Author: Dave Franklin
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Not Taking The Michael
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Read more: Not Taking The MichaelSome talented actors appear to have a bitch of a time choosing a worthwhile script. It’s almost as if a load is dumped in front of them, they close their eyes and pick one. Travolta’s a prime example, having appeared in nine thousand flicks but only a handful of classics since he first got going…
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Starring Debuts #14: Emily Lloyd in Wish You Were Here (1987)
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Read more: Starring Debuts #14: Emily Lloyd in Wish You Were Here (1987)That arch wit Morrissey obviously knows a thing or two about holidaying in dismal seaside towns. Just listen to the brilliant Everyday is Like Sunday in which he dreamily yearns for such places to be bombed: This is the coastal town that they forgot to close down. Armageddon, come Armageddon! Come, Armageddon, come! Everyday is…
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A Handful of 80s British Classics
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Read more: A Handful of 80s British Classics“Don’t threaten me with a dead fish!” Full marks if you can recognize an indignant Withnail trying to be tough with a gruff poacher in a pub. As far as British movies go, Withnail and I gets my vote as the decade’s best alongside the perpetually bewildered Harold Shand in The Long Good Friday. Now…
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Starring debuts #13: Dolph Lundgren in Rocky IV (1985)
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Read more: Starring debuts #13: Dolph Lundgren in Rocky IV (1985)Look, I’m not gay. Yes, I love The Wizard of Oz and did once find myself in a gay nightclub via a drunken youthful mistake, but don’t go trying to give me all that lady doth protest too much shit. I’m not gay. All right? Saying that, I must confess to a sneaking admiration for…
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Starring debuts #12: Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate (1967)
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Read more: Starring debuts #12: Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate (1967)There’s a scene in The Graduate where Benjamin Braddock (Hoffman) is lying supine on a hotel bed while Mrs. Robinson (Bancroft), the sophisticated older woman who’s introduced him to the mysteries of sex, sits alongside clad in a black bra slowly unbuttoning his white shirt and running her hands over his smooth chest. Accompanied by…
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Annoying Fuckers
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Read more: Annoying FuckersMost people are annoying. It doesn’t matter whether they’re a droning colleague, that snarky online twat who just won’t see sense, some random queue jumper, a younger sibling, the halitosis-afflicted taxi driver taking the long way round, a right wing foreign president, a neighbor loudly playing music or that hotty in the supermarket who looks…
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Fucked-Up Films #2: Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS (1975)
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Read more: Fucked-Up Films #2: Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS (1975)Film Title Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS Synopsis Mein Gott! Director Don Edmonds Cast Dyanne Thorne Gregory Knoph Tony Mumolo Richard Kennedy George Buck Flower What are these sick bastards doing? Obviously inspired by Dr Josef Mengele’s ‘pioneering’ work in Auschwitz, this is a flick that concentrates on the more extreme Nazi obsessions. Ilsa…
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Staring Debuts #11:Jeffrey Combs in Re-Animator (1985)
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Read more: Staring Debuts #11:Jeffrey Combs in Re-Animator (1985)It’s apt that Herbert West (Combs) resembles both Harry Potter and Scottish necrophile Dennis Nilsen. His small stature and precocious schoolboy looks suggest he’s harmless, enabling him to obscure a deep-rooted fascination with corpses while committing murder if necessary. It’s a plum role, all right, and Combs seizes it with such memorable relish that he…
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Fucked-Up Films #1: The Exterminator (1980)
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Read more: Fucked-Up Films #1: The Exterminator (1980)Film Title The Exterminator Synopsis Life is war whether you’re in Nam or the Big Apple Director James Glickenhaus Cast Robert Ginty Christopher George Steve James Samantha Eggar I have a clear recollection of standing in a video shop aged twelve with On Golden Pond on one side and The Exterminator on the other. I…
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Frenzy (1972)
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Read more: Frenzy (1972)Hitch does tits! Well, there’s a bit more to this blackly comic, London-based thriller than bare breasts, but they’re the most obvious sign the legendary director had embraced the early seventies’ newfound freedoms. Frenzy is graphic at times, much more so than other serial killer efforts such as Shadow of a Doubt and Psycho, but…