even have Bela as second choice. The documentary mentions Chester Morris, Conrad Veidt and Paul Muni ahead of Lugosi. But Lugosi fought hard for the role and got it. The rest is history. However, he could have had the Frankenstein role as well. How would have history played out differently for the two of them had Lugosi took on that role? While Walston seemed to think otherwise (unless I am misinterpreting his comments), I personally am glad that Karloff got that role, though both would be stereotyped by their successful roles. But I was not happy that because of Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932) was a flop and Bela’s contract for Univeral was not extended (he would end up working again later for Universal).

This documentary makes a nice complementary viewing to Ed Wood. You can find this biography on the Heroes of Horror R1 Image release. It is OOP. If you can find it used, buy it. It is an awesome biography set.

[Secret Executioner]

This documentary looks really interesting. Bela Lugosi was a great actor and he must be the greatest Dracula ever. Amazing that he wasn't an obvious choice for this part.

Since you mentionned Boris Karloff, there's a bit of irony in a 1937 serial called SOS Coast Guards as the main villain (played by Bela Lugosi) is named Boroff.

Lately, I've seen:

Blue Jasmine

The latest effort by Woody Allen. Not sure if it's because it's not my type of film or if the movie is surrounded with over-hype, but I didn't find this one as great as many reviews said it was. It was actually a bit depressing, I couldn't help but feel sorry for the main character (played by Cate Blanchett who - I must admit - is great in that film).

The "extras" of the Tarzan the Fearless DVD I bought recently. It's basically a history of Tarzan in cinema (through text and some pictures of artworks or pictures from movies) and a list of the Tarzan movies made between 1918 and the early 2000 (the release is from 2003).

[masterofoneinchpunch]

This documentary looks really interesting. Bela Lugosi was a great actor and he must be the greatest Dracula ever. Amazing that he wasn't an obvious choice for this part.

Since you mentionned Boris Karloff, there's a bit of irony in a 1937 serial called SOS Coast Guards as the main villain (played by Bela Lugosi) is named Boroff.

...The "extras" of the Tarzan the Fearless DVD I bought recently. It's basically a history of Tarzan in cinema (through text and some pictures of artworks or pictures from movies) and a list of the Tarzan movies made between 1918 and the early 2000 (the release is from 2003).

Heroes of Horror set from Image has several biographies including Lon Chaney Jr., Vincent Price, Boris Karloff, Peter Lorre.

Bela is my favorite Dracula and an underrated actor. His heroin addiction hurt some of his later performances, but he was a consummate performer and was still good regardless of how bad the film. I have not seen that serial (I see VCI put it out here in a non-public domain, I'll have to pick up one of these days.)

I have seen a couple of the Johnny Weissmuller Tarzan films, but still have several to go. It is interesting that Fearless (with Buster Crabbe) was originally a full 12 part serial (which a few reviewers states as lost.)