Everything That Dies, Some Day Comes Back

Depending on your point of view this 1984 science fiction film is either a brilliant satire or an excessively violent piece of trash.   As a centrist dad I necessarily fall somewhere in between these two extremes.   It is set in some near future where a megacompany (Omni Consumer Products or OMP) is being paid to help the Detroit police force, which certainly needs it judging by the amount of crime going on.  When a cop (Murphy, played by Peter Weller) is shot to pieces and killed by a gang of sadistic criminals what remains of his body is used by OMP to create a cyborg policeman. It's debatable who are the most obnoxious characters in this entertainment, the aforementioned criminals or the top executives at OMP who have lost any semblance of humanity in their desire for money and power. Not altogether surprisingly it emerges that the head criminal and the CEO of OMP are in cahoots, and the story ends up as a kind of revenge tale with Robocop going after both of these vil...

This 1951 comedy starring Alec Guinness has a weird science fiction premise to it, the possibility of creating a  synthetic cloth that never wears out.   Sidney Stratton (Guinness) is obsessed with the idea, and given that he might be a brilliant scientist (rather than a simple crackpot) maybe he is right. No one though is prepared to back his ideas so he gets himself employed at textile mills in order to carry out experiments surreptitiously, before then getting fired when he is discovered. This is the pattern until he meets Daphne Birnley (played by the delightful Joan Greenwood) who thinks he might be on to something and persuades her father, who owns a mill, to give him all the resources he needs. Cue a series of comic explosions, but then (eureka) Sidney succeeds!  It will revolutionise the clothing industry and Mr Birnley is all set to tell the press of this amazing breakthrough.  Not only is the cloth indestructible but it repels dirt as well.   Sidn...

This 1967 Western by Monte Hellman (a new name to me) is a real oddity.  It has been described as an existential Western, a kind of ‘Waiting for Godot’ and it certainly has a minimalist narrative which after some initial scene setting reduces to the four main characters making their way across hot and inhospitable terrain. There are only four characters of note, of which Willett is ost ensibly the main one (played by the veteran Warren Oates). He's an ex-bounty hunter who is a stoical kind of guy who’s not easily taken in.   In contrast his young companion Coley is not very bright and is an accident waiting to happen. Then there is Millie Perkins playing someone given in the cast list as simply 'The Woman' (yes, it's that sort of film).  She's the driving character behind what little story there is, hiring Willett and Coley to take her to a place called Kingsley.    She won’t say why but Willett thinks he knows why. Willett has a brother, Coigne, and at the...

I recently watched 'Criss Cross', a film noir directed by Robert Siodmak and starring Burt Lancaster, which I was very underwhelmed by. Nevertheless I approached this film noir with the same director and star with high hopes, as it is a highly regarded adaptation of an Ernest Hemingway short story.  To add to my interest the story was adapted again, in the 1960s, in a terrific version directed by Don Siegel which I have fond if distant memories of. When I say adaptation that’s a bit of a stretch.   Judging from the plot summary on Wikipedia, Hemingway’s story is quite sparse - all that happens is that a couple of hired hit men turn up in a small town, find their victim, and shoot him dead.  The reader is left with the  intriguing question of why the victim doesn’t try to escape from his killers or at least plead for his life. So it would be more accurate to say that this film (like the later one) is inspired by Hemingway’s story in that it attempts to explain ...

This is maybe a unique John Ford Western in that it is about real Wild west characters and events.  In this case we’re in Tombstone so of course the film must climax with the gunfight at the OK Corral.   Not that you would know this from the title, which was apparently chosen by Ford simply because he liked the song.  Accordingly a fictional character, Clementine Carter, was created as a love interest for Wyatt Earp. Many other liberties were taken so that what we have here bears very little resemblance to actuality. This is a story about two warring families, the Earps and the Clantons.  The former consist of four brothers at the outset, although two are killed by Old Man Clanton before we get to the gunfight itself.  The first brother is killed early on when the Clantons (father and four sons) steal the Earps’ cattle.  This prompts Wyatt to become marshal but if the viewer is expecting an exciting revenge tale they will be disappointed. Instead Ford direc...

Apparently it was Katherine Hepburn who when perusing a draft script for this film made the astute observation that Ginger gave Fred sex appeal, and he gave her class. That’s so true, even in this film where Ginger’s character Dale seems plenty classy, judging by her lavish London apartment.  Her  apartment is directly below that of Edward Everett Horton’s theatrical producer Horace Hardwick, and who should be the star of his latest production but none other than one Jerry Travers who is played of course by Astaire. Naturally Jerry has to do some tap dancing in the apartment (why wouldn't he?) which annoys Dale by keeping her awake.  Never mind, they are soon falling for each other and everything seems set fair. Except that  due to an unfortunate misunderstanding Dale then learns (so she thinks) that Jerry is Horace and therefore a married man.  Cue much hilarity given that Mrs Hardwick is a matchmaker who is keen to bring Dale and Jerry together. Mrs Hardwick i...