I was thirteen when Top Gun came blazing to the big screen in 1986. I absolutely loved the film and saw it three or four times during its original theatrical run. Tom Cruise was buff, the planes were cool, and…
Flashdance arrived in U.S theaters on April 15, 1983. Critics hated the film, but the public loved it. Just ten-years old at the time, I remember how torn sweatshirts and leg warmers became must-haves. Because the movie was rated R,…
Released in 1969, Me, Natalie is very much a film of the 1960’s, but dealing with female late adolescence. A subject nearly anyone who’s ever been there, can relate too in some way. Scripted by A. Martin Zweiback, from a…
One of the biggest influences on Mel Brooks’ spoof Blazing Saddles, Destry Rides Again takes place in the town of Bottleneck, corrupt from the mayor on down. Marlene Dietrich plays Frenchy, the local saloon owner who quietly helps the criminals…
Editor’s Note: Elements of this piece appeared in a review for an earlier release of this film–RW] Released just four years after Cruise’s mega-hit Top Gun, Days of Thunder follows largely the same premise–except here, the speed machines are race…
Released in 1963, Sunday in New York is the kind of lukewarm sex comedy–pre-sexual revolution–only that era could produce. Eileen, played by a young Jane Fonda, is a virgin from Albany annoyed by the fact that all her suitors end…
By the end of the 1960’s, Bette Davis big screen appearances were increasingly rare. Released in 1970, Connecting Rooms explores the relationship between three people who have rooms in a rundown London boarding house. Davis plays Wanda Fleming, a lonely…
Released in 1975, the TV movie Love Among the Ruins marked the first-and only-time acting royalty Katharine Hepburn and Laurence Olivier would work together onscreen. Helmet by Hollywood veteran George Cukor, who had directed Hepburn in eight films, including such…
[Editor’s Note: Elements of this piece appeared in a review for an earlier release of this film–RW] Few directors have made a commercially successful career out of the erotic thriller. Fewer still have got critical raves for their work along…
The British New Wave (or “kitchen sink drama movement”) was an innovative, but brief cinematic movement during the late fifties and early sixties. These films, usually in black and white, focused on class and social issues. Billy Liar directed by…