The Frightened City (DVD) @ discount dvd online store
The Frightened City (DVD)
Featuring a pre-Bond Sean Connery as gruff Irish mob enforcer Paddy Damion, THE FRIGHTENED CITY earns its status as a notable example of British film noir. Set in London, the film makes a nod to American mob violence in one scene where Scotland Yard condemns the press for making analogies to Chicago gang uprisings. Czech actor Herbert Lom, perhaps best known for his role as Inspector Clouseau`s boss in THE PINK PANTHER, plays corrupt, villainous accountant Waldo Zhernikov. Zhernikov wants to consolidate each of London`s six crime organizations into one unstoppable syndicate. He recruits a relatively insignificant racketeer, Harry Foulcher (Alfred Marks) to run the reorganization, so that Zhernikov can remain the powerful, silent brains behind the operation. He also recruits Damion to enforce the new order. The plan at first goes well, with the various mob leaders appeased by the increased influx of money into their pockets. However, in response to Zhernikov`s spiraling power trip, Foulcher eventually breaks away, igniting an all-out mob gang war. To regain control, Zhernikov sends Damion to kill Foulcher. Damion, however, finds himself double-crossed and offered up to the police for the murder. On the run from both the police and the mob, Damion goes after Zhernikov and his cronies to set things straight.NR"
Director: John Lemont
ACTORS: Sean Connery, Herbert Lom, John Gregson, Alfred Marks, Yvonne Romain
Above Suspicion (DVD)
When a dedicated cop (Christopher Reeve) falls prey to a drug dealer`s bullet and is paralyzed for life, passions are aroused between his brother and wife. A generous insurance policy further piques his suspicions and rage, which explodes in a mysterious crime whose suspects are all above suspicion.R"
Director: Steven Schachter
ACTORS: Christopher Reeve, Joe Mantegna, Kim Cattrall, Finola Hughes
Guadalcanal Diary (DVD) Fox War Classics Wartime account of the Marine invasion of the Solomon Islands during WWII. Clearly intended to bolster home-front morale, but the better-than-average cast of tough guys and the proximity of the release to the events th...
Wartime account of the Marine invasion of the Solomon Islands during WWII. Clearly intended to bolster home-front morale, but the better-than-average cast of tough guys and the proximity of the release to the events themselves give the action an added urgency.
NR"
Director: Lewis Seiler
ACTORS: Preston Foster, Lloyd Nolan, Richard Conte, William Bendix, Anthony Quinn
The Man Who Wasn`t There (DVD)
The Coen brothers` THE MAN WHO WASN`T THERE is a brilliantly photographed black-and-white absurdist noir set in Santa Rosa, California, in 1949. Ed Crane (the outstanding Billy Bob Thornton) is a slow-moving, barely talking barber who doesn`t seem to want much out of life. He has virtually no relationship with his wife, Doris (Frances McDormand), who has more fun with her boss, Big Dave (James Gandolfini). But when a strange character (Jon Polito) lets it be known that he`s looking for a silent partner to finance his dream business (something he calls dry cleaning), Ed sees a possible way out of his doldrums. Just like any good James M. Cain novel (which the Coens cited as a major influence on the story), blackmail, deceit, violence, murder, and double crossing ensue, all with the magic Coen twists and turns.
THE MAN WHO WASN`T THERE looks simply magnificent; the cinematography, the outfits, and the set designs perfectly capture this intriguing post-WWII paranoid world embodied by misfits, cheats, simpletons, con men, and other ne`er-do-wells. Thornton, who also supplies the wonderfully droll narration, gives a bravura performance as Ed, the everyman who has never strayed from the straight and narrow--until now. Always with a Chesterfield in his mouth, he wanders from scene to scene almost as if he`s a spectator--even though he`s at the center of everything that goes on. The supporting cast, as usual in a Coen brothers film, is outstanding, including McDormand, Gandolfini, Polito, Tony Shalhoub, Richard Jenkins, and Scarlett Johansson as a young potential piano prodigy.R"
Director: Joel Coen
ACTORS: Billy Bob Thornton, Frances McDormand, James Gandolfini, Michael Badalucco, Katherine Borowitz
The Tailor of Panama (DVD)
Pierce Brosnan stars as the anti-Bond in maverick director John Boorman`s adaptation of legendary spy novelist John le Carre`s seamy tour of post-Noriega Panama. A British intelligence agent whose taste for gambling and other men`s wives has put him on the wrong side of his bosses at MI6, Andy Osnard (Brosnan) is posted to the backwater of Panama to atone for his sins. To that end, he recruits upscale tailor Harry Pendel (Geoffrey Rush), leveraging the man`s financial problems and questionable past to gain access to information about the activities of his elite clientele. Meanwhile, Osnard remains true to form, recruiting the personal services of lovely embassy official Francesca (Catherine McCormack), and attempting the same with Harry`s wife, Louisa (Jamie Lee Curtis). When Harry`s best friend Micki (Brendan Gleeson), a former member of the anti-Noriega underground, now a broken man, begins blustering about politics in front of Osnard, both of these con men begin to see him as the solution to their problems. The mundane tragedy of espionage familiar to le Carre`s Cold Warriors has been replaced by farce with the collapse of the Soviet Union. Boorman creates an atmosphere redolent with U.S.-abetted corruption in this well written and acted film, which also features playwright Harold Pinter in a cameo role.R"
Director: John Boorman
ACTORS: Geoffrey Rush, Pierce Brosnan, Jamie Lee Curtis, Brendan Gleeson, David Hayman
