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The following article includes discussions of graphic sexual assault.

Horror is all about pushing boundaries. As a means to refract contemporary fears, anxieties, and pressures, the horror genre, almost by design, must resist censoring or constraining the terror on screen. Some of the most iconic horror sequences, such as Janet Leigh's death in "Psycho" and the chestburster in "Alien," were boundary-pushing triumphs. Richly textured and gorgeously composed shocks with purpose, they have endured as hallmarks of the genre.

Of course, horror can go too far. Savagery and gruesome violence can have the opposite effect by blunting the efficacy of any given scare. It's why several filmmakers, such as Damien Leone, director of 2002's indie sensation "Terrifier 2," opted to scrap some material, worried the brutality would hurt rather than elevate. And it's not just horror. Some of the most disturbing movie scenes imaginable exist firmly in other genres. Sometimes,...

At the intersection of big-star international dealmaking, the 70mm epic, and the humble sword ‘n’ shield actioner, this comic book viking saga stacks one absurd, borderline bad taste action scene on top of another. It’s an irresistible mash-up of earlier successes, well directed visually by Jack Cardiff. Richard Widmark at forty must play the Viking action hero, Russ Tamblyn at thirty is still a physical dervish, and Sidney Poitier takes on the strangest casting of his career. Plus, low sexist comedy from a platoon of hearty Brit thesps!

The Long Ships

Blu-ray

Viavision [Imprint] 137

1964 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 126 min. / Street Date June 29, 2022 / Available from Viavision / Aus 34.95

Starring: Richard Widmark, Sidney Poitier, Russ Tamblyn, Rosanna Schiaffino, Oskar Homolka, Edward Judd, Lionel Jeffries, Beba Loncar, Clifford Evans, Gordon Jackson, Colin Blakely, Paul Stassino, Leonard Rossiter, Jeanne Moody, Julie Samuel.

Cinematography: Christopher Challis

Production Designer: Vlastimir Gavrik, Zoran Zorcic

Art Director: Bill Constable...

Myopic Harry Palmer, the great cook, lover and reluctant spy, returns to where his trouble with the British Army began. This time he’s tangled up in a political snarl that might have dire consequences: not only are the Russians involved, ex-Nazis are on the payroll. Israel may have an agent in the field, and not necessarily working in Her Majesty’s interest. Michael Caine’s star quality shines through in this second Harry Palmer spy yarn, filmed on German locations in high style by Guy Hamilton.

Funeral in Berlin

Blu-ray Disc

Paramount Pictures

1966 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 102 min. / Street Date May 26, 2020 / 20.49

Starring: Michael Caine, Oskar Homolka, Paul Hubschmid, Eva Renzi, Guy Doleman.

Cinematography: Otto Heller

Film Editor: John Bloom

Production Designer: Ken Adam

Original Music: Konrad Elfers

Written by Evan Jones from the novel by Len Deighton

Produced by Charles D. Kasher & Harry Saltzman

Directed by Guy Hamilton

All three...

(See previous post: Fourth of July Movies: Escapism During a Weird Year.) On the evening of the Fourth of July, besides fireworks, fire hazards, and Yankee Doodle Dandy, if you're watching TCM in the U.S. and Canada, there's the following: Peter H. Hunt's 1776 (1972), a largely forgotten film musical based on the Broadway hit with music by Sherman Edwards. William Daniels, who was recently on TCM talking about 1776 and a couple of other movies (A Thousand Clowns, Dodsworth), has one of the key roles as John Adams. Howard Da Silva, blacklisted for over a decade after being named a communist during the House Un-American Committee hearings of the early 1950s (Robert Taylor was one who mentioned him in his testimony), plays Benjamin Franklin. Ken Howard is Thomas Jefferson, a role he would reprise in John Huston's 1976 short Independence. (In the short, Pat Hingle was cast as John Adams; Eli Wallach was Benjamin Franklin.) Warner...

This remake of a pre-Code classic adds amazing European locations, glorious Technicolor and entire armies on the move, yet doesn’t improve on the original. Producer David O. Selznick secured Rock Hudson to play opposite Jennifer Jones, but the chemistry is lacking. Why did the man spend twenty years trying to top Gone With the Wind?

A Farewell to Arms

Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1957 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 152 min. / Street Date April 18, 2017 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: Jennifer Jones, Rock Hudson, Vittorio De Sica, Mercedes McCambridge, Elaine Stritch.

Cinematography: Oswald Morris, Piero Portalupi

Production Designer: Alfred Junge

Art Direction: Mario Garbuglia

Film Editors: John M. Foley, Gerard J. Wilson

Original Music: Mario Nascimbene

Written by Ben Hecht from a play by Laurence Stallings from a novel by Ernest Hemingway

Produced by David O. Selznick

Directed by Charles Vidor

What happens when a major Hollywood producer thinks he has all the answers?...

William Castle’s 13 Ghosts (1960), 13 Frightened Girls, Homicidal, and Mr. Sardonicus are coming to Blu-ray in two double features from Mill Creek Entertainment! Both double bills will be released on July 5th.

From Mill Creek Entertainment: “13 Ghosts (1960) – B&W – 85 minutes – Not Rated

Charles Herbert, Jo Morrow, Martin Milner, Rosemary DeCamp. Donald Woods, Margaret Hamilton

When an eccentric uncle wills a huge, ramshackle house to his impoverished family, they get the shock of a lifetime. Their new residence comes complete with a spooky housekeeper, plus a fortune in buried treasure and 12 horrifying ghosts.”

13 Frightened Girls (1963) – Color – 88 minutes – Not Rated

Murray Hamilton, Joyce Taylor, Hugh Marlowe, Khigh Dhiegh, Charlie Briggs, Norma Varden

The girls of a Swiss boarding school have one thing in common — they are all daughters of diplomats. One in particular finds out that she has a knack for espionage, and uncovers the murder of a Russian diplomat. Now she...

When I was a kid, I used to love a scary movie. I remember catching the original The Haunting (1963) one night on Channel 9’s Million Dollar Movie when I was home alone. Before it was over, I had every light in the house on. When my mother got home she was screaming she’d been able to see the house glowing from two blocks away. The only thing screaming louder than her was the electricity meter.

That was something of an accomplishment, scaring me like that. Oh, it’s not that I was hard to scare (I still don’t like going down into a dark cellar). But, in those days, the movies didn’t have much to scare you with. Back as far as the 50s, you might find your odd dismemberment and impaling, even an occasional decapitation, but, generally, the rule of the day was restraint. Even those rare dismemberments,...

Billy Wilder directed Sunset Blvd. with Gloria Swanson and William Holden. Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett movies Below is a list of movies on which Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder worked together as screenwriters, including efforts for which they did not receive screen credit. The Wilder-Brackett screenwriting partnership lasted from 1938 to 1949. During that time, they shared two Academy Awards for their work on The Lost Weekend (1945) and, with D.M. Marshman Jr., Sunset Blvd. (1950). More detailed information further below. Post-split years Billy Wilder would later join forces with screenwriter I.A.L. Diamond in movies such as the classic comedy Some Like It Hot (1959), the Best Picture Oscar winner The Apartment (1960), and One Two Three (1961), notable as James Cagney's last film (until a brief comeback in Milos Forman's Ragtime two decades later). Although some of these movies were quite well received, Wilder's later efforts – which also included The Seven Year Itch...

Virginia Bruce: MGM actress ca. 1935. Virginia Bruce movies on TCM: Actress was the cherry on 'The Great Ziegfeld' wedding cake Unfortunately, Turner Classic Movies has chosen not to feature any non-Hollywood stars – or any out-and-out silent film stars – in its 2015 “Summer Under the Stars” series.* On the other hand, TCM has come up with several unusual inclusions, e.g., Lee J. Cobb, Warren Oates, Mae Clarke, and today, Aug. 25, Virginia Bruce. A second-rank MGM leading lady in the 1930s, the Minneapolis-born Virginia Bruce is little remembered today despite her more than 70 feature films in a career that spanned two decades, from the dawn of the talkie era to the dawn of the TV era, in addition to a handful of comebacks going all the way to 1981 – the dawn of the personal computer era. Career highlights were few and not all that bright. Examples range from playing the...

Rex Ingram in 'The Thief of Bagdad' 1940 with tiny Sabu. Actor Rex Ingram movies on TCM: Early black film performer in 'Cabin in the Sky,' 'Anna Lucasta' It's somewhat unusual for two well-known film celebrities, whether past or present, to share the same name.* One such rarity is – or rather, are – the two movie people known as Rex Ingram;† one an Irish-born white director, the other an Illinois-born black actor. Turner Classic Movies' “Summer Under the Stars” continues today, Aug. 11, '15, with a day dedicated to the latter. Right now, TCM is showing Cabin in the Sky (1943), an all-black musical adaptation of the Faust tale that is notable as the first full-fledged feature film directed by another Illinois-born movie person, Vincente Minnelli. Also worth mentioning, the movie marked Lena Horne's first important appearance in a mainstream motion picture.§ A financial disappointment on the...

Michael Caine young. Michael Caine movies: From Irwin Allen bombs to Woody Allen classic It's hard to believe that Michael Caine has been around making movies for nearly six decades. No wonder he's had time to appear – in roles big and small and tiny – in more than 120 films, ranging from unwatchable stuff like the Sylvester Stallone soccer flick Victory and Michael Ritchie's adventure flick The Island to Brian G. Hutton's X, Y and Zee, Joseph L. Mankiewicz's Sleuth (a duel of wits and acting styles with Laurence Olivier), and Alfonso Cuarón's Children of Men. (See TCM's Michael Caine movie schedule further below.) Throughout his long, long career, Caine has played heroes and villains and everything in between. Sometimes, in his worst vehicles, he has floundered along with everybody else. At other times, he was the best element in otherwise disappointing fare, e.g., Philip Kaufman's Quills.

Hammer horror fans are in for a treat, as respective collections of five William Castle films and five Hammer horror movies are coming out on Blu-ray in August, and The Incredible Two-Headed Transplant has been set to come out on Blu-ray.

The William Castle and Hammer horror collections will respectively come out on DVD August 18th from Mill Creek. The Incredible Two-Headed Transplant, meanwhile, is slated for release later this year by Kino Lorber. Stay tuned to Daily Dead for further updates.

From Mill Creek: "Iconic horror director William Castle created a simple, but winning formula for his films: a little comedy, a lot of scares, a preposterous gimmick, and a clear sense that fright films should be fun. This even meant Castle would, like Alfred Hitchcock, appear in his trailers and even the movies themselves. Though his career spanned 35 years and included everything from westerns to crime thrillers, he'll...

A clip from Alfred Hitchcock's dark thriller from 1936, adapted from Joseph Conrad's novel The Secret Agent. By coincidence, Hitchcock's previous film, released earlier in the same year, was called Secret Agent. Austrian actor Oscar Homolka plays Verloc, who is plotting a terrorist outrage in London, with Sylvia Sidney as his wife. In this scene, Verloc blames Scotland Yard for the death of his wife's hapless brother, blown up accidentally as he carries a bomb intended for Piccadilly Circus tube station

• Sabotage is released on Blu-Ray on 1 June courtesy of Network Distributing Continue reading...

Teresa Wright-Samuel Goldwyn association comes to a nasty end (See preceding post: "Teresa Wright in 'Shadow of a Doubt': Alfred Hitchcock Heroine in His Favorite Film.") Whether or not because she was aware that Enchantment wasn't going to be the hit she needed – or perhaps some other disagreement with Samuel Goldwyn or personal issue with husband Niven Busch – Teresa Wright, claiming illness, refused to go to New York City to promote the film. (Top image: Teresa Wright in a publicity shot for The Men.) Goldwyn had previously announced that Wright, whose contract still had another four and half years to run, was to star in a film version of J.D. Salinger's 1948 short story "Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut." Instead, he unceremoniously – and quite publicly – fired her.[1] The Goldwyn organization issued a statement, explaining that besides refusing the assignment to travel to New York to help generate pre-opening publicity for Enchantment,...

By Lee Pfeiffer 

The three Harry Palmer feature films (The Ipcress File, Funeral in Berlin and Billion Dollar Brain) have had a rather cluttered history in terms of their video releases. Surprisingly, producer Harry Saltzman didn't stick with one studio in terms of their theatrical releases, as he did with the James Bond films which he co-produced with Cubby Broccoli. Instead, each of the Palmer films was financed by and released by a different studio. Thus, in the ensuing decades, the video rights to these films have been convoluted. The titles have remained consistently available to consumers in some countries, while in others (including the USA), they have appeared and disappeared from the marketplace for years at a time. Now the Warner Archive has reissued Paramount's original DVD version of Funeral in Berlin as a burn-to-order title. The original film, The Iprcress File, was internationally acclaimed as the "thinking man's 007" movie.

Paul Henreid: From lighting two cigarettes and blowing smoke onto Bette Davis’ face to lighting two cigarettes while directing twin Bette Davises Paul Henreid is back as Turner Classic Movies’ Star of the Month of July 2013. TCM will be showing four movies featuring Henreid (Now, Voyager; Deception; The Madwoman of Chaillot; The Spanish Main) and one directed by him (Dead Ringer). (Photo: Paul Henreid lights two cigarettes on the set of Dead Ringer, while Bette Davis remembers the good old days.) (See also: “Paul Henreid Actor.”) Irving Rapper’s Now, Voyager (1942) was one of Bette Davis’ biggest hits, and it remains one of the best-remembered romantic movies of the studio era — a favorite among numerous women and some gay men. But why? Personally, I find Now, Voyager a major bore, made (barely) watchable only by a few of the supporting performances (Claude Rains, Best Supporting Actress Academy Award nominee...

Billy Wilder movies, Johnny Carson interviews tonight on TCM Billy Wilder is Turner Classic Movies’ Director of the Evening tonight, July 8, 2013. But before Wilder Evening begins, TCM will be presenting a series of brief interviews from The Tonight Show, back in the old Johnny Carson days — or rather, nights. The Carson interviewees this evening are Doris Day, Charlton Heston, Tony Curtis, Chevy Chase, and Steve Martin. (See also: Doris Day today.) (Photo: Billy Wilder.) As for Billy Wilder, TCM will be showing the following: Some Like It Hot (1959), The Fortune Cookie (1966), The Spirit of St. Louis (1958), and The Seven Year Itch (1955). Of course, all of those have been shown before and are widely available. Some Like It Hot vs. The Major and the Minor: Subversive and subversiver Some Like It Hot is perhaps Billy Wilder’s best-known film. This broad comedy featuring Marilyn Monroe, Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis...

Eleanor Parker Now on TCM Palms Springs area resident Eleanor Parker, who turns 91 next June 26, is Turner Classic Movies’ Star of the Month of June. One of the best actresses of Hollywood’s studio era, Parker isn’t nearly as well-remembered today as she should be despite three Best Actress Academy Award nominations (Caged, 1950; Detective Story, 1951; Interrupted Melody, 1955), a number of box-office and/or critical hits, and a key role in one of the biggest blockbusters of all time (The Sound of Music). Hopefully, the 34 Eleanor Parker movies TCM will be showing each Monday this month — beginning tonight — will help to introduce the actress to a broader 21st-century audience. Eleanor Parker movies "When I am spotted somewhere it means that my characterizations haven’t covered up Eleanor Parker the person. I prefer it the other way around," Parker once said. In fact, the title of Doug McClelland’s 1989 Eleanor Parker bio,...

When I was a kid, I used to love a scary movie. I remember catching the original The Haunting (1963) one night on Channel 9’s Million Dollar Movie when I was home alone. Before it was over, I had every light in the house on. When my mother got home she was screaming she’d been able to see the house glowing from two blocks away. The only thing screaming louder than her was the electricity meter.

That was something of an accomplishment, scaring me like that. Oh, it’s not that I was hard to scare (I still don’t like going down into a dark cellar). But, in those days, the movies didn’t have much to scare you with. Back as far as the 50s, you might find your odd dismemberment and impaling, even an occasional decapitation, but, generally, the rule of the day was restraint. Even those rare dismemberments,...

A while back I submitted an article that listed ten great full-length films to check out on YouTube and was pleased to find that some of you Owf readers were really happy to find such an article on your favourite movie blog! So today’s Top 10 is a follow up to that piece, a sequel if you like, and below you can find ten more fantastic films that you can legally watch for free online. As we’re all undoubtedly skint in this longest, most depressing of months, hopefully one of the below can brighten your day!

10. The Woman In Green (1945)

Legendary detective Sherlock Holmes (Basil Rathbone) and his faithful sidekick Dr. Watson (Nigel Bruce) are called in by Scotland Yard to investigate a series of bizarre murders, where the only connection is that each victim has had a finger severed off. Believing the culprit to be a maniac, Scotland Yard...

By Lee Pfeiffer

Tomorrow, Turner Classic Movies (North America) offers an eclectic line-up of intriguing movies as well as flat-out classics. Beginning in the wee small hours of the morning, TCM presents two films I confess I've never heard of: Shanks, a 1974 movie starring Marcel Marceau (!) as a puppeteer who raises the dead and Mr. Sardonicus, with the wonderful Oskar Homolka as a man who forces a doctor to try to cure him from bearing a perpetual grin on his face. During the day, TCM presents some real gems: Humphrey Bogart's last movie The Harder They Fall and a line-up of back-to-back terrific Westerns: Alavarez Kelly with William Holden and Richard Widmark, Will Penny with Charlton Heston, True Grit with John Wayne and Sam Peckinpah's Ride the High Country. If these don't have you glued to your seat, the evening wraps up with Cagney in White Heat followed...

Start: 03/09/2010 Start: 03/09/2010

Cinefamily, in Los Angeles, California at the Silent Movie Theater, is having a very special event to benefit the Betty Rowland Trust on March 9, 2010 at 9 Pm.

"Betty Rowland was the first burlesque queen I met in person, in 1997. The first time we met, she told me that she had once sued my grandfather, Samuel Goldwyn, as part of a publicity stunt, for using her moniker for the title of his film Ball of Fire (1941). Betty had earned the nickname, 'Ball of Fire', during her bump-and-grind days in the late 1930s for her flaming red hair and rhythmic movements." —Liz Goldwyn, director of Pretty Things...

Decide for yourself on how strong Betty’s case was, and get to know her and the other Queens of Burlesque with this double feature! Pretty Things is a documentary on the last generation of American ‘Burlesque Queens’ as told by a...

While you’re already getting your big Academy Awards party ready in time for the telecast on March 7th, we’ve got something for even bigger movie fans to enjoy. Of course, we’re talking about a movie marathon!

All month long, Turner Classic Movies will be running over 360 Academy Award nominated and winning films, back to back, with an interesting twist. In the vain of the game “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon,” each film will have a common actor or actress from the previous film.

For example, tomorrow night’s schedule consists of The Graduate with Anne Bancroft and William Daniels, which goes into Reds which stars Daniels and Jack Nicholson, into Chinatown with Nicholson and John Huston. Though we’re already about two weeks into the marathon, there are still plenty of great films to look forward to, including some TCM firsts like Gladiator, Titanic, Alien, and Trading Places.

The William Castle Film Collection (Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, $80.95) assembles the master showman’s eight Columbia Pictures features in one set. Three (Zotz!, 13 Frightened Girls, The Old Dark House) are new to DVD. Only two are in color (Girls, House), but black and white works far better here to evoke film fear anyhow. Castle produced and directed them all (though he shares a producing credit with Hammer Films’ Anthony Hinds on the House remake). Three were scripted by Robb White (who also wrote Castle’s earlier gimmicky genre hits MacAbre and House On Haunted Hill) while Ray Russell and Robert Dillon racked up two scripts each and Starlog contributor Robert Bloch penned one.

The films (fantasies, thrillers, comedies) are grouped sort of by theme, two per disc. So, 13 Frightened Girls (a.k.a. The Candy Web) is teamed with 13 Ghosts for the triskaidekaphobia entry. Homicidal and Strait-jacket represent the murder,...