FILM FRENZY

Peter Cushing in Fear in the Night; Ralph Bates in Lust for a Vampire; David Prowse in The Horror of Frankenstein (Photos: Severin)

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.)

FIVE EASY PIECES (1970). It’s not overkill to declare that writer-director Bob Rafelson’s Five Easy Pieces was one of the defining movies of the early 1970s. A new kind of picture even for its era, this absorbing character study dared to make its protagonist, Bobby Dupea (Jack Nicholson), often unlikable. Yet in Bobby’s inability to get a grasp on his own values and self-worth, it also made him an easily relatable character for the turbulent times, a period mourning the death of ’60s idealism and rocked by the war raging in Vietnam. Nicholson’s performance as an oil-rigger who’s soon revealed to be a pianist escaping from his upper-class roots still stands as one of his greatest — the “chicken salad sandwich” scene is immortal, thanks largely to his emoting — and the stellar cast also includes Karen Black as Bobby’s doting girlfriend, Sally Struthers (a year away from All in the Family immortality), Ralph Waite (two years away from The Waltons fame), future pop star Toni Basil, and future Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe author Fannie Flagg. This earned four major Academy Award nominations: Best Picture, Actor, Supporting Actress (Black), and Original Screenplay (Rafelson and Carole Eastman). Black’s superb performance nabbed her a Golden Globe as well as prizes from the New York Film Critics Circle and the National Board of Review; alas, the Academy idiotically gave its award as a sentimental sop to 70-year-old past winner Helen Hayes, whose winning turn in Airport was accurately described by the New York Times‘ Vincent Canby as, “let’s face it, just a teentsy-weentsy bit terrible.”

4K extras include audio commentary by Rafelson and interior designer Toby Rafelson, and a 1976 interview with Rafelson.

Movie: ★★★½

LOVELINES (1984) / SUNSET (1988). The Alliance label recently released several older (1977-1990) efforts on Blu-ray, all outfitted with those slick slipcovers that resemble VHS boxes and cassettes. Certainly in these two instances, the slipcovers are cooler than the movies hiding inside.

The ‘80s were jam-packed with teen sex comedies, and Lovelines qualifies as one of the more obscure titles from the period. Its most recognizable cast member is Michael Winslow, who that same year was hitting it big by showcasing his motormouth sound skills in Police Academy. Here, he’s J.D., a would-be entrepreneur who runs Lovelines, a telephone hotline for high school students. Despite its titular prominence, Lovelines doesn’t figure much into the core plot, which instead involves a Romeo-and-Juliet-styled romance between Piper (Mary Beth Evans) and Rick (Greg Bradford), two aspiring rock ‘n’ rollers from competing schools. There are a handful of amusing lines scattered about — I especially like when a doofus at a costume party mistakes Cyrano de Bergerac for Pinocchio — but otherwise this is as hopeless as one might expect. On the other hand, a viewer can almost always count on at least one breakdancing sequence in this sort of film, and this picture generously offers two. That’s future RoboCop / NCIS: Los Angeles actor Miguel Ferrer as Dragon, the drummer for a band called The Flying Phlegm.

The connective tissue between Lovelines and Sunset is Rod Amateau, a longtime (since 1947) Hollywood veteran who as a sexagenarian directed Lonelines and wrote the original story for Sunset (his only other ’80s credit was the notorious catastrophe The Garbage Pail Kids Movie). Unlike Lovelines, Sunset was a big-budget production, with Blake Edwards as writer-director and Bruce Willis and James Garner leading an impressive cast. But like most of the films that arrived at the end of Edwards’ otherwise stellar career, it proved to be a massive critical and commercial bomb. The hook is more than promising, taking its cue from the real-life friendship between the famous marshal Wyatt Earp and silent-cinema cowboy star Ton Mix. The fictional tale in Sunset finds the two men investigating a murder that might revolve around sadistic studio head Alfie Alperin (Malcolm McDowell, predictably — and lazily — cast). The period recreation is flawless (Patricia Norris earned an Oscar nomination for Best Costume Design), and Garner is nothing short of sensational as the wise and wisecracking lawman. But the mystery is too convoluted to maintain interest, and Willis is simply terrible, doing little more than smirking on cue and shambling through the picture like a Romero zombie. (Garner wasn’t impressed with his co-star, rightly dismissing his style as “high school” and opining that “he thinks he’s so clever he can just walk through it.”)

There are no extras on either film.

Lovelines: ★½

Sunset: ★★

MAGNIFICENT BODYGUARDS (1978). It’s Jackie Chan … in Super 3-D! While there’s nothing remotely magnificent about Magnificent Bodyguards, it was the first Hong Kong flick to be filmed in 3-D, so at least it has that historical tidbit to keep its scant reputation afloat. Otherwise, it’s pretty familiar stuff, which isn’t exactly a dis since this familiar stuff can often be pretty entertaining. It’s one of those “men on a mission” yarns, with warrior extraordinaire Lord Ting Chung (Chan) part of a group that has been hired to help the enigmatic Lady Nan (Ping Wang) and her sick (and never glimpsed) brother cross dangerous terrain. Ting Chung’s fellow bodyguards are a stoic type (James Tien) whose m.o. is to peel the skin off his enemies and a goofball (Siu-lung Leung) who doesn’t allow his deafness to interfere with his martial arts prowess. It’s fun if forgettable, and the 3-D means that pointy objects are repeatedly thrust at the camera. The most startling moments? Whenever snatches from John Williams’ world-famous and instantly recognizable score for Star Wars are employed. Isn’t this copyright infringement and thus illegal? Given the Lucas empire’s tight control over all aspects of the franchise, I’m surprised nobody was sued … or summarily executed by a pointy object thrust at them.

Magnificent Bodyguards has been issued in a stellar 3-disc, 3-D Blu-ray edition by 88 Films. The film is available for viewing in Flat 2-D, Anaglyph 3-D (a pair of glasses is included), and Digital 3-D. Extras consist of audio commentary by Hong Kong cinema experts Frank Djeng of the NY Asian Film Festival and F.J. DeSanto; a pair of featurettes with Hong Kong cinema connoisseurs; and trailers. A booklet and a lenticular slipcover are also included.

Movie: ★★½

MAURICE (1987). The team of director James Ivory and producer Ismail Merchant earned sizable art-house income, critical raves, and boatloads of awards for two of their three E.M. Forster adaptations, 1986’s A Room with a View (see From Screen To Stream below) and 1992’s Howards End. Maurice, an adaptation of the novel that (as per Forster’s wishes) only became published following the author’s death in 1970, largely slipped through the cracks at the time of its initial release, although it’s worth another look. Certainly, the film’s place in LGBTQ cinema was cemented from the start, since this refreshingly honest and sympathetic look at homosexuality debuted in the age of Ronald Reagan and AIDS. James Wilby stars as the title character, a Cambridge lad who ends up in a loving yet platonic relationship with fellow student Clive Durham (Hugh Grant). Yet societal expectations — to say nothing of England’s punishments for anyone caught engaging in homosexual acts — temper their actions, with Clive reluctantly gravitating toward women and Maurice seeking help from a doctor (Ben Kingsley) who employs hypnotism as a cure. A protracted running time allows much of the story’s passion to seep out, but this remains an impressive and even important motion picture. Jenny Beavan and John Bright, who picked up the Best Costume Design Oscar the previous year for A Room with a View, earned another nomination for their work here.

Extras in the 4K + Blu-ray edition include two discussions with Ivory and director of photography Pierre Lhomme; a making-of piece featuring interviews with Wilby and Grant; and deleted scenes.

Movie: ★★★

SANGSTER DIRECTS HAMMER (1970-1972). Stop! Hammer time! In an era in which there are still precious few 4K and /or Blu-ray box sets dedicated to the output of England’s premiere horror studio — even Warner Bros. didn’t bother with a Volume Two after releasing the Blu collection Hammer Horror Classics: Volume One back in 2015 — here’s a superb offering from the folks at Severin. As screenwriter, Jimmy Sangster was one of Hammer’s MVPs, not only penning approximately two dozen scripts over the years (see From Screen To Stream below for a handful of them) but also helping jumpstart the studio’s horror reign with his screenplays for 1956’s X the Unknown, 1957’s The Curse of Frankenstein, and 1958’s Horror of Dracula. He would later try his hand at directing, helming a trio of films that would turn out to be the last ones he made for Hammer in any capacity.

The Horror of Frankenstein (1970) is notable for being the only Frankie flick from Hammer not to star Peter Cushing as the scientist obsessed with creating life. Instead, Sangster (as writer-director) chose to head in another direction, making his Victor Frankenstein younger and more with the times — the times meaning, naturally, the movie’s 1970s release date, not the novel’s 1790s setting. This Victor Frankenstein, portrayed by Ralph Bates, is a hip, sarcastic womanizer — he’s also a cold-blooded killer, murdering his father so he can use the family fortune to finance his increasingly outlandish experiments. He succeeds in creating a monster (David Prowse) that in tried and true fashion escapes the castle to wreak havoc. Sangster adds some interesting narrative asides within the traditional framework, and the closing capper is especially clever. The film’s detractors have criticized the picture for not starring Cushing and for what’s perceived as a campy approach, but I’ve always viewed the humor as more curdled than campy, and Bates, while no Cushing, excels in the role of the bad Baron (Hammer planned to make the actor their next Cushing or Christopher Lee but the idea didn’t take). Prowse, however, brings none of the pathos of Boris Karloff’s performance in the part nor any of the genuine menace exhibited by Lee in his at-bat. Prowse would play a different Frankenstein monster, again for Hammer, in 1974’s subsequent Frankenstein and the Monster From Hell (with Cushing back in the scientist’s seat) before providing Darth Vader with his physical form (James Earl Jones, of course, handled vocal duties) in 1977’s Star Wars and beyond.

Lust for a Vampire (1971) is the second entry in Hammer’s Karnstein Trilogy, sandwiched between 1970’s The Vampire Lovers and 1971’s Twins of Evil. All three are loosely based on Sheridan Le Fanu’s classic 1872 novella Carmilla, although all literary pretensions are tossed aside for pleasures of the flesh as Hammer had by this point entered its decidedly more robust blood-and-boobs phase. The vampire Carmilla (played in this installment by Yutte Stensgaard) has been reincarnated by Count Karnstein (Mike Raven) and attends a nearby girls’ school under the name Mircalla. She still prefers necking with other ladies, but her lesbian tendencies are put to the test when one of her teachers, noted author Richard LeStrange (Michael Johnson), falls in love with her. Ralph Bates has been carried over from The Horror of Frankenstein — in fact, he’s in all three of the Sangster-directed films — yet despite top billing, he actually has a supporting role as a history professor and student of the occult who creeps out all the students with his lecherous stares. Tudor Gates wrote the screenplays for all three Karnstein sagas, and there are some interesting developments at play in this installment — that would not include the unconvincing romance between Carmilla and LeStrange, further crippled by the producers’ decision to overlay one of their amorous clinches with the jarring and drippy tune “Strange Love.” Bates and Suzanna Leigh (as a concerned teacher) are good, Johnson remains rigid, Stensgaard is vacuous, and, even dubbed, former disc jockey Raven manages to serve up uncured ham.

Sangster’s third and final directorial work isn’t another creature feature but rather a psychological thriller. Fear in the Night (1972), which he co-scripted with Michael Syson, centers on Peggy (ever-appealing Judy Geeson of To Sir, With Love, reviewed below in From Screen To Stream), a young woman who has just gotten married and is whisked off to a remote boys’ school by her teacher husband Robert (Ralph Bates). It’s between semesters, and the only other people on the grounds are the eccentric headmaster (Peter Cushing) and his coolly collected, and much younger, wife (Joan Collins). Before she even leaves London for the sticks, however, Peggy is attacked by a man with a prosthetic arm, and she’s terrified once he turns up at the school to continue menacing her. Viewers not familiar with a certain 1955 Georges Clouzot classic might be blindsided by its major plot twist — everyone else will know how this unfolds but will mostly enjoy it anyway, thanks to Sangster’s inspired use of the setting and strong performances from all four principal cast members, particularly Cushing in an unusual role.

Severin’s 7-disc set offers each film on 4K UHD and Blu-ray, with the final disc devoted to more extra features. Chief among these disc 7 attractions are the new documentary Hammer & Beyond: The Legacy of Jimmy Sangster; an archival interview with Sangster; and a piece on Bates. Extras on The Horror of Frankenstein include audio commentary by Sangster; audio commentary by film historian Tim Lucas; vintage behind-the-scenes footage; a 1997 panel discussion with Sangster, Prowse, and co-star Veronica Carlson; an illustrated audio essay on various cinematic adaptations of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein; two featurettes on Shelley; and an alternate TV opening credits sequence. Extras on Lust for a Vampire include audio commentary by Sangster and Leigh; audio commentary by author David Flint (Ten Years of Terror: British Horror Films of the 1970s); an illustrated archival audio interview with Stensgaard; an archival interview with Gates; a video essay; and an alternate version of one of the lesbian scenes. Extras on Fear in the Night include audio commentary by Sangster; audio commentary by Flint; an archival audio interview with Cushing; and a video essay. The set also contains a glorious 312-page book.

The Horror of Frankenstein: ★★★

Lust for a Vampire: ★★½

Fear in the Night: ★★½

Collection: ★★★½

10 CLOVERFIELD LANE (2016). In this maybe-sort-of follow-up to 2008’s Cloverfield, a young woman named Michelle (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) is involved in a car accident and subsequently finds herself the prisoner of Howard (John Goodman). This stranger insists he plucked her from the crash for her own protection — if he’s to be believed, the rest of the world has been wiped out, and the only survivors are himself, Michelle, and Emmett (John Gallagher Jr.), the sweet if simple handyman who spent years helping Howard construct his underground bunker. Howard hopes the three of them can spend the next few years coexisting as a happy family until the outside air is breathable again, but Michelle makes every effort to escape, all the while wondering if there’s any truth to Howard’s conspiracy theory. This is where I promise not to reveal any spoilers, but honestly, what is there to really spoil? Here’s a movie that ends up being too clever for its own good, becoming utterly predictable in its relentless attempts at unpredictability. When the plot looks as if it will thrust, it of course will parry, and the film further dilutes any genuine surprises by often telegraphing its intentions ahead of time. There’s also one subplot too many, with its clumsy presence only there to spin the story off into another (expected) direction. This isn’t to say the film is a bust — the terrific performances by the three leads and debuting director Dan Trachtenberg’s effective staging (the bunker atmosphere alternates between friendly and foreboding) are worthy enough to earn this a soft recommendation. Just don’t expect many more surprises than one would find in any given episode of Matlock.

4K extras include audio commentary by Trachtenberg and producer J.J. Abrams as well as various making-of featurettes.

Movie: ★★½

FILM CLIPS

AUDITION (1999). Seeking someone to replace his dearly departed wife, a widower (Ryo Ishibashi) holds fake tryouts for a movie, with the real purpose of the auditions being to find himself a beautiful young bride. Out of the 30 prospects, he quickly settles on the meek Asami (Eihi Shiina), little realizing she will soon turn his life into a living hell. A slow burn of a film that eventually erupts into shocking violence of the “torture porn” variety, this celebrated effort from Japanese director Takashi Miike has lost none of its power to disturb, although its sexual politics (is the movie feministic or misogynistic?) remain as muddied as ever.

Extras in the 4K edition include audio commentary by Miike and scripter Daisuke Tengan; audio commentary by Miike biographer Tom Mes; an introduction by Miike; interviews with Miike, Ishibashi, and Shiina; and an audio essay.

Movie: ★★★

THE MASTERMIND (2025). Disclosure Day’s Josh O’Connor had a busy 2025, headlining the indie effort Rebuilding, starring opposite Paul Mescal in The History of Sound, and tackling the main role — aside from Daniel Craig’s Benoit Blanc, of course — in the Knives Out mystery Wake Up Dead Man. He was also front and center for this latest effort from writer-director Kelly Reichardt, whose First Cow landed in the #2 spot on my 10 Best of 2020 list. Set in 1970 Massachusetts, this centers on the sort of person often described as one of life’s losers: J.B. Mooney, an unemployed laborer who decides to steal several paintings from an art museum. J.B.’s first mistake as an amateur thief is to think that his undependable buddies would make good accomplices. The film is a low-key gem about a privileged yet lost man adrift in a privileged yet lost America, and the irony of the ending is particularly satisfying.

The only Blu-ray extra is a video essay.

Movie: ★★★

FROM SCREEN TO STREAM

CITIZEN KANE (1941). Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane has been cited as the greatest film ever made from so many different quarters, it’s a wonder a Congressional law was never passed making it required viewing for anyone who claims they like movies. With his first picture, writer-director-producer-star Welles introduced and/or perfected a slew of innovative cinematic techniques, as well as related a damn good mystery (“Rosebud”) and an even better character study. And he had exceptional talents supporting him: Gregg Toland with his ofttimes breathtaking cinematography, future West Side Story director Robert Wise with his savvy editing, and Bernard Herrmann with his exceptional score. But those aren’t the only reasons this film about the rise and fall of newspaper magnate and empire-builder Charles Foster Kane (largely based on William Randolph Hearst) endures — what really provides it with its emotional hook is how perfectly Welles captures the feelings of loneliness, alienation, and despair that often all but define human existence. The sequence in which Kane, who has everything except what’s most important to him, finally cracks and destroys the room around him in an almost robotic manner is one of the most haunting ever committed to celluloid — yet it’s merely just one more great scene in a movie packed with ‘em. Citizen Kane earned nine Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Director, Actor, and nods for Toland, Wise, and Herrmann, but the controversy, the surrounding politics, and the organization’s own frequent inability to recognize masterpieces led to it winning a single Oscar: Best Original Screenplay for Welles and co-scripter Herman J. Mankiewicz. (Herrmann at least won Best Music Score for his other 1941 effort, All That Money Can Buy aka The Devil and Daniel Webster.)

Movie: ★★★★

A ROOM WITH A VIEW (1986). It may come as a surprise to some that Merchant Ivory Productions, created by producer Ismail Merchant and director James Ivory, had been around since the early 1960s, considering that “Merchant Ivory” as a film brand didn’t emerge until the pair began experiencing their greatest successes during the 1980s and 1990s. Pictures such as Shakespeare Wallah, The Europeans, and The Bostonians — all scripted, like the vast majority of theirs works, by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala — earned appreciative ink, but the tony outfit’s breakthrough was this adaptation of the E.M. Forster novel. The movie often feels like a test run for the team’s thematically richer hits, 1992’s Howards End and 1993’s The Remains of the Day, but its modest pleasures nevertheless stand on their own. A 19-year-old Helena Bonham Carter makes her striking film debut as Lucy Honeychurch, who travels to Florence under the tutelage of her chaperone Charlotte Bartlett (Maggie Smith) and falls for the brash George Emerson (Julian Sands), who’s vacationing there with his liberal-minded father (Denholm Elliott). Upon returning to England, Lucy moves ahead with her plans to marry the supercilious Cecil Vyse (Daniel Day-Lewis), but the unexpected arrival of the Emersons changes everything. Nominated for eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Director, and supporting bids for Smith and Elliott, this won three: Best Adapted Screenplay for Jhabvala, Art Direction-Set Decoration, and Costume Design.

Movie: ★★★

THE SNORKEL (1958) / THE PIRATES OF BLOOD RIVER (1962) / MANIAC (1963) / THE LEGACY (1978). In addition to the three pictures he directed, Jimmy Sangster also wrote dozens of movies (not to mention episodes of such popular TV shows as McCloud, Kolchak: The Night Stalker, and Wonder Woman). Here are four such scripting efforts, the first three for Hammer.

The Snorkel is a nifty thriller in which a suave gentleman (Peter Van Eyck) devises an imaginative way to murder his wife (it involves the titular underwater apparatus); his plan works until his teenage step-daughter (Mandy Miller) starts to figure out his m.o. The dimness of the teen’s guardian (Betta St. John) is tough to take, but Van Eyck is suitably menacing, and the ending is terrific.

Although it was primarily known for its horror output, Hammer enjoyed a fair measure of success with the engaging adventure yarn The Pirates of Blood River. Christopher Lee plays the eyepatch-wearing French scoundrel LaRoche, whose band of rum-soaked reprobates descends upon a Protestant community already reeling from the corruption of the town leaders. Kerwin Mathews stars as the dashing hero, while Oliver Reed, as one of the pirates, takes center stage in a rousing sequence involving swords and blindfolds.

Not nearly as shocking as its title would indicate — it’s certainly nothing like William Lustig’s same-named flick from 1980 — Maniac stars Kerwin Mathews as an American artist who winds up in a desolate French town, where he becomes romantically involved with both a sultry saloon owner (Nadia Gray) and her sheltered step-daughter (Liliane Brousse). In time, he agrees to help the girl’s father (Donald Houston) escape from an insane asylum, a move he may end up regretting. The love-triangle material is weak, but Sangster makes up for any lulls by providing not one but two satisfying twists during the home stretch.

Better than its mangy reputation, The Legacy stars real-life couple Katharine Ross and Sam Elliott (who wed in 1984 and happily are still together) as Americans in England for business. They end up at the remote countryside mansion of millionaire Jason Mountolive (John Standing) alongside other guests, including a former Nazi (Charles Gray) and a rock ‘n’ roll star (The Who’s Roger Daltrey). It becomes clear that all these people owe some sort of allegiance to Mountolive, and that debt might have something to do with the fact that they’re all being killed under strange circumstances. Sangster co-wrote the script, while director Richard Marquand was just five years away from helming Return of the Jedi.

The Snorkel: ★★★

Maniac: ★★½

The Pirates of Blood River: ★★★

The Legacy: ★★★

TO SIR, WITH LOVE (1967). Although it’s exceedingly rare these days (Josh O’Connor being an exception, as noted above), it used to be common for actors to headline three or more films in one single year: For stars under the old studio system (Cagney, Gable, etc.), it was the norm rather than the exception, and even in more recent decades, workaholics like Michael Caine and Gene Hackman could be found beefing up their filmographies by working around the clock — and calendar. What’s not so common is for all the titles from a solitary year to emerge as gargantuan hits, and yet that’s what happened with Sidney Poitier in 1967. Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner was a monster box office smash while In the Heat of the Night copped the Best Picture Oscar, but before either opened in theaters, Poitier already had a sizable hit that year with To Sir, With Love, which became one of the year’s top 10 grossers and housed a #1 pop single to boot. Poitier stars as Mark Thackeray, an engineer whose difficulty in finding a job in his chosen field leads him to accept a teaching position at a school located in London’s East End. Faced with a class full of rough-and-tumble students, Thackeray decides that the best way to reach these kids is by ignoring the school curriculum and instead teaching them about love, rebellion, marriage, and other worldly pursuits (yes, it beat Dead Poets Society to the punch by over two decades). Lulu, who sings the chart-topping title tune, is cast as one of Thackeray’s charges, although the more impressive performances come from Christian Roberts as the surly Denham and especially Judy Geeson as the astute Pamela.

Movie: ★★★