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There’s been a lot of talk lately about how the studios have lost interest in physical media, with Disney outsourcing its discs to Sony and questions over where the business is going in the wake of Redbox’s demise and Best Buy’s decision to stop selling Blu-rays and DVDs. Yet not only have the rumors of physical media’s death been greatly exaggerated as boutique labels step in to pick up the slack, but even at the studio level, praiseworthy efforts to showcase archival treasures are alive and well. Take, for example, the new Warner Archive Blu-ray of Raoul Walsh’s 1946 classic “The Man I Love.”

“The Man I Love” is a film beloved by cinephiles but hardly famous — among Warners’ 1940s releases, it’s a long way down from “Casablanca” and “The Maltese Falcon” when it comes to widespread popularity. It’s the kind of movie that...

It is the spring of “Baby Reindeer.” Netflix’s addictive limited series about a struggling comedian (Richard Gadd) working at a bar who makes the biggest mistake of his life when he gives a lonely woman (Jessica Gunning) a cup of tea on the house is the most watched series currently on the streamer and viewership is growing. And the fact that it’s based on a true story, makes “Baby Reindeer” even more creep and chilling. It’s a must-see voyeur thriller.

The same was true in the fall of 1987 with Adrian Lyne’s “Fatal Attraction.” Audiences flocked to the hard R-rated thriller which starred a wild-haired Glenn Close as an editor with a publishing company who has one-night stand with a happily married attorney (Michael Douglas) whose wife and daughter are out of town. Though it’s “understood” that it’s just a fling, Close’s Alex just won’t let go.

Exclusive: Gary Cole and Shawn Ashmore have been tapped to star in Anderson Falls, an indie crime drama from Title Media and Lone Suspect. French director Julien Seri, whose films include Yamakasi and Night Fare, is attached to helm the pic, which will begin shooting this summer in Los Angeles.

The film follows Detective Jeff Anderson (Ashmore) who, after his wife’s suicide, becomes convinced that she has in fact been murdered. Obsessed with his investigation, Anderson finds out that his wife was the victim of a team of father-and-son serial killers and sets out to stop them from killing other women.

Luke Barnett and Vincent Masciale of Lone Suspect are producing with Giles Daoust of Title Media and The Ring franchise executive producer Mike Macari of Koji Productions. Catherine Dumonceaux will serve as the executive producer.

Title Media and Lone Suspect have collaborated before horror-comedy Fear, Inc, starring Abigail Breslin,...

The great Fred Zinnemann's last feature is a very personal story, a fairly uncomplicated drama with a mountain climbing backdrop. Sean Connery plays older than his age as a Scotsman on an Alpine vacation, toying with social disaster. With excellent, non- grandstanding performances from Betsy Brantley and Lambert Wilson. Five Days One Summer DVD-r The Warner Archive Collection 1982 / Color / 1:85 enhanced widescreen / 108 96 min. / Street Date July 12, 2016 / available through the WBshop / 21.99 Starring Sean Connery, Betsy Brantley, Lambert Wilson, Jennifer Hilary, Isabel Dean, Gérard Buhr, Anna Massey, Sheila Reid, Emilie Lihou. Cinematography Giuseppe Rotunno Film Editor Stuart Baird Original Music Elmer Bernstein Written by Michael Austin from the story 'Maiden Maiden' by Kay Boyle Produced and Directed by Fred Zinnemann

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Fred Zinnemann is a filmmaker that I've come to admire, as much for his personal integrity as for the movies he made. He could be inconsistent and...

On December 14, 2012, a gunman entered Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut and shot 20 children aged between 6 and 7 years old, as well as six adult staff members. It’s the kind of horror that you hope one can’t even imagine, but it became a real life nightmare for the parents and […]

The post ‘Newtown’ Trailer: How Does a Small Community Recover From a Despicable Act of Violence? appeared first on /Film.

John Flynn's The Outfit (1974), a brutally efficient bit of business based glancingly on Richard Stark’s procedurally inquisitive and poetic crime novel of the same name, is a movie that feels like it’s never heard of a rounded corner; it’s blunt like a 1970 Dodge Monaco pinning a couple of killers against a Dumpster and a brick wall. I say “glancingly” because the movie, as Glenn Kenny observed upon The Outfit’s DVD release from the Warner Archives, is based less on the chronologically unconcerned novel than an idea taken from it. On the page Stark's protagonist, the unflappable Parker, his face altered by plastic surgery to the degree that past associates often take a fatal beat too long to realize to whom it is they are speaking, assumes the detached perspective of a bruised deity, undertaking the orchestration of a series of robberies administered to Mob-run businesses...

This is a Great film noir. A straying husband's 'innocent' dalliance wrecks lives and puts his marriage in jeopardy. Been there, done that?   Dick Powell and Lizabeth Scott are menaced by Raymond Burr, while wife Jane Wyatt is kept in the dark. Andre de Toth's direction puts everyone through the wringer, with a very adult look at the realities of the American marriage contract, circa 1948. Pitfall Blu-ray Kino Lorber Studio Classics 1948 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 86 min. / Street Date November 17, 2015 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95 Starring Dick Powell, Lizabeth Scott, Jane Wyatt, Raymond Burr, John Litel, Byron Barr, Jimmy Hunt. Cinematography Harry Wild Art Direction Arthur Lonergan Film Editor Walter Thompson Written by Karl Kamb from the novel by Jay Dratler Produced by Samuel Bischoff Directed by André De Toth

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Is 'domestic noir' even a category? I think so. Some of the creepiest late- '40s noir pictures take intrigue,...

Josh Olson on Noir! kicks off this week at Trailers from Hell, with screenwriter Olson introducing Fred Zinneman's "Act of Violence," starring Ryan, Heflin, a world-weary Mary Astor and a 21-year-old Janet Leigh.Moviegoers seeking easy answers should steer clear of Fred Zinneman’s hardboiled thriller from 1948, Act Of Violence. Zinneman uses the then recent horrors of World War II as the springboard for this complex morality play starring Van Heflin and Robert Ryan as two ex-POWs whose shared humanity has been corrupted by the Nazi prison camps. Just how corrupt they are is the subject of Robert Richards’ screenplay (from the story by Collier Young). The cast, including Janet Leigh and Phyllis Thaxter, is interesting from top to bottom and features a vivid turn from Mary Astor as a prostitute who gives Heflin shelter.

Hollywood actor known for playing wholesome wives and Ma Kent in Superman

Although Phyllis Thaxter, who has died aged 92, had a successful career in films throughout the 1940s and 50s, many will remember her for her last movie role, in Superman (1978). It was the small but key part of Ma Kent, the childless farmer's wife who adopts a foundling baby and names him Clark. Together with her husband (Glenn Ford) – both made intentionally to resemble the couple in Grant Wood's American Gothic painting – they bring up the abnormally physically gifted boy until he's ready to fly off "to fight for truth, justice and the American way".

At one stage, she tells him: "We Kents don't like show-offs, ain't that so? A body's got to be humble even if he knows that he's better'n his neighbours." A fragile beauty, Thaxter was never a show-off, but made an impact in a gentle way,...

Superman actress Phyllis Thaxter has died at the age of 90. Thaxter, who passed away in her Florida home following a long battle with Alzheimer's, is best known for her role playing Clark Kent's mother in Richard Donner's 1978 film. The actress was also recognised for her parts in Bewitched, Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo and Act of Violence, and worked on Broadway earlier in her career. "She was one of the most beautiful and patrician icons of the (more)...

The Hollywood Reporter confirms the sad news that Phyllis Thaxter died on Tuesday at her in Florida after what they describe as, "a long bout with Alzheimer's." The actress will be best known to comic book fans for playing Ma Kent in Richard Donner's Superman over 30 years ago. "She was one of the most beautiful and patrician icons of the golden age of movies, TV and theater," veteran movie critic Rex Reed told the site. Thaxter was also known for roles in the likes of Bewitched, Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo and Act of Violence.

Phyllis Thaxter, the wholesome actress who played Ma Kent in 1978’s Superman and the faithful girlfriend to vengeful Pow Robert Ryan in the 1948 film noir classic Act of Violence, has died. She was 90. Thaxter died Tuesday at her home in Orlando after a long bout with Alzheimer's, according to her daughter, actress Skye Aubrey. Photos: Hollywood's Notable Deaths of 2012 A contract player at MGM and Warner Bros. in the 1940s and ’50s before her career was derailed by illness, Thaxter also starred in the psychological thriller Bewitched (1945), playing opposite Edmund Gwenn as a woman fighting

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Fred Zinnemann began his career during the studio era, but kept on going, however sporadically, long after most of his contemporaries had retired. Even so, today his name means little to most moviegoers and critics alike. But why? Quite possibly because, like William Wyler, Zinnemann covered just about every film genre there is. His relatively small oeuvre — 21 narrative feature films — encompasses the following: Western (High Noon, The Sundowners [sort of]), romance (From Here to Eternity), socially conscious drama (The Search, The Men, A Hatful of Rain), historical drama (A Man for All Seasons), adventure (The Seventh Cross, Five Days One Summer), religion (The Nun's Story), thriller (The Day of the Jackal), crime (Eyes in the Night, Kid Glove Killer, Act of Violence), war (Behold a Pale Horse), comedy (My Brother Talks to Horses), melodrama (Little Big Jim) psychological drama (Teresa, The Member of the Wedding), musical (Oklahoma), pseudo-"historical" drama (Julia, whose...

Act of Violence

Directed by Fred Zinnemann

Screenplay by Robert L. Richards

USA, 1948

A recurring theme among war veterans, be it in film or in real life, is how many are haunted by the memories of their so called exploits and other various horrific scenarios which unfolded before their unfortunate eyes. Austrian-born director Fred Zinnemann, whose parents were unlucky victims of WWII, takes this notion of a shameful wartime past returning to plague a U.S. veteran to a near literal degree in his 1948 picture, Act of Violence.

Frank R. Enley (Van Heflin) is living the ideal life on the outskirts of Los Angeles. He is blessed with a successful career, has a caring and supporting wife, Edith (Janet Leigh), a new baby, and a lovely two story house located in a quintessentially American suburban neighbourhood. Shortly after Frank leaves the home one day with a neighbor for a two day fishing expedition,...

There aren’t many network sitcoms that can boast the breadth and awesomeness of How I Met Your Mother‘s song and dance routines. It’s a tradition the CBS series plans to continue as it kicks off its seventh season this Monday at 8/7c with a big Robin and Barney musical number. Judging by this video preview, another legendary performance is in the works.

To celebrate the show’s latest foray into musical territory, TVLine has compiled a list of Himym‘s 10 Best Song and Dance Moments — and there were plenty to choose from!

Fall TV: Catch Up on All the News,...

A new promo for the one-hour season premiere of CBS’ How I Met Your Mother raises two big questions. They both start with the word “Who,” yet — amazingly! — neither ends with “is the Mother?”

How I Met Your Mother Wedding Preview: Barney and Robin Burn Up the Dance Floor

Also, if this photo of Robin and Barney getting a bit dirty with their dancing put a smile on your face, you’ll get a peek at their close dance floor encounter here as well.

How I Met Your Mother Preview: Kal Penn’s Role, Barney’s Love Hexagon, Robin’s...

"Born to play beautifully tortured, angry souls, the actor Robert Ryan was a familiar movie face for more than two decades in Hollywood's classical years, his studio ups and downs, independent detours and outlier adventures paralleling the arc of American cinema as it went from a national pastime to near collapse." Manohla Dargis in the New York Times: "A little prettier and he might have been one of the golden boys of the golden age. But there could be something a touch menacing about his face (something open and sweet too), which bunched as tight as a fist, and his towering height (he stood 6 foot 4) at times loomed like a threat. The rage boiled up in him so quickly. It made him seem dangerous…. The two dozen features in a Film Forum series dedicated to Ryan and opening [today] includes dazzlers, solid genre fare, some curiosities and a few duds. Most...

"It's all in the eyes," Robert Ryan once said of film acting. "That's where you do most of your work."

But was it true of Ryan himself? His own narrow and heavily lidded brown eyes often registered as black disks in the lighting schemes of the late 40s and early 50s—that is, when they weren't overwhelmed by his massive forehead and his thick tangle of dark hair, or a pair of tragic eyebrows that threatened to merge with the numerous crags in his face as he entered middle age. Not to mention his lanky, extremely powerful physique. Take a close look at Ryan in The Set-Up or On Dangerous Ground and you'll get a sense of the relative frailty and delicacy of most male movie stars. In the post-war era, only Burt Lancaster was as physically imposing (Kirk Douglas was always fit but he was self-contained and self-motivated, even...

Coming to your screen this week: A possible detour in a Pretty Little romance, White Collar buttons up its summer season, and True Blood‘s Sookie gets down and dirty. As but a supplement to the fresh features and reporting TVLine has coming your way, here are 35 programs to keep on your radar.

Monday, August 8

8/7c Bachelor Pad (ABC) | If you’re among those eagerly anticipating Season 2 of this Bachelor/ette offshoot, I hope you are really eager for it, because this opener is three flippin’ hours long.

8 pm How I Met Your Mother (CBS) | Repeat No. 1: “This game...

How is Hollywood responding to a new generation of war veterans? With films that send them back out on the road, says John Patterson

Coming home to America from a war has always been a dicey proposition. After the first world war, the doughboys returned to ticker-tape parades and heroes' welcomes, followed by unemployment and troubled times in fat years and lean. On screen, luckless veterans of the American Expeditionary Force faced such diverse destinies as the one visited on Paul Muni in I Am A Fugitive From A Chain Gang, and that first enjoyed, then definitively paid for in a hail of bullets, by Jimmy Cagney in The Roaring Twenties.

After the second world war, the vets got a square deal from the government. At the movies, the difficulties of the return to peacetime were sympathetically depicted in The Best Years of Our Lives, an Oscar-winning smash that only...