Plan 9 from Outer Space

BELA LUGOSI
VAMPIRA
LYLE TALBOT

PRODUCED AND DIRECTED BY
EDWARD D. WOOD, JR.

" With its incoherent plot, jaw-droppingly odd dialogue, inept acting, threadbare production design, and special effects so shoddy that they border on the surreal, Plan 9 From Outer Space has often been called the worst movie ever made. But it's an oddly endearing disaster; boasting genuine enthusiasm and undeniable charm, it is the work of people who loved movies and loved making them, even if they displayed little visible talent. In Plan 9, alien invaders attempt to conquer the world by raising the dead, starting with an old man dressed in a Dracula costume (Lugosi [...] ), his much-younger and well-proportioned wife (Maila "Vampira" Nurmi), and a remarkably overweight police officer (Tor Johnson). Often funny and consistently entertaining (if almost always for the wrong reasons), Plan 9 From Outer Space is an anti-masterpiece if there ever was one, and as Criswell so brilliantly puts it, "Can you PROVE it didn't happen?!?" [...] " allmovie

My friend, can your heart stand the shocking facts about grave robbers from outer space?" Plan 9 from Outer Space is a 1959 science fiction/horror film written, produced, and directed by Edward D. Wood, Jr..

[...] The film also claims to posthumously star Bela Lugosi through use of archive footage and a brief scene of the actor shot by Wood just before Lugosi's death in 1956, although Lugosi's character is primarily portrayed by chiropractor Tom Mason.

The plot of the film is focused on a race of extraterrestrial beings who are seeking to stop humans from creating a doomsday weapon that would destroy the universe. In the course of doing so, the aliens implement "Plan 9", a scheme to resurrect Earth's dead as zombies to get the planet's attention, causing chaos. " Wikipedia

The Third Man

In Italy for 30 years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love - they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.

"Pulp novelist Holly Martins travels to shadowy, postwar Vienna, only to find himself investigating the mysterious death of an old friend, black-market opportunist Harry Lime--and thus begins this legendary tale of love, deception, and murder."
The Criterion Collection

"The Third Man (1949) is an award-winning British film noir directed by Carol Reed and starring Joseph Cotten, Alida Valli, Trevor Howard and Orson Welles. The screenplay was written by novelist Graham Greene. Greene wrote a novella of the same name in preparation for the screenplay, which was published in 1950." Wikipedia

The Atomic Café

"The Atomic Café is an acclaimed documentary film about the beginnings of the era of nuclear warfare, created from a broad range of archival of film from the 1940s, 1950s and early 1960s - including newsreel clips, television news footage, U.S. government-produced films (including military training films), advertisements, television and radio programs. News footage reflected the prevailing understandings of the media and public.

The film was produced over a five-year period through the collaborative efforts of three directors: Jayne Loader, and brothers Kevin and Pierce Rafferty. The filmmakers opted to not use narration and instead they deploy carefully constructed sequences of film clips to make their points. The soundtrack utilizes atomic-themed songs from the Cold War-era to underscore the themes of the film.

Though the topic of atomic holocaust is a grave matter, the film approaches it with black humor. Much of the humor derives from the modern audience's reaction to the old training films, such as the Duck and Cover film shown in schools.

The film was released in April 1982. Its release coincided with a peak in the international disarmament movement, and the film received much wider distribution than was the norm for politically-oriented documentaries. It rapidly became a cult classic, and greatly influenced documentary filmmaking." Wikipedia

M - Eine Stadt sucht einen Mörder

"A simple, haunting phrase whistled off-screen tells us that a young girl will be killed. "Who is the murderer?" pleads a nearby placard as serial killer Hans Beckert (Peter Lorre) closes in on little Elsie Beckmann. In his harrowing masterwork M, Fritz Lang merges trenchant social commentary with chilling suspense, creating a panorama of private madness and public hysteria that to this day remains the blueprint for the psychological thriller." The Criterion Collection
(See also this essay by Stanley Kauffmann)

M was released in Germany in 1931.
The film is in public domain and available at Internet Archive. MPEG4 (266 MB) MPEG1 (856 MB) MPEG2 (3.6 GB)



Clicca qui per vedere M - il Mostro di Düsseldorf (in italiano).

Night of the Living Dead

"Night of the Living Dead is a seminal 1968 black-and-white independent horror film directed by George A. Romero. […] The film stars Duane Jones as Ben and Judith O'Dea as Barbra. The plot revolves around the mysterious reanimation of the dead and the efforts of Ben, Barbra and five others to survive the night while trapped in a rural Pennsylvania farmhouse.


Romero produced the film on the small budget of $114,000. […] Night of the Living Dead was strongly criticized at the time of its release for its graphic content, but three decades later the Library of Congress entered it into the United States National Film Registry with other films deemed "historically, culturally or aesthetically important".

The film had a tremendous impact on the culture of Vietnam-era America. It is so thoroughly laden with critiques of late-1960s American society that one historian described the film as "subversive on many levels". While not the first zombie film made, Night of the Living Dead influenced countless films and is perhaps the defining influence on the modern pop-culture zombie archetype. The film is the first of five Dead films (completed or pending) directed by Romero. It has been remade twice, in 1990 and in 2006. "  From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The original film is available for download at no cost. MPEG4(235 MB) MPEG1(876 MB) MPEG2(3.9 GB)

Read more!

Criticism

"Reviewers disliked the film's gory special effects. Variety labeled Night of the Living Dead an "unrelieved orgy of sadism" and questioned the "integrity and social responsibility of its Pittsburgh-based makers." New York Times critic Vincent Canby referred to the film as a "junk movie" as well as "spare, uncluttered, but really silly".

Nevertheless, some reviewers recognized the film as groundbreaking. Pauline Kael called the film "one of the most gruesomely terrifying movies ever made - and when you leave the theatre you may wish you could forget the whole horrible experience… The film's grainy, banal seriousness works for it - gives it a crude realism". A Film Daily critic commented, "This is a pearl of a horror picture which exhibits all the earmarks of a sleeper". […]

Since the release, critics and film historians have seen Night of the Living Dead as a subversive film that critiques 1960s American society, international Cold War politics, and domestic racism. Elliot Stein of The Village Voice saw the film as an ardent critique of American involvement in Vietnam, arguing that it "was not set in Transylvania, but Pennsylvania - this was Middle America at war, and the zombie carnage seemed a grotesque echo of the conflict then raging in Vietnam". […]

While George Romero denies he hired Duane Jones simply because he was black, reviewer Mark Deming notes that "the grim fate of Duane Jones, the sole heroic figure and only African-American, had added resonance with the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X fresh in the minds of most Americans." […]

The deaths of Ben, Barbra and the supporting cast offered audiences an uncomfortable, nihilistic glimpse unusual for the genre.

The treatment of female characters attracted criticism from feminist scholars and critics. Women are portrayed as helpless and often excluded from the decision-making process by the male characters. […]

Other prevalent themes included "disillusionment with government and patriarchal nuclear family" and "the flaws inherent in the media, local and federal government agencies, and the entire mechanism of civil defense." Film historian Linda Badley explains that the film was so horrifying because the monsters were not creatures from Outer Space or some exotic environment, "They're us"."