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Cults are scary enough in real life. As a general rule, they infatuate your loved ones, drain their bank accounts, abuse them and make them think they like it, and in absolute worst cases -- think Jonestown and Heaven's Gate -- it all ends in mass death. Making that scarier for horror movies can be tough, but it usually involves actual supernatural powers. Horror movies involving cults offer them the one thing reality can't: legitimacy. In a fictional story, the dangerous demon or deity worshipped by the cultists can be real, and provably so.

Like actual cult involvement, a significant chunk of horror movies about cults end badly for their main characters. Real-world cult deprogramming takes a long time, and isn't cinematic, so in the movies, there's usually either a simpler solution, like killing the leader, or no solution at all. Satan is frequently involved, either explicitly or implicitly, in...

The holidays are upon us, so whether you’re looking for film-related gifts or simply want to get for yourself some of the finest this year had to offer, we have a gift guide for you. Including must-have books on filmmaking, the best from the Criterion Collection and other home-video lines, subscriptions, magazines, music, and more, dive in below.

4K & Blu-ray Box Sets

There’s no better gift than an epic film collection, and 2024 was an embarrassment of riches thanks to a number of box sets. The king of them all, especially if you’re looking for a gift for a burgeoning cinephile, is Criterion’s massive CC40, collecting 40 landmark films form their 40-year history. It’s not the only stellar set from the company, of course, as I adored the essential Chantal Akerman Masterpieces, 1968–1978, Éric Rohmer’s Tales of the Four Seasons, Gregg Araki’s Teen Apocalypse Trilogy, Three Revolutionary Films by Ousmane Sembène,...

NYC Weekend Watch is our weekly round-up of repertory offerings.

Bam

A series of “silent” movies includes films by Tati, Miguel Gomes, and Chaplin.

Film at Lincoln Center

The new 4K restoration of Sergei Parajanov’s Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors continues.

Museum of the Moving Image

The Seventh Victim and The Fog play on Friday; a Godzilla series gets underway; The Indian in the Cupboard plays on 35mm Saturday and Sunday.

Metrograph

Rio Bravo, Funny Games, Insomnia, Kung Fu Hustle, The Outfit, and The Good, the Bad, the Weird show on 35mm; My Crazy Uncle (or Aunt), Insomnia, and Crush the Strong, Help the Weak begin.

Roxy Cinema

Dancer in the Dark and Scream play on 35mm, while Suspiria and Without You I’m Nothing also screen.

Museum of Modern Art

A massive retrospective of Portuguese cinema continues, while the films of Mohammad Reza Aslani screen.

IFC Center

4K restorations...

Sure, there are plenty of new and classic horror movies on streaming this year. But there’s nothing that beats the sensation of sliding a disc into a Blu-ray player. It harkens back to the thrill of going to your local video store, picking out a scary movie and taking it home.

We thought we’d celebrate that sensation by picking out our very favorite new home video releases for this Halloween, a mixture of obscure favorites, outright classics, near-hits from some of our favorite modern filmmakers and a new movies that gets a terrific home video treatment. Grab some candy, your comfiest pajamas and settle in for the night with these gems.

Janus “Demon Pond”

One of the season’s must-have titles is “Demon Pond,” a bizarro, late-‘70s nightmare from Masahiro Shinoda, whose “Pale Flower” and “Double Suicide” are already a part of the Criterion Collection. Shinoda updates...

Things are getting spooky over at the Criterion collection, and it's not just because Beetlejuice's Winona Ryder recently stopped by the closet. For the next 24 hours, the famed purveyors of physical media will be offering a 50% off flash sale, including new releases like Gummo, Gregg Araki's Teen Apocalypse Trilogy,...

The horror films produced by Val Lewton for Rko Studios throughout the 1940s all share DNA, though the third and fourth films in the cycle, Jacques Tournier’s I Walked with a Zombie and Mark Robson’s The Seventh Victim, seem to be especially connected. Both were released in 1943 and concern protagonists who enter hidden worlds beyond their understanding, worlds that allude to rot existing in conventional society should one care to acknowledge it. The protagonists’ growing awareness parallels our own, though in each case the viewer is left with little hope for reform or closure. They have glimpsed nightmare realms and are humbled by what they discover about their societies as well as themselves.

Notions of reform are particularly relevant to I Walked with a Zombie, which offers an unusually nuanced portrait of the legacy of colonialism. Betsy Connell (Frances Dee), a nurse from snowy Ottawa, is hired to...

Directed by horror master George A. Romero, the box office smash, Night of the Living Dead, arrives on 4K Uhd on 7th October. Shot on a shoestring budget the movie is a great story of independent cinema and became one of the most influential films of all time.

Following on 14th October comes I Walked with a Zombie and The Seventh Victim on 4K Uhd and Blu-ray™ . Terror lives in the shadows in a pair of mesmerizingly moody horror milestones conjured from the imagination of Val Lewton, the visionary producer-auteur who turned our fears of the unseen and the unknown into haunting excursions into existential dread.

To celebrate this release we have a chance for 2 lucky winers to win a copy of all 3 movies.

Criterion Collection Halloween Giveaway

Night of the Living Dead

New 4K Restoration

Shot outside Pittsburgh on a shoestring budget, by a band of filmmakers determined to make their mark,...

This October, Spirit Entertainment, in collaboration with The Criterion Collection, is set to delight horror fans with the release of two seminal films, Night of the Living Dead and a double feature of I Walked with a Zombie and The Seventh Victim. These releases promise to offer a fresh perspective on classic horror with pristine 4K restorations and an array of special features that delve into the making and legacy of these groundbreaking films.

Night of the Living Dead: A Landmark in Independent Cinema

Directed by the legendary George A. Romero, Night of the Living Dead will be available in a new 4K Uhd restoration on 7th October. Shot on a modest budget just outside Pittsburgh, this 1968 masterpiece became a midnight hit and a box-office sensation, fundamentally altering the horror genre. The film’s simple yet gripping plot follows a group of strangers trapped in a farmhouse as they fend...

Does anyone remember the Satanic panic? It was a bizarre mix of urban legend, conspiracy theory, media frenzy, and religious fanaticism that occurred primarily in the early 1980s. The phenomenon was marked by thousands of alleged incidents of ritualized abuse, often involving children, and desecrations reportedly perpetrated across the nation by scores of so-called Satanic cults in towns and cities everywhere. While many of the reports were later found to be baseless—and the initial investigative techniques used to supposedly substantiate them discredited—the aftermath of the panic remains with us today in the shape of things such as QAnon and PizzaGate.

The roots of the Satanic panic were found in the late 1960s and ‘70s, thanks to books like The Satan Seller, social changes like the rise of the counterculture in the national zeitgeist, infamous events like the Manson Family murders, the introduction of new religions into American society,...

A pair of moody horror milestones from producer Val Lewton, I Walked with a Zombie and The Seventh Victim are being paired up for a new release from The Criterion Collection.

The double feature is getting a 4K Uhd + Blu-ray combo edition as well as a Blu-ray edition and a DVD edition, with the release date for all three versions set for October 8, 2024.

Terror lives in the shadows in a pair of mesmerizingly moody horror milestones conjured from the imagination of Val Lewton, the visionary producer-auteur who turned our fears of the unseen and the unknown into haunting excursions into existential dread.

As head of Rko’s B-horror-movie unit during the 1940s, Lewton, working with directors such as Jacques Tourneur and Mark Robson, brought a new sophistication to the genre by wringing chills not from conventional movie monsters but from brooding atmosphere, suggestion, and psychosexual unease.

Suffused with ritual, mysticism,...

Likely that Gummo‘s most often been seen on a DVD passed among friends like cinematic contraband. Though I doubt that legacy will ever quite die (maybe now it’s Mkv files), that history makes all the more notable a 4K upgrade put into circulation by Criterion. They’ll be releasing Harmony Korine’s totemic feature debut in October alongside a Val Lewton double of I Walked with a Zombie and The Seventh Victim and Masahiro Shinoda’s Demon Pond. Per the traditional October viewing, one could say that all four are, in their own ways, horror.

Meanwhile, G. W. Pabst’s immortal Pandora’s Box, featuring the never-bested Louise Brooks, gets a Blu-ray upgrade.

See cover art below and more at Criterion:

The post The Criterion Collection’s October Lineup Includes Val Lewton and Harmony Korine on 4K first appeared on The Film Stage.

With one foot planted firmly in the Kiss Me Deadly era of film noir and the other closer to The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, writer-director Allen Baron’s Blast of Silence begins with a brutal, uncompromising invocation of birth and ends with an almost mystically sensitive death. The story of socially isolated hit man Frankie (Baron) who comes to terms with his deferred need for human connection just in time for, one, Christmas and, two, a job that will require him to be especially cold-hearted, Blast of Silence is less a manifestation of the labyrinthine plot trajectories of great noir than an early harbinger of the DIY moxie of the American independent movement.

Baron’s blunt, almost perfunctory story doesn’t reveal much about the inner workings of its central character, instead taking advantage of the downright dull aspects of New York City, a city that films (especially noir...

One of the unique aspects of the horror films produced by Val Lewton at Rko in the 1940s is the seriousness with which they discuss matters of mental illness. Even today, mental health issues are often tiptoed around, but in the forties, they were practically taboo. As discussed in previous entries in this column, Cat People (1942) is largely about repression and The Body Snatcher (1945) deals with guilt, paranoia, and psychopathy. The Seventh Victim (1943), one of the lesser-seen entries in the Lewton cycle, is about loneliness, the depression that stems from it, and suicidal ideation. It externalizes the inner struggles between the light and darkness that use the mind as a battlefield and demand a choice between life and death. Because of the unflinching way The Seventh Victim approaches the subject of suicide, this should be a considered a content warning for the discussion to come later. But first, some background on the film itself.

I'd thought, going into Assassin Club, that the tale of a hitman who discovers that he has to kill seven others before he gets killed himself might be riffing on Robert Sheckley's The Seventh Victim (filmed as The 10th Victim) or The Running Man or Fight Club or the latter John Wick films or almost anything else. In part that's because one doesn't expect a startling amount of originality from a film that seems to be named after a homicidal chocolate bar.

In retrospect it was wrong to hope for even that much. If it has a saving grace it's that it's not two hours long, and one hopes that those involved had some nice evenings out in Turin while filming. That's Turin which is called upon to double for other cities, albeit with the aid of some stock establishing footage. While Glasgow might often be Gotham or New York,...

By Hank Reineke

A March 1945 notice in the Los Angeles Times reported that following his return to Hollywood from a Uso camp tour, Boris Karloff was to begin work on a Rko Radio production titled Chamber of Horrors. The film was to be produced by Val Lewton, the producer who had already brought to the screen such psychological-horrors as Cat People (1942), I Walked with a Zombie (1943) and Curse of the Cat People (1944). Karloff had already appeared in a pair of Lewton’s horror-melodramas for Rko, The Body Snatcher (1945) and Isle of the Dead (1945). The actor had been enjoying his freelance status of late. Recent castings in a series of mad scientist films (1940-1942) for Columbia solidified Karloff’s reputation as cinema’s preeminent boogeyman - even in roles sans grotesque makeup appliances. So the engagement of the actor for Chamber of Horrors was properly trumpeted in a 1945 Variety notice as...

Gay Sewer Gremlin. After closing out November with some Satanists in The Seventh Victim, we kicked off December with the queer-coded antichrist in Fear No Evil before getting into the rape-revenge weeds with David Fincher’s The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. Now it’s time to really get into the holiday spirit with what may be one of the kinkiest […]...

New remastered restorations of Val Lewton pictures? We’re there. This terrific double bill gives us two Lewton shockers that are in no way ‘lesser’. The progressive psycho killer picture The Ghost Ship suffered a legal setback and disappeared for almost fifty years; it’s a masterpiece of taste and tone. Bedlam is a costume picture with an ideal role for Boris Karloff, and multiple eerie moments worthy of Edgar Allan Poe. Both movies exhibit interesting storytelling techniques, too. Rko should have promoted Lewton to A pictures, as they did his collaborators Jacques Tourneur, Robert Wise and Mark Robson.

The Ghost Ship + Bedlam

Blu-ray

Warner Archive Collection

1943 + 1946 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / Available at Amazon.com / Street Date October 12, 2021 / 24.99

Starring: Richard Dix, Edith Barrett; Boris Karloff, Anna Lee.

Cinematography: Nicholas Musuraca

Art Directors: Albert S. D’Agostino, Walter E. Keller

Original Music: Roy Webb

Written by Donald Henderson Clarke; Carlos Keith & Mark Robson...

The best horror film of the 1990s and perhaps the only serial killer picture post- Psycho that can stand on equal terms with Hitchcock’s classic, Jonathan Demme and Ted Tally’s adaptation of the Thomas Harris novel is a standout experience in every way. Not all 4K Ultra HD encodings are worth crowing about but this one is — the added visual detail and especially the contrast range really make a difference. Kino offers a good selection of extras as well, including a teaser trailer I haven’t seen for years and a fine Tim Lucas commentary.

The Silence of the Lambs

4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1991 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 118 min. / available through Kino Lorber / Street Date October 19, 2021 / 39.95

Starring: Jodie Foster, Anthony Hopkins, Scott Glenn, Ted Levine, Anthony Heald, Brooke Smith, Tracey Walter, Kenneth Utt, Paul Lazar, Adelle Lutz, Obba Babatundé, Diane Baker, Roger Corman, Ron Vawter, Charles Napier,...

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By Hank Reineke

All evidence suggests that Mark Robson was producer Val Lewton’s “go to” director. Or, at the very least, for his celebrated series of psychological horror and mystery films released by Rko Radio Pictures 1943-1946. Of the six thrillers produced, Robson would helm no fewer than four (The Seventh Victim (1943), Ghost Ship (1943), Isle of the Dead (1945) and Bedlam (1946). The latter two are perhaps the best remembered of the four as both would feature free-agent boogeyman Boris Karloff in a starring role. Though the first of the Lewton horrors, The Cat People (1942, directed by Jacques Tourneur) is likely the best celebrated of the six films overall, I’ve always held a special fondness for Isle of the Dead. Now, revisiting the film with this stunning Blu ray transfer, I’m as impressed as ever with Robson’s claustrophobic direction, the thoughtful...

With April lurking right around the corner once again, that means we're close to the halfway point to another All Hallows' Eve, and Shudder is celebrating in style with their largest slate of programming to date, including the return of Samuel Zimmerman's “Halfway to Halloween” Hotline, the season 2 premiere of Creepshow, the 2021 Fangoria Chainsaw Awards, Train to Busan Presents: Peninsula, In Search of Darkness: Part II, and a bunch of other new additions!

Below, you can check out the full list of titles coming to Shudder this April, and be sure to visit Shudder's website to learn more about the streaming service and their scary good lineup!

Press Release: New York – March 4, 2021 – April showers bring a packed lineup of new horror films and series to Shudder, AMC Networks’ premium streaming service for horror, thriller and the supernatural, for its annual ‘Halfway to Halloween Month.’ With April marking the halfway point to Halloween,...

Horror cinema, by nature, is most often concerned with the uncanny. The fantastic. The grotesque. Despite the genre’s largely fictional preoccupations, however, the macabre has always been a viable outlet for political and social commentary. In fact, the American horror film provides an often reliable indicator as to which forms of societal unrest plague the nation at any given time. Perhaps more than any other filmic genre, horror has provided an outlet for filmmakers to document government fallacy and real- life atrocity through the filter of fantastic, often supernatural, narratives. By hyperbolizing societal conflicts like war, civil unrest, poverty, and corruption, a good political horror film seeks not only to draw attention to such issues, but also to make them seem manageable by comparison. Take, for example, the premise of George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead (1978). While Americans needn’t worry themselves over hordes of zombies rising from...

With a seemingly endless amount of streaming options—not only the titles at our disposal, but services themselves–each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit platforms. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.

Happiest Season (Clea DuVall)

Happiest Season, Hollywood’s first major lesbian Christmas rom-com, has everything you’d expect from a Christmas movie: snow; sweaters; mismatched family members coming together under one roof; characters saying they hate Christmas and then succumbing to holiday cheer; conflict; satisfying resolution. Director and co-writer Clea DuVall embraces cliches, but filtering them through a lesbian perspective allows old tropes to gain new context. Family dysfunction carries extra weight when viewed through the lens of heteronormativity. The happy couple’s falling-out hits deeper because it’s wrought with the anxiety of coming out. Their fairytale ending feels all the more precious because it’s hard won,...

A new drama about Tudor queen Anne Boleyn, starring Jodie Turner-Smith, has found its Henry VIII.

British actor Mark Stanley has been cast as the iconic monarch. Best known for playing Grenn in the HBO series “Game of Thrones,” Stanley has also had starring roles in “Kajaki,” “Our Kind of Traitor” and “Dickensian.”

Boleyn was the Queen of England from 1533 to 1536 as the second wife of King Henry VIII. Their tempestuous marriage, and her execution for treason, made her one of the most colorful figures in English history. The Fable Pictures drama for U.K. broadcaster Channel 5 will explore the final months of Boleyn’s life from her perspective, and will follow her as she struggles to survive, to secure a future for her daughter, and to challenge the powerful patriarchy closing in around her.

The hotly anticipated series — which is shaping up to be one of the most...

The November 2020 lineup for The Criterion Channel has been unveiled, toplined by a Claire Denis retrospective, including the brand-new restoration of Beau travail, along with Chocolat, No Fear, No Die, Nenette and Boni, Towards Mathilde, 35 Shots of Rum, and White Material.

There will also be a series celebrating 30 years of The Film Foundation, featuring a new interview with Martin Scorsese by Ari Aster, as well as a number of their most essential restorations, including films by Jia Zhangke, Ritwik Ghatak, Luchino Visconti, Shirley Clarke, Med Hondo, and more.

There’s also David Lynch’s new restoration of The Elephant Man, retrospectives dedicated to Ngozi Onwurah, Nadav Lapid, and Terence Nance, a new edition of the series Queersighted titled Queer Fear, featuring a new conversation between series programmer Michael Koresky and filmmaker and critic Farihah Zaman, and much more.

See the lineup below and learn more on the official site.

Today’s noir forecast is vice, kidnapping, murder, suicide, narcotics and a sleazy stolen baby racket! Kino’s third volume of Universal-International pix contains two seldom-screened quality urban noirs. Expect genuine dark themes in these sizable-budget location noirs filmed before Universal pulled most production back onto its one-size-fits-all backlot sets. Barbara Stanwyck dominates one show, while noir stalwarts Richard Conte and Dennis O’Keefe anchor the other two dramas, with dynamic showings by Coleen Gray, Edith Barrett, Peggy Dow, Jeanette Nolan, Meg Randall and especially Gale Storm.

Film Noir the Dark Side of Cinema III

Abandoned, The Lady Gambles, The Sleeping City

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1949-50 / B&w / 1:37 Academy / 79,99,86 min. / Street Date June 9, 2020 / available through Kino Lorber / 34.99

Starring: Dennis O’Keefe, Gale Storm, Jeff Chandler, Meg Randall, Raymond Burr, Marjorie Rambeau, Jeanette Nolan, Mike Mazurki, Will Kuluva, David Clarke; Barbara Stanwyck, Robert Preston, Stephen McNally, Edith Barrett, John Hoyt,...

This the nest review contains spoilers.

The book world already has a term for Scotland-set detective novels – Tartan Noir. There’s an increasing need for similar to describe the emerging genre of glossy BBC domestic thrillers set north of the border. Trust Me, The Replacement, The Victim, The Cry and now The Nest… all miniseries, all stories about women, all set against the dramatic backdrop of the highlands and the steel-glass shine of regenerated city centres and architect-designed residences.

Visit Scotland Noir, maybe? Minted-Lassie Thrillers?

The Nest’s minted lassie is Emily (Sophie Rundle), a Glasgow music teacher married to local-boy-done-good Dan (Martin Compston). They live in a dream loch-side house and appear to have it all. Love, money, a devoted marriage and quite definitely, a place in the world. What they don’t – and can’t – have, is a child.

We meet Emily and Dan having exhausted their IVF...

Hammer’s key Satanic Mass epic comes to Blu-ray in a terrific improved transfer. Christopher Lee’s pitched battle with Charles Gray’s necromancer Mocata has long been a favorite of fans of symbolist rituals with candles, magic circles, Christian icons, etc. We’re happy to report that after all the monstrous demons and human sacrifices, good prevails through the agency of an ordinary housewife, who can sling a Latin incantation faster than you can say ‘The Goat of Mendes.’ This is yet another big-deal Hammer disc for 2019 — we also get a look at the earlier Blu-ray with its revised special effects.

The Devil Rides Out

Blu-ray

Scream Factory

1968 / Color / 1:66 widescreen / 95 min. / The Devil’s Bride / Street Date October 29, 2019 / Available from Scream Factory / 27.99

Starring: Christopher Lee, Charles Gray, Nike Arrighi, Leon Greene, Patrick Mower, Gwen Ffrangcon Davies, Sarah Lawson, Paul Eddington, Rosalyn Landor.

Cinematography: Arthur Grant

Film Editors: James Needs,...

You can tell that the Halloween season is getting closer, between various retailers already donning their shelves with tons of decorations, the days are getting shorter, and Turner Classic Movies has debuted their October schedule online, which features an abundance of genre awesomeness that will be hitting airwaves this fall. Without a doubt, TCM is one of the best resources for classic film, so for those of you looking to broaden your horizons this Halloween, definitely check out their calendar and set those DVRs.

Also, TCM has designated Godzilla as their “Monster of the Month” for October, so look for a bunch of classic films featuring the “King of the Monsters” and other beloved Kaiju throughout October as well.

**All Listings are in Est.**

Friday, September 27th

3:15pm – The Mummy’s Shroud

6:30pm – The Mummy (1959)

Saturday, September 28th

2:00am – Belladonna of Sadness

3:30am – House (1977)

Sunday, September...

July’s home entertainment releases are ending on a high note this week, as we have tons of great horror and sci-fi titles coming our way this Tuesday. Scream Factory is keeping busy with a handful of Blu-rays on their docket this week, including Quatermass and the Pit, Quatermass 2, The Leopard Man, Lust for a Vampire, and a Steelbook edition of Humanoids from the Deep.

Roxanne Benjamin’s feature film debut, Body at Brighton Rock, is also being released this Tuesday on various formats, and Vinegar Syndrome is resurrecting both Hellmaster and Play Dead as well. And, if you happened to miss it in theaters, Deon Taylor’s The Intruder is set to invade your home media shelves this week as well.

Other Blu-ray and DVD releases for July 30th include What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, Hotel Inferno and The Reptile.

Body at Brighton Rock

Wendy, a part-time...

After directing Cat People (1942), Jacques Tourneur introduced moviegoers to The Leopard Man, and more than 75 years after its initial release, Scream Factory is bringing the serial killer horror film to Blu-ray for the first time on July 16th, and we've been provided with the cover art and full list of special features:

Press Release: Los Angeles, CA – Scream Factory proudly presents the 40s horror cult classic The Leopard Man in its Blu-ray debut July 30, 2019. The release comes complete with special features including new audio commentary and a brand new 4k scan of the original nitrate camera negative.

From legendary horror film producer Val Lewton and from Jacques Tourneur, the director of the original Cat People, The Leopard Man is one of the first American films to attempt a remotely realistic portrayal of a serial killer.

Is it man, beast or both behind a string of savage maulings and murders? An...

A top horror title gets the Powerhouse Indicator treatment just in time for Halloween — it’s not a domestic release but it plays in our Region A players. You can shuffle the alternate versions like a deck of cards: one basic movie, but six separate encodings: by length, title sequence and aspect ratio. Plus fascinating extras and a killer versions comparison feature.

Night of the Demon / Curse of the Demon

Blu-ray

Powerhouse Indicator

1957 / B&W / 1:66 + 1:75 widescreen / 95 & 82 min. / Limited Edition / Street Date October 22, 2018 / available from Amazon UK / £47,42

Starring: Dana Andrews, Peggy Cummins, Niall MacGinnis, Maurice Denham,

Athene Seyler

Cinematography: Ted Scaife

Production Designer: Ken Adam

Special Effects: George Blackwell, S.D. Onions, Wally Veevers

Film Editor Michael Gordon

Original Music: Clifton Parker

Written by Charles Bennett and Hal E. Chester

from the story Casting the Runes by M. R. James

Produced by Frank Bevis, Hal E. Chester

Directed by Jacques Tourneur...

by Nathaniel R

Because Jean Brooks had frequently been mentioned as a supporting actress standout of 1943, the last film I screened for our celebration was Val Lewton production The Seventh Victim. I have only one question: what did I just watch? Kristen Lopez was right on the podcast when she called it a "polite" horror movie. Even the satanic villains are polite...

Talk about staying power — Jonathan Demme’s riveting, ultimately humanistic horror thriller raked in a full house of Oscars and is still scaring new viewers. Even those that chose to avoid it know what it’s all about. My review bows to the film’s superiority and remarks on some of its finer points of cinematic splendor.

The Silence of the Lambs

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 13

1991 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 118 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date February 13, 2018 / 39.95

Starring: Jodie Foster, Anthony Hopkins, Scott Glenn, Ted Levine, Anthony Heald, Brooke Smith, Tracey Walter, Kenneth Utt, Paul Lazar, Adelle Lutz, Obba Babatundé Diane Baker, Roger Corman, Ron Vawter, Charles Napier, Chris Isaak, George Romero, Kasi Lemmons, Lauren Roselli.

Cinematography: Tak Fujimoto

Film Editor: Craig McKay

Original Music: Howard Shore

Written by Ted Tally from the novel by Thomas Harris

Produced by Edward Saxon, Kenneth Utt

Directed by Jonathan Demme

“I’ve...

Next to Universal, few studios have had such a big impact on horror than Rko Radio Pictures. Started in 1927, Rko was the first studio founded to make exclusively sound films, a then-brand-new invention that served as a major draw for the studio. Rko’s life was relatively short (it was killed just 30 years after forming), but during their time, they put out a seriously impressive number of classics, including Top Hat, It’s a Wonderful Life, The Informer, and most notably, Citizen Kane.

Of course, Rko didn’t shy away from horror. While their output wasn’t nearly as prolific as, say, Universal’s, it was still quite impressive, boasting some of the most formative and important horror films of old Hollywood. Rko saw the release of a few all-time classics, including I Walked With a Zombie, The Thing From Another World, King Kong, and the topic of today’s Crypt,...

It’s a wonder movie from the 1930s, a political fantasy that imagines a Utopia of peace and kindness hidden away in a distant mountain range — or in our daydreams. Sony’s new restoration is indeed impressive. Ronald Colman is seduced by a vision of a non-sectarian Heaven on Earth, while Savant indulges his anti-Frank Capra grumblings in his admiring but hesitant review essay.

Lost Horizon (1937)

80th Anniversary Blu-ray + HD Digital

Sony

1937 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / 133 min. / Street Date October 3, 2017 / 19.99

Starring: Ronald Colman, Jane Wyatt, Edward Everett Horton, John Howard, Thomas Mitchell, Margo, Isabel Jewell, H.B. Warner, Sam Jaffe, Noble Johnson, Richard Loo.

Cinematography: Joseph Walker

Film Editors: Gene Havelick, Gene Milford

Art Direction: Stephen Goosson

Musical director: Max Steiner

Original Music: Dimitri Tiomkin

Written by Robert Riskin from the novel by James Hilton

Produced and Directed by Frank Capra

Frank Capra had a way with actors and comedy...

(Aotn) Turner Classic Movies is bringing the horror next month. Starting on October 1st the channel will be bringing back movies such as the original Cat People and Dracula. Fan’s of classic movies will surely not want to miss this.

If you have ever wanted to know where the band White Zombie got there name be sure to tune in on Halloween morning at 8:30 Am. The Universal Monster’s are sprinkled throughout this marathon and will hopefully delight old school horror fans.

Complete Schedule Below:

Sunday October 1, 2017

8:00 Pm Dracula (1931) 9:30 Pm Dracula’s Daughter (1936) 11:00 Pm Son Of Dracula (1943)

Monday October 2, 2017

12:30 Am Nosferatu (1922)

Tuesday October 3, 2017

8:00 Pm Frankenstein (1931) 9:30 Pm Bride Of Frankenstein (1935) 11:00 Pm The Mummy (1932)

Wednesday October 4, 2017

12:30 Am The Wolf Man (1941) 2:00 Am Island Of Lost Souls (1933) 3:30 Am The Black Cat (1934) 4:45 Am The Invisible Man (1933)

Sunday October 8, 2017

2:00 Am Night...

This French disc release of the Jacques Tourneur classic gets everything right — including both versions in picture perfect transfers. Devil debunker Dana Andrews locks horns with Niall MacGinnis, a necromancer “who has decoded the Old Book” and can summon a fire & brimstone monster from Hell, no election fraud necessary. Even fans that hate ghost stories love this one — it’s a truly creepy, intelligent highlight of the horror genre.

Night of the Demon

Region A + B Blu-ray + Pal DVD

Wild Side (Fr)

1957 / B&W / 1:66 widescreen / 95 & 82 min. / Street Date November 27, 2013 / Curse of the Demon, Rendez-vous avec la peur / Available from Amazon UK or Foreign Exchange Blu-ray

Starring: Dana Andrews, Peggy Cummins, Niall MacGinnis, Maurice Denham,

Athene Seyler

Cinematography: Ted Scaife

Production Designer: Ken Adam

Special Effects: George Blackwell, S.D. Onions, Wally Veevers

Film Editor Michael Gordon

Original Music: Clifton Parker

Written by Charles Bennett and Hal E. Chester

from the...

Jacqueline Bisset’s in a heck of a fix. Her hubby Alan Alda has been seduced by promises of fame and fortune from creepy concert genius Curt Jurgens, and is responding to weird overtures from Curt’s daughter Barbara Parkins. The pianist’s mansion is stuffed with occult books, and he displays an unhealthy interest in Alda’s piano-ready hands. Do you think the innocent young couple could be in a diabolical tight spot? Nah, nothing to worry about here.

The Mephisto Waltz

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1971 / Color /1:85 widescreen / 115 min. / Street Date April 18, 2017 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Alan Alda, Jacqueline Bisset, Barbara Parkins, Brad(ford) Dillman, William Windom, Kathleen Widdoes, Pamelyn Ferdin, Curt Jurgens, Curt Lowens, Kiegh Diegh, Berry Kroeger, Walter Brooke, Frank Campanella.

Cinematography: William W. Spencer

Film Editor: Richard Brockway

Original Music: Jerry Goldsmith

Written by Ben Maddow from a novel by Fred Mustard Stewart

Produced...

Sometimes a movie is simply too good for just one special edition… Savant reached out to nab a British Region B import of Georges Franju’s horror masterpiece, to sample its enticing extras. And this also gives me the chance to ramble on with more thoughts about this 1959 show that inspired a score of copycats.

Eyes Without a Face (Bfi — U.K.)

Region B Blu-ray + Pal DVD

Bfi

1959 / B&W / 1:66 widescreen / 90 min. / The Horror Chamber of

Dr. Faustus, House of Dr. Rasanoff, Occhi senza volto / Street Date August 24, 2015 / presently £10.99

Starring: Pierre Brasseur, Edith Scob, Alida Valli, Francois Guérin,

Béatrice Altariba, Juliette Mayniel

Cinematography: Eugen Schüfftan

Production Designer: Auguste Capelier

Special Effects: Charles-Henri Assola

Film Editor: Gilbert Natot

Original Music: Maurice Jarre

Written by Pierre Boileau, Thomas Narcejac, Pierre Gascar, Claude Sautet from a novel by Jean Redon

Produced by Jules Borkon

Directed by Georges Franju

Savant has reviewed Eyes Without a Face twice,...

Here’s a real gem — a ‘classic’ Chekhov story turned into a compelling tale of lust and murder. George Sanders and Linda Darnell shine as a judge and the peasant girl who intrigues him; Edward Everett Horton is excellent cast against type in a dramatic role.

Summer Storm

DVD

Sprocket Vault / Kit Parker

1944 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / 106 min. / Street Date October 20, 2009 (I’m a little late) / available through Sprocket Vault / 14.99

Starring: George Sanders, Edward Everett Horton, Linda Darnell, Anna Lee, Hugo Haas, Lori Lahner, Sig Ruman, Robert Greig, Byron Foulger, Mike Mazurki, Elizabeth Russell.

Cinematography: Archie Stout, Eugen Schüfftan

Art Direction: Rudi Feld

Collaborating Editor: Gregg G. Tallas

Original Music: Karl Hajos

Written by Roland Leigh, Douglas Sirk (as Michael O’Hara), Robert Theoren based on the play The Shooting Party by Anton Chekhov

Produced by Seymour Nebenzal

Directed by Douglas Sirk

Douglas Sirk, born Hans Detlef Sierck, had a pretty amazing career.

Expatriate Francis Lederer is a cultured menace in UA's revisit of the Dracula myth, made just before Hammer Films staked its claim on the horror genre. Avid Hitchcock fans may find the storyline very familiar, when European cousin Bellac strikes up a 'special' relationship with his American cousin Rachel. The Return of Dracula Blu-ray Olive Films 1958 / B&W / 1:85 widescreen / 77 min. / Street Date October 18, 2016 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95 Starring Francis Lederer, Norma Eberhardt, Ray Stricklyn, Virginia Vincent, John Wengraf. Cinematography Jack MacKenzie Film Editor Sherman A. Rose Original Music Gerald Fried Written by Pat Fielder Produced by Arthur Gardner, Jules V. Levy Directed by Paul Landres

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

The Levy-Gardner-Laven producing combo, minus Arnold Laven this time out, assemble what was probably their most successful drive-in cheapie for United Artists. Promoting their secretary Pat Fielder to screenwriter, they had already done okay with a contemporary, non-Gothic vampire story...

Richard Brooks' exciting Humphrey Bogart picture is one of the best newspaper sagas ever. An editor deals with a gangster threat and a domestic crisis even as greedy heirs are selling his paper out from under him. Commentator Eddie Muller drives home the film's essential civics lesson about what we've lost -- a functioning free press. Deadline - U.S.A. Blu-ray Kl Studio Classics 1952 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 87 min. / Street Date July 26, 2016 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95 Starring Humphrey Bogart, Ethel Barrymore, Kim Hunter, Ed Begley, Warren Stevens, Paul Stewart, Martin Gabel, Joe De Santis, Audrey Christie, Jim Backus, Willis Bouchey, Joseph Crehan, Lawrence Dobkin, John Doucette, Paul Dubov, William Forrest, Dabbs Greer, Thomas Browne Henry, Paul Maxey, Ann McCrea, Kasia Orzazewski, Tom Powers, Joe Sawyer, William Self, Phillip Terry, Carleton Young. Cinematography Milton Krasner Film Editor William B.Murphy Original Music Cyril J. Mockridge Produced by Sol C. Siegel...

With a seemingly endless amount of streaming options — not only the titles at our disposal, but services themselves — we’ve taken it upon ourselves to highlight the titles that have recently hit the interwebs. Every week, one will be able to see the cream of the crop (or perhaps some simply interesting picks) of streaming titles (new and old) across platforms such as Netflix, iTunes, Amazon Instant Video, and more (note: U.S. only). Check out our rundown for this week’s selections below.

American Ultra (Nima Nourizadeh)

From its first few shots, it’s clear that American Ultra is removed from the relatively grounded drama of Greg Mottola’s underrated Adventureland, the last film that paired Jesse Eisenberg and Kristen Stewart. We first meet Eisenberg’s bloodied and beaten Mike Howell detained and chained to a table in a septic interrogation room. As an agent throws photographic evidence of...

Bogart finds Bacall and movie history is made; for once the make-believe romantic chemistry is abundantly real. Howard Hawks' wartime Caribbean adventure plays in grand style, with his patented mix of precision and casual cool. It's one of the most entertaining pictures of the 'forties. To Have and Have Not Blu-ray Warner Archive Collection 1944 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 100 min. / Street Date July 19, 2016 / available through the WBshop / 21.99 Starring Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Walter Brennan, Hoagy Carmichael,Dolores Moran, Sheldon Leonard, Walter Szurovy, Marcel Dalio, Walter Sande, Dan Seymour. Cinematography Sid Hickox Art Direction Charles Novi Film Editor Christian Nyby Original Music Hoagy Carmichael, William Lava, Franz Waxman Written by Jules Furthman, William Faulkner from the novel by Ernest Hemingway Produced by Howard Hawks, Jack L. Warner Directed by Howard Hawks

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Speaking for myself, I can't think of a more 'Hawksian' picture than To Have and Have Not.

This four-feature set is the weirdest cinematic treasure box of the year, a sort of anti-matter film school. Three of the films are derived from a single Yugoslavian picture rejected by Roger Corman. His acolytes Jack Hill and Stephanie Rothman proceeded to add serial killings, supernatural hauntings, a goofy vampire, and an ending that could be called 'Zombies In The Wax Museum.' Tim Lucas tells the whole story in a fascinating feature-length extra docu. Blood Bath Blu-ray Arrow Video (USA) 1963 - 1966 / B&W / 1:66 widescreen / 95 - 81 - 62 - 75 min. / 2-Disc Limited Edition / Street Date May 30, 2016 / 49.95 Starring William Campbell, Patrick Magee, Rade Marcovic, Miha Baloh, Irena Prosen; Marissa Mathes, Linda Saunders, Sandra Knight, Carl Schanzer, Biff Elliot, Sid Haig, Jonathan Haze. Cinematography Nenad Jovicic, Dan Telford, Alfred Taylor. Original Music Bojan Adamic, Ronald Stein, Written by Vlasta Radovanovic, Vic Webber, Jack Hill & Stephanie Rothman Directed by Rados Novakovic, Michael Roy,...

Director Jacques Rivette just passed away back in January. There's more interest lately in his 12-hour opus Out 1, but if you'll settle for just 2.5 hours, this unique early New Wave feature will take you inside Rivette's world of artists, students, and refugees from political persecution, all in conflict in a sunny Paris of 1958. It's just as revolutionary as an early Godard or Truffaut, but in a style all Rivette's own. Paris Belongs to Us Blu-ray The Criterion Collection 802 1961 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 141 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Paris nous appartient / Street Date March 8, 2016 / 39.95 Starring Betty Schneider, François Maistre, Giani Esposito, Françoise Prévost, Daniel Crohem, Jean-Claude Brialy, Jean-Marie Robain, Jean Martin. Cinematography Charles L. Bitsch Film Editor Denise de Casablanca Original Music Philippe Arthuys Written by Jacques Rivette, Jean Grualt Produced by Claude Chabrol, Roland Nonin Directed by Jacques Rivette

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

The French New...

As a supplement to our Recommended Discs weekly feature, Peter Labuza regularly highlights notable recent home-video releases with expanded reviews. See this week’s selections below.

Two playful journeys into women’s lives — one a mystery forged in darkness, one an adventure-turned-ritualistic-requiem. Jacques Rivette’s Duelle and Noroît originally set up a four-part circle of films that were never finished. But these never-released-in-America masterpieces comprise his most wondrous ode to classical Hollywood, each based on a forgotten text. In Rivette’s own obsessive mise-en-scéne, their fantasies are grounded through realism, constructed worlds where the camera simply documents performance.

The streets of Paris remain conspicuously quiet through Duelle, a noir-fantasy modeled off Rko’s The Seventh Victim. The frizzle-haired ingénue Hermine Karagheuz balances on a ball before coming crashing back down, and suddenly a woman gives her the task of finding a missing man (encouraged by the booming sounds of the...

This is as sexy as Hollywood pix got in 1960. John O'Hara's novel about class snobbery and the drive for success posits Paul Newman as a moody go-getter. In glossy soap opera fashion, his silver spoon-fed bride Joanne Woodward morphs into an unfaithful monster. Some adulterous relationships are excused and others not in this glossy, morally rigged melodrama. In other words, it's prime entertainment material. From the Terrace Blu-ray Twilight Time Limited Edition 1960 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 144 min. / Ship Date January 19, 2016 / available through Twilight Time Movies / 29.95 Starring Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Myrna Loy, Ina Balin, Leon Ames, Elizabeth Allen, Barbara Eden, George Grizzard, Patrick O'Neal, Felix Aylmer. Cinematography Leo Tover Art Direction Maurice Ransford, Howard Richmond, Lyle R. Wheeler Film Editor Dorothy Spencer Original Music Elmer Bernstein Written by Ernest Lehman from the novel by John O'Hara Produced and directed by Mark Robson

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

1960 saw the release of...

Rko's morale-building wartime thriller adds an element of sexual perversion to its story of Nazi crimes against children, thus creating one of the studio's all-time biggest hits. Bonita Granville is the victim Tim Holt her Nazi-youth heartthrob, and Otto Kruger provides the perverted sneers. Hitler's Children DVD-r The Warner Archive Collection 1943 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 82 min. / Street Date December 1, 2015 / available through the WBshop / 21.99 Starring Tim Holt, Bonita Granville, Kent Smith, Otto Kruger, H.B. Warner, Lloyd Corrigan, Erford Gage, Hans Conried, Gavin Muir, Nancy Gates, Egon Brecher, Peter van Eyck, Edward Van Sloan. Cinematography Russell Metty Film Editor Joseph Noriega Original Music Roy Webb Written by Emmet Lavery from the book Education for Death by Gregor Ziemer Produced by Edward A. Golden Directed by Edward Dmytryk

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Perhaps the most popular anti-Nazi info-propaganda thriller of the war, Hitler's Children is a very well made shocker that...

Depraved convicts ! Crazy Manhattan gin parties! Society dames poaching other women's husbands! A flimflam artist scamming the uptown sophisticates! All these forbidden attractions are here and more -- including Bette Davis's epochal seduction line about impulsive kissing versus good hair care. It's a 9th collection of racy pre-Code wonders. Forbidden Hollywood Volume 9 Big City Blues, Hell's Highway, The Cabin in the Cotton, When Ladies Meet, I Sell Anything DVD-r The Warner Archive Collection 1932-1934 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 63, 62, 78, 85, 70 min. / Street Date October 27, 2015 / available through the WBshop / 40.99 Starring Joan Blondell, Eric Linden, Humphrey Bogart; Richard Dix, Tom Brown; Richard Barthelmess, Bette Davis, Dorothy Jordan, Berton Churchill; Ann Harding, Robert Montgomery, Myrna Loy, Alice Brady, Frank Morgan; Pat O' Brien, Ann Dvorak, Claire Dodd, Roscoe Karns. Cinematography James Van Trees; Edward Cronjager; Barney McGill; Ray June Written by Lillie Hayward, Ward Morehouse, from his play; Samuel Ornitz, Robert Tasker, Rowland Brown...