REVIEW: The Killing [1956]

Just a bad joke without a punch line. After test screenings left audiences confused and frustrated, writer/director Stanley Kubrick and producing partner James B. Harris decided to return to the edit bay and turn The Killing‘s overlapping, repetitious structure into a more linear A-to-B narrative. You can’t blame the former for wanting to do everything possible to make the film a hit since it was his first project with a real budget positioning his career forward (he’d disavowed Fear and Desire as amateurish and sophomore effort Killer’s Kiss proved almost…

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REVIEW: The Lady from Shanghai [1948]

“Killing you is killing myself. But, you know, I’m pretty tired of both of us.” Director Why would Orson Welles work on a studio film again after the debacle of The Lady from Shanghai? The auteur submitted his first film noir on budget only to watch producers chop sixty minutes out and demanded reshoots to add distracting close-ups. I guess that’s the price of casting Rita Hayworth whether she’s your wife or not. The money is in play to see her and if you’ve already bleached and cut her iconic…

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