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Burt Lancaster and Edward G. Robinson are excellent in this adaptation of Arthur Miller’s award-winning Broadway play, about a family torn apart by the denial of dark secrets from the WW2 homefront. Mady Christians is the mother who refuses to accept her son’s death, and Louisa Horton and Howard Duff the brother and sister trying to understand how their father could ship defective war materiel responsible for needless combat deaths. The show is powerful, even with Miller’s social message muted — and director Irving Reis gets it all on screen.

All My Sons

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1948 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 94 min. / Street Date January 4, 2022 / available through Kino Lorber / 24.95

Starring: Edward G. Robinson, Burt Lancaster, Mady Christians, Louisa Horton, Howard Duff, Lloyd Gough, Harry Morgan, Arlene Francis, Elisabeth Fraser.

Cinematography: Russell Metty

Art Directors: Hilyard Brown, Bernard Herzbrun

Film Editor: Ralph Dawson

Original Music: Leith Stevens

Written for...

Powerhouse Indicator moves forward to their fourth fancy box of noirs from the studio of Harry Cohn, six pictures stretching from the postwar boom to the end of the original classic noir era. This time around we have some notable directors, and a nice selection of stars — Dennis O’Keefe, George Murphy, Fred MacMurray, Kim Novak, Jean Simmons, Rory Calhoun and Richard Conte. Kim Novak makes her starring debut as a femme fatale; noir icon Richard Conte shines in a movie that marks a turn into a new kind of existential, paranoid thriller. And speaking of paranoid, we again get to lighten up with another selection of theme-appropriate Three Stooges shorts.

Columbia Noir #4

Region B Blu-ray

Powerhouse Indicator

1948-1957 / B&w + Color / 1:85 widescreen, 1:37 Academy / Street Date September 27, 2021 / available from Powerhouse Films UK / 49.99

Starring: Louis Hayward, Dennis O’Keefe; George Murphy; Fred MacMurray, Kim Novak; Jean Simmons, Rory Calhoun; Dennis O’Keefe,...

This unique proto-slasher is not a rip-off of The Exorcist and for my taste is more meaningful, despite associating innocent children with horrible killings and religious repression. Director Alfred Sole uses these edgy elements to whip up an involving mystery, and a committed cast lifts it high above the exploitation gutter. Great extras, especially a commentary by Richard Harland Smith.

Alice, Sweet Alice

Blu-ray

Arrow Video

1976 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 98 min. / Communion / Street Date August 6, 2019 / 39.95

Starring: Linda Miller, Paula Sheppard, Mildred Clinton, Niles McMaster, Tom Signorelli, Brooke Shields, Miss Lillian Roth.

Film Editor: Edward Salier

Original Music: Stephen Lawrence

Written by Rosemary Ritvo, Alfred Sole

Produced by Richard K. Rosenberg

Directed by Alfred Sole

Back in the 1970s horror films didn’t always get a fair critical reception, so it was difficult to know which ones were the winners. Alice, Sweet Alice is an accomplished post- Exorcist shocker about mayhem in a dysfunctional Catholic family.

George Roy Hill, who won an Oscar for directing Paul Newman and Robert Redford in the 1973 box office hit The Sting, died Friday in Manhattan of complications from Parkinson's disease; he was 81. Hill also directed Newman and Redford in their first film together, the hugely popular comedy-western Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), which received Oscar nominations for Best Picture and Director, and won four, including one for the song "Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head." Hill started his directing career during television's Golden Age in the `50s, helming such live dramas as A Night to Remember and Judgment at Nuremberg. In 1957 he moved to Broadway, directing acclaimed productions of Look Homeward, Angel and Tennessee Williams' Period of Adjustment, which later became his directorial film debut in 1962, starring a young Jane Fonda. Hill garnered attention for the 1964 Peter Sellers comedy The World of Henry Orient, and after taking on big budget films Hawaii and Thoroughly Modern Millie, cemented his status as a breezy, iconoclastic director with Butch Cassidy as well as the The Sting, which received ten Oscar nominations and won seven. Known for taking on challenging material (and defying studio control), Hill also tackled two difficult novel adaptations . Slaughterhouse-Five (1972) and The World According to Garp (1982) . as well as the `70s comedies The Great Waldo Pepper (starring Redford) and Slap Shot (starring Newman). Hill enjoyed later acclaim with the gentle 1979 comedy A Little Romance, starring Laurence Olivier and a 14-year-old Diane Lane, but ended his career quietly with 1984's The Little Drummer Girl and the 1988 Chevy Chase comedy Funny Farm. Hill is survived by his former wife, Louisa Horton, as well as two sons, two daughters, and twelve grandchildren. --Prepared by IMDb staff...