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WolfmanOz at the Movies #72
Damn you all to hell ! In the year 1968, two movies came out that changed modern day science-fiction films forever – Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece 2001: A Space Odyssey has been the most celebrated out of the two (and my all-time favourite movie), but Planet Of The Apes stands on its own ground and has…
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WolfmanOz at the Movies #71
The ultimate man of conscience It is a widely accepted axiom that it is easier to make a good movie out of a bad play than out of a good one; a bad play can be altered with a clear conscience so that its mishandled virtues are brought to the fore in a different medium,…
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WolfmanOz at the Movies #70
A Tale of the Christ There are some films that make a lasting impression when you see them for the first time, and Ben-Hur (the 1959 version) is one such movie for myself. I first saw it on a re-release in the early 1970s when my parents took the family to see it on a…
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WolfmanOz at the Movies #68
Hope is a good thing Was what prisoner Andy Dufresne says to his fellow prisoner and close friend Ellis “Red” Redding in the superlative prison drama film The Shawshank Redemption. Released in 1994, the film was a box-office disappointment and despite being nominated for a swag of awards it wasn’t until its release on VHS…
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WolfmanOz at the Movies #67
Those who about to die salute you With the introduction of cinemascope/widescreen in 1953 starting with The Robe, cinema saw a growing popularity of Biblical/historical epics throughout the 1950s and 1960s. One of the best, and, certainly one of the most discussed was Stanley Kubrick’s 1960 film Spartacus. The film was inspired by the life…
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WolfmanOz at the Movies #66
Star of stage, screen and alimony Was the epitaph suggested for himself by actor and comedian Peter Sellers. Sellers was a prodigious talent, touching on genius at times, although almost all of his best work had been completed by the mid 1960s. Born Richard Henry Sellers in 1925. He began accompanying his parents in a…
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WolfmanOz at the Movies #65
Follow the money Is the phrase, master screenwriter William Goldman attributed to Deep Throat (aka Mark Felt), the informant who took part in revealing the truth behind the June 1972 Watergate break-in in the superb 1976 political thriller All The President’s Men, although the phrase did not appear in the book or in any of the…
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WolfmanOz at the Movies #64
Not a lot of people know that Is the catchphrase that many impersonators use in mimicking Michael Caine which came from his habit of informing people of obscure facts that he had remembered. Celebrating his 90th birthday only a couple of weeks ago, Michael Caine has not only appeared in over 160 movies that has…
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WolfmanOz at the Movies #63
Tom, Dick and Harry Were the names given to the three tunnels that were used in the mass escape by British and Commonwealth POWs from the German POW camp Stalag Luft III. The film of course is The Great Escape (released in 1963) which depicts a heavily fictionalised version of the escape, with numerous compromises made…