Laszlo Gorog Movies
Though Hungarian politics play a key role in providing the backdrop for this account of a young woman's life, the real focus is on the long-term romance between the woman and her married lover. The tale begins just before the outbreak of WW II. Franciska is a country girl working in a mansion. One day she is hiding out in a bomb shelter when she meets Lajos, her married neighbor. Something clicks between them and soon they spend every Sunday tooling about on his Harley Davidson. It doesn't take many such Sundays for the two to fall in love. But then the war erupts and Lajos, who is Jewish, suddenly disappears. Franciska doesn't see him again until she establishes herself in Budapest and gets a job as a servant in an apartment block. She is happy when Lajos suddenly shows up at her door and they are able to resume their weekly trysts. The relationship deepens, but she refrains from accepting his proposal because Lajos' wife is terribly ill. Later Franciska joins the newly established social police force and eventually rises through the ranks. She proves to be an excellent cop, and is adept at blithely ignoring the injustice she inadvertently supports until a sudden mysterious event changes everything. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
This feather-weight Hungarian comedy was helmed by popular local comedian Robert Koltai. It is the story of a hammy actor who tries to force his son to become a thespian too. To please his over enthusiastic father the son dutifully attends drama school. He falls in love with beautiful Eva and after they graduate they and their pal Geza begin working in a rural theater with a nest of has-beens and bad actors. It is there that the son begins to understand his father a little better. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
This Hungarian anthology is comprised of three unconnected short films by different directors that are united in their grim assessment of Hungary in the 1990s. The first, "Fire! Fire! ("Egavaros, Egahazis") is by Pal Sandor and portrays Budapest as a depressing hell on earth filled with desperately hungry homeless people who would sacrifice their lives for a crust of bread. Sandor's Budapest is frequently compared to Sodom and Gomorrah and in the a huge fire destroys it all. Karoly Makk's "Hungarian Pizza" is infused with ironic humor and offers an only slightly less grim view of a pair of starved homeless people (one of whom was a college professor) who hold a family living in a Budapest apartment hostage for a freshly delivered pizza. Negotiations ensue, but the story ends with bloodshed. Miklos Jancso makes fun of his reputation for creating exceptional visuals in "The Great Brain Death." It is the most difficult vignette and while visually stunning, remains difficult to decipher. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
In the early 19th century, the dreaded Emperor Napoleon was at large, posing a threat to all of his neighbors. In this swashbuckling comedy, the court jester to the Emperor Francis of the Austro-Hungarian Empire manages to save his life and become a royal favorite. This puts him in conflict with an ambitious courtier, who arranges for him to be imprisoned on charges that he secretly prefers Napoleon to his own monarch. He is cleared of those charges, but then must deal with the many romantic tribulations arising from the fact that he has been given a beautiful young woman to protect and take care of. In addition to fending off various noblemen who have dishonorably lustful designs on the girl, he must cope with the fact that she is hopelessly in love with him. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Istvan Hirtling, György Cserhalmi, (more)
Boiling over with sexual shenanigans and general sleaziness the Mexico-set tale centers on a confused socialite who falls in love with an American engineer who was hired by her half- brother to oversee his mining outfit. At first the attraction between the girl and the Yank is purely sexual, but soon it turns to love. This causes the half-brother great torment, for he has fallen in love with his sister. Obsessed with jealousy, the conniving brother tries to bust things up by bringing in the girl's ex-lover. He is a cad and after trying unsuccessfully to seduce her, the creep results to rape. The next day, the despondent woman tries to kill herself, but the American shows up and reassures her that his love is true. This was the first film actress Merle Oberon had worked on in seven years and was filmed in her spectacular Mexican home. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Merle Oberon, Steve Cochran, (more)
Filmmaker Richard Rush made his directorial debut with this low-budget drama about the danger of teenage romance and juvenile delinquency. Cathy Taylor (Jennifer West) and Jim Mills (Richard Evans) are a pair of teenagers who have fallen in love. When they're spotted making out at a local lover's lane by the police, they're arrested and brought in to the station; their parents, imagining the worst, warn them that their romance could lead to behavior that could ruin their lives. However, Cathy and Jim, brought even closer together by their misfortune, are heedless of their parents' pleas, and before long Cathy finds herself pregnant. In no position to marry, Jim offers to pay for an illegal abortion, but he has to turn to crime in order to raise the money. Keep an eye peeled for a young Jack Nicholson, who plays a youthful troublemaker named Buddy. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jennifer West, Richard Evans, (more)
A man driving along a lonely back road at night is suddenly startled by what he sees, and is promptly killed by something that crashes through his windshield. The next day, in the nearby town of River Falls, teenagers Carol Flynn (June Kenney) and Mike Simpson (Gene Persson) decide to go looking for her father, who didn't get home last night. They find his wrecked truck and enter a nearby cave to begin searching for him. There they find his blood-covered hat and other signs of human remains and, as they go deeper inside, suddenly get trapped in a huge web -- then they spot its maker, a spider the size of a small house. They manage to escape and alert the county sheriff (Gene Roth), who doesn't take them seriously but does heed the warning of Mr. Kingman (Ed Kemmer), the science teacher at the local high school, to bring a pest-control crew along with his deputies, and a tanker loaded with DDT. They encounter the creature, and, after losing one of their men, dispatch it with the insecticide. Kingman persuades the sheriff to bring the carcass into town so that he can arrange to have it studied, leaving it in storage at the high school recreation room, for lack of anywhere bigger to keep it. As it turns out, the creature isn't dead, just stunned. As the local rock & roll band rehearses, the giant spider comes to bloodthirsty consciousness, breaking out of the building and ravaging the town. Bullets won't hurt it -- as Kingman says, you could punch holes in it all day without hitting a vital spot -- and the town is soon cut off when the telephone lines are knocked down. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ed Kemmer, Gene Persson, (more)
Generous portions of The Secret Land, the 1948 documentary on the Byrd Antarctic Expedition, were worked into the action of The Land Unknown. Jock Mahoney and William Reynolds play Hal and Jack, leaders of an expedition to the South Pole. Along for the ride is girl reporter Maggie (Shawn Smith), over whose affections Hal and Jack constantly battle. Making a forced landing in the Antarctic, our intrepid explorers find that they've descended well below sea level. Before long, they are attacked by prehistoric beasts which have been preserved in this heretofore uncharted region. When not fending off Tyrannosauri and Pterodactyls, Hal, Jack, Maggie and copter pilot Steve (Phil Harvey) try to steer clear of an unwieldly carnivorous plant. Further complicating things is the presence of a long-lost, slightly demented scientist (Henry Brandon) who craves companionship...specifically the female companionship of Maggie. Its reasonably convincing special effects notwithstanding, The Land Unknown is much ado about nothing. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jock Mahoney, Shawn Smith, (more)
The Mole People holds the dubious distinction of being the weakest of the Universal-International horror films. John Agar plays Dr. John Bentley, who leads a Middle Eastern expedition in search of a lost tribe of Sumerians. Bentley and his cohorts follow a tunnel deep, deep, deep below the surface of the earth, eventually coming across a tyrannical tribe of albino Sumerians, who use the semi-human Mole People as slaves. What follows is so dull and plodding that stars John Agar and Hugh Beaumont seem like Mel Gibson and Arnold Schwarzenegger in comparison. Some prints of The Mole People are minus the pre-credits "explanation" by 1950s celebrity egghead Dr. Frank Baxter. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Agar, Cynthia Patrick, (more)
Most of this Republic B-plus mystery yarn is set in a penthouse, next door to a music hall where a strange song-and-dance extravaganza is being staged. This production incorporates several ice-skating sequences--a good excuse as any for the presence of leading lady Vera Hruba Ralston, Republic's answer to Sonja Henie. Ralston and orchestra leader William Marshall come across the body of producer Edward Norris. Almost everyone in the cast is placed under suspicion, since Norris was a cad and blackmailer. The surprise killer is (as usual) not that much of a surprise, though the scenarists keep us going with some last-minute red herrings. Murder in the Music Hall was reissued in a shortened version titled Midnight Melody in 1951. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Vera Ralston, William Marshall, (more)
Rosalind Russell plays yet another independent career woman in She Wouldn't Say Yes. This time she's a psychiatrist who sees no need for a man in her life. Her resolve weakens a bit when she meets Lee Bowman, a dashing combat sketch artist suffering from wartime emotional problems. Bowman falls in love with the shrink and determines to establish a beachhead, while Russell is equally determined to hold her ground. She doesn't say yes for the first 80 minutes of the film, but does in the last six. Even Rosalind Russell made jokes concerning the inordinate number of look-alike films she made in this vein. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
It all begins when popular actress Susan Darrell (Joan Fontaine) returns from a USO tour to marry business exectuive Richard Aiken (Walter Abel). During his bachelor party, Aiken commisserates with Susan's ex-husband, Broadway producer Roger Berton (George Brent), and two of her former sweethearts, lumberman Mike Ward (Don DeFore) and novelist Bill Anthony (Dennis O'Keefe). Each man recalls his experiences with Susan-and each has an entirely different impression of the girl's personality! While trying to determine who the "real" Susan is, her three previous beaux decide that the stuffy Aiken is not for her. Indeed, Susan does reconsider her impending marriage in order to renew her romance with one of her earlier amours, but it wouldn't be fair to reveal which one. An amusing distaff variation on Citizen Kane (with a bit of Rashomon thrown in), The Affairs of Susan is a tour de farce for Joan Fontaine, called upon to essay four different interpretation of the same character. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Joan Fontaine, George Brent, (more)
Tales of Manhattan is a sumptuous multipart film centered around a formal tailcoat. The coat is specially designed for stage actor Charles Boyer, who wears it during a rendezvous with his lady friend (Rita Hayworth). The lady's husband (Thomas Mitchell) shoots Boyer, thus the tailcoat is damaged merchandise and sold at a discount to a bridegroom (Cesar Romero). When the groom's peccadillos catch up to him, the bride (Ginger Rogers) chooses to marry the best man (Henry Fonda) instead, and the coat is shipped off to a second hand store. It is purchased by a would-be composer (Charles Laughton), who wears it the night that he is to conduct his first symphony; alas, the coat is too tight and tears apart, nearly ruining the conductor's debut. Stitched back together, the coat is donated to a skid row mission, wherein the kindly proprietor gives the coat to a down and out drunkard (Edward G. Robinson) so that the shabby gentleman can attend his 25th college reunion. Later on, the coat is stolen by a crook (J. Carroll Naish) in order to gain entrance to a fancy charity ball. The crook holds up the ball and stuffs the loot in the pockets of the coat, but while escaping in an airplane he loses the outer garment. The coat floats down to an impoverished African American shanty community; a farmer (Paul Robeson) decides to distribute the "money from heaven" amongst his needy neighbors. At the end, the tattered coat adorns the shoulders of a scarecrow. Tales of Manhattan is one of the best "portmanteau" dramas turned out by Hollywood; it was directed by French expatriate Julien Duvivier, a past master of the multi-story technique. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Charles Boyer, Rita Hayworth, (more)














