Socially Distant, self isolated and sheltered in place.
Oh boy has it been a shitty year. When I started this blog in March I questioned the shelf life of a name like “Quarantined Critic”. It isn’t a great … Continue Reading Bill & Ted Face the Music (2020) September 6th, 2020
Of all the words that appropriately describe la Belle et la Bête none more succinctly encapsulates its jaw-dropping perfection than beautiful. Of course it’s an etherial, atmospheric and magical fantasy … Continue Reading le Belle et la Bête (1946) June 20th, 2020
I shouldn’t have to tell you that we’re still in the midst of a global pandemic. The death toll in the United States is over 121k as of this writing. … Continue Reading An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn (2018) June 19th, 2020
I’ve had nothing but difficulty in trying to come up with something to say about Alfred Hitchcock’s 1946 melodramatic spy romance Notorious that’s worth saying. It’s one of those movies … Continue Reading Notorious (1946) June 2nd, 2020
Is there a term for feeling ‘homesick’ for a place you’ve never lived? I’m feeling that way about Utah. Sigh, today I saw an alert that southern Utah was under … Continue Reading Mackenna’s Gold (1969) May 30th, 2020
Pillow of Death closes out the Inner Sanctum Mystery series with maybe the best movie title ever. Don’t get me wrong, Frozen Ghost and Weird Woman are phenomenal titles that … Continue Reading Pillow of Death (1945) May 10th, 2020
House of Dracula follows House of Frankenstein in the Universal Monsters franchise and like most serials I expected a modicum of continuity. Unfortunately that’s the exact amount of continuity in … Continue Reading House of Dracula (1945) May 8th, 2020
The Frozen Ghost sucked, and much to our chagrin, the next movie on the list is another Inner Sanctum Mystery. That’s too masochistic, even for me. So I told my … Continue Reading Phantasm (1979) May 2nd, 2020
70 years before The Avengers regularly broke box-office records for The Marvel Cinematic Universe, Universal Studios had its own cultural juggernaut with the Universal Monsters. Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff … Continue Reading House of Frankenstein (1944) April 26th, 2020
In my last review I brazenly compared The Uninvited to Scooby-Doo, which in retrospect now feels like a challenge too tempting for the cinema gods to ignore. As luck would … Continue Reading One Body Too Many (1944) April 25th, 2020
Originally a radio show, the Inner Sanctum Mysteries jumped to the film medium like a Tales from the Crypt precursor with 6 films starring Lon Chaney Jr. We chose to … Continue Reading Calling Dr. Death (1943) April 19th, 2020
If… is the first film in a trilogy starring Malcom McDowell as Mick Travis. All three films are available on the Criterion Channel until the end of April when they, … Continue Reading If…. (1968) April 1st, 2020
The last day of the month means the last chance to watch a movie leaving the Criterion Channel. All I knew going in was someone on r/criterion called the ending … Continue Reading The Day of the Locust (1975) March 31st, 2020
In our house the last couple days of the month means scavenging the Criterion Channel’s scraps. Don’t get me wrong, it’s much more like the moonlit spaghetti dinner in Lady … Continue Reading Sorry, Wrong Number (1948) March 30th, 2020
We strayed from The List today. See, Criterion.com had a 50% off 24 hour flash sale a couple of weeks ago, or months ago, who can tell when sheltering in … Continue Reading Anatomy of a Murder (1959) March 28th, 2020
Yep, we needed a break from Hitchcock. Yep, we did skip ahead in The List… by 52 years, but that doesn’t really break the tenants of the list. As you … Continue Reading Hardcore (1979) March 25th, 2020
