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Stories by Scott Marks

The Addams Family 2: new kooky characters gone wrong

Who ya got: The Munsters or The Addams Family? I had just turned ten the season both shows made their network debuts, so the choice became the subject of raging schoolyard debate. It wasn’t a …

October 14, 2021
Fritz Lang’s Metropolis — ninety-four years after its release

It’s all out there somewhere: the Pomona preview print of The Magnificent Ambersons; the missing reels of Eric von Stroheim’s Greed; Lon Chaney’s uncut London After Midnight; even the pie fight from Dr. Strangelove is …

October 10, 2021
Wife of a Spy: Kiyoshi Kurosawa unravels a tired Hitchcockian yarn

The latest from Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Pulse, Cure, Tokyo Sonata) is being pitched as an “old-school Hitchcockian thriller.” The Master has been dead over 40 years. All this slavish delineating has long since passed the point …

October 7, 2021
Scott Marks’ kindest cut

“Testing! Testing!” The voice still worked. No sign of hearing impairment either. It was 3:50 p.m. and in the time it took to tilt my head clockward, a nurse was at my side. “Would you …

October 1, 2021
Tony Bennett’s first and last dramatic performance

What can be said of an ensemble drama in which Milton Berle gives the best performance? Or a searing indictment of the Oscars that couldn’t have been made without producer Joseph E. Levine first obtaining …

September 26, 2021
Five from the Fourth Annual Joyce Forum Jewish Short Film Festival

UPDATE: I was mistakenly sent sent a list of screeners that included Skylark and Point Symmetry. Neither film is included in the Joyce Forum. Sorry for any confusion. With the San Diego Jewish Film Festival …

September 23, 2021
The Carpetbaggers part two: Elizabeth Ashley makes her screen debut

My analysis of The Carpetbaggers was pitched as either a cover story or a column entry to be presented in two parts. Guess who lost the coin toss. Here’s part two. The Carpetbaggers (1964) Somewhere …

September 17, 2021
Tsai Ming-liang bathes Days in pink moments

The bad news is that Days is intentionally unsubtitled. The good news is that there’s barely a word spoken by our two leads. Loneliness is their universal language. More bad news: this is the only …

September 16, 2021
The Carpetbaggers: Howard Hughes saga takes flight and conquers Hollywood!

The Carpetbaggers (1964) Producer/distributor Joseph E. Levine had been in the picture business for a little over a decade before his success blossomed. What did he get in return for purchasing the rights to Godzilla …

September 10, 2021
Flag Day: proud papa Penn

Sean Penn’s latest arrived at multiplexes armed with an edict from its star/director aimed at the unjabbed among us: unless you’re vaccinated, stay away from Flag Day. Talk about cruel and unusual punishment. Why should …

September 9, 2021
The better Casino Royale

No, not that Casino Royale. The other, better one! Casino Royale (1967) We open with a postscript that can be found in the supplementary section of the DVD: it was Peter Sellers who suggested Orson …

September 3, 2021
Respect: Aretha Franklin’s remarkable vocal reach

C.L. Franklin (Forest Whitaker) regularly awakened his daughter Aretha (Skye Dakota Turner) to wow the partygoers gathered in the spacious living room below with the young girl’s remarkable vocal reach. These so-called “church parties” were …

September 2, 2021
Airport ’77 : the spirit is willing, but the script is weak

What’s bigger, more exciting, and two years older than Airport 1975? Airport ‘77! Airport ’77 (1977) In Airport, the Arthur Hailey original, disaster struck in the form of mad bomber Van Heflin, while the 747 …

August 27, 2021
Sweet Girl: Jason Momoa’s howlingly enjoyable nonsense with a twist

It’s been a fertile period of late for adventure films that pair tough burly movie stars opposite young unknowns — Dave Bautista and Chloe Coleman in My Spy, Liam Neeson and Jacob Perez in The …

August 26, 2021
Airport 1975: credits read like a Love Boat passenger manifest

If this dive into Airport 1975 were any deeper, it would have crashed! Airport 1975 (1974) It was the first of three officially sanctioned sequels to Airport, the obscenely successful air-disaster soap opera based on …

August 20, 2021
Habit: guns, nuns, and jump cuts

There was a time in the mid-’90s when it seemed like every other indie release owed a debt of originality to Quentin Tarantino. Hell, he produced half of them! The studio press release for Habit, …

August 19, 2021
Three of Jean Arthur’s Columbia comedies

Many performers lost their careers during Hollywood’s transition to sound, but Jean Arthur literally found her voice in talkies. And don’t let the pink and squishy sounds it radiates fool you: Ms. Arthur was a …

August 13, 2021
Hitler, baby, one more time

There should never be another fictionalized account of the Holocaust put to film. The temptation to sentimentalize the atrocities too often proves impossible to resist. (As Prof. Deborah Lipstadt points out, “The minute you’re trying …

August 12, 2021
Goodbye, Columbus: this critic's first R rated film

What was the first film to receive an R rating from the MPAA? Not The Graduate, which was classified Adults Only, but The Split, a crime drama starring Jim Brown and Diahann Carroll. Do you …

August 6, 2021
Jungle Cruise: 127 minutes to nowhere

There have been movies based on 45 rpm singles (Ode to Billy Joe, Harper Valley P.T.A.) T.V. shows (Downton Abbey, Barney’s Great Adventure), toys (Ouija, The LEGO Movie), and comic books too numerous to mention, …

August 5, 2021
Judd Apatow and Steven Brill pursue the prison camp formula

This week’s grouping offers hope to the horizontally challenged, especially if one has a sense of humor when it comes to body image. Heavyweights (1995) The Parent Trap meets Stalag 17 when an overnight camp …

July 30, 2021
Joe Bell: nothing new from Mark Wahlberg

A careful jog of the memory might help to recall the headline-grabbing story upon which Joe Bell is based. Those who have seen the trailer should find it fairly easy to ascertain the gingerly hinted-at …

July 29, 2021
Celluloid staycations: Where The Boys Are and Mr. Hobbs Takes a Vacation

Still reluctant to book a flight? Here are a couple of vacations you can take without leaving home. Where The Boys Are (1960) A convincingly fabricated backlot blizzard is enough to persuade four Midwestern college …

July 23, 2021
Pig: Nicolas Cage’s purloined pal

What is life but a succession of good and bad choices? There were times when Nicolas Cage’s career and personal life bounded off the rails in the direction of Charlie Sheen wackyland. But then Cage …

July 22, 2021
John Travolta oozes seductiveness in Saturday Night Fever

Saturday Night Fever made something special out of white polyester and blow-dryers as an extension of one’s arm, and transformed Deney Terrio — John Travolta’s trainer and future host of Dance Fever — into a …

July 16, 2021
Black Widow: two James Bonds for the price of one

Thoughts of writing this one off were tempting, but the day was hot, the timing right, and the screen large. Was Marvel right to patiently ride out the pandemic by skipping the VOD route in …

July 15, 2021
More Alexandre Rockwell: In The Soup, Pete smalls is Dead, Little Feet

As promised in last week’s review of Alexandre Rockwell’s Sweet Thing, a few words on its prequel, Little Feet. But first, let’s present two of the director’s previous films. In the Soup and Pete Smalls …

July 9, 2021
Summer of Soul: a black Woodstock doc?

Where were you on July 20, 1969? Unless you were among the thousands fortunate enough to have been in Mount Morris Park for the opening of the Harlem Cultural Festival, chances are you were glued …

July 8, 2021
Behold! Bugs Bunny on Blu-ray

Before we discuss three of the better Bugs and Elmer shorts contained in the numbered, limited edition blu-ray set, The Bugs Bunny 80th Anniversary Collection, a word about packaging. The Looney Tunes gang has morphed …

July 2, 2021
Sweet Thing: Alexandre Rockwell’s family affair

The latest family affair from Alexandre Rockwell (In the Soup, 13 Moons) is a product from another time. On the surface, it could very well have been a black-and-white low-budget indie that was left lounging …

July 1, 2021
The disco roller-boogie film that introduced audiences to Patrick Swayze

The movies’ one glorious footnote to disco roller-boogie can be found in Peter Bogdanovich’s awfully romantic comedy They All Laughed, wherein a klutzy John Ritter attempts to skate his way into Dorothy Stratten’s heart. That’s …

June 25, 2021
Netflix’s Security: obscure cameras for writer-director Peter Chelsom

The company Grandpa Bill Marks worked for threw an annual picnic that encouraged employees to invite family members for an afternoon of games, barbeque, and enough beer to keep back teeth at high tide. Having …

June 24, 2021
Critic comedies starring Mel Brooks, Vincent Price, and Bob Hope

Three comedies about critics starring Mel Brooks, Vincent Price, and Bob Hope. Our first entry earned Mel an Oscar® for Best Animated Short, and in spite of that, it’s good! The Critic (1960) For many, …

June 18, 2021
Queen Bees: TV triumphant for The Santa Clause’s Michael Lembeck

’Twas home video that first began sawing away at television’s umbilical cord. It was bad enough that stations sliced and diced movie running times quicker than a Popeil Chop-O-Matic to make room for commercial breaks. …

June 17, 2021
Walter Matthau’s dark side exposed in Charley Varrick

Walter Matthau? A bank robbing serial killer wanted by both good guys and bad guys alike?! Times were tough. The actor had to hock wedding presents just to pay the rent. The $2500 this minisculely …

June 11, 2021
In the Heights takes a hint from La La Land

It was to be the first image I’d seen projected since the lockdown. The trailer pronouncement landed with the jaw-splintering force of a fist enfolding a roll of quarters: “From the director of Crazy Rich …

June 10, 2021
Woody Allen’s PBS mockumentary

My original intention was to cover a couple of Woody Allen’s middle-to-modern funny films. Then I happened across this hilarious, never-broadcast, half-hour PBS mockumentary on YouTube. I hope you enjoy this Holy Grail of hilarity …

June 4, 2021
Cruella: Sympathy for the de Vil

A haughty fashion designer (Emma Thompson) and the seamstress most likely to dethrone her (Emma Stone) wage battle in this, the third live-action attempt on the part of the studio to ransack the Disney Vault, …

June 3, 2021
Everyone’s favorite curse word

This week’s offerings include a trio of documentaries that range in subject from the history of everyone’s favorite curse word, Miami’s cocaine cartel, and for openers, a cautionary fable for the marginally talented among us …

May 28, 2021
A North Hollywood outside of time

North Hollywood arrives with the tagline: The first ever movie about becoming a pro skater. Sonja Henie and I, Tonya to the contrary, for the sake of argument the profession referred to in the catchphrase …

May 27, 2021
Sewer-based films

Having spent 14 months in quarantine, the sudden reintroduction to the outside world left me feeling nostalgic for cramped spaces. For those having similar difficulty reacclimating, this week’s viewings selections are all sewer-based. Talk about …

May 21, 2021
Those Who Wish Me Dead: Angelina Jolie’s effortless role

What is it about playing firefighters that makes big shot movie stars agree to fiddle while the budget burns up around them? I submit the following list of A-listers who, at the peak of their …

May 20, 2021
The British Film Institute launches BFI Player Classics

The British Film Institute launches BFI Player Classics on May 14. The new streaming outlet promises what it calls a “collection of classic British cinema specifically for the American market.” (I’m guessing that means no …

May 14, 2021
Selections from the Human Rights Watch Film Festival

If it seems as though it was just a couple of months ago that we spoke about the Human Rights Watch Film Festival, it was. Alas, nothing on this list comes close to topping Talking …

May 13, 2021
SCTV: the Rick Moranis years

By the time a wave of big screen hits earned Rick Moranis household name status, he had already gained cult immortality in certain sectors of the USA and Canada for his participation in 25 episodes …

May 7, 2021
The Conservation Game: The real Tiger King

The last time I viewed a projected image was inside the Grossmont 10 on March 13, 2020. Since then, I’ve gone to bed each night asking God to spare me from covid-19, if only because …

May 6, 2021
Oscars roundup: Crip Camp, Over the Moon, Sound of Metal

Oscar-nominated movies...at home! Crip Camp (2020) Judy Heumann. The mere mention of her name sends shivers down the spines of all who look to cut corners at the expense of denying the disabled community equal …

April 30, 2021
First name: Oscar

It’s been over a year since most of us have set foot inside a theatre. Instead, we’ve spent the past 13 months streaming instead of screening, and so the idea of handing out movie awards …

April 29, 2021
Breakfast on Pluto: How does somebody survive a deeply aggressive world just by being themself?

Breakfast on Pluto (2005) Neil Jordan’s The Crying Game stands as one of the most significant films released in the past thirty years, if for no other reason than that it’s a suspense thriller that …

April 23, 2021
The Marksman: Liam Neeson season

Over the past decade or so, the early months of the year — a time when most average moviegoers spend their days either catching up on Awards Season dross or in hibernation — have generally …

April 22, 2021

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