Old Movies Appreciation topic

[Greystoke]

The Pawnbroker, The Detective, and The Boston Strangler are all quite interesting films, and I think The Pawnbroker and The Boston Strangler are both really good. Less so The Detective, in my opinion, which I like. It is good in its own right, and it's also ambitious, but doesn't entirely succeed in what it tries to say and do. Some aspects probably dated quite quickly, and Lloyd Bochner was poorly cast. But Sinatra is great here and it's commendable filmmaking in a lot of respects.

All three would make for a great night of movies with a succulent Chinese meal.

[Walter Hale 4]

UPDATE I been able to get three of four movies, THE BOSTON STRANGLER (360p) , TONY ROME (360p) and THE PAWNBROKER.
Qualities on the three above needed to be compromised but that's fine.The idea was to compare these to my prior recordings on DVD back when i was subscriber to Fox Classics and TCM channel (The latter does not exist in this country anymore).
The Pawnbroker, in particular, looks like its about 10 minutes longer than i recall so i'll be checking up on if there is extra scenes there.

THE DETECTIVE was difficult and slower to download. It's in 5.10 GB which would be impossible to get it transfered to a portable USB device to then connect it on my Plasma-TV and watch.

Any DVD Converter does include a feature where you can compress a large GB file, however

[Walter Hale 4]

The Pawnbroker, The Detective, and The Boston Strangler are all quite interesting films, and I think The Pawnbroker and The Boston Strangler are both really good. Less so The Detective, in my opinion, which I like. It is good in its own right, and it's also ambitious, but doesn't entirely succeed in what it tries to say and do. Some aspects probably dated quite quickly, and Lloyd Bochner was poorly cast. But Sinatra is great here and it's commendable filmmaking in a lot of respects.

All three would make for a great night of movies with a succulent Chinese meal.

Yes Bochner was too suave with his depicting of a ladies man , Psychologist, I agree.
You got to love that scene near the end where Sinatra (Joe) tells him "You're full of crap"
The movie to me, was marred by it's over use of flashback sequences, but even so, it's long been a favorite, for past 5 decades, warts and all

[Walter Hale 4]

Good to find DON'T MAKE WAVES (1967) is there.

It's slapstick-y comedy however, in particular at the start of the film.

https://ok.ru/video/1100082907650

[Walter Hale 4]

FIREBALL 500 , American International Pictures Production (1966)...



Studio:
American International Pictures

Director:
William Asher

Starring:
Frankie Avalon, Fabian, Annette Funicello, Chill Wills, Julie Parrish, Harvey Lembeck, Sandy Reed, Michael Nader, Mary Hughes, Salli Sachse, Patti Chandler, Luree Holmes, Linda Brent

Plot:
Stock car racer Dave Owens (Avalon) travels from California to North Carolina to compete in stock car racing. His racing rival in the south is Leander Fox (Fabian). Dave gets mixed up in moonshine running — along with Leander — after meeting Martha (Parrish), who convinces Dave to run moonshine for her. The law catches up with Dave and says if he doesn’t play ball, his racing career will be jeopardized.

Trivia:
• Sandy Reed is a race announcer for this film, as well as technical advisor. Reed was an announcer at race track in Glendale and Riverside, California.
• The premiere was held in Charlotte, NC.
• The Fireball 500 car driven by Frankie Avalon was created and designed by George Barris for the film.
• Location scenes filmed in Charlotte, North Carolina, at the Ascot Raceway in Gardena, California, and at the Saugus Raceway in California.
• The car driven by Frankie Avalon was a Plymouth Barracuda.


https://cometoverhollywood.com/2022/07/25/musical-monday-fireball-500-1966/


Hey, hello, My friends,

Earlier this morning i posted over on "What Songs You're Listening" thread, the Frankie Avalon song My Way (That Gets Me My Way) from this film.

But for the life of me, i cannot seem to find it over on Frankie's discography on 45's and full albums at all

I then, checked on separate EP's (Extended Plays) if it might have existed because it stands to reason there mustv'e, but nothing concrete surfaced, yet. Possibly a six-track EP was made in conjunction.


There's a vid to Fireball 500 over on the russian site but alas features two russian translates , but i was more interested on finding the song, My Way That Gets Me My Way, or the EP (assuming that there was one).
This is it here in case you want to check it out:- https://ok.ru/video/985548065324

Film was OK for it's time that would've suited Elvis easily, it's still fun to see the 1960's spirit, culture and fashions back in the day (even with russian dubbs).

Need to scroll to the 52:10 point if you want to view/listen My Way (That Gets Me My Way)

[Walter Hale 4]

HEY, Look at That !

The aussie movie Funny Things Happen Down Under (1965) that featured Dame Olivia Newton John, exists on russian site. Unlike the Frankie Avalon above film, there's no russian overdubs on this one.

Am looking forward to watching this.

https://m.ok.ru/video/4137152023206

[Walter Hale 4]

LOST (1956) available on OK R U (russian website).

The UK Film was also called TEARS FOR SIMON.

https://ok.ru/video/3113936751104

[Walter Hale 4]

STORM WARNING, starring Doris Day, Ginger Rogers, Steven Cochran and Ronald Raegen is available on OK R U. Aspect ratio is 480p however.

Just the same, i'l add it here in case some of you has not seen this brilliant movie.

100 percent recommend if you love the black and white film noir golden era


https://ok.ru/video/272542796451

[Walter Hale 4]

One of the scariest short films ever made. La cabina (The Telephone Box) is a 1972 film directed by Spanish director Antonio Mercero, and written by him and José Luis Garci.

[Walter Hale 4]

Changes (1969) which starred Michele Carey available on OK R U. I posted it here last year but that one had the audio muted for just three minutes. This one there is NO muted audio.


https://ok.ru/video/3409005644454

spoiler alert
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changes_(1969_film)

[Walter Hale 4]

OH MY-MY.

The movie CARNAL KNOWLEDGE (1971) is available ranging from 360p, 480p or 1060p take your pick


https://ok.ru/video/2751098980967

[Walter Hale 4]

Mike Nichols talks about his controversial film CARNAL KNOWLEDGE

"People adopted attitudes and anecdotes while waiting in line to see the film, or sitting at home refusing to see the film, because, they had been told, it was ‘too dirty.’"

“So many of the reviews and so much of the commentary surrounding Carnal Knowledge appeared to have been written, composed, thought over while waiting to see the film. People adopted attitudes and anecdotes while waiting in line to see the film, or sitting at home refusing to see the film, because, they had been told, it was ‘too dirty.’ Or Mike Nichols had flamed out. So sad.

“Say or think whatever you wish about me as a director, but I thought Jules [Feiffer] had written a blistering and truthful examination of male power and female conformity. I don’t think Jules or I felt we could take a stance other than that of bewildered men, and both of us failed to understand how and why we respond, behave, age. Is it cultural or glandular? I do not know, but I thought a study of two men flailing about and trying to find love—or what had been defined for them as love—was a legitimate topic for a film. Jules had wanted to see it on the stage, but I wanted it on film. I wanted close-ups; I wanted tight spaces in which lives were falling apart, and you could almost smell sweat and Arpege and Hask hair oil and hairspray and the metallic scent given off by old trays from which TV dinners had been eaten. I wanted—and I got—full garbage cans on the set of that film.

“I can’t talk about Carnal Knowledge without specifically talking about Jack [Nicholson] and Ann-Margret. Both of them gave so beautifully on that film. It was like war service, military duty, and not, I hope, because I was so difficult, but because they were both exposing far too much of themselves and their characters. Everyone was wonderful: I get furious when people would say Cyn [O’Neal] only had to show up with that hairdo to be effective. The possession of space and air is acting, and it is very difficult to find actors who can mold a character with nothing but air and lighting surrounding them. To drop a name: I spoke to Alfred Hitchcock one time, and I praised the extraordinary work done by Janet Leigh in Psycho. ‘But she’s only driving and thinking!’ morons bleat. Well, yes, but the very baroque and heavy machinery of that film rests on her shoulders, and the moral journey we take with her as she drives toward both her death and some sense of redemption is shattering, and almost always dismissed as not really being acting. Hitchcock smiled and said, ‘Janet is great. She was the mule of that film, smuggling everything in and then dropping us off at the hotel.’ Dine on that story for months.

“No one took Ann-Margret seriously as an actress. She’s a performer, they would say, and you just don’t entrust her to fill a character. Well, I don’t agree, and not just about Ann-Margret. I wanted her history, her insecurity in that film, and she gave it freely, and then she invested all of her own fears—aging, gravity—that could affect a woman who just wants—chillingly and sadly—to be loved, to be married, to run a home.


“Jack was already being seen and discussed as the great actor he was and has remained, and he devoted himself to the film and to Ann-Margret as her character would have liked him to be as her lover and husband. No one on earth gives as much as Jack. No one.

“A lot of sh*t arose when Elizabeth [Taylor] was cast in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? It began with doubts of her talent and the ludicrousness of casting her in a role for which she was too young by two decades. I chose to count her age from the date of her first appearance before a camera, the days on sets, in editing and looping, in promotion. By my estimation Elizabeth was approaching eighty, and she had knowledge we would need.

“Elizabeth can hear, high up in the eaves of a set, a sound that lets her know that a bulb is not situated correctly. The lights go up, and they make a sound. ‘Sounds wrong, darling,’ she would say. Garson Kanin told a story about Carole Lombard stopping a scene because there was a miniscule cool spot on her cheek, which meant a bulb was blown. I could top that: Elizabeth would let me know that I wasn’t lighting Sandy [Dennis] properly, and show me how to do it. This never upset Haskell [Wexler] because she was always right. In the sweetest way she would say to me, quietly, that the camera was not properly situated for what I wanted. And I knew nothing, I assure you. ‘Which lens?’ she would ask, and she was always right when she would quickly point to the right one, which was not the one I would have chosen.

“I did not paste a performance on Elizabeth. When she emerged as effective and correct as Martha, I was unfairly credited with creating a performance from editing magic, judicious angles, coaching. Entirely incorrect. Coaching, by the way, is bullshit. One either has the ability or they do not. Elizabeth did. She proved it. Do I think she discussed the role and the play with Richard [Burton]? Yes, I do, and smart of her to do so, but no one, not even Richard, could turn anyone into Martha or any other character.

"I find myself terribly pleased with a lot of Carnal Knowledge, and my name is on it as its director, but almost everyone in that cast served as a director, and they all taught me so much.

"I was delighted with the success Ann-Margret had with the film, and angered when certain critics implied, as they had with Elizabeth, that I had pasted a performance on them, colluded with the editors to craft a performance. Vicious sh*t. Ignorant sh*t. The worst was, of course, John Simon, a critic who was not only vicious but almost always incorrect, particularly when it concerned the facts of film making. ...Ann-Margret gave of herself tremendously in that part. She is a very intuitive and gifted actress, and Simon cornered me at a party once and congratulated me on 'working around the tits.' What a vile man.

“I mean no offense to Cloris Leachman or to Ellen Burstyn or to Barbara Harris or to Margaret Leighton, the four women who competed with Ann-Margret for the Oscar as Supporting Actress. That was a rich category, but Ann-Margret was robbed. I rarely, if ever, indulge in those conversations, but watch them, if you must, on a cold day, and tell me who had a higher degree of difficulty and not only met it, but crushed it.”


John Simon died after suffering a stroke at a dinner theatre. I regret that Mike had died and I could not convey this news.

When Kathleen Turner, slurring her words, obese, scratching beneath her tits, and manically licking her lips, appeared as Martha in a stage revival of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and later revealed her pleasure in her brilliance and in “improving” the parts of both Maggie the Cat in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and Martha, after they were “ruined” by Elizabeth Taylor, I was able to call Mike Nichols to discuss. Mr. Nichols’ comments were brilliant—and unprintable.



Above Interview with Mike Nichols, conducted by James Grissom, 1992.

[Walter Hale 4]

look at that !

Dr. Jekyll Mr. Hyde 1941 - starring Spencer Tracy, Lana Turner, Ingrid Bergman, is available online. This was a remake from the 1931 original.

https://ok.ru/video/268721130147


the Macomber Affair 1947 - starring Gregory Peck, Joan Bennetts and Robert Preston

https://ok.ru/video/1039820786356

[Walter Hale 4]

ahhh Wonderful !!!


The Big Shot (1942) that starred the one the only, Humphrey BOGART is there

Anyone here seen this movie before?

https://ok.ru/video/645592189680

[Walter Hale 4]

YES !!!


Laura (1944) available in 720p.
https://ok.ru/video/646122703600



It's my pleasure to find and add here as "Laura" is an all-time great, a favorite, certainly from the 1940s vintage

The film was directed by Otto Preminger and stars Gene Tierney, Dana Andrews, Clifton Webb, Vincent Price and in an adelaide, AU connection , Dame Judith Anderson

At 88 minutes, this one looks like it's running a tad slow than my own commercially released PAL DVD copy but MAYBE that's the way, the correct speed.

I know my PAL copy was 83 minutes and contains a bonus deleted scene (about two minutes) . This was included but separate from the movie, however.

I will be sure to download this gem and then compare it to my own recording and official PAL DVD release.

Anyone here also a fan of this Black and White Film Noir ?

[Walter Hale 4]

just had a look, the russian vid has the deleted scene in place (22 minute mark), so it's the full movie, alright !


What follows is the deleted scene in isolation from youtube. Real odd that the scene was deleted and on some prior commercial releases , this appears separate to the film. Go figure

[Greystoke]

YES !!!


Laura (1944) available in 720p.
https://ok.ru/video/646122703600



It's my pleasure to find and add here as "Laura" is an all-time great, a favorite, certainly from the 1940s vintage

The film was directed by Otto Preminger and stars Gene Tierney, Dana Andrews, Clifton Webb, Vincent Price and in an adelaide, AU connection , Dame Judith Anderson

At 88 minutes, this one looks like it's running a tad slow than my own commercially released PAL DVD copy but MAYBE that's the way, the correct speed.

I know my PAL copy was 83 minutes and contains a bonus deleted scene (about two minutes) . This was included but separate from the movie, however.

I will be sure to download this gem and then compare it to my own recording and official PAL DVD release.

Anyone here also a fan of this Black and White Film Noir ?

Laura is a really terrific film. I'm certainly fond of it.

[Walter Hale 4]

good on you greystoke...


how about some of Clifton Webb's posh-style lines in the script




Waldo Lydecker : I don't use a pen. I write with a goose quill dipped in venom.

Waldo Lydecker : In my case, self-absorption is completely justified. I have never discovered any other subject quite so worthy of my attention.

Waldo Lydecker : I'm not kind, I'm vicious. It's the secret of my charm.




Waldo Lydecker : My dear, either you were born on a extremely rustic community, where good manners are unknown, or you suffer from a common feminine delusion that the mere fact of being a woman exempts you from the rules of civilized conduct.

Waldo Lydecker : You'd better watch out, McPherson, or you'll finish up in a psychiatric ward. I doubt they've ever had a patient who fell in love with a corpse.

Waldo Lydecker : I cannot stand these morons any longer. If you don't come with me this instant, I shall run amok.




Waldo Lydecker : [Scene deleted from theater version and restored in 1990] She was quick to seize upon anything that would improve her mind or her appearance. Laura had innate breeding, but she deferred to my judgment and taste. I selected a more attractive hairdress for her. I taught her what clothes were more becoming to her. Through me, she met everyone: The famous and the infamous. Her youth and beauty, her poise and charm of manner captivated them all. She had warmth, vitality. She had authentic magnetism. Wherever we went, she stood out. Men admired her; women envied her. She became as famous as Waldo Lydecker's walking stick and his white carnation.

Waldo Lydecker : I should be sincerely sorry to see my neighbor's children devoured by wolves.


Waldo Lydecker : Murder is my favorite crime.


Waldo Lydecker : Love is eternal. It has been the strongest motivation for human actions throughout history. Love is stronger than life. It reaches beyond the dark shadow of death.

[Walter Hale 4]

the1950's cult-classic "The Wild One" available online on youtube -

[Walter Hale 4]

Rebel Without a Cause available on OK R U but this has spanish dubbed audio...

https://ok.ru/video/2141237873406

[Walter Hale 4]

a wonderful interesting little 20 minute insight where actor Gig Young talks to Natalie Wood and Jim Backus and features the logistics involved in filming a couple scenes of Rebel Without a Cause.

[Walter Hale 4]

Greetings (1968)

Directed by Brian De Palma and it starred a very young Robert De Niro.

Basically revolves around a group of mates discuss on how to dodge the draft in Vietnam, JFK's assassination, voyeurism, computer dating, and everything else.

[Walter Hale 4]

Mars Needs Women (Sci-Fi, 1968) Tommy Kirk, Yvonne Craig ...



A Tattered Web (Crime, Drama) CBS American Made-for-TV - 1971 (co-stars Ann Helm)

[Walter Hale 4]

another online link here in sharper quality

[Walter Hale 4]

Captain Newman M.D. available online, 100 percent recommended!