Flesh and the Woman (1954)iMDB Rating: 6.1 Date Released : 1 June 1958 Genre : Drama Stars : Gina Lollobrigida, Jean-Claude Pascal, Arletty, Raymond Pellegrin. Pierre Martel is a brilliant lawyer in Paris who has fallen in love with a ravishing Italian girl, Sylvia Sorrego and they take up housekeeping on a luxurious scale beyond his means, and Pierre commits a few irregularities and is asked to resign the Bar Association. He heads for Algeria and tells Sylvia to sell everything they own and join him there. Sylvia is a no-show and Pierre, broke, with a ..." /> Movie Quality : BRrip Format : MKV Size : 700 MB
Pierre Martel is a brilliant lawyer in Paris who has fallen in love with a ravishing Italian girl, Sylvia Sorrego and they take up housekeeping on a luxurious scale beyond his means, and Pierre commits a few irregularities and is asked to resign the Bar Association. He heads for Algeria and tells Sylvia to sell everything they own and join him there. Sylvia is a no-show and Pierre, broke, with a dishonored name and having lost the woman he loves, dons the hair-shirt he wears the rest of the film and becomes a human wreck, and he joins the Foreign Legion. Pierre and his friends Mario and Fred engage in a bit of globe-hopping warfare for the next four years and are sent back to the camp in Algeria. There, they discover a house/castle near the camp called "The Last Stop" run by Madame Blanche, who spends most of her time reading playing cards. When she isn't reading cards, Madame Blanche runs a few prostitutes on the side and arranges for three ladies of the evening to spend a night in ...
Watch Flesh and the Woman Trailer :
Review :
Petit Jeu
Word to the wise: this is the remake of Jacques Feyder's great movie (1934) and you 'd better avoid Siodmak's version which is useless .Jean Claude Pascal ,Gina Lollobrigida and Marie Bell take on Pierre Richard -Wilm 's ,Marie Bell's and Françoise Rosay's parts .Lollobrigida is more beautiful than Marie Bell and that's it.
The screenplay (well summarized by the precedent users )was typically thirties when the Legion Etrangère (see also "L'Atlantide" "La Bandera" )was one of the audience's favorite subjects.In the fifties it was probably already old-fashioned .Hence the absurdity to redo.
Do not get me wrong : I like both Robert Siodmak and Arletty.But this movie does not do them justice.
Let's put it straight:the screenplay of "la red" is trite to a fault.So why is it so mesmerizing? It must be the form.Visually,it's a splendor: few directors can take advantage of the seaside landscapes as Emilio Fernandez did:think Lean' s "Ryan's daughter" or Jean Grémillon's "Remorques".Some will say that the symbolism -a breaker- is ponderous.The director was probably influenced by Bunuel for symbols abound.There's a big difference though:whereas Bunuel's obsessions often deal with sex cum religion,"la red" is thoroughly pagan.Rossanna Podesta epitomizes some kind of Goddess,of Eve before the fall .A Madonna's face but a sensual body and a false innocence :it was not surprising Robert Wise would cast her as Helen of Troy.
Even more disturbing than the threatening omnipresence of the sea is the script: 75% of "la red " is devoid of any dialog.Looks and smiles tell everything (the meal is a good example) Two males and a female ,that's no good,one character says.All are caught up in "the net " (the beach ) ,a dead end.The only way to get out of this world is the sea.
The Rose Bowl Story (1952)iMDB Rating: 5.1 Date Released : 24 August 1952 Genre : Comedy, Drama, Romance, Sport Stars : Marshall Thompson, Vera Miles, Richard Rober, Natalie Wood Movie Quality : HDrip Format : MKV Size : 700 MB
The newly crowned Rose Bowl Princess and a tough but tender football player find the California Rose Bowl is an area for their budding romance.
Watch The Rose Bowl Story Trailer :
Review :
Simple, corny, yet enjoyable movie.
A quaint, if corny, image of Americana in the near-postwar era. College football star (who will be playing in the Rose Bowl) is in love with poor girl. Jim Backus as poor girl's dad in a role he'll refine for Rebel W/O A Cause. Typical gags such as worn chair with springs sticking out. While the movie is typical of so many B movies (thin, simple plot), I watched this while staying up all night on New Year's Eve and enjoyed it greatly.
The Redhead from Wyoming (1953)iMDB Rating: 6.0 Date Released : 8 January 1953 Genre : Western Stars : Maureen O'Hara, Alex Nicol, William Bishop, Robert Strauss. In Wyoming Territory, a range war is brewing between entrenched cattle barons and new settlers. Cattle king Reece Duncan is opposed by ambitious gambler Jim Averell, who imports his old flame, shapely saloon queen Kate Maxwell, and sets her up as an alternative cattle buyer. As matters build toward violence, Kate finds she's being taken advantage of. But her only potential ally in staving off ..." /> Movie Quality : HDrip Format : MKV Size : 870 MB
In Wyoming Territory, a range war is brewing between entrenched cattle barons and new settlers. Cattle king Reece Duncan is opposed by ambitious gambler Jim Averell, who imports his old flame, shapely saloon queen Kate Maxwell, and sets her up as an alternative cattle buyer. As matters build toward violence, Kate finds she's being taken advantage of. But her only potential ally in staving off carnage is seemingly mild-mannered sheriff Stan Blaine...who distrusts her.
Watch The Redhead from Wyoming Trailer :
Review :
Maverick, where are you going
Okay, Maureen O'hara's dresses are over the top and half the cast in most scenes, seems to be thinking, "why is she wearing that". Still, the movie has some interesting qualities and good moments. First, we have a woman who not only looks pretty and sexy, but can ride fast, think and use a gun. The writer, Polly James, is probably responsible for the fact that we have an interesting and strong woman character in the lead, a refreshing change for a 1953 Western. Second, the film makes several references to Maverick. First Jeanne Cooper (36 years on the Guiding light soap opera later) gets called a maverick, then Maureen O'hara starts referring to Sheriff Stain Blaine as "Maverick". This was four years before the "Maverick" television series and probably this movie was an inspiration for it. William Bishop, as the heavy, Jim Averell, is a much more interesting character than the drifter Sheriff played by Alex Nicol. Bishop is also a better actor than Nicol. The plot twists are silly, but fun. For example, at one point, when you think there is going to be a battle between two gangs, the sheriff convinces everybody to throw their gun belts on a wagon. Surprisingly everybody does it. I just wondered how they were going to get the fifty or so gun belts redistributed back to their original owners when they left. There's some fun in watching Dennis Weaver (later "Gunsmoke" and "McCloud") in one of his earliest roles. He's fine. Also Jack Kelley who went on to play Bart Maverick in the television series is around in a slightly smaller part. Altogether, this is a rather pleasant 80 minutes. Maureen O'Hara, feminists and Western fans should especially enjoy it. Incidentally, costume designer, Edward Stevenson, went on to win an Oscar in 1960 for "the Facts of Life." He designed costumes for over 190 movies. Guess, everybody has an off-day.
The Good Die Young (1954)iMDB Rating: 6.7 Date Released : 1 November 1954 Genre : Crime, Drama, Film-Noir, Thriller Stars : Laurence Harvey, Gloria Grahame, Richard Basehart, Joan Collins. Three good men - a broken boxer, an American veteran trying to win back his mother-dominated wife, and an air force sergeant married to a faithless actress - are corrupted by Miles Ravenscourt, an amoral "gentleman." Because they need money, they let Miles lure them into his scheme to rob a postal van with a large cash cargo." /> Movie Quality : BRrip Format : MKV Size : 700 MB
Three good men - a broken boxer, an American veteran trying to win back his mother-dominated wife, and an air force sergeant married to a faithless actress - are corrupted by Miles Ravenscourt, an amoral "gentleman." Because they need money, they let Miles lure them into his scheme to rob a postal van with a large cash cargo.
Watch The Good Die Young Trailer :
Review :
He did die young
What a sizzling lead performance in this superb British noir film by Larry Harvey! And what a terrible irony in the title, since Larry died at the age of only 45 in 1973. I remember him so well on the day walking in Hampstead with his little daughter Domino that he told me he was dying of stomach cancer. I asked him if he were certain, if there were not something 'they could do', but he merely looked at me with his ironical smile, a resigned one, and said no, he was dying. His nonchalance did not desert him. He shrugged it off sadly but with his ingrained insouciance. His reaction to his own imminent demise had no self-pity in it, but was full of pathos, as he regretted that he would not be able to watch Domino grow up. Alas, she too has now gone. He also worried about what would happen to Paulene, who is still as glamorous as she was then. But how sadly some meet their ends. Gloria Grahame, who also sizzles in this film, only lived to 58, and Stanley Baker only made it to 48. So yes, the good die young. But Joan Collins, ostensibly only 21 at the time (but already in her ninth feature film role!), is still with us and currently working on her 119th film! This film, brilliantly directed by Lewis Gilbert (and I noted that Jack Clayton, himself later to be such a brilliant director, is credited here as Associate Producer), is a terrific psychological study of how a group of desperate men can come together to commit a crime which they would otherwise never commit. Their individual stories are all fully sketched by a cast of wonderful pros. The four men are Richard Baseheart, John Ireland, and Stanley Baker, led by the mischievous, amoral, and as it turns out, probably psychotic, Larry Harvey, as the character known as 'Rave'. The devilish, pathological scheming of 'Rave' is brilliantly shown, and in the scenes towards the end of the film, Larry is positively terrifying. Robert Morley has a brief look-in which he slightly overdoes, but then he always had a propensity to overact, especially with the excessive widening of his eyes at crucial moments. Gloria Grahame does a wonderful job of playing a lascivious, 'gorgeous pouting', totally amoral movie starlet married to the long-suffering John Ireland. Ireland doesn't know whether he wants to kiss or to strangle her, as she is so exasperating but also so irresistible. And it was not only Ireland who found her so, but a large part of the Western world. Gloria Grahame certainly had 'that something', and more besides. The most polished performance in the film is probably that by Margaret Leighton, who later married Larry in 1957 (they divorced four years later). In the film she anticipates later true events by playing Larry's older wife. She is so insouciant and acts with such effortless ease that it is like watching olive oil coat the lens. In between Margaret Leighton's arched eyebrows there lurked a great deal of intelligence, a fine sense of humour, and an appreciation of irony. The stories behind the individual characters in this film are harrowing, and Joan Collins as an emotional prisoner of her harridan mother is particularly typical of the time. In those days, girls really did feel unable to leave their mothers and were easily emotionally blackmailed by them, whereas today the young are so indifferent to lasting attachments that a parent is merely another avatar in a video game, to be tossed aside when convenient. The central character remains the spoilt, narcissistic, pleasure-loving and wholly irresponsible 'Rave', who suffers from that condition known to psychologists as 'infantile omnipotence', and who reacts to the word 'No!' with a violent tantrum. The botched burglary and its aftermath is painful to watch, but I dare not say whether any of the vexed situations which drove the participants into it are resolved, for that would give away too much. Certainly, this is one of the finer British efforts in this genre during the 1950s.
Prisoners of the Casbah (1953)iMDB Rating: 5.5 Date Released : 3 November 1953 Genre : Adventure Stars : Gloria Grahame, Cesar Romero, Turhan Bey, Nestor Paiva. A typical Sam Katzman sand-and-sandals saga that is better than his later "Harem Scarum" only because this one doesn't have Elvis Presley. Gloria Grahame is the princess, Turhan Bey is the Captain of the Guard and Cesar Romero is the oily villain who has his sights set on Gloria and her father's throne. Romero and his henchmen cause Gloria, disguised as a boy (what a waste!), and Turhan to flee ..." /> Movie Quality : BRrip Format : MKV Size : 870 MB
A typical Sam Katzman sand-and-sandals saga that is better than his later "Harem Scarum" only because this one doesn't have Elvis Presley. Gloria Grahame is the princess, Turhan Bey is the Captain of the Guard and Cesar Romero is the oily villain who has his sights set on Gloria and her father's throne. Romero and his henchmen cause Gloria, disguised as a boy (what a waste!), and Turhan to flee to the Casbah, where they plot to strike back at Romero.
Watch Prisoners of the Casbah Trailer :
Review :
One more One Thousand and One Nights Tale
Well, let's not forget that's also one more Sam Katzman production. The (IN)FAMOUS Sam Katzman, who haunted Columbia Studios for many years, with his cheap movies. This one is colorful, watchable, bearable and not as disappointing as other productions from this era. I don't understand what the mighty Gloria Grahame did in that film. Perhaps she opened the wrong studio entrance. Gloria Grahame who electrified the audiences in Fritz Lang's Big Heat, and the very same year !!!
Sam Katzman was only the producer, and the interesting Richard Bare the director. As far as I know, he did not work with Katzman on another picture. But perhaps I am wrong. I'll check. Katzman was the owner of this one indeed. Technicians are always the same, when you watch the credits, including the music score artist: Mischa Bakalaneikoff...who performed on almost all Sam Katzman films. Perhpas all of them. And not only Katzman ones.
Back to Prisoners of the Casbah, it takes place in Algiers, but it could have been Bagdad or Damascus. Who cares?...
Katzman has done better - Siren of Bagdad and Serpent of the Nile, with a surprising ending - but Universal productions starring Jon Hall and Maria Montez were a thousand times better. No comparison. Even if this one is - I repeat - not charmless.
Non è mai troppo tardi (1953)iMDB Rating: 3.9 Date Released : 16 May 1953 Genre : Drama, Fantasy, Mystery Stars : Paolo Stoppa, Isa Barzizza, Marcello Mastroianni, Giulio Donnini." /> Movie Quality : HDrip Format : MKV Size : 700 MB
Flesh and the Woman (1954)iMDB Rating: 6.1
