movies

Example of feet hidden:

https://archive.is/4z1C3

With Gladiator II thrusting into cinematic arenas next month, we hand out laurels to the greatest sword-and-sandal movies of them all

I. Spartacus (1960)
II. Gladiator (2000)
III. Ben-Hur (1959)
IV. Cleopatra (1963)
V. Caligula: the Ultimate Cut (2023)
VI. Quo Vadis (1951)
VII. The Sign of the Cross (1932)
VIII. Monty Python’s Life of Brian (1979)
IX. Cleopatra (1934)
X. Fellini Satyricon (1969)
XI. Julius Caesar (1953)
XII. Carry On Cleo (1964)
XIII. The Eagle (2011)
XIV. Sebastiane (1976)
XV. Asterix & Obelix: Mission Cleopatra (2002)
XVI. The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964)
XVII. A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1966)
XVIII. Caesar and Cleopatra (1945)

By the 1980s, the genre of fantasy martial arts had produced some of the best martial arts performances of all time. They present the best of both worlds – the action, mythology, and magic of fantasy mixed with the thrill of watching graphic martial arts combat. These films were often set in a fantastical world that allowed martial artists to defy physics and perform gravity-defying stunts. The special effects and the magnetic characters of the 1980s made it a golden age of this hybrid genre. Film-makers have taken the conventions of kung fu and transformed them into something exciting and different.

These movies married martial artists to monsters, magic, and adventure, delivering over-the-top fight scenes and exciting storytelling, bringing with them rich folklore, lore, mythical creatures, and heroes on epic journeys. Films like Shogun Assassin and one of Kurt Russell's best comedy films, Big Trouble In Little China didn't just define the genre but helped define cinema in its entirety in the 1980s and beyond. The decades that followed would pay tribute to many of the moments and themes in these styles of film, and left an indelible mark on the pop culture of their era.

1. Big Trouble In Little China (1986)
2. Encounters Of The Spooky Kind (1980)
3. Shogun Assassin (1980)
4. Mr. Vampire (1985)
5. Fists Of The White Lotus (1980)
6. The Last Dragon (1985)
7. Zu: Warriors From The Magic Mountain (1983)
8. The Boxer's Omen (1983)
9. The Seventh Curse (1986)
10. Legend Of The Eight Samurai (1983)

The third guy is Denis Villeneuve

The Lumière festival in Lyon in south-east France – the home of 19th-century movie inventor-pioneers Auguste and Louis Lumière – always serves up mouthwatering classic films on the big screen. This is true once again this year, with a retrospective season of works by Fred Zinnemann, famously the director of High Noon and From Here to Eternity.

In one of its most interesting films, the festival also provided what could be the last remaining underexamined footnote in the history of the great Powell/Pressburger partnership that gave us Black Narcissus, The Red Shoes and The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp.

Zinnemann’s fascinating film Behold a Pale Horse (1964) is based on a novel that Emeric Pressburger wrote after his split from Michael Powell, called Killing a Mouse on Sunday. (Pressburger also wrote a second novel, The Glass Pearls, a psychological thriller, which was ignored at the time, but has been recently reissued.)

Pressburger’s first novel was inspired by the Pimpernel-type bandit Quico Sabaté, a daring fighter for the Republican side in the Spanish civil war. After the anti-Francoists’ defeat he lived in exile in France, but infuriated the Spanish government with repeated raids into Spanish territory.

Zinnemann’s movie is one that all Powell/Pressburger fans have to see. It is adapted from Pressburger’s book by American screenwriter JP Miller, and it’s an engrossing and mysterious drama of character and destiny, with a Greeneian slant, a story about the meaning of martyrdom in a secular world. And it’s a fascinating meditation on the long, strange history of European fascism in 20th-century Spain, the fascism that existed before and long after the second world war.

Gregory Peck plays Manuel Artiguez, an ageing exiled Republican guerrilla living in France, who has for years been conducting amazing sorties into Spanish territory, more or less for the pleasure of tweaking the fascists’ noses. But now he has lapsed into melancholy inactivity.

...

How would Powell and Pressburger have filmed this? Perhaps not so very differently: the story is as rich and complex and difficult to pigeonhole – and rooted in a distinctive and lovingly rendered landscape – as the projects that always attracted them. My guess is that Powell would have wanted a stronger female presence, apart from the mother on her deathbed. In the film, Manuel has an odd flirtatious moment with a barmaid just before he goes for his last confrontation with the forces of the right. But a Powell/Pressburger version would, I think, have created a love interest or former love interest for Manuel in the French village. This could be a woman who would chide or console Manuel, be protective of the little boy and then feel ruefully deserted when Manuel leaves for the last time, while recognising that he had to do it – the kind of role in which Powell might have cast his partner, Pamela Brown.

At all events, Behold a Pale Horse is a must-see for Powell/Pressburger fans, and for everyone else.

https://collider.com/hellboy-the-crooked-man-jack-kesy/

The next big release from A24 might also be its cutest to date. The studio just released the first trailer for The Legend of Ochi, a fantasy adventure that also happens to star a cute-as-hell creature to rival Grogu.

While it looks like a somewhat familiar “kid befriends mysterious creature” story, the film does have some interesting aspects, including not only the titular critter, but also what appears to be some kind of post-apocalyptic fantasy setting. Here’s the official description:

In a remote northern village, a young girl, Yuri, is raised to never go outside after dark and to fear the reclusive forest creatures known as the ochi. When a baby ochi is left behind by its pack, she embarks on the adventure of a lifetime to reunite it with its family.

The Legend of Ochi comes from writer and director Isaiah Saxon, who previously made a number of music videos for the likes of Björk, and is making his feature debut here. The cast includes Helena Zengel, Finn Wolfhard, Emily Watson, and Willem Dafoe. It doesn’t have a premiere date yet, but A24 says the movie is “coming soon.”

Trailer

James Gunn shares the first image of the Man of Steel's crime-fighting canine companion, Krypto, for his anticipated Superman movie.

While news of Ballerina's reshoots had been made transparent, it is now said that Stahelski would re-do most of the movie without Wiseman.

Two to three months of reshoots aren't reshoots, that's a new film! Lionsgate isn't having the best year.

A washed-up stunt director is struggling to find his way in a changing industry. He risks everything to stage a comeback, while also attempting to repair the relationship with his estranged daughter.

IMDb

If you grew up in the early 2000s, you probably saw a trailer for Kangaroo Jack. The trailer gives the impression that the movie is a screwball road trip comedy about two friends and their wacky, talking Kangaroo sidekick. Except it’s not that. It’s an extremely unfunny movie about two idiots escaping the mob. There’s a random kangaroo in it for like 5 minutes and he only talks during a hallucination scene that lasts less than a minute. Turns out, the producers knew that they had a stinker on their hands so they cut the movie to be PG and focus the marketing on the one positive aspect that test audiences responded to, the talking kangaroo, tricking a bunch of families into buying tickets.

What other movies had similar, deceitfully malicious marketing campaigns?