Author Archives: chipkaufmann

The very first time I saw this movie, I must have been 10 years old and caught it on TV while I was staying home sick from school. As this was my first exposure to anything by H.G. Wells, I was far too young to know or understand any of his principal concerns such asContinue reading “THE MAN WHO COULD WORK MIRACLES (1937): H.G. Wells Fantasy Still Has Something To Say”

H. Rider Haggard’s SHE was one of a number of late Victorian fantasy/romance novels I read when I was in high school back in the late 1960s. I ran across stills from a 1935 production of the story in a book about KING KONG which I’d purchased for my mother in 1976 (KONG was one ofContinue reading “SHE (1935): RKO Version Is A Marvel To Behold”

My mother was a great fan of mysteries and our home book library (back when there was such a thing) was full of them. Most of them were from the 1930s and early 1940s as the taste for mysteries declined after World War II. Being a child of the 1950s, I grew up with theContinue reading “1930s PERRY MASON Movie Set: Worth Seeing But They Are Very Uneven”

I first purchased a DVD of NO ORCHIDS FOR MISS BLANDISH (1948) from quality public domain provider VCI Entertainment back in 2010 (it has since been discontinued). I had never seen it or even heard of it but I was intrigued by hearing it described by its original English critics as “the worst British movie ever made.Continue reading “NO ORCHIDS FOR MISS BLANDISH (1948): Brit Attempt At American Film Noir Is Quite Good”

Kathryn Bigelow’s win for THE HURT LOCKER at the 2010 Academy Awards marked the first time in the Academy’s 82 year history that a woman was awarded Oscar for Best Director. In fact during that eight decade span, only 3 women (Lina Wertmuller- SEVEN BEAUTIES (1976), Jane Campion-THE PIANO (1993), Sofia Coppola-LOST IN TRANSLATION (2003)Continue reading “A Brief History Of Women Directors (2010)”

It’s been 30 years since Hammer Films last released a movie. That film was a remake of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1939 classic THE LADY VANISHES done in collaboration with The Rank Organisation who provided the funding. Rank had just scored a big success with a remake of Hitchcock’s THE 39 STEPS and wanted to try theirContinue reading “HAMMER FILMS: Back From The Grave (2012)”

t had been several years since I last saw RASPUTIN, THE MAD MONK and that had been in an incomplete form. The 2004 Anchor Bay double DVD set from their Hammer Collection had coupled it with THE DEVIL RIDES OUT which featured Christopher Lee as the good guy. The point was to offer a showcase forContinue reading “RASPUTIN: THE MAD MONK (1966) – More SVENGALI Than RASPUTIN”

As I grow older, one of life’s little pleasures is being able to revisit the movies of the past (especially my past) on home video. More often than not thanks to digital technology, these movies look better than they did when I first saw them back in the 1960s and 1970s. Even more enjoyable are theContinue reading “RECENT REDISCOVERIES (2011)”

Most people believe that so-called “modern” horror movie (those without a supernatural or fantasy element and with a contemporary setting) began in 1960 with Alfred Hitchcock’s PSYCHO but in fact modern horror began 3 years earlier in England and with not a single movie but 3. All 3 films are set in the present (ca.Continue reading “1959: The Year That The Modern Horror Movie Began (2009)”

From time to time I like to focus my reviews/articles on movie people who have given and still continue to give satisfaction in the works they have created and left behind for us to enjoy. One such person is director Don Sharp. Sharp was born in Australia in 1921 (actually Hobart, Tasmania just like ErrolContinue reading “SHARP AS A TACK: The Films of Australian Director Don Sharp (2010)”