Cinema Basement

A review by Brooks Rich I had some trepidation as this film's release approached. The de-aging technology they used on the actors sat weird with me, especially after how odd that same technology came off in It: Chapter 2. So I was worried about an entire three hour plus film having to de-age Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, and Joe Pesci. Yeah ......  that didn't matter because this film is one of the best films to come out in a long time. I don't care what people say .....  Martin Scorsese"" is one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. The Irishman tells the story of Frank Sheeran, played brilliantly by Robert De Niro, a former hit man for a crime family run by Joe Pesci, who is unbelievably good in this, who claimed that he was involved in the disappearance of famed teamster Jimmy Hoffa, played by Al Pacino, doing some of his best work in years.  Four icons of American cinema ...... what else could he need?! Scorsese returns to his roots and has delivere...

A review by Brooks Rich Some people are going to look at this film and either think, ”Um, no thanks... I'll watch  Clue,”  or ”I hated  The Last Jedi.... fuck Rian Johnson.” This is the wrong attitude to have towards this movie because this is one of the most fun and well-written films to come out this year. Johnson is a fantastic screenwriter. This  should be apparent to anyone who has seen  Brick  and  Looper . Knives Out feels like the film he has been building to his entire career. Not only is the script incredibly tight and quick witted, Johnson's direction is superb. This is the best he's ever been behind the camera, and that's coming from a guy who adores Looper and Brick. The plot is simple. A wealthy patriarch of a family has been killed and the police and a private investigator must try to navigate the victim's crazy family to get to the truth. I don't want to say anything else about the plot. Just watch the film. Don't let any beat of t...

A Review by Forrest Humphrey   There aren't many monsters as instantly recognizable and popular as Dragons. And why not? They're big, they fly, they breath fire, sometimes they're as smart as people, live forever, use magic. There's no end to what a creative individual can do with Dragons. But even among Dragon flicks, this film remains quite unique, and stands out for a number of reasons. So for our “Forgotten Film Friday” I present 2002's “Reign of Fire”. Set in the then-future year of 2020, our story follows Quinn (played by Christian Bale) as the leader of a survivor camp stationed in an old castle outside London. As a child, Quinn bore witness to the end of civilization when the railway company his mother worked for unearthed something quite unexpected when digging new tunnels: an enormous, hungry, angry dragon. That was only the first, as soon, millions swarmed the earth like a plague, burning everything away and humanity utterly failed in stopping th...

A Film Review by Forrest Humphrey   In an era where we get far to many sequels nobody asked for in the film industry's desperate bid to play on nostalgia for money, a rare gem sometimes comes along. “Doctor Sleep” is one of those gems. Based on the Stephen King novel of the same name, “Doctor Sleep” had the daunting task of following one of the most beloved horror films of all time, that of course being Stanley Kubrick's “The Shining.”  What follows is a story about Dan Torrance, the young boy who escaped the Overlook Hotel with his mother, as an adult. Plagued even decades later by his experiences, he has turned to substance abuse to dull his “Shining” and run from the literal ghosts in his past. For those who might not know/remember, “The Shining” refers to the psychic powers possessed by a rare few individuals like Dan and Dick Hallorann from the original novel/film. Cue Abra, a young girl with even stronger powers than Dan, who has run afoul of the True Knot, a cu...

A review by Brooks Rich Little Men is a film from 2016 that is directed by Ira Sachs. It is not the showiest film in the world. It is small, quiet.  It is a film that looks at the lives of two families and the grudge between the adults that divides them. Little Men fits into one of my favorite subgenres in film – films told from the point of view of children that show the bullshit that adults create and how kids are forced to deal with both the adults and the bullshit. Films like Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labryinth, Francois Truffaut's 400 Blows, and Yasujiro Ozu's Good Morning, which writer/director Ira Sachs took inspiration from for Little Men, all feature children trying to live in a world run by adults who are borderline incompetent or sometimes even cruel. Greg Kinnear, probably the most well-known of the main cast, save for Alfred Molina in a smaller role, plays Brian Jardine. Jardine is a struggling actor who, with his wife and thirteen-year-old son Jake, mov...

A review by Brooks Rich I probably should have covered this film back in October, but went with the film Oculus instead, when I covered this director. But it works now because Doctor Sleep, directed by Mike Flanagan, is released this week. Hush is a great fit for the months we cover Hitchcock because it uses suspense brilliantly. It builds dread and tension, and the few small jump scares it has, it earns. It also most effectively plays on a common fear.... that we feel like someone is watching us when we're alone. Hush captures that feeling you get when you're home alone at two in the morning and think you see something out of the corner of your eye.  A young deaf author named Maddie is living at a remote cabin in the woods, trying to finish the ending of her second novel. She is also a year past a pretty ugly break up. Her only neighbors are the kind hearted Sarah and her boyfriend, John. In the middle of the night Sarah is brutally murdered by a man with a crossbow. This ma...

A review by Brooks Rich In order for me to explain why this film doesn't work for me fully I need to spoil the ending and explain how studio interference ruined what could have been one of Hitchcock's best films. So if you've never seen Suspicion by all means go see it. It still works for the most part and Cary Grant and Joan Fontaine are fantastic together. But if you have seen it or don't mind spoilers, please keep reading. Joan Fontaine plays Lina, a spinster who becomes infatuated with charming playboy Johnnie Aysgarth, Cary Grant in his first tole for Hitchcock. Grant would go on to star in three other films for Hitchcock, making him one of Hitchcock's most trusted collaborators along with Jimmy Stewart. Lina and Johnnie fall in love and get married but soon Lina grows suspicious of Johnnie and suspects him of trying to kill her. It's interesting to see Grant play a less than honorable character. Johnnie is at first very much like a lot of the charact...

A review by Brooks Rich It was hard to decide where to start the two month long coverage of Hitchcock. He was in his biggest period of transition from the silent era to 1949 going, of course, from silent films to finding himself in the British studio system before eventually moving to Hollywood and becoming the Hitchcock we all know. So I figured.... let's start with the film Hitchcock considers his favorite, 1943's Shadow of a Doubt.  Young Charlie Newton, played by Teresa Wright, lives in the quiet, bucolic town of Santa Rosa, California. She extends an invitation to her namesake, Uncle Charlie, played by the legendary Joseph Cotten, to come visit her and her family. He comes to visit, making a show of his affection for his sister, Charlie’s mother, and seeming to care deeply for the family. But Uncle Charlie starts to act suspiciously, and soon Charlie suspects he may be a wanted serial killer known as the Merry Widow Murderer.  One of my favorite sub-genres is e...

A review by Brooks Rich Sometimes when I got back to the films I love from my childhood I wince at what poor taste I had. I ask myself, "good god, Brooks, why did you watch Suburban Commando so much?" I thought Hulk Hogan was cool back in the day. So sue me. But sometimes I find that a film I loved as a child holds up pretty well. I am not saying this is one of my favorite movies of all time and I hold it on the same level as Die Hard or my favorite film, Rear Window. But for a sports underdog story, The Mighty Ducks from 1992 is pretty solid. It's not groundbreaking cinema but it's a feel good story and sometimes that's all you need. The plot is pretty simple. A lawyer named Gordon Bombay, a likable Emilio Estevez, gets pulled over for drunk driving and must do 500 hours of community service. He is assigned to coach an ice hockey team that can barely skate, let alone score any goals or win any games. Through his wisdom, and using legal means to steal the star...

We now arrive at the director's coverage I have been looking forward to the most. For the months of November and December we will be looking at the career of arguably the greatest director of all time, Alfred Hitchcock. Yes he was a problematic guy and his actions towards some of his female stars left a lot to be desired. But film would not be what it is without Hitchcock. He is the master of suspense and for the month of November we will be looking at his work from the silent era all the way up to 1949. This will encompass his work in the British film industry and his transition over to the studio system of Hollywood. His major masterpieces come post 1949 but there's a lot of great stuff before that. So welcome to the silent era to 1949 of Cinema Basement's Alfred Hitchcock special. As always we will be jumping around so none of what we cover are in chronological order but we'll give some history as each film is posted.