Captive Eye

On episode 46 of Captive Eye, David Kleiler, Jean-Paul Ouellette and Steve Head consider the enduring qualities of James Whale’s Bride of Frankenstein (1935), and bring to light some rarely talked about stories from its making and original release.

When Martin Scorsese brought Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom back from its longtime purgatory, the word on the street was that it was a piece of transgressive cinema from an acclaimed director, *before* Psycho, which caught a lot of hell it didn’t deserve, and largely ended its creator’s career. What lingers about Peeping Tom is its sense of tragedy: its betrayal of trust. The magnificently dramatic collision of Anna Massey’s devoted and naive Helen, and Karlheinz Bohm’s Mark, an introverted, outsider (literally, he’s from another country) with a psychotic urge instilled in him by his father. Peeping Tom wasn’t created with broad appeal in mind. When you get right down to it, Peeping Tom is essentially a rebellious statement made at a turning point in Powell’s career. It’s an obliteration of expectations; and career-wise a costly one. On this episode of Captive Eye (formerly Diabolique Webcast), writer/producer/director J. P. Ouillette and Prof. David Kleiler join me to discuss director Michael Powell’s intriguingly meticulous 1960 classic.

Earlier this year, when Shout Factory announced their Blu-ray release of John Carpenter’s Village of the Damned, I can’t say I was enthusiastic about the news. It mostly served to remind me how much I wanted to like the film and that I found it hugely disappointing. Sure, it’s neatly stylish, and even cool at times. But it’s a colorfully lackluster endeavor that sure doesn’t stand up to director Wolf Rilla’s black-and-white original—a film more worthy of appreciation. On this episode of the Diabolique Webcast, J. P. Ouellette, David Kleiler, and I discuss the 1960 original Village of the Damned, which needs the well-produced-Blu-ray-release treatment afforded its remake.

Mulholland Drive is perhaps a unique sort of puzzle—one that’s different upon every deconstruction. Conversationally you can take the film apart and put it back together and maybe you’ll come up with an entirely different theory as to what’s truly going on in director David Lynch’s 2001 psychodrama. On this episode of the Diabolique Webcast, writer/producer/director J. P. Ouillette and Prof. David Kleiler join me to discuss Mulholland Drive, which was recently released on Blu-ray by The Criterion Collection. Speaking for myself, if I recorded this podcast again I might arrive at completely different conclusions about the film. So go ahead and press play for my current take.

From a technical strand-point, Brian de Palma’s 1980 psychological thriller Dressed to Kill is top notch. His fascination with the techniques of filmmaking makes the film a treasure trove for cinephiles. The film has its detractors, of course, but fans of split-diopter and tracking shots can’t deny that Dressed to Kill has beautiful examples of both. And I’ll admit, I can be charmed by a film’s style enough to forgive deviations from its narrative. Mr. de Palma believes you can too. On this episode of the Diabolique Webcast, David Kleiler and I consider the merits of Dressed to Kill, which will be released on Blu-ray by the Criterion Collection in September.

Steve Head and David Kleiler discuss Nicolas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now (1973), a haunting supernatural thriller, starring Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie. The film is renowned for its innovative editing and striking cinematography, as well as for its naturalistic eroticism. It is being released on blu-ray by the Criterion Collection, in an impressive new 4k restoration.

What would you do if you and your significant other stopped at a gas station while traveling, and your significant other suddenly vanished without trace? That is the premise for George Sluizer’s haunting and very disturbing 1988 film, The Vanishing, which has just been released on Blu-ray by The Criterion Collection. David Klieler and Steve Head discuss the film in depth.

Join Steve Head and David Kleiler for a discussion on Jim Jarmusch’s ultra-cool vampire film, Only Lovers Left Alive, starring Tilda Swinton and Tom Hiddleston. The film is available on blu-ray, August 19 2014, from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment.

Thirty-five years after it’s initial release, Nosferatu the Vampyre, Werner Herzog’s haunting tone poem of death and loneliness is as potent today as it was in 1979. To celebrate the film’s recent arrival on blu-ray for the first time in both the US and the UK, Fangoria Magazine #334 has featured it on its cover. Steve Head and David Kleiler discuss the film with special guest, Fangoria’s editor, Chris Alexander who counts Nosferatu among his favorite films of all time. The film is available on blu-ray from the BFI in the UK, and from Shout! Factory in the US.​

Giving credit where it’s due, cinephiles must thank Liz Coffey, an archivist at the Harvard Film Archive, for saving the only known-to-exist 35mm print of the “middle version” of The Wicker Man. Its discovery—following an inquiry by a representative of Studio Canal, who later confirmed the print’s edit with director Robin Hardy—was one of the great finds at the HFA in 2013.  On this episode of the Diabolique Webcast, Liz tells the untold story about how the print arrived at the HFA (one possibly being via Roger Corman), how it was nearly thrown away, and how it was saved.

Steve Head and David Kleiler welcome special guest, Bret Wood, Vice President and Executive Producer at Kino Lorber, to discuss Kino’s new blu-ray release of F. W. Murnau’s Nosferatu (1922), the film that Werner Herzog called the most important German film ever made.

Ever since the arrival of sound, people have been predicting the end of film as we know it. The latest to sound the alarm are Steven Spielberg and George Lucas who, last month, predicted the meltdown of the movie industry in the not too distant future…a future in which only mega-budgeted blockbusters will make it into mainstream theaters, while smaller independent films will be distributed mostly via cable and streaming. Is it apocalypse now, or the natural evolution of cinema? Steve Head, David Kleiler and Dan Kimmel weigh in on the impending catastrophe and ask, have we been down this road before?

With the release of Rodney Ascher’s film, Room 237, which seeks deeper meaning in Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of Stephen King’s horror classic, Steve Head and David Kleiler have their own say on the symbolism and the possible hidden meanings of Kubrick’s film.