Saturday, December 25, 2021

Monday, December 13, 2021

Back in the habit


BENEDETTA

2021
Directed by Paul Verhoeven
Written by David Birke, Pascal Bonitzer, and Paul Verhoeven (based on the book Immodest Acts: The Life of a Lesbian Nun In Renaissance Italy by Judith C. Brown)

Spoilers: moderate

Sunday, December 12, 2021

Sister act


THE DEVILS

1971
Written and directed by Ken Russell (based on the books The Devils of Loudon by Aldous Huxley and The Devils by John Whiting)

Spoilers: moderate

Troubled youth


BELFAST

2021
Written and directed by Kenneth Branagh

Spoilers: that's a big ol' N/A

Wednesday, December 8, 2021

In fabric


JU DOU

1990
Directed by Zhang Yimou and Yang Fenglian
Written by nobody, apparently? (based on the novel Fuxi Fuxi by Liu Heng)

Spoilers: moderate

Tuesday, December 7, 2021

Red, red wine


RED SORGHUM

1987
Directed by Zhang Yimou
Written by Chen Jianyu and Zhu Wei (based on the stories "Red Sorghum" and "Sorghum Wine" by Mo Yan)

Spoilers: moderate

Sunday, December 5, 2021

City of spies


CLIFF WALKERS

2021
Directed by Zhang Yimou
Written by Quan Yongxian and Zhang Yimou

Spoilers: mild

Father, son, and House of Gucci


HOUSE OF GUCCI

2021
Directed by Ridley Scott
Written by Becky Johnston and Roberto Bentivegna (based on the book The House of Gucci: A Sensational Story of Murder, Madness, Glamour, and Greed by Sara Gay Forden)

Spoilers: N/A

Saturday, December 4, 2021

American Gothic Week: No longer of God's making, but the monstrous offspring of man's depraved fancy, glowing with only an evil mockery of beauty


TWICE-TOLD TALES

1963
Directed by Sidney Salkow
Written by Robert E. Kent (based on the stories "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment" and "Rapaccini's Daughter" and the novel The House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne)

Spoilers: moderate

Wednesday, December 1, 2021

What a disaster: She's gone with the hula hula boys, she don't care about me


HURRICANE

1979
Directed by Jan Troell
Written by Lorenzo Semple Jr. (based on the novel The Hurricane by James Norman Hall and Charles Nordoff)

Spoilers: well, there's a hurricane in it, but moderate, I guess

Tuesday, November 30, 2021

American Gothic Week: From a mere eccentricity to a dark mania


THE HAUNTED PALACE

1963
Directed by Roger Corman
Written by Charles Beaumont (based on the novella "The Case of Charles Dexter Ward" by H.P. Lovecraft plus eight lines of the poem "The Haunted Palace" by Edgar Allan Poe)

Spoilers: moderate

Sunday, November 28, 2021

American Gothic Week: Poe boys


THE TERROR

1963
Directed by Roger Corman with Francis Ford Coppola, Dennis Jakob, Jack Hill, and Jack Nicholson
Written by nobody till after it was over, and credited to Leo Gordon and Jack Hill

Spoilers: moderate

American Gothic Week: When we are alone for a long time, we people space with phantoms


DIARY OF A MADMAN

1963
Directed by Reginald Le Borg
Written by Robert E. Kent (based on the stories "Diary of a Madman" and "The Horla" by Guy de Maupassant)

Spoilers: moderate

Wednesday, November 24, 2021

American Gothic Week: Forgotten lore


THE RAVEN

1963
Directed by Roger Corman
Written by Richard Matheson (with several lines taken from the poem by Edgar Allan Poe)

Spoilers: moderate

Sunday, November 21, 2021

American Gothic Week: Determined to prove a villain


TOWER OF LONDON

1962
Directed by Roger Corman
Written by Leo Gordon, F. Amos Powell, and Robert E. Kent

Spoilers: the Plantagenets don't make it

Saturday, November 20, 2021

American Gothic Week: The notion of that identity which at death is or is not lost for ever, was to me, at all times, a consideration of intense interest


TALES OF TERROR

1962
Directed by Roger Corman
Written by Richard Matheson (based on the stories "Morella," "The Black Cat," "The Cask of Amontillado," and "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar" by Edgar Allan Poe)

Spoilers: moderate

Tuesday, November 16, 2021

American Gothic Week: The rigid embrace of the narrow house


PREMATURE BURIAL

1962
Directed by Roger Corman
Written by Charles Beaumont and Ray Russell (based on the story by Edgar Allan Poe)

Spoilers: moderate

Monday, November 15, 2021

American Gothic Week: I felt every fiber in my frame thrill as if I had touched the wire of a galvanic battery


PIT AND THE PENDULUM

1961
Directed by Roger Corman
Written by Richard Matheson (with one scene toward the end somewhat based on the story by Edgar Allan Poe)

Spoilers: moderate; high for the original short story

Sunday, November 14, 2021

American Gothic Week: A countenance not easily to be forgotten


THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER

1960
Directed by Roger Corman
Written by Richard Matheson (based on the story by Edgar Allan Poe)

Spoiler alert: you read this in 9th grade and presumably recall that the title is not metaphorical, but somehow still only moderate

Tuesday, November 9, 2021

Deviant art


ETERNALS

2021
Directed by Chloé Zhao
Written by Patrick Burleigh, Ryan Firpo, Kaz Firp, and Chloe Zhao

Spoilers: moderate

Sunday, November 7, 2021

Just try to make it sound like you wrote it that way on purpose


THE FRENCH DISPATCH OF THE LIBERTY, KANSAS EVENING SUN

2021
Directed by Wes Anderson
Written by Roman Coppola, Hugo Guinness, Jason Schwartzman, and Wes Anderson

Spoilers: moderate

Sunday, October 31, 2021

Census Bloodbath: Sure burned my beans bad on that one


THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE PART 2

The Eighth (oh God) Annual Great October Switcheroo!  Once again, we're crossing over with the wonderful Brennan Klein of Popcorn Culture and sometimes Alternate Ending, and I'm doing some of the 80s slashers he's catalogued as part of his Census Bloodbath project, while he's doing some of the old-timey sci-fi I've been hoarding as part of my own Cardboard Science archive.  This year, he finally gave me three pieces of the slasher genre's major arcana, such as I've been very subtly and surreptitiously hinting that I'd like to do this whole time; in return, I accidentally gave him three pieces of indecent crap.  Oops!  (But, seriously, apologies.)

1986
Directed by Tobe Hooper
Written by L.M. Kit Carson

Spoiler alert: moderate

If it was gay, bright, and beautiful, that's how Ziggy wanted it


ZIEGFELD FOLLIES

1946
Directed by Vincente Minnelli, Charles Walters, George Sidney, Lemuel Ayers, Roy Del Ruth, and Robert Lewis

Spoiler alert: inapplicable (and as I've said before, it's difficult to be brief with musicals or anthologies, and this one's both)

Friday, October 29, 2021

Desert planet


DUNE: PART ONE

2021
Directed by Denis Villeneuve
Written by Jon Spaihts, Eric Roth, and Denis Villeneuve

Spoiler alert: good golly, it's Dune

Tuesday, October 26, 2021

Census Bloodbath: Urban legend


FRIDAY THE 13th PART VIII: JASON TAKES MANHATTAN

The Eighth (oh God) Annual Great October Switcheroo!  Once again, we're crossing over with the wonderful Brennan Klein of Popcorn Culture and sometimes Alternate Ending, and I'm doing some of the 80s slashers he's catalogued as part of his Census Bloodbath project, while he's doing some of the old-timey sci-fi I've been hoarding as part of my own Cardboard Science archive.  This year, he finally gave me three pieces of the slasher genre's major arcana, such as I've been very subtly and surreptitiously hinting that I'd like to do this whole time; in return, I accidentally gave him three pieces of indecent crap.  Oops!  (But, seriously, apologies.)

1989
Written and directed by Rob Hedden

Spoiler alert: moderate

Friday, October 22, 2021

We know the limits of nature. We know—or are we just afraid to test the limits of our certainty?


THE AWAKENING

1980
Directed by Mike Newell
Written by Cliff Bryant, Allan Scott, and Clive Exton (based on the novel The Jewel of the Seven Stars by Bram Stoker)

Spoiler alert: moderate

Wednesday, October 20, 2021

Census Bloodbath: For Christ's sake, spare me the speech! I've listened to it for a decade


The Eighth (oh God) Annual Great October Switcheroo!  Once again, we're crossing over with the wonderful Brennan Klein of Popcorn Culture and sometimes Alternate Ending, and I'm doing some of the 80s slashers he's catalogued as part of his Census Bloodbath project, while he's doing some of the old-timey sci-fi I've been hoarding as part of my own Cardboard Science archive.  This year, he finally gave me three pieces of the slasher genre's major arcana, such as I've been very subtly and surreptitiously hinting that I'd like to do this whole time; in return, I accidentally gave him three pieces of indecent crap.  Oops!  (But, seriously, apologies.)

HALLOWEEN 4: THE RETURN OF MICHAEL MYERS

1988
Directed by Dwight H. Little
Written by Alan B. McElroy, Danny Lipsius, Larry Rattner, and Benhamin Ruffner

Spoiler alert: moderate

Monday, October 18, 2021

The customary protests


THE LAST DUEL

2021
Directed by Ridley Scott
Written by Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, and Nicole Holofcener (based on the book The Last Duel: A True Story of Trial By Combat In Medieval France by Eric Jager)

Spoiler alert: pretty much inapplicable, but I don't say who dies!

Wednesday, October 13, 2021

The chrysanthemums are all ready—they deserve to bloom once


THE CURSE OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER


2006
Directed by Zhang Yimou
Written by Zhihong Bian and Zhang Yimou (based, loosely, on the play Thunderstorm by Cao Yu)

Spoiler alert: moderate

Monday, October 11, 2021

Why should I feel sorry? It was Claude Daigle who got drowned, not me


THE BAD SEED

1956
Directed by Mervyn LeRoy
Written by John Lee Mahin (based on the play by Maxwell Anderson based on the novel by William March)

Spoiler alert: moderate

Friday, October 8, 2021

A rare beauty in the north


HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS

2004
Directed by Zhang Yimou
Written by Li Feng, Peter Wu, Wang Bin, and Zhang Yimou

Spoiler alert: moderate verging on high

Monday, October 4, 2021

Sunday, October 3, 2021

All under heaven


HERO

2002 PRC/2004 USA
Directed by Zhang Yimou
Written by Feng Li, Bin Wang, and Zhang Yimou

Spoiler alert: the plot's about an attempted assassination of Qin Shi Huang, so maybe it's not the biggest spoiler to say that no, it doesn't come off; otherwise, moderate

Sunday, September 26, 2021

Farewell my concubine


LEGEND OF THE DEMON CAT

2017 PRC/2019 USA
Directed by Chen Kaige
Written by Hui-Ling Wang and Chen Kaige (based on the novel Sramana Kukai by Baku Yumenakura)

Spoiler alert: mild

Tuesday, September 21, 2021

The legendary weapons of China


SHANG-CHI AND THE LEGEND OF THE TEN RINGS

2021
Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton
Written by Dave Callaham, Andrew Lanham, and Destin Daniel Cretton

Spoiler alert: moderate

Monday, September 20, 2021

Cardboard Science: Jet age


CHAIN LIGHTNING

1950
Directed by Stuart Heisler
Written by Liam O'Brien, Vincent B. Evans, and Lester Cole

Spoiler alert: moderate

Thursday, September 16, 2021

She's a real basket case


MALIGNANT

2021
Directed by James Wan
Written by Ingrid Bisu, Akela Cooper, and James Wan

Spoiler alert: the determination of a spoiler warning is a subjective exercise, of course, but I will assert "moderate"

Sunday, September 12, 2021

Have you considered a centrifuge?


MADAME CURIE

1943
Directed by Mervyn LeRoy
Written by Paul Osborn, Paul Rameau, Walter Reisch, and Aldous Huxley (based on the book by Éve Curie)

Spoiler alert: inapplicable

Tuesday, September 7, 2021

If she doesn't scare you, that sounds about right


CRUELLA

2021
Directed by Craig Gillepsie
Written by Dana Fox, Tony McNamara, Aline Brosh McKenna, Kelly Marcel, and Steve Zissis

Spoiler alert: the puppies were all products of incest, apparently (moderate) 

"All women are rivals, fundamentally" (so which one's Joan Fontaine?)


THE DARK MIRROR

1946
Directed by Robert Siodmak
Written by Nunnally Johnson and Vladimir Pozner

Spoiler alert: moderate

Sunday, September 5, 2021

Try hitting him with the car again, that usually works in cases like these


RANDOM HARVEST

1942
Directed by Mervyn LeRoy
Written by Arthur Wimperis, George Froeschel, and Claudine West (based on the novel by James Hilton)

Spoiler alert: moderate

Saturday, September 4, 2021

You killed Charlotte! You bastards!


BLOSSOMS IN THE DUST

1941
Directed by Mervyn LeRoy
Written by Anita Loos and Ralph Wainwright

Spoiler alert: inapplicable? though Edna Gladney is not, I daresay, actually well-known, plus they make up a whole lot of stuff, so "moderate"

I loved you, I've never loved anyone else, I never shall


WATERLOO BRIDGE

1940
Directed by Mervyn LeRoy
Written by S.N. Behrman, Hans Rameau, and George Froeschel (based on the play by Robert E. Sherwood)

Spoiler alert: moderate (and severe, I suppose, for the 1931 film of the same name, which I recommend you never watch for fun)

Wednesday, September 1, 2021

And some, you'd assume, were good people


HOLD BACK THE DAWN

1941
Directed by Mitchell Leisen
Written by Charles Brackett, Billy Wilder, Richard Maibaum, and Manuel Reachi (based on the novel by Ketti Frings)

Spoiler alert: moderate

Friday, August 27, 2021

Tuesday, August 24, 2021

Chief? McLeod!


DETECTIVE STORY

1951
Directed by William Wyler
Written by Robert Wyler and Philip Yordan (based on the play by Sidney Kingsley)

Spoiler alert: moderate

Monday, August 23, 2021

Father knows best


THE DESPERATE HOURS

1955
Directed by William Wyler
Written by Joseph Hayes and Jay Dratler (based on the play by Joseph Hayes)

Spoiler alert: mild