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SlipStreams Vol. 16 (Patreon exclusive)
Three random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL editor Bill Chambers for the week of March 22, 2024. PICK OF THE WEEK Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (2007, d. Sidney Lumet (U.S.: Fubo, Peacock, Roku, Vudu, Tubi, Kanopy, Crackle, Pluto, Shout!, Plex; Canada: Prime, Tubi, CTV))Sidney Lumet's swan song brought the prolific director's career to a sudden stop; he lived another four years, making Before the Devil Knows You're Dead feel like a purposeful valediction with surprisingly little positive to say about his time on Earth. He was an old lib in the throes of Bush II, and this…
SlipStreams Vol. 15 (Patreon exclusive)
Three streaming recommendations from Walter Chaw for the week of March 8, 2024.
SlipStreams Vol. 14
Three random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL editor Bill Chambers for the week of February 23, 2024.PICK OF THE WEEKWaking the Dead (2000, d. Keith Gordon (U.S./Canada: Criterion))Criterion Channel's "Interdimensional Romance" slate is a treasure trove of bittersweet love stories, but I want to single out this underseen gem from director Keith Gordon, which has only grown more poignant in the 24 years since its release. Fielding Pierce (Billy Crudup) is a clean-cut, all-American kid putting himself through law school with a stint in the Coast Guard. Visiting his brother Danny's publishing outfit, he meets the magnetic Sarah Williams…
SlipStreams Vol. 13
Three random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL's Walter Chaw for the week of February 16, 2024. PICK OF THE WEEK Cujo (1983, d. Lewis Teague (U.S.: Max, DirecTV; Canada: Paramount+)) It's time for a serious reconsideration of Lewis Teague's Cujo, which was arguably buried in the steady stream of Stephen King adaptations from this period. Find in this middle-American noir a career-defining performance from Dee Wallace as Donna, a mother doing her best to shield her young son Tad (Danny Pintauro) from the ugliness of their shared reality. When a St. Bernard, after poking his head in a hole…
SlipStreams Vol. 12
Three random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL editor Bill Chambers for the week of February 9, 2024. PICK OF THE WEEK The Bedroom Window (1987, d. Curtis Hanson (U.S.: Criterion, Kanopy; Canada: Criterion, Hollywood Suite)) Curtis Hanson wrote and directed this page-turner of a movie, which fleshes out the plot of Anne Holden's slim pulp novel The Witnesses. Married Sylvia (Isabelle Huppert) is having a fling with yuppie Terry (Steve Guttenberg). When she sees an assault from Terry's bedroom window he thinks might be linked to a nearby murder, Terry urges her to go to the police. But because…
SlipStreams Vol. 11
Three random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL's Walter Chaw for the week of February 2, 2024.PICK OF THE WEEKKin-dza-dza! (Кин-дза-дза!) (1986, d. Georgiy Daneliya (U.S./Canada: YouTube))Since discovering that Mosfilm is restoring portions of their archive and posting the results on YouTube with English subtitles, I've been trying like mad to fill a few thousand gaps in my film education. For me, a child of the Reagan era and its hugely successful propaganda campaign against the "Evil Empire," the Soviet Union was always this austere wasteland peopled by mindless automatons bent on my atomic destruction. No matter how many examples…
SlipStreams Vol. 10
Three random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL editor Bill Chambers for the week of January 26, 2024. PICK OF THE WEEK Out of the Blue (1982, d. Dennis Hopper (U.S./Canada: Tubi, Plex)) Nominated for the Palme d'Or in 1980, Out of the Blue was Dennis Hopper's triumphant return to filmmaking after the sabotaged release of 1971's The Last Movie and various addictions imposed a lengthy hiatus on his directing career. Initially, he was only supposed to act in it, but the producers were unhappy with hyphenate Leonard Yakir's vision for the film and asked Hopper to take over. And…
SlipStreams Vol. 9
Three random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL's Walter Chaw for the week of October 7, 2022.PICK OF THE WEEKEnemy Mine (1985, d. Wolfgang Petersen (U.S.: Starz, DirecTV; Canada: Disney+))One of the films that fired my imagination in the matinee of my moviegoing youth, the late Wolfgang Petersen's Enemy Mine shipwrecks intergalactic archenemies Davidge (Dennis Quaid) and Drac (Louis Gossett, Jr.) together on a savage planet. Part Robinson Crusoe on Mars, part The Defiant Ones, all ludicrous, it's one of the rare films to deliver with full-throated glee everything the premise promises. It's got space battles, monster fights, broad politics,…
SlipStreams Vol. 8
Four random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL's Walter Chaw for the week of July 29, 2022.PICK OF THE WEEKPatterns (1956, d. Fielder Cook (U.S.: Paramount+, Epix, Roku, Hoopla, Kanopy, DirecTV, Fandor, Pure Flix; Canada: Hoopla, Fandor))Sixty-six years on, the Rod Serling-scripted Patterns remains the sharpest autopsy of corporate mind-think and groupspeak ever created. In it, a ruthless executive (Everett Sloane) seeks to pass over a loyal and decent career employee (Ed Begley) for a hotshot up-and-comer (Van Heflin) just recruited from another company. The executive is not, however, willing to be forthright in his intentions and so conspires to…
SlipStreams Vol. 7
Three random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL editor Bill Chambers for the week of July 22, 2022.PICK OF THE WEEKThe Way of the Gun (2000, d. Christopher McQuarrie (U.S.: Roku, Vudu, Tubi, Kanopy, Redbox, Pluto TV, Plex; Canada: Tubi, Plex))I didn't catch up with this until recently, after James Caan passed away. The directorial debut of Oscar-winning screenwriter Christopher McQuarrie, best known these days as the architect of the Mission: Impossible franchise from Rogue Nation on, The Way of the Gun is a bracingly vulgar film about two off-the-grid crooks (Ryan Philippe and Benicio Del Toro) who kidnap the…
SlipStreams Vol. 6
Four random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL's Walter Chaw for the week of July 15, 2022.PICK OF THE WEEKSamurai Marathon (2019, d. Bernard Rose (U.S.: Hoopla, Tubi, Pluto TV, Hi-Yah!; Canada: Hoopla, Tubi))Retaining most of the same production team from Takashi Miike's propulsive 13 Assassins, ace producer Jeremy Thomas decided to go with a foreign director for his next jidaigeki and chose, of all people, iconoclastic Bernard Rose. Best known for the original Candyman, Rose is a man of refined tastes, having directed a series of Tolstoy adaptations and engaged in an ongoing project covering the lives of great…
SlipStreams Vol. 5
Four random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL editor Bill Chambers for the week of July 8, 2022.PICK OF THE WEEKIntruder (1989, d. Scott Spiegel (U.S.: AMC+, Vudu, Tubi, Shudder, Pluto TV, Spectrum On Demand, Arrow; Canada: Tubi, Shudder, Arrow, AMC+))Evil Dead II co-writer Scott Spiegel made his feature debut with this semi-autobiographical (very semi) slasher flick set within the quaint confines of the Walnut Lake grocery store. Owners Bill (Dan Hicks) and Danny (Eugene Robert Glazer) have just sold the place and tasked the night crew with staying after hours to mark down the prices for clearance--and wouldn't you…
SlipStreams Vol. 4
Four random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL's Walter Chaw for the week of July 1, 2022.PICK OF THE WEEKBright Lights, Big City (1988, d. James Bridges (U.S.: Roku, Tubi, Redbox, Pluto TV; Canada: Tubi))I loved Bright Lights, Big City, Jay McInerny's preternaturally cocksure, first-person pomo updating of The Great Gatsby, when I read it in the months before the release of this big-screen adaptation starring Michael J. Fox. The diminutive sitcom megastar spent the years between the first two Back to the Futures mostly eschewing big-money grabs in favour of working on interesting projects with interesting directors, jumping full-body…
SlipStreams Vol. 3
Four random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL editor Bill Chambers for the week of June 24, 2022.PICK OF THE WEEKWhat Lies Beneath (2000 (U.S.: rental only; Canada: Tubi))A film that was something to occupy director Robert Zemeckis while he waited for Tom Hanks to shed pounds during the making of Cast Away, What Lies Beneath was unfairly dismissed as a coldly technical exercise when it opened to tepid reviews in July of 2000. Michelle Pfeiffer plays Claire, a recent empty-nester who's just moved to a picture-perfect house by the lake that husband Norman (Harrison Ford) inherited from his father.…
SlipStreams Vol. 2
Four random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL's Walter Chaw for the week of June 17, 2022.PICK OF THE WEEKThe Chocolate War (1988 (U.S.: Prime, Paramount+, Epix, Hoopla, Tubi, DirecTV; Canada: Hoopla, Tubi, MGM))An adaptation of Robert Cormier's YA classic from that pre-Harry Potter period when YA wasn't nearly so fulsome or populated, Keith Gordon's pitch-black The Chocolate War covers a fundraising drive at a private Catholic school that, more than a decade before Alexander Payne's Election, takes vicious satirical aim at the thin skin of civilization stretched over our animal natures. In meanness, the film falls somewhere between Williams…
SlipStreams Vol. 1
Four random-ish streaming recommendations from FILM FREAK CENTRAL editor Bill Chambers for the week of June 10, 2022.PICK OF THE WEEKThe Clock (1945 (U.S., Canada: The Criterion Channel))For my money, the peak of Judy Garland's collaborations with Vincente Minnelli, not counting Liza. Replacing director Fred Zinnemann a few weeks into production (at Garland's behest), Minnelli scrapped most of Zinnemann's footage and started fresh with an eye towards shooting more of the picture on location in New York, making The Clock one of Minnelli's rare excursions into something resembling realism. The precursor to truncated romances like Richard Linklater's Before trilogy, The Clock's…