Puglia, Frank

The Mark of Zorro (Special Edition) (Colorized / Black and White)

When they say they don't make 'em like they used to, they're talking about 20th Century Fox's exhilarating The Mark of Zorro, starring Tyrone Power as the caped one, Linda Darnell as his love interest, and Basil Rathbone at his scurrilous best as Zorro's nemesis. More textured than the 1920 original with Douglas Fairbanks, this 1940 version has Don Diego/Zorro (Powers) returning from Madrid to defend his father and rally the caballeros (noblemen) against Los Angeles's corrupt new governor (J. Edward Bromberg), intent on taxing the peons to death.

If this all sounds like an Old California redo of the classic Adventures of Robin Hood, that's because it is. Powers has a field day as Don Diego, the "fancy clown" betrothed to the governor's niece, Lolita (Darnell). Don Diego the effete snob performs silly parlor tricks, peers through pince-nez, and yawns disdainfully at one and all. Power's cowardly alter ego is so believable, his transformation to masked superhero becomes all the more thrilling. Imagine Captain Pasquale's (Rathbone) shock when, in the film's brilliantly choreographed showdown, this annoying fop turns out to be a world-class swordsman.

Director Rouben Mamoulian, known for great period melodramas, does a skillful job of alternating garrison intrigue with big action scenes, including a nighttime ride that climaxes with Zorro on horseback leaping off a bridge. In the romantic highlight, Lolita confides her innermost desires to a suspiciously worldly friar. The first-rate supporting cast includes Gale Sondergaard as the governor's treacherous wife and the frog-voiced Eugene Pallette (Friar Tuck in The Adventures of Robin Hood) as a padre in cahoots with the masked one. Technically, this retelling rates an unqualified "Wow!" The cinematography, obviously influenced by Goya, makes full use of chiaroscuro shadows, and Alfred Newman's Latin-flavored score is irresistibly rousing and romantic. --Glenn Lovell

This swashbuckling remake of the silent classic stars Tyrone Power as the dashing masked avenger who single-handedly saves Los Angeles from Spanish despots. Don Diego Vega (Power) is summoned home from his elite training corps in Spain to California, where he finds his father deposed and the people living in tyranny. Disguised as Zorro, a sword-wielding mystery man dressed in black, he works to restore his father to power and return the tax money stolen by the villains (J. Edward Bromberg, Basil Rathbone). He even finds time to romance the ruling tyrant's beautiful niece (Linda Darnell).

For Whom the Bell Tolls

Girls Girls Girls (1962)

Hawaii seems like an afterthought in Elvis's second island outing. Half the musical numbers take place on boats (including the seasick-making title tune) and half in a Trader Vic's-style nightclub, so there's little good use of the exotic locale. There's little use of that lovable dish Stella Stevens, either, who's relegated to "other woman" duty as Elvis courts bland Laurel Goodwin. Goodwin's a rich girl going incognito, while E.P. is a penniless fisherman who dreams of owning his own boat. You finish the plot. The King is in good voice here, although the songs are fairly weak, with some curious flings at calypso and flamenco mixed in. He comes to shoulder-shaking life for "Return to Sender," a sizzling number that shows how his entire being could be possessed by a musical moment. This movie doesn't have enough of those to boost it into the upper tier of Elvis pictures. --Robert Horton

That Night in Rio (Fox Marquee Musicals)

A nightclub singer doubles for a Brazilian baron confusing his girlfriend and the baron's wife.System Requirements:Run Time: 90 MinutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: MUSIC DVD/DOCUMENTARY Rating: NR UPC: 024543403739 Manufacturer No: 2240373

"It don't make sense, the chica chica boom chic. But it's immense, the chica chica boom chic." Let us pause to ponder the immortal wisdom of these words, sung by Carmen Miranda in That Night in Rio, and then move swiftly on to effortless enjoyment of this splashy nonsense. Here we are in Rio--well, the Fox backlot--for an absurd tale of mistaken identity and romantic trading-off. Nightclub performer Don Ameche looks exactly like a famous South American airline magnate (also played by Ameche, natch), and so doubles for him during a lavish party when the Baron is away on delicate business. Alice Faye, still the top female star at Fox at this time, takes a supporting role, slightly miscast, as the Baroness. Faye always had the down-on-the-farm appeal expressed in her all-American face, but the form-fitting gold gown she wears during the party gives evidence of another kind of appeal; she's drop-dead sexy here.

The songs by Mack Gordon and Harry Warren are not copious, but Carmen Miranda has a couple of signature numbers and Faye sings "They Met in Rio." The plot had been adapted once before, as Folies Bergere, and would later surface as On the Riviera, with Danny Kaye. Extras include an informative 14-minute documentary about Alice Faye's life after quitting movies in 1945 (her two daughters contribute) and a deleted scene that has Faye and Ameche doing--you guessed it--"The Chica Chica Boom Chic." --Robert Horton

Icons of Horror - Boris Karloff (The Boogie Man Will Get You/The Black Room/The Man They Could Not Hang/Before I Hang)

Boris Karloff was to the Horror Movie what Fred Astaire was to the Musical: the epitome of class and style. No matter how grisly the circumstances he d rise above them with talent poise and even charm. And here for the first time on DVD are four of his finest chillers from his peak years in the 1930s and 1940s all demonstrating his amazing range. In The Black Room he plays twin brothers one good one evil naturally in a small country where beautiful women seem to turn up missing. The Man They Could Not Hang and Before I Hang present him in his classic Mad Doctor persona as forward-thinking scientists who run afoul of the law and become crazed killers. And in The Boogie Man Will Get You he sends up that image in a delightful farce that also stars Peter Lorre (M) and Larry Parks (The Jolson Story). It s a collection all fervent classic-horror fans have been eagerly waiting for!Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: HORROR Rating: NR UPC: 043396162334 Manufacturer No: 16233

Boris Karloff made his fame during the great horror cycle at Universal Pictures in the 1930s, but he also flaunted his iconic status at other studios. At Columbia, Karloff etched a handful of good mad doctor roles (notably The Devil Commands, available on a separate DVD) and other oddities. Four of these mostly low-budget pictures are gathered in this two-disc set--which, if not a collection of classics, is nevertheless a real boon for Karloffians.

Although it is called the Icons of Horror Collection, the "horror" is more macabre mood than monster mash. The best (and best-looking) film in the set, 1935's The Black Room, is a wonderfully lurid costume romp with Karloff in a dual role: twin brothers who inherit a baronage but live under a family curse. One is good, one bad, and happily enough, the bad brother has the upper hand. Karloff is in terrific form, and the film features a secret chamber (complete with torture pit) that provides just the right Gothic oomph. Director Roy William Neill later did Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man.

The Man They Could Not Hang, from 1939, is a solid mad-scientist picture. Karloff's Dr. Savaard has perfected a re-animation process, but the police arrest him before he can revive a student--and so the doctor is sentenced to death for murder. The hanging isn't a problem, not when the doctor's assistant has the process down pat, and now Karloff can take elaborate revenge. Before I Hang (1940) opens a similar vein, with Karloff once again sentenced to death and this time conducting experiments in prison (aided by Edward Van Sloan, filmdom's original Van Helsing). However, using a murderer's blood in the secret serum proves a fatal mistake.... These cheaply-made films are solid enough programmers of the era, and surprisingly literate--although it would be a stretch to call them scary.

The Boogie Man Will Get You (1942) goes the comedy route, spoofing Karloff's image as a white-haired gentleman who should not be allowed to run experiments in the basement. An Arsenic and Old Lace vibe prevails (Karloff had been starring in the stage production), and the labored comedy has Karloff and Peter Lorre using boarders at an early-American hotel as subjects for experiments. Larry Parks and "Slapsie Maxie" Rosenbloom co-star. Lorre, who's in his slim Maltese Falcon period, is as sly and peculiar as ever; of course, he and Karloff would team up again for more horror-comedy in the 1960s: The Raven and Comedy of Terrors. --Robert Horton

20 Million Miles To Earth (50th Anniversary Edition)

Special-effects legend Ray Harryhausen's stop-motion talents and "Dynamation" (rear-projection) process are the highlights of the '50s-era creature feature 20 Million Miles to Earth. An American spaceship returns to Earth after a mission to Venus and crashes into the sea near Sicily. A sole survivor (William Hopper) is rescued, along with a specimen that quickly grows into a reptilian biped called the Ymir. The being eventually grows to 20 feet high and escapes its confines, whereupon it rampages through Rome before a showdown with the military. Despite lacking much of a personality, the Ymir is a marvelous showcase for Harryhausen's skills. Unfortunately, the rest of the film does not match his level of excellence; direction by Nathan Juran is perfunctory (his later collaborations with Harryhausen, including The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, are more lively), and performances and scripting are flat. Still, Harryhausen fans should enjoy this opportunity to see this phase of his career before he created his most enduring works. --Paul Gaita

Special effects genius Ray Harryhausen (Jason and the Argonauts, Clash of the Titans) brings you one of his earliest groundbreaking films, now available for the first time in vibrant color! When an American spaceship crash-lands off the coast of Sicily, a rescue team discovers that the crew has brought back a gelatinous mass that soon hatches and evolves into a strange bi-ped creature which increases in size rapidly. Soon 20-feet tall, the creature rampages through Rome before being destroyed as it seeks refuge in the Colosseum.

Phantom of the Opera

This 1943 version of the horror story is more Technicolor musical than scare piece. Claude Rains plays the unfortunate, masked anti-hero, but he doesn't get the room to showcase a promising and sympathetic performance. Susanna Foster and Nelson Eddy, on the other hand, get plenty of screen time to warble. Well worth a visit just for the look of the film, which won an Oscar for cinematography. --Tom Keogh

This spectacular retelling of Gaston Leroux's immortal horror tale stars Claude Rains as the masked phantom of the Paris opera house - a crazed composer who schemes to make a beautiful young soprano (Susanna Foster) the star of the opera company and wreak revenge on those who stole his music. Nelson Eddy, the heroic baritone, tries to win the affections of Foster as he tracks down the disfigured "monster" who has begun murdering those who resist his mad demands. This lavish production remains a masterpiece not only of the genre, but for all time.

Tall in the Saddle

In this convoluted Western mystery, "tall in the saddle" is more of a genealogical clue than an accurate index of the hero's behavior. John Wayne has come to town, so he says, to work for a local rancher--who was murdered shortly after sending for him. Prime villain would appear to be Ward Bond, exuding oiliness as the local judge, who doesn't seem to be a real judge. Paul Fix (who cowrote the screenplay) and Harry Woods supply the thuggery. But mostly it's women that Wayne has trouble with: the dead man's genteel niece (Audrey Long) and her virago of a duenna (Elisabeth Risdon), and especially Ella Raines, who dresses like a man (well, a very pretty boy), runs the neighboring ranch, and falls into instant love-hate with Wayne. (This was Raines's glory period--within a few months in 1943-44 she was breathtakingly lovely in Corvette K-225, Hail the Conquering Hero, and Phantom Lady--but alas, here she's mostly just shrill.)

As run-of-the-mill Wayne Westerns go, this RKO picture is a bit upscale from the fare at Republic, if also less robust. Edwin L. Marin's direction is undistinguished, but the RKO craftsmanship is handsome as usual, and it must have been nice to work from a coherent screenplay for a change. Gabby Hayes is around to discuss sexual politics with Duke. For some reason the veteran character actor Frank Puglia goes uncredited as Raines's enigmatic servant, who seems to have wandered in from a Val Lewton production. --Richard T. Jameson

Woman-hating cowboy becomes foreman of ranch run by pretty woman and her spinster aunt who have inherited the ranch.

Brute Force (Criterion Collection)

When a prison guard who sadistically beats prisoners finally becomes unbearable, the inmates stage a vicious riot.
No Track Information Available
Media Type: DVD
Artist: LANCASTER/CRONYN
Title: BRUTE FORCE
Street Release Date: 04/17/2007
Domestic
Genre: DRAMA

Jules Dassin's brooding, brutal drama about a prison wound to the breaking point by a sadistic captain of the guards is a classic film noir as well as one of the greatest prison films ever made. Burt Lancaster (in only his third film but already commanding the screen like a pro) is the savvy prison veteran whose clashes with Hume Cronyn (the ambitious guard with a god complex) land him first in solitary then in the claustrophobic drain pipe, a muddy, airless work detail that slowly kills every man assigned to it. With the help of his cellmate buddies and former gangland boss Charles Bickford he hatches a plan to break out, but Cronyn has his own plans for the unbreakable prisoner. Dassin's oppressive prison is thick with atmosphere: cavernous buildings and halls that echo with the footsteps of inmates and the clanking of bars, overcrowded cells that seem to close in on the men, a busy machine shop where the film's most memorable scene takes place--the ruthless assassination of a stoolie in a pounding metal press. Cinematographer William Daniels, a master of Hollywood's soft-focus glamour, creates a harsh, hard-edged look for the film, softened only by looming shadows. A sense of doom hovers over everything, culminating in an explosive finale, but the barbaric, brutish violence hangs in the air long after the film is over. --Sean Axmaker

On the DVD
Criterion's beautiful restored print of Brute Force is accompanied by a small collection of supporting materials, including a commentary track by longtime film noir experts Alain Silver and James Ursini. They give a good brief on the film's history, such as the disagreements between producer Mark Hellinger and director Jules Dassin on the subject of the movie's use of flashbacks--an approach that would break the claustrophobia of the prison sequences and introduce female characters. Hellinger wanted the backstory, Dassin objected, and the producer won; but the point is definitely arguable. Prison-movie specialist Paul Mason gives a useful 15-minute talk, partly on Brute Force and partly on the genre of prison movies. Criterion's booklet has an excellent essay by critic Michael Atkinson, a vintage 1947 profile of the colorful columnist-turned-producer Hellinger, and an intriguing, bitter exchange of letters between Hellinger and Production Code chief Joseph Breen on the subject of the film's censorship problems. --Robert Horton

Paul Leni's The Man Who Laughs