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Win Mean Streets Limited Edition Dual 4K Uhd and Blu-ray Box Set! Limited Edition Dual 4K Uhd and Blu-Ray Box Set & Standard Edition 4K and Blu-Ray Arrive 15th January 2024. We are giving away a Dual Edition Box Set to one lucky winner!

From the legendary director who needs no introduction – Martin Scorsese – comes his tour de force Mean Streets, the film that placed him firmly on the path to becoming one of the most-lauded filmmakers of his generation. This early work gave a glimpse of a true master at work and also showcased the fledgling careers of two Hollywood powerhouses Harvey Keitel and Robert De Niro, in their first ever movie appearance together.

Now to celebrate its 50th Anniversary Mean Streets gets a brand new 4K restoration supervised by Scorsese himself. It’s time to experience this seminal movie, like never seen before with a brand-new Limited Edition version from...

Rereleased for its 50th anniversary, this ultraviolent urban pastoral remains thrilling, sensual, dangerous and effortlessly fluent

Sin and shame are the driving forces of Martin Scorsese’s blistering early classic from 1973, now on rerelease for its 50th anniversary; it is an ultraviolent urban pastoral boiling up from the streets of Little Italy in Lower Manhattan around the time of the annual San Gennaro feast. It’s a thrillingly sensual, dangerous, effortlessly fluent movie which reaches back to the Warner Brothers’ gangster films, but also to Fellini’s I Vitelloni (1953), Godard’s Breathless (1960) and even the Boulting brothers’ Brighton Rock (1948). One year before, Francis Ford Coppola had released his sensational mob drama The Godfather, the great top-down grand political narrative of organised crime. Mean Streets is a great example of the opposite tradition: the ordinary worm’s-eye-view of the mafia, which was to lead to Scorsese’s GoodFellas and David Chase’s The Sopranos,...

No matter how learned they are, film critics can be oh, so wrong. Elvis Presley‘s Viva Las Vegas inspired a review in The New York Times that was critical of the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll‘s early work. The New York Times also ignored one of Elvis’ best songs in the review.

The New York Times said Elvis Presley’s singing improved in ‘Viva Las Vegas’

In a 1964 article, The New York Times gave a mixed appraisal of Viva Las Vegas. “Coming on a balmy day, with no pretensions of art, Viva Las Vegas, the new Elvia Presley vehicle, is about as pleasant and unimportant as a banana split,” the article said. “And as fetching to look at, it might be added.

“By now, after some rocky beginnings, the Presley movie formula has leveled off to a series of musical romps that are extremely easy to take,” the article continued.

Elvis Presley starred in 31 movies in his acting career. Not every single one was a critical darling, but many did well at the box office, giving Presley the status of one of the biggest stars in Hollywood. His movies earned over $284 million worldwide, and a few earned Elvis a pretty payday.

Here are the top 5 highest-grossing Elvis Presley movies 5. ‘Jailhouse Rock’ – $4 million Elvis Presley | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/Getty Images

Jailhouse Rock is the third movie starring Elvis Presley. Directed by Richard Thorpe, the film centers around Vince (Presley), a convict who discovers in jail that he has the potential to become a star. While the movie received mixed reviews from critics, it was a hit with audiences and was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress.

The film is also fondly remembered for its soundtrack, which included the song “Jailhouse Rock.” The titular tune reached No.

Prior to the advent of the so-called “eco-vengeance” genre, Italian cinema used animals, or at least the symbolism they naturally encapsulate, in the most disparate contexts, from those coherent with their nature to more unusual and weird derivations. With regard to the singular use of animals in Italian cinema, a reference is certainly owed to Dario Argento’s first films—L’uccello dalle piume di cristallo, Il gatto a nove code, and Quattro mosche di velluto grigio—which were followed by huge commercial success that encapsulated what Argento had learnt from Alfred Hitchcock and the Nouvelle Vague, as well as from the literary heritage of Raymond Chandler, where animals appeared in the titles embodying the characters’ gestures, modus operandi, and personalities—the animal as a metaphor representing the diabolical “human” nature. Although the presence of animals in the titles is often justified, of course, by some narrative solution or gimmick,...

1953’s House of Wax with Vincent Price cast a long shadow fairly early in the horror world; creepy Grand Guignol (in 3D no less) with a strong thread of vengeance gave us further goodies such as Tourist Trap (1979) and a recently reappraised remake in 2005. It’s not surprising then that TV would take a crack at molding its own vicious visage; what they came up with is a pilot film that executives deemed too shocking for the small screen – Chamber of Horrors (1966), a decidedly ghoulish take on necrophilia and murder mixed with breezy banter and chopped up body parts. I think the brass may have been right to send this one to the big screen.

Before you get too excited, we’re not talking Blood Feast here; it’s incredibly tame by today’s standards. No, it’s the subject matter itself which would send mom and dad into epileptic fits,...

Here's a brief look – to be expanded – at Turner Classic Movies' June 2017 European Vacation Movie Series this evening, June 23. Tonight's destination of choice is Italy. Starring Suzanne Pleshette and Troy Donahue as the opposite of Ugly Americans who find romance and heartbreak in the Italian capital, Delmer Daves' Rome Adventure (1962) was one of the key romantic movies of the 1960s. Angie Dickinson and Rossano Brazzi co-star. In all, Rome Adventure is the sort of movie that should please fans of Daves' Technicolor melodramas like A Summer Place, Parrish, and Susan Slade. Fans of his poetic Westerns – e.g., 3:10 to Yuma, The Hanging Tree – may (or may not) be disappointed with this particular Daves effort. As an aside, Rome Adventure was, for whatever reason, a sizable hit in … Brazil. Who knows, maybe that's why Rome Adventure co-star Brazzi would find himself playing a Brazilian – a macho, traditionalist coffee plantation owner,...

Ann-Margret movies: From sex kitten to two-time Oscar nominee. Ann-Margret: 'Carnal Knowledge' and 'Tommy' proved that 'sex symbol' was a remarkable actress Ann-Margret, the '60s star who went from sex kitten to respected actress and two-time Oscar nominee, is Turner Classic Movies' star today, Aug. 13, '15. As part of its “Summer Under the Stars” series, TCM is showing this evening the movies that earned Ann-Margret her Academy Award nods: Mike Nichols' Carnal Knowledge (1971) and Ken Russell's Tommy (1975). Written by Jules Feiffer, and starring Jack Nicholson and Art Garfunkel, the downbeat – some have found it misogynistic; others have praised it for presenting American men as chauvinistic pigs – Carnal Knowledge is one of the precursors of “adult Hollywood moviemaking,” a rare species that, propelled by the success of disparate arthouse fare such as Vilgot Sjöman's I Am Curious (Yellow) and Costa-Gavras' Z, briefly flourished from...

Cinematic Titanic is the live movie riffing show from the creator and original cast of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and they’re bringing their show to St. Louis this Saturday October 12th for what they’re calling their ‘Farewell Tour’ which I guess means this is the last time you’ll be able to see these guys riff on movies. Like MST3K, the show was created by Joel Hodgson and features the same team that first brought the Peabody award winning cult-classic series to life: Trace Beaulieu (Crow, Dr. Forrester), J. Elvis Weinstein (Tom Servo, Dr. Erhardt), Frank Conniff (TV’s Frank), and Mary Jo Pehl (Pearl Forrester), Cinematic Titanic continues the tradition of riffing on ‘the unfathomable’, ‘the horribly great’, and the just plain ‘cheesy’ movies from the past.

Four years ago when Cinematic Titanic came to the St. Louis area’s St. Charles Family Arena, they riffed on...

Fans are drumming up support for a  "Garrison's Gorillas" TV movie based on the 1967 ABC TV series, featuring a "Dirty Dozen" scenario of training Allied prisoners for World War II military missions.

The original TV stories focused on a sordid group of 'wronged-guys', recruited from stateside prisons to use specialized criminal skills against the Third Reich during World War II.

The men were promised a parole at the end of the war if they made the grade. And if they lived. The alternative was an immediate return to prison. If they ran, they could expect execution for desertion.

The four main characters were con-man 'Actor' (Cesare Danova),  safecracker 'Casino' (Rudy Solari), cat burglar 'Goniff' (Christopher Cary) and native American 'Chief ' (Brendan Boone).

Led by West Pointer 'First Lt. Craig Garrison' (Ron Harper) from a secluded English mansion serving as a headquarters, the group ranged all over Europe in exploits...

Welcome to The Ultimate Silver Screen Mixtape, a collection of many all time best musical moments in cinema. Before we get into the thick of it, let me lay down a little bit of background and ground rules. This feature was inspired by one Martin Scorsese, who’s use of particularly choiced soundtrack cuts has led to some of the most indelible scenes in film history. That’s another way of saying that the conventional soundtrack is out for this listing – no disrespect to the masters of movie music.

I’m sure many of you will recognize several of my picks as obvious – and many have received lengthy coverage in the past. What I’m striving for here is an overhaul of moments that are elevated, punctuated or immortalized by the soundtrack. That said; let’s jump right in!

I thought it fitting to start off with one of Scorsese...

George Lucas, David Prowse as Darth Vader and Irvin Kershner

Photo: StarWars.com It was a strange start to the week as I had two back-to-back obituary posts reporting the deaths of Leslie Nielsen and Irvin Kershner and while my personal experience with them is limited there are others that can shine a little more light on their respective careers with a little more first-hand knowledge than I can offer.

The first comes from George Lucas where the following quote comes from StarWars.com: "The world has lost a great director and one of the most genuine people I've had the pleasure of knowing... Irvin Kershner was a true gentleman in every sense of the word. When I think of Kersh, I think of his warmth, his thoughtfulness and his talent. I knew him from USC --- I attended his lectures and he was actually on the festival panel that...

"Garrison's Gorillas" was an ABC TV series broadcast 1967-1968, with a total of 26 hour-long episodes produced. The series was 'inspired' by the 1967 war action feature "The Dirty Dozen", which featured a similar scenario of training Allied prisoners for World War II military missions.

"Garrison's Gorillas" focused on a motley group of commandos recruited from stateside prisons to use their special skills against the Germans in World War II.

The men were promised a parole at the end of the war if they worked out. And if they lived. The alternative was an immediate return to prison. If they ran, they could expect execution for desertion.

The four main characters were the con-man 'Actor' (Cesare Danova), a safecracker 'Casino' (Rudy Solari), a cat burglar 'Goniff' (Christopher Cary) and a native American with a switchblade 'Chief (Brendan Boone').

Led by West Pointer 'First Lt. Craig Garrison' (Ron Harper) and headquartered in a secluded mansion in England,...

Starring: Harvey Keitel, Robert De Niro, David Proval, Amy Robinson, Richard Romanus, Cesare Danova

Directed by: Martin Scorsese

“It’s all bullshit except the pain. The pain of hell. The burn from a lighted match increased a million times. Infinite. Now, ya don’t fuck around with the infinite. There’s no way you do that. The pain in hell has two sides. The kind you can touch with your hand; the kind you can feel in your heart… your soul, the spiritual side. And ya know…...

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