Favorite films

Recent reviews

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  The Silent Swordsman 1967

  ★★★ Watched 26 Mar 2025

  The border is under attack and General Yuan, whose troops are defending a fort/part of The Wall, has sent several calls for help to General Lu Qiang, but not received an answer. When General Yuan receives a copy of a letter sent by Qiang to the attackers telling them he is holding off sending his troops, he forwards it to a women's religious retreat high in the mountains for safe keeping. When Qiang is finally confronted about his lack of…

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  Vampire Circus 1972

  ★★★★ Rewatched 25 Mar 2025

  HAMMER FILM PRODUCTIONS #59

  My thoughts from February 16, 2022:

  "Among the best of HAMMER's classic vampire films, this one opens with a 12 minute prologue that is almost a short film. A young girl is kidnapped, taken to the castle of Count Mitterhaus (the excellent Robert Tayman), and drained of blood. Torch bearing villagers storm the castle looking for the girl as well as the schoolmaster's wife Anna who has become the counts mistress. When the count is staked…

Popular reviews

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  Le Samouraï 1967

  ★★★★★ Rewatched 16 Nov 2017 2

  Killer for hire Jef Costello (Alain Delon) lies smoking, fully dressed, on the bed in his Paris apartment, a room that looks as inviting as a monk's cell. He rises, feeds a caged bird (his only real contact with a living creature), puts on his trench coat, carefully places his hat on his head, runs his fingers along the brim (like a Hollywood gangster), then goes outside where he steals a car. He drives around town setting up an alibi…

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  Unorthodox 2020

  ★★½ Watched 17 Apr 2020

  Having never read the book, apparently the author left the Satmar sect of Hasidic Judaism, raised her daughter, become a writer, then moved to Berlin where she continued to write. In the Netflix four part series, the reasons she left the sect are beautifully presented, harrowing and frightening. However, at the same time we see this period of her life, another story is told. In this one when she leaves the community she immediately travels to Berlin where her mother…