FILM FRENZY

Jack Lemmon and Marilyn Monroe in Some Like It Hot (Photo: Criterion)

By Matt Brunson

(View From The Couch is a weekly column that reviews what’s new on Blu-ray, 4K and DVD. Ratings are on a four-star scale.)

DOMINO (2005). By all appearances, Domino led a fascinating life: The daughter of English actor Laurence Harvey (The Manchurian Candidate), this tomboy quickly gave up the lifestyle of the rich and famous to forge her own path as a bounty hunter. That sounds like compelling material for a kick-ass biopic, but armed with a script by Richard Kelly, director Tony Scott instead chooses to ignore many of the smaller details of Domino’s hard-scrabble existence to fashion an ugly and ofttimes impenetrable action flick about a trio of bounty hunters. It’s Scott’s attempt to make a crime caper as tricked up as, say, Pulp Fiction or Get Shorty, but it’s an unholy mess, and it subjugates the character of Domino to such a degree that she ultimately feels like a bit player in her own story. As the title character, Keira Knightley is required only to snarl on cue, while Mickey Rourke and Edgar Ramirez are equally lifeless as her fellow bounty hunters. Even the patented eccentricity of Christopher Walken, cast as a producer of TV reality shows, isn’t powerful enough to overcome the overbearing weight of Scott’s garish treatment of this story. The rapid-cut editing, grainy photography, and pretentious use of sound (often, the same line is echoed on the soundtrack over and over… and over) generate multiple migraines, while the ugly color saturation suggests that a crew member upchucked all over the film stock. The real Domino Harvey died of a drug overdose shortly before the movie’s release; she was 35 years old. Yet even here, the film doesn’t play fair, ending only with a written credit that states, “In Loving Memory,” as if her final minutes on Earth played out like a Kleenex scene from Steel Magnolias rather than an ugly Janis Joplin moment. But at least Domino the person had 35 years; Domino the movie is strictly DOA.

There are no DVD extras.

Movie: ★

FEAR IN THE PHILIPPINES: THE COMPLETE BLOOD ISLAND FILMS (1959-1970). Around the same time he created Independent-International Pictures and had a hand in such IIP pictures as Satan’s Sadists, Blazing Stewardesses, and the immortal Dracula vs. Frankenstein, writer-director-producer-distributor Samuel M. Sherman (still with us and about to turn 85 in two weeks) served as a marketing consultant for Hemisphere Pictures, where he worked with Filipino director Eddie Romero and producer Kane W. Lynn on a number of pictures shot in the Philippines. The most famous of these efforts are four horror yarns that have collectively come to be known as the “Blood Island” series. The Severin Films label has not only corralled all four titles to appear in one set but have also restored them so that they doubtless look even better than during their original runs (after all, I can’t imagine a drive-in theater in, say, Gastonia, NC, circa 1970 making the movies look this good).

Arriving well before the other films, Terror Is a Man (1959) is an effective version of the H.G. Wells classic The Island of Dr. Moreau — not as powerful as the Laughton version or as fun as the Lancaster remake, but it’s the best of the “Blood Island” franchise. One year after playing Dracula (see From Screen To Stream below), Francis Lederer is cast as the Moreau double Dr. Charles Girard, who lives on the remote Blood Island with his understandably gloomy wife Frances (Greta Thyssen), his brutish assistant Walter (Oscar Keesee), and a couple of servants. Shipwrecked on the island is William Fitzgerald (Richard Derr), who receives a warm welcome from the Girards and soon finds himself curious about the doctor’s work, which he ultimately learns is the attempt to turn a panther into a human being. Co-directed (like most films in the series) by Romero and Gerry de Leon, Terror Is a Man is a fairly atmospheric terror tale which paints Girard as obsessed rather than insane, and which views the “humanimal” as both a creature of horror and pity. Terror Is a Man was later re-released in the late 1960s under the title Blood Creature to more closely match the other three movies’ monikers; other names have included The Gory Creatures and Creature From Blood Island.

Despite its low budget, the black-and-white Terror Is a Man feels like a professional picture in most regards — the same, alas, can’t be said for the three color flicks that would follow. Still, the unique location shooting of the Philippine wilderness and the vivid monster makeup help the pictures survive against the lamentable acting and erratic scripting. John Ashley stars in all three pictures and he’s an agreeable if rather passive hero. Brides of Blood (1968) finds him cast as Jim Farrell, a government agent arriving on the island alongside Dr. Paul Henderson (Kent Taylor) and his hot-to-trot wife Carla (former stripper Beverly Hills, aka Beverly Powers, aka perfectly dreadful). They discover that the local natives routinely sacrifice young women to a fearsome creature — could this monster have anything to do with the one “civilized” man on the island, wealthy land owner Esteban Powers (Mario Montenegro)? Brides of Blood was also released under approximately 10(!) other titles, including Brides of Blood Island, Grave Desires, Orgy of Blood, and Danger on Tiki Island.

Mad Doctor of Blood Island (1969) marks a tiny step down from the goofy glories of Brides of Blood. Ashley here essays the role of Bill Foster, a doctor who quickly bonds with two other new arrivals: Shelia (Angelique Pettyjohn), there to reconnect with her estranged, and perpetually drunk, father (Tony Edmunds), and Carlos (Ronaldo Valdez), returning to his childhood home with the hopes of taking his widowed mother (Tita Muñoz) away from what’s viewed as a cursed island. The newcomers are all introduced to Dr. Lorca (Ronald Remy), a scientist who’s involved with the green-skinned monster ripping the locals apart. The plotting isn’t bad in this one, but Romero and de Leon make the unfortunate decision to pull the camera back and forth and shake it like crazy whenever the creature is about to gut someone. Mad Doctor of Blood Island also played under the titles Blood Doctor, Tomb of the Living Dead, and The Revenge of Doctor X.

Beast of Blood (1970) is the last and least in the series. It’s an actual continuation of / sequel to Mad Doctor of Blood Island, picking up where that one left off. Ashley returns as Dr. Foster (the other surviving heroes, alas, cruelly suffer the fate of Hicks and little Newt in Alien³; i.e. getting killed off at the very beginning of the picture), learning that both Dr. Lorca (now played by Eddie Garcia) and the green monster are still alive. This one makes the mistake of sidelining the creature far too often, choosing instead to focus on a tepid love triangle between Foster, an American journalist (Celeste Yarnall), and a helpful local (Liza Belmonte) — stupor also sets in during the countless scenes of the good guys and the bad guys chasing each other through the jungle.

Among the many special features included in this Blu-ray compilation, my favorite would have to be the poster & still galleries. In addition to the expected movie images and artwork, there are also promotional materials explaining the campaigns and gimmicks — for example, imitation engagement rings were handed out to all single ladies attending screenings of Brides of Blood — as well as a series of letters from the films’ producers to one of the investors. Other extras include audio commentaries by Sherman; interviews with Sherman, Romero, Powers, Yarnall, and Garcia; an alternate Brides of Blood title sequence and a title card for Jungle Fury (yet another alternate title); and the Super 8 digest version of Beast of Blood.

Collection: ★★½

PADDINGTON 2 (2017). If the United States has Mickey Mouse, then the United Kingdom has Paddington Bear. A national treasure, the bear created by British author Michael Bond first starred in a 1958 children’s book and went on to conquer not only literature but television and merchandising as well. It’s surprising that it wasn’t until 2014 that he made his cinematic bow, but Paddington predictably was both a commercial and critical darling. A sweet little movie, it showed how the friendly bear from Darkest Peru ended up in London, where he eventually became a member of the Brown family. Free of even the smallest inklings of cynicism and snark, it’s easy to see why the movie was so universally embraced, and a similar response likewise greeted Paddington 2. In this outing, Paddington (voiced by Ben Whishaw) seeks a present for his Aunt Lucy (voiced by Imelda Staunton) back in Deepest Peru. He finds a lovely pop-up book of London, but because it’s rumored to point the way to hidden treasures, it’s stolen by pompous and washed-up actor Phoenix Buchanan (Hugh Grant). Framed for the theft, Paddington winds up in prison, where he gets acquainted with such surly convicts as Knuckles McGinty (Brendan Gleeson); meanwhile, Henry and Mary Brown (Hugh Bonneville and Sally Hawkins) feverishly work to prove his innocence. As with the first flick, there’s nothing truly exceptional about Paddington 2, but it’s charming, humorous, and full of heart. A third film, Paddington in Peru, reaches Blu later this month. Fun trivia fact: When Paddington 1 & 2 hit Ukraine, the dubbing for its ursine star was done by Volodymyr Zelenskyy in his pre-presidential days as a popular entertainer.

4K extras include audio commentary by writer-director Paul King; pieces on Grant and Gleeson’s characters; and an instructional on how to make Paddington’s favorite food, a marmalade sandwich.

Movie: ★★★

SOME LIKE IT HOT (1959). Billy Wilder’s immortal screen gem was voted the best comedy of all time by the American Film Institute in 2000, and you won’t find many movie fans who don’t agree that it’s at least near the top of the heap. Caught in the wrong place at the wrong time — specifically, front-row seats for the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre — musicians Jerry (Jack Lemmon) and Joe (Tony Curtis) evade the mobsters hot on their trail by disguising themselves as Daphne and Josephine, two members of an all-female jazz band. Leaving Chicago and ending up in Florida, both guys have their hands full trying to keep up the ruse; additionally, Joe decides to occasionally disguise himself as a millionaire in order to romance band singer Sugar Kane (Marilyn Monroe) while Jerry considers marrying a real millionaire (Joe E. Brown) who actually believes he’s a woman. There isn’t much to say about this masterpiece that hasn’t already entered into cinema lore, whether it’s the off-screen troubles with Monroe, the risqué double entendres that somehow slipped by the censors, or the endless barrage of classic quotes. The film’s final line is legendary, although I have a soft spot for Jerry’s description of a sashaying Sugar: “Look at that! Look how she moves! That’s just like Jell-O on springs!” An Oscar winner for Best Black-and-White Costume Design (Orry-Kelly), this earned five other nominations, including bids for Wilder (as both director and co-scripter with I.A.L. Diamond) and a sensational Lemmon; absurdly missing were the nods for Monroe (in the finest performance of her career) and Best Picture.

Extras in the 4K + Blu-ray edition include film scholar audio commentary; a trio of behind-the-scenes pieces; appearances by Wilder on The Dick Cavett Show in 1982; a 1955 radio interview with Monroe; and a 1988 TV interview with Lemmon.

Movie: ★★★★

2073 (2024). I guess congratulations are in order for writer-director Asif Kapadia, who managed to make what was probably the most depressing movie of 2024. That in itself is no cinematic crime — film history is full of motion pictures that are both brilliant and bleak — but the trouble with 2073 is that not only does it employ an unwieldy gimmick as its foundation but it places it in the service of a “preaching to the choir” piece. Nodding in the direction of Chris Marker’s La Jetée (with perhaps a quick glance at Marker’s Sans Soleil as well), 2073 begins in the titular year, with a mute woman known only as “Ghost” (Samantha Morton) living underground in a bombed-out San Francisco. It’s been 37 years since a global catastrophe called “The Event” took place, and the survivors are trying to stay alive in an authoritarian state in which homes have been destroyed, books have been banned, and police divide their time between beating innocent people in the streets and whisking them away to never be seen again. And, oh yes, “Chairwoman” Ivanka Trump has been in power for 30 years. So far, so fictional — and so lame, with Ghost’s voice-over thoughts about this dystopian society rather redundant and unrevealing. But then the movie switches its genre from science fiction to documentary, with the majority of the running time spent showing contemporary footage of all the tyrannical evildoers across the globe (Trump, Putin, Duterte, etc.), their enablers (Thiel, Musk, Bezos, and so on), and the death and destruction caused by their actions and attitudes. Only a MAGA moron would label any of this as “fake news,” but beyond his well-placed outrage, Kapadia (best known for the Oscar-winning Amy Winehouse documentary) achieves nothing with a movie in which the fiction is feeble and the facts are scattershot.

The only Blu-ray extras are trailers for other films from NEON.

Movie: ★★

FILM CLIPS

FORBIDDEN WORLD (1982). One of producer Roger Corman’s Alien rip-offs is this horror/sci-fi hybrid in which a gruesome creature bumps off the hapless humans occupying a deep-space lab complex. One of the gloppiest movies ever made — alien slime, human innards, or some variation thereof seem to pop up in nearly every sequence — there isn’t much to recommend this formulaic jaunt, although I guess I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the titter-inducing scene in which, in the midst of all the bloodletting, the blonde scientist (June Chadwick) and the curvaceous lab assistant (Dawn Dunlap) elect to shuck their clothes for a shower during which they calmly discuss the situation while soaping each other’s backs.

The 4K edition contains both the theatrical version and the director’s cut. Extras include audio commentary by director Allan Holzman; a making-of featurette; and an interview with Corman.

Movie: ★½

RESPIRO (2002). On the Mediterranean island of Lampedusa, Grazia (Rain Man‘s Valeria Golino) is known for being a free spirit, albeit the sort whose behavior often confuses the locals and embarrasses her husband (Vincenzo Amato). Her sons (Francesco Casisa and Filippo Pucillo), however, adore her and do everything to protect her not only from the annoyed populace but also from herself. Respiro is the sort of picture one would expect from a country that also produced Federico Fellini: full of rugged, natural beauty, marked by coming-of-age rites of passage, and peopled by earthy and often eccentric individuals. The film works nicely as long as it operates in this realistic (make that neorealistic) vein, but once the plot requires Grazia to hide out, it turns into an onerous watch with no endgame in sight, and the waft of magical realism that awkwardly and almost arbitrarily takes over only serves to further dilute its appeal.

The only Blu-ray extra is the theatrical trailer.

Movie: ★★½

FROM SCREEN TO STREAM

THE RETURN OF DRACULA (1958). It’s an interesting title, in that the “Return” suggests this might be a direct sequel to one of the countless Dracula flicks produced at some point during the previous decades. Instead, it’s its own entity, a low-budget effort seeking merely to cash in on the love of all things Stoker. Francis Lederer essays the role of the Count, here evading European vampire slayers by killing a Czech artist named Bellac Gordal and assuming his identity as he heads off to America to meet the victim’s stateside relatives. As his widowed cousin Cora (Greta Granstedt) hasn’t seen Bellac since they were children, it’s an easy deception to pull off. It proves even easier to fool Cora’s daughter Rachel (Norma Eberhardt), since she’s impressed with the new man of the house and dotes on his every word. But a vampiric presence tends to lead to unusual circumstances, such as the gutting of a kitten loved by Cora’s little boy (Jimmy Baird), or the strange behavior of Rachel’s blind friend Jennie (Virginia Vincent), or the simple fact that Cousin Bellac never seems to be around during the daylight hours (he keeps his coffin in a beachside cave). Average in most respects, The Return of Dracula does include some arty touches by director Paul Landres that are worth noting, including the fog surrounding Dracula even as he rests in his coffin and the splash of blood-red appearing for a few seconds in this otherwise black-and-white endeavor. The plot is fairly nonsensical, but Lederer, despite being miscast, still brings the proper measure of weariness to a Dracula having to deal with (the horror!) small-town Americana and chatty relatives.

Movie: ★★½

SUSPICION (1941). Suspicion marked the first of four collaborations between Alfred Hitchcock and Cary Grant, and while few would consider it their best joint project — most would say North By Northwest, I would say Notorious, and probably nobody would say To Catch a Thief (pleasant as it is) — it’s a decent thriller in its own right. And speaking of “notorious,” that’s an accurate assessment of that abrupt finale, one of the most famous “altered endings” in Hollywood history (a 180-degree change from that of the source material, Anthony Berkeley’s novel Before the Fact). Joan Fontaine, reunited with Hitchcock the year after their smashing success with the Best Picture Oscar winner Rebecca, essays the role of Lina McLaidlaw, a young spinster who comes out of her shell after she meets and marries Johnnie Aysgarth (Grant), a bachelor who, it turns out, doesn’t have a penny to his name. What he does have is a history of bad bets and big debts, and once his sins start to catch up with him, Lina begins to wonder if her husband is capable of murder. Nigel Bruce, best known as Dr. Watson to Basil Rathbone’s Sherlock Holmes in the series of Arthur Conan Doyle adaptations, is a delight as Johnnie’s best friend Beaky, and the film contains the sort of neat touches for which Hitchcock was celebrated (check out that glowing glass of milk). An Academy Award nominee for Best Picture and Best Dramatic Score (Franz Waxman), Suspicion earned Fontaine the Best Actress Oscar — she’s just fine, even though the feeling remains that the victory was a consolation prize for losing the previous year for Rebecca. As for Grant, he earned a Best Actor nomination for another 1941 release, the melodrama Penny Serenade.

Movie: ★★★