Double Indemnity (1944)

“Double Indemnity” is the film noir classic before there was such a genre. It forced extramarital sex and murder onto 1940s America, a place not used to seeing its own sin displayed onscreen. It’s a miracle the film ever got made. (Confused? If you tune in Fox News or vote Republican, then you know all about ignoring sin and fact. Please, go away.) I digress. This classic follows a greedy salesman (Fred MacMurray) out to dump unneeded car insurance on a rich prick, but instead gets sucked in by the man’s amoral wife (Barbara Stanwyck, has there been a deadlier/cooler actress?) who sees opportunity: Off hubby, get fucked on the side, and get rich. I will not spill plot, or the inevitable (government-forced) ending, but marvel at every beautiful cruel act. Billy Wilder made this gem, and he knows gems, and this may be his best. The lead actors kill as immoral shits you want to see die, but truly fantasize about. Best asset: Regular Hollywood tough guy Edward G. Robinson as the hero and book nerd! Dig his angry geek tirade against low-IQ insurance dweebs, and witness acting at its greatest. One of the true Hollywood greats, a must watch. A+

Jason and the Argonauts (1963)

“The greatest film ever made.” Says Tom Hanks of “Jason and the Argonauts.” Damn it, he might not be right, but he’s not far off. How can you argue? This is absolute movie magic beauty: Giddy childish wonder watching wide-eyed as a group of men take on the gods and battle skeletal beings risen from the ground, all for honor. The director is Don Chaffey, but this is Ray Harryhausen’s gem: The special effects guru dreamed up those skeletons and the myriad giants and monsters and living ships that make up this classic. Screw CGI, this is the stuff of a boy (and girl’s) deepest imagination. The plot veers way off the Greek religious record as Jason (Todd Armstrong), lost son of a dead king, captures the Golden Fleece to –- unknown to him -– reclaim his rightful throne in an adventure that should spawn 100 sequels. Along the way, Jason finds a ship, Argo, brave warriors, and adventure and love, and monsters, and I will stop. Ditch Jason. The hero is Harryhausen. Dig those skeletons battling men to the death. This is what it meant to be young in 1963! A

Rollerball (1975)

In 2018 super-corporations rule the world in a soulless oligopoly as every need is served by nameless businesses. Government and freedom of choice is dead. Citizen-consumers are told to do their part and buy, buy, and obey, making the corporations even wealthier. It’s the dream world of the modern Koch Brothers, Consumers United, and right-wing GOP greed. I digress, but that’s the world behind 1975’s “Rollerball,” a futuristic nightmare flick that focuses on a roller rink blood sport that’s like basketball on wheels, with spikes, motor bikes, and death. James Caan is Jonathan, the Michael Jordon of the sport, a long-time veteran at the top of the game. Until the Corporate Gods tell him to stop. Why? No man can rise against the Corporate Elite. Damn, this is a fine premise. It’s predictions are crazy eerie. The film itself, directed by Norman Jewison? A dud. Caan -– who can deny his screen power? -– appears bored, the pace glacial, and the cheapo imagery amateurish. Oh, there’s a fantastic bit that foresees the rise of the ’Net and the fall of books, but like the Koch Brothers warning, it belongs in a better movie. C+

Dredd (2012) and Mad Max (1979)

It’s the future, so bring on the apocalypse. I downed cheapo, gonzo 1979 Australian classic (and Mel Gibson debut) “Mad Max” as a fast antidote to “Dredd,” the second cinematic coming of comic book anti-hero killer cop Judge Dredd after the God-awful, terrible 1995 Sylvester Stallone film of the same name that put freakin’ Rob Schneider in the sidekick role. 

(The less said about that debacle, the better. It took me months to recover from just one viewing.)

Is “Dredd” better? By far. Miles. It’s still crap. For myriad reasons. The plot: It’s post-nuclear war U.S. of A., and the whole East Coast is a godless concrete jungle of high rises and crime. The police and courts have been merged into the Judges: Leather-clad, masked cops with guns and a glint to kill. Basically, it’s like present day America except everybody is an unarmed young black man. You can get “judged” and end up in a body bag just for walking. Sorry, I digress. Still on a “FrutivaleStation” kick. Can’t help it.

Anyway, Dredd (Karl Urban) is the best (read: most ruthless) cop in Mega-City (because Metropolis was taken) and we follow him here as he takes on a high-rise apartment tower that reaches for the heavens, but might as well plunge low to the pits of hell. As in 1995, Dredd has a sidekick. And it’s a she, and not Schneider in drag, thank the gods. Helmetless because why stump the fan boy’s eye candy factor, Judge Anderson (Olivia Thirlby) also is a mutant who can read the thoughts of others. Why are there mutants popping around? No idea. 

Dredd and Anderson enter the complex to investigate a grisly drug-related triple murder and within minutes find themselves at the mercy of the building’s ruthless drug lord (Lena Headey). Mama she is called, and she places the building on lockdown and tells every thug ruthless, shitty, one-eyed, tenant over an intercom that she wants Dredd’s head now. From there it’s war, the tenants attack our hero (and the girl rookie) and he shoots, bombs, kicks, scowls, and grimaces his way through the lot to the top.

If One Man Against an War Zone Apartment Complex and the intercom bit sounds familiar it’s because the plot and details were done exactly point-for-point in “The Raid,” an kick-ass Indonesian action/blood fest also from 2012. Literally, this is a replica. Down to camera angles. Everything says director Pete Travis is innocent, it’s a mere coincidence. If it is, “Raid” is still the better film. And Travis has the luck of a rat. “Raid” has a hero that means something and is one hell of a sight to behold, has a human trait, and a reason not to fail. It’s also a spectacular feast of stunts. Seriously, see it.

This has CGI glut, a zero hero with Urban (good actor, no slam, I like him) doing Eastwood as an unkillable tank, and it all means nothing. Absolutely nothing. I get it. Dredd is supposed to be the darker Dark Knight. Great read for a book, I’m sure, bur a lousy watch and with so many wasted opportunities. Dig it: Mama has created a nasty drug that slows the brain to a crawl so every movement feels wicked trippy, lights pop, and rushing water stands still, and the effect is crazy wicked on screen. So let’s see Dredd on that shit, right? No. Dude just kills and scowls. I won’t watch a third film. C 

“Mad Max” I can watch endlessly. You know the plot: It’s the near-future, meaningful authority is dust-bin history, and the highways are open roads of lawlessness akin to old Australia or the American West than anything we’d call the future. Zero horses, all cars. Gibson is Max, a highway cop trying to maintain some order against roaming bikers who steal, rape, and kill for the pure glee. The bikers make the error to wrong Max’s friends and family, and Gibson as Max explodes like a fuel-air bomb in a film that feels not scripted or planned, but captured out of a complete drug-fueled nightmare. Not slow like in “Dredd,” but warp-speed head-rush fast.

Whole sections of “Max” are incomprehensible and wreck loud, but few films -– especially chase ones -– have ever felt more in the moment. It vibes like a tale that had to be made or writer/director George Miller and his star would just die. And for all the story’s debauchery, Miller shows little blood or gore. It’s just over the camera frame’s edge, way deep in our skull, and that is scarier than anything anyone can put before our eyes. Gibson is young and scary fanatical, is that acting? A-

The Blob (1958)

Steve McQueen is the world’s oldest teenager in “The Blob,” the corny, campy horror classic that opens with the funniest, catchiest theme song that I can recall. “Beware of The Blob, it creeps/ And leaps and glides and slides/ Across the floor/ Right through the door.” It’s a laugh riot. The movie is too, right from the start with McQueen playing 17 (!) calling a first-date gal named Jane (Aneta Corsaut) as “Jenny,” and getting away with it because he’s Steve Freakin’ McQueen. Anyway, meteor hits, a blob pops out, eats an old guy’s arm, and it’s on  -- laughs, goofy special effects, and punk teen kids saving the world when the cops won’t listen. Classic scene: The cinema! What’s hard as hell to take is the sexism: Every woman and girl is a helpless twit prone to hysterics and less brave than the 7-year-old brat in PJs prone to carrying around his teddy. Actually that’s the gist of the film: Those nightmare fantasies kids have about monsters coming true and no adult will believe them real. So honk the horns, and hold those ladies’ hands tight. B

The Robe (1953)

Biblical epic “The Robe” is more akin to “Ben-Hur” than any film about Christ. It follows a (fictional) man inspired by Christ, here Marcellus Gallio (Richard Burton), the rich, man-ho, authority-bucking Roman centurion who oversaw the very crucifixion of the Son of God. The titular red robe is that worn by Jesus, dropped at the cross, and won by Gallio in a bet. The robe, or course, isn’t just cloth. It’s the whole blood of salvation thing set to wake up Gallio from his life’s stupor. Too dumb for analogies? Dude also literally gets Jesus’ blood on his hands. The rest of the film tracks Gallio as he becomes a believer. Burton gnashes teeth down to the gums and when he gets that robe near his face, he “sucks” it up like Frank Drebin wrestling with that pillow in “Naked Gun.” Tin sword fights on stairs abound, too. Very “Robin Hood” sans tights. Thank the Lord. Still, for all the unintended laughs, many of director Henry Koster’s images are knock out: A distraught Judas walking off into the night, a tree in the distance is stunning. The end-scene “walk to heaven”? Just ick. B

Fruitvale Station (2013)

I cannot recall a more timely film in recent years. Seemingly every week in some U.S. city, police and vigilante pricks (Zimmerman) are gunning down unarmed black men at a clip not seen since … pre-1960? It just happened in Charlotte, and it’s the cold plot behind true story “Fruitvale Station.” We open with cell phone footage: 22-year-old Oscar Grant is shot point blank in the back New Year’s Day 2009 by a transit cop. He dies hours later. We then flashback to Oscar’s (Michael B. Jordon) final day as he desperately steers away from peddling drugs, works his way back into the graces of his girlfriend and daughter, and helps celebrate his mother’s (Octavia Spencer) birthday. It is she who suggests Oscar and his pals take the train that night. Writer/director Ryan Coogler’s drama is full of gut-puncher tragic moments like that, but also too syrupy scenes where Oscar plays chase with his tot in slo-mo magic hour light. The best moments come when they show Oscar as just a guy, any guy, struggling to correct course, thinking he has time, not knowing he does not. One day, maybe, films like this will be of the past. A-