JOHNNY WADD (1971)

When Jeannie Hamilton (Patti Lee) goes missing, her girlfriend (Andy Bellamy) calls on Johnny Wadd (John Holmes), a private detective who lives in a groovy beachside condo in Marina del Rey. After taking the case, the plot thickens when Sandy Hamilton (Sandy Dempsey) hires Wadd to drop the inquest into her missing sister. The first […]

FRITZ THE CAT (1972)

Ralph Bakshi’s Fritz the Cat is a kaleidoscopic trip through the late sixties as viewed through the lens of the titular character (Skip Hinnant) who goes from idealistic college dropout to leftist revolutionary to a center-left resignation in the span of a fleet 78 minutes. The film’s march from its freewheeling beginning to the darker […]

AFTERNOON DELIGHTS (1980)

Jumping off with a rollicking, endearingly sloppy, soundalike cover of The Starlight Vocal Band’s “Afternoon Delight” which sounds as if it were recorded by a marginally talented pack of runaways who were discovered while getting high off scotch guard in the parking lot of a Bay Ridge skating rink (and were subsequently paid in more […]

THE ULTIMATE DEGENERATE (1969)

Making their black and white film cycle a full circle experience, 1969’s The Ultimate Degenerate opens on a scene that hints that the film might be a twist on 1966’s Take Me Naked, Michael and Roberta Findlay’s first collaborative feature that was stacked to the rafters with narration, peeping, and exhibitionism. But instead of a […]

PUBLIC ENEMIES (2009)

When it comes to the discussion about style-over-substance, Michael Mann’s is not a name that should be spoken in the same breath as that phrase, which is apt for filmmakers who have a keen eye but a tin ear and an empty soul. For Mann is not only a dazzling stylist, but he began his […]

A THOUSAND PLEASURES (1968)

Released the same year as The Curse of Her Flesh and The Kiss of Her Flesh, 1968’s A Thousand Pleasures opens on yet another scene of domestic tranquillity according to the Family Findlay which is to say that, before the opening credits even begin to roll, Michael Findlay becomes fed up with Roberta’s constant nagging […]

MIAMI VICE (2006)

Upon the absolutely conventional fade-out of the Universal logo, desaturated to reflect the film’s overwhelming cool, blue and white color scheme, director Michael Mann has the audience in his grip by throwing them into the middle of a scrum of sound and color. A club scene that throbs with pulsating music makes almost all of […]

THE FLESH TRILOGY (1967-1968)

In the annals of sexploitation, Michael and Roberta Findlay’s Flesh Trilogy (made up of 1967’s The Touch of Her Flesh and 1968’s The Curse of Her Flesh and The Kiss of Her Flesh) may very well be the pinnacle of gutter trash that floated its way into a polluted tributary and found itself drifting toward […]

COLLATERAL (2004)

Eschewing the sprawling narratives of every film previously helmed by Michael Mann, 2004’s Collateral is a spartan thriller in which a shadowy and silver-fox contract killer named Vincent (Tom Cruise) pours into a random cab driven by Max (Jamie Foxx), a good-hearted man and erstwhile dreamer. Vincent then forces Max to chauffeur him to his […]

A POEM IS A NAKED PERSON (1974)

“Even crippled hippies from Oklahoma have a right to sing a song.” – Leon Russell, Shootout on the Plantation (early demo version) After spending a good portion of his career as a sideman, producer, and as a piece of Phil Spector’s Wall of Sound, Leon Russell had emerged from Joe Cocker’s Mad Dogs and Englishmen […]