VHS Tracking

Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa in SHOWDOWN IN LITTLE TOKYO (1991)

Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa gave us a gold standard villain in SHOWDOWN IN LITTLE TOKYO (1991) and he devours every scene he’s in.

Wake Up Dead Man and Sentimental Value (Movie Squad Podcast #516) - RTRFM

New Movie Squad podcast. Reviews of WAKE UP DEAD MAN and SENTIMENTAL VALUE. Listen through the RTRFM website or your favourite podcasting app!

rtrfm.com.au/podcasts/mov...

Dude is wearing three shirts, a coat and scarves, and a bow tie

Watching Chow Yun-Fat’s masterclass in layering, CITY ON FIRE

The Hot Spot (1990) Look, I always knew about The Hot Spot (1990) because of an adolescent crush on Jennifer Connelly. A neo-noir directed by Dennis Hopper was also an alluring proposition, Don Johnson in the lead as an opportunistic drifter in a small Texan town, caught between two archetypical babes, the girl next door (Connelly) and the southern belle vamp (Virginia Madsen). Hopper was originally supposed to be making a film from a Mike Figgis script, but ditched that to settle upon an older screenplay adaptation he found of a 1953 novel by Charles William, …

The Hot Spot (1990)

Look, I always knew about The Hot Spot (1990) because of an adolescent crush on Jennifer Connelly. A neo-noir directed by Dennis Hopper was also an alluring proposition, Don Johnson in the lead as an opportunistic drifter in a small Texan town, caught between two archetypical…

VHS Tracking Presents…
BASSENDREAM (2022)
Wednesday 3rd December
Doors open: 6:30pm
Intro/Q & A with cinematographer Oliver Hay: 7:10pm
Film: 7:40pm
Goolugatup Heathcote gallery

Free screening. Register here!

www.eventbrite.com.au/e/vhs-tracki...

Hollywood 90028 (1973) I only watched Jaques Demy’s Model Shop when Quentin Tarantino programmed it as part of a retrospective that was shown on SBS, as it was a clear influence on Once Upon A Time In Hollywood as a ‘Driving around LA’ movie. In Once Upon A Time, it’s about a cool guy driving around L.A. while the spectre of murderers and serial killers lingers on the fringes in the form of the Manson Family.

Hollywood 90028 (1973)

sometimes I wonder what people might be talking about on Threads, but I guess there's really no way to know

SEE YOU IN DECEMBER AUSTRALIA! Tell ur frends and come see our final DREM shows.

📸 by @justoffthesix.bsky.social

RIP Udo Kier, star of JOHNNY MNEMONIC (1995) and BARB WIRE (1996).

Hello. It's Thursday evening. About a week ago we launched our newsletter. It's been really nice to publish and share things with people. However, there's currently only 15 subscribers which is a bit sad when over 10k people have visited the site. Sign up won't you?

www.thecurb.com.au/subscribe/

Announcing the first three titles to join the Imprint Asia collection from the Golden Princess Film Library! 🌟

These exclusive SteelBook releases are each in a Limited Edition Hardbox.

• CITY ON FIRE
• PEKING OPERA BLUES
• A CHINESE GHOST STORY TRILOGY

Pre-orders open Friday 21 November.

The Big Combo (1955) There are images in The Big Combo (1955) that are everything you want from a classic Film Noir. Opening with a woman stepping down a darkly lit corridor, backstage to a boxing match, pursued by suited figures. Later, a man in a suit wearing a hat emerges from the fog outside, stepping into a hangar to catch up with his nemesis.

The Big Combo (1955)

Trash Classics: Strange Days | Showtimes | Book Tickets | Luna Palace Cinemas Kathryn Bigelow and James Cameron's cyberpunk thriller starring Ralph Fiennes.

STRANGE DAYS (1995), the cyberpunk neo noir cult classic directed by Kathryn Bigelow and written by James Cameron. Starring Ralph Fiennes, Angela Bassett and Juliette Lewis. Screening one night only! Fri 28 Nov at Luna Leederville. Rated R18. Get your tickets!

www.lunapalace.com.au/films/strang...

Nightfall (1956) For a classic film noir, I settled upon Nightfall (1956) on a whim and the opening moments of Aldo Ray browsing a newspaper stand in the evening, and flinching when the streetlights came on overhead, that hooked me in. The city lights turn on and the title card appears with the woozy theme song. There’s something poetic and observational here, within the prelude to a crime story in Los Angeles.

Nightfall (1956)

Red Rooms (2023): Seeing Is On paper, Red Rooms is the ideal horror movie for a person like me, which is to say, a coward. It's a bloodless film that is rich with blood.

"On paper, RED ROOMS is the ideal horror movie for a person like me, which is to say, a coward. It would be a misnomer to say the film has no violence though—it is violence, a bloodless film that is rich with blood."

Day two of ringing the bell to come sign up to our newsletter for free - or sling us some dollars on a monthly basis. Whatever takes your fancy.

Help keep independent Aussie media alive.

A new look the Curb... Well folks, we've entered our Ghost era of the Curb. This is the same old site you've known with the same interviews and reviews and the same passionate support for Australian cinema, just a little d...

Oh hey folks.

Chiming in to say the Curb has a brand new look and a brand new way of supporting us.

Head on over and subscribe and sign up for our monthly or annual subscriptions here:

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does anyone have any leads on Australian literary agents who are 1) young 2) hip 3) alternative 4) (most important) have a sense of humour/like funny prose?

or American agents that'd take an Australian writer in?

Last night’s film, OUTLAND (1981). In the period between Bond & his late 1980s renaissance as older sex symbol, Sean Connery did some really Interesting films. Solid mix of low-fi SF, western & bad town noir. Could argue Connery at his best when he wasn’t firm in his footing, as seems the case here

Yokohama BJ Blues (1982) Only after I finished watching Yokohama BJ Blues (1982) did I realise that the lead actor, Yusaku Matsuda, played the role of Sato the villain in the Michael Douglas action flick, Black Rain. I knew Matsuda was a Japanese movie star and was known for action films himself in the 1970s, and yet I just didn’t connect him to this shaggy haired blues singer named BJ who makes a living as a private detective, walking around the port town of Yokohama.

Yokohama BJ Blues (1982)

VHS Tracking Issue 28 - "Cinemas" “We come to this place… for magic”, to quote our Nicole (Kidman, in the American theatre chain ads for AMC). For Issue 28 of VHS Tracking zine,...

New VHS TRACKING zine! The CINEMAS Issue! Writers contributing on the theme of cinemas. Cover art photography by Thomas Earnshaw. Riso printed by Neighbourhood Press. Get your copy! vhstrackingzines.bigcartel.com/product/vhs-...

Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point review Tyler Taormina’s sprawling portrait of an Italian-American family’s festive gathering in Long Island makes for an enjoyably hazy Christmas movie.

CHRISTMAS EVE IN MILLER'S POINT is like Robert Altman and Ingmar Bergman teamed up to make a John Hughes movie. Many will not enjoy this largely plotless film that looks like a wacky Xmas comedy, but isn't. Tyler Taormina (also made HAM ON RYE) is going his own way. tinyurl.com/4xex3rxp

The Return Of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1995) McConaughey voice: “Leatherface, you just gotta keep looking for those greenlights…” A video store staple is the cash-in ‘before they were stars’ release, particularly cheap looking DVDs with a badly photoshopped poster emphasising a big movie star in an early role. The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1995), or as I saw it on video shelves, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation…

The Return Of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1995)

'... the Angels got a new mama.'

Halloween 4: The Return Of Michael Myers (1988) The poster of Halloween 4: The Return Of Michael Myers (1988) makes me think of seeing it in video store magazines, or seeing it in VHS tape sales in the centre of a strip mall. Being a kid, scared of horror movies but kind of curious, and trying to understand the lore of “Michael Myers is back to hunt his niece” or “Donald Pleasance returns as Dr.

Halloween 4: The Return Of Michael Myers (1988)

Burial Ground (1981) As an Italian zombie flick, Burial Ground (1981) spends a lot of time with decaying zombie faces in close-up, crud-strewn make-up with maggots wriggling around. I couldn’t help but wonder… did the make-up artist apply the maggots carefully with a tweezer, or did they just dump a bucket upside down the zombie’s head and see what stuck? Part of the appeal and artistry with…

Burial Ground (1981)

Pale Blood (1990) Somewhere between TV shows like Silk Stalkings and Forever Knight, there’s the direct-to-video horror thriller, Pale Blood (1990). A hang over of Miami Vice aesthetics employed in the service of arty genre trash. And yet, there’s a certain elegance here, thanks to the stoic presence of George Chakiris (from the original West Side Story) as a vampire who arrives in the City of Angels to track down a serial killer who is pretending to be a vampire, draining women of blood.

Pale Blood (1990)

Pumpkinhead (1988) Reading a TV Guide description of Pumpkinhead (1988) as a kid, the type of movie that would only be programmed super late at night on a weekend, always intrigued me. A man gets revenge on the bikers who killed his boy by raising up a supernatural creature. Reading that it was directed by Stan Winston, known as the Special Effects guy of…

Pumpkinhead (1988)

Reading a TV Guide description of Pumpkinhead (1988) as a kid, the type of movie that would only be programmed super late at night on a weekend, always intrigued me. A man gets revenge on the bikers who killed his boy by raising up a supernatural creature. Reading that it was…

Alison’s Birthday (1981) Alison’s Birthday (1981) lets you know it’s an Australian horror story through the shot of a Cold Chisel album on the floor when a seance goes haywire. At age 16, Alison (Joanne Samuel from Mad Max) is mucking around with a ouija board with a couple of school friends, and receives a warning from the other side: they’re after you, and it will happen on your 19th birthday.

Alison’s Birthday (1981)

Alison’s Birthday (1981) lets you know it’s an Australian horror story through the shot of a Cold Chisel album on the floor when a seance goes haywire. At age 16, Alison (Joanne Samuel from Mad Max) is mucking around with a ouija board with a couple of school friends, and…

#carnivalofsouls