Favorite Film Posters: Stripped to Kill 2: Live Girls

The first of many posts celebrating my favorite film posters. As an artist and a cinephile, I’ve long been enamored with the art of the film poster. I was fortunate to grow up during a golden age for movie posters—the seventies, eighties, and into the nineties, when real, honest-to-goodness artists crafted 27x40 inch masterpieces to … Continue reading Favorite Film Posters: Stripped to Kill 2: Live Girls

Lost and Found: Doppelganger

In which Drew Barrymore singlehandedly puts the “erotic” in this forgotten erotic thriller. A neglected erotic thriller that got lost in the glut of the 1990s erotic thriller boom, Doppelganger (1993) comes courtesy of writer-director Avi Nesher, of such acclaimed films as She (1982), Time Bomb (1991) and Raw Nerve (2000). Okay, none of those … Continue reading Lost and Found: Doppelganger

From the Vault: Joan Collins in Fatal Charm

This post was first published at my old blog. It’s been revised slightly and I’m re-presenting it here, just in time for Dame Joan Collins’s 92nd birthday tomorrow. I've made it my mission to hunt down and watch all of Starfire Lounge VIP Joan Collins's pre-Dynasty cult films. From crime dramas to horror to erotic thrillers, … Continue reading From the Vault: Joan Collins in Fatal Charm

Bad Girls We Love: Bridget Gregory in The Last Seduction

Who's a girl gotta suck around here to get a drink? Thirty years ago this fall, raven-haired beauty Linda Fiorentino gifted us with one of the great femme fatales of all time in John Dahl’s excellent neo-noir The Last Seduction (1994). Bridget Gregory is iconic, a deliciously manipulative grifter with a sardonic streak. She’s cold … Continue reading Bad Girls We Love: Bridget Gregory in The Last Seduction

“Nancy Drew in a Garter Belt”: Nancy Allen in Dressed to Kill

Among film lovers, Nancy Allen is considered a capital “G” Goddess. A central figure in late 1970s, early 1980s American cinema, Allen is revered thanks to her performances in at least six classics films with rabid fanbases: Carrie (1976), I Wanna Hold Your Hand (1978), Dressed to Kill (1980), Blow Out (1981), Terror in the … Continue reading “Nancy Drew in a Garter Belt”: Nancy Allen in Dressed to Kill

Lost and Found: Basic Instinct 2

In writing about Sharon Stone as crime novelist Catherine Tramell, a role she’s played twice, I was faced with two enticing choices. First, and most obvious, is to write about Stone’s electrifying, transcendent, and scandalous performance in her first Catherine Tramell film, Paul Verhoeven’s Basic Instinct (1992). That film is basically the gold standard for … Continue reading Lost and Found: Basic Instinct 2