it’s a movie about a woman who beheads her brother, stabs her children, and sends her lover’s wife up in flames. For Maria Callas, it’s a natural.
Based on the plot of Euripides’ Medea. Medea centers on the barbarian protagonist as she finds her position in the Greek world threatened, and the revenge she takes against her husband Jason who has betrayed her for another woman.Read More »
Previously available only in edited versions and poor-quality transfers, it remains one of the most obscure and bizarre Italian gothics of the ‘70s: When a trio of free-spirited young women – led by a smoldering Rosalba Neri of LADY FRANKENSTEIN fame – insist on spending the night in a castle rumored to be owned by the Devil himself, their cobweb-and-candelabra lark triggers a nightmare of lust, violence, vampirism and the ultimate ecstasy of Satanic seduction. Edmund Purdom (FRANKENSTEIN’S CASTLE OF FREAKS), Robert Woods (COUNTESS PERVERSE) and Carla Mancini (ERIKA) co-star in this unique shocker “taken from the theatrical work of the Grand Guignol” – also known as LUCIFERA: DEMON LOVER – written/directed by Paolo Lombardo (THE EMBALMER), produced by Dick Randall (PIECES) and featuring a soundtrack by Elvio Monti (CRISTIANA DEVIL NUN), now scanned uncut in 2K from the vault negative for the first time ever.Read More »
Quote: A documentary on China, concentrating mainly on the faces of the people, filmed in the areas they were allowed to visit. The 220 minute version consists of three parts. The first part, taken around Beijing, includes a cotton factory, older sections of the city, and a clinic where a Cesarean operation is performed, using acupuncture. The middle part visits the Red Flag canal and a collective farm in Henan, as well as the old city of Suzhou. The final part shows the port and industries of Shanghai, and ends with a stage presentation by Chinese acrobats.Read More »
Quote: This modern-dress studio production is “not your parents’ Don Giovanni” – the very opening shots, depicting a real New York slum full of rundown buildings, dead rats and garbage-covered snow, make that clear. Set in the South Bronx, this Giovanni strips the characters of their social statuses, keeps humor to the barest minimum, and brings forth loudly and clearly all the darkness that normally only simmers below the opera’s surface. Anna is an obvious rape victim who turns to heroin to escape from her trauma. Masetto does indeed beat Zerlina. And Giovanni and Leporello, innately “not so different,” are here portrayed as identical African American twins – a nearly interchangeable pair of streetwise, leather-clad, coke-snorting, gun-wielding hoods. Ensembles are staged as interpretive dances, and the finale is a hodgepodge of surreal horror, with a green-faced Commendatore, a somber little girl who lures pedophile Giovanni toward his doom, and bare-chested “demons,” both male and female, rising from the pavement.Read More »
Annie, the mistress of a middle-aged financier, accompanies him on a trip to Hong Kong. When his business interests collapse Annie ends up destitute. She is befriended by a group of socialites and begins her rite of passage in their world.Read More »
Quote: Tombolo, paradiso nero is a 1947 film directed by Giorgio Ferroni. Inspired by an article by Indro Montanelli, the film depicts the undergrowth of smugglers, prostitutes and deserters from the post-war Pineta del Tombolo, when the US military was stationed in the area.Read More »
synopsis: Two amateur armed robbers steal $5,000 from NY’s red light district, only to discover it was an intended protection payment to the mob. With Mafia hit men after them they seek shelter in a sleazy sex shop.Read More »