Displaying items by tag: Lee Pfeiffer

“As soon as Indy stepped out of the shadows in that first scene and revealed himself to us with that badass confidence and intensity, I feel like in that moment, Harrison Ford truly became a movie star of the highest order.” – Charles de Lauzirika, producer/director of Dangerous Days: Making Blade Runner

The Digital Bits and History, Legacy & Showmanship are pleased to present this multi-page retrospective article commemorating the 40th anniversary of the release of Raiders of the Lost Ark, the Lucas & Spielberg action classic that introduced moviegoers to the globe-trotting adventures of Indiana Jones and spawned a franchise of sequels, prequels, games, and theme park attractions.

Raiders, featuring Harrison Ford as everyone’s favorite cinematic archaeologist, was the most successful movie of its year of release and for a period of time the third highest-grossing motion picture of all time. The Oscar-winning movie also starred Karen Allen as heroine Marion Ravenwood, Paul Freeman as archvillain Belloq, Ronald Lacey as villain Toht, John Rhys-Davies as sidekick Sallah, and Denholm Elliott as colleague Marcus Brody.

In 1999 the Library of Congress selected Raiders of the Lost Ark for preservation in the National Film Registry as being “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant,” and earlier this year, Raiders and the other movies in the series were released for the first time on 4K UHD (reviewed here). [Read on here...]

We’re kicking off the new week with more disc reviews...

For those who missed it, I posted my thoughts on Wolfgang Petersen’s In the Line of Fire (from Sony) and Adam Wingard’s Godzilla vs. Kong (from Warner Bros.) in 4K Ultra HD on Friday. They’re very different films, but each looks and sounds terrific, so do give them a look.

Also, Dennis has turned in his comments on George Sherman’s Larceny, a 1948 film noir that’s coming on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber Studio Classics on 7/13.

And Stephen has reviewed Arthur Barron’s Jeremy (1973) on Blu-ray, as recently released on the format by Fun City Editions.

We also have a brand new History, Legacy & Showmanship column from our own Michael Coate, which looks back at the theatrical release of Gordon Parks’ original Shaft in honor of the film’s 50th anniversary. The in-depth piece (four pages in all!) features a new roundtable interview with historians Josiah Howard and Lee Pfeiffer, as well as Shaft super-fan Chris Utley. You’ll find that here and it’s well worth a look. [Read on here...]

“It’s the worst Bond movie ever made.” — Lee Pfeiffer, co-author of The Essential Bond: The Authorized Guide to the World of 007

The Digital Bits and History, Legacy & Showmanship are pleased to present this retrospective commemorating the 45th anniversary of the release of The Man with the Golden Gun, the ninth (official) cinematic James Bond adventure and second entry to feature Roger Moore as Agent 007.

In case you missed them or desire a refresher read, this column’s other celebratory 007 articles in this series include The World Is Not Enough, Licence to Kill, Moonraker, Quantum of Solace, From Russia with Love, Never Say Never Again, Live and Let Die, Octopussy, Casino Royale (1967), Tomorrow Never Dies, Die Another Day, Dr. No, The Living Daylights, The Spy Who Loved Me, You Only Live Twice, Diamonds Are Forever, Casino Royale, For Your Eyes Only, Thunderball, GoldenEye, A View to a Kill, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Goldfinger, and 007… Fifty Years Strong.

The Bits continues the series with this retrospective featuring a Q&A with an esteemed group of film historians and James Bond authorities who discuss the virtues, shortcomings and legacy of 1974’s The Man with the Golden Gun. [Read more here...]

“2001 is Kubrick’s crowning achievement. It’s the movie that launched him into ’superstar’ status that placed him alongside the likes of Welles, Bergman, Fellini, Kurosawa, Hitchcock, Ford...” — film historian and author Raymond Benson

The Digital Bits and History, Legacy & Showmanship are pleased to present this retrospective commemorating the golden anniversary of the release of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Stanley Kubrick’s acclaimed science-fiction adventure starring Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood.

Featuring groundbreaking visual effects and memorable usage of classical music (and decades of analysis), 2001 premiered 50 years ago this week, and for the occasion The Bits features a compilation of statistics and box office data that places the movie’s performance in context; passages from vintage film reviews; and a reference/historical listing of the movie’s limited-market 70-millimeter and roadshow engagements. [Read on here...]

Okay, we’ve got a bunch of good stuff for you today…

First up, we’ve posted a pair of new Blu-ray reviews from Tim, featuring his thoughts on Gidget (1959) from Twilight Time and also The Witches (1967) from Arrow Academy. Do check them out.

Also today, our own Michael Coate has a new History, Legacy & Showmanship column in which he celebrates the 50th anniversary of the original classic Planet of the Apes with a new roundtable interview of film historians Jeff Bond, John Cork, and Lee Pfeiffer. It’s a great discussion, so don’t miss it. [Read on here…]

“What we have here is a total lack of respect for the law!”

The Digital Bits and History, Legacy & Showmanship are pleased to present this retrospective article commemorating the 40th anniversary of the release of Smokey and the Bandit, the popular action comedy starring Burt Reynolds as Bo (aka Bandit), Sally Field as Carrie (aka Frog), Jerry Reed as Cledus (aka Snowman), and Jackie Gleason as the unforgettable Sheriff Buford T. Justice of Portague County. [Read on here...]

”Thunderball will always be the ‘big one.’ When Bond was bigger than anything on the planet, except maybe the Beatles.” — Steven Jay Rubin

The Digital Bits is pleased to present this retrospective commemorating the golden anniversary of the release of Thunderball, the fourth cinematic James Bond adventure starring Sean Connery as Agent 007 and, notably, the first produced in widescreen and, when adjusted for inflation, the most successful entry in the series.  [Read on here...]

“Had GoldenEye failed, that would have been it for 007.” — John Cork

The Digital Bits is pleased to present this retrospective commemorating the 20th anniversary of the release of GoldenEye, the 17th (official) cinematic James Bond adventure and, most notably, the first to star Pierce Brosnan as Agent 007.

As with our previous 007 articles (available here, here, here, and here), The Bits continues the series with this retrospective featuring a Q&A with an esteemed group of James Bond authorities who discuss the virtues and shortcomings of GoldenEye and analyze whether or not the passage of time has been kind to the film. [Read on here...]

“Unlike most of the Bond films, [A View to a Kill] lacks the sense of cleverness that is so instrumental to the success of 007. It is a film where everyone was working a bit too quickly, where the inherent tone of a Bond film was in short supply, the Bond film that feels the most like an expensive TV movie. It is the Bond film that should have gotten the Mystery Science Theater 3000 treatment.” — John Cork

The Digital Bits is pleased to present this retrospective commemorating the 30th anniversary of the release of A View to a Kill, the 14th (official) cinematic James Bond adventure and, most notably, the final to star Roger Moore as Agent 007.  [Read on here...]

“[T]he lasting impact of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is that it showed that a James Bond film could be made without Sean Connery in the lead role. The producers maintained that audiences came to the films to see James Bond, not necessarily the actor playing him.” — Bruce Scivally

The Digital Bits is pleased to present this retrospective commemorating the 45th anniversary of the release of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, the sixth cinematic James Bond adventure and, most notably, the first not to star Sean Connery as Agent 007.  [Read more here...]