DVD Collectors Online

Circus World, a review by GSyren

Title	Circus World (5-709165-114021)
Director	Henry Hathaway
Actors	John Wayne, Claudia Cardinale, Rita Hayworth, Lloyd Nolan, Richard Conte
Produced	1964 in United States
Runtime	135 minutes
Audio	English Dolby Digital 5.1
Subtitles	Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish
Overview	Matt Masters (John Wayne) is a circus owner who has to start from scratch when his ship sinks in the Barcelona harbour. Starting up a Wild West act, he takes under his wing Toni Alfredo (Claudio Cardinale), a trapeze artist whose mother Lili (Rita Hayworth) has abandoned her. Seeking Lili out in a Hamburg bar, Masters obtains her a job in the circus anonymously, so that she can get to know her daughter.
My thoughts	Samuel Bronston + Henry Hathaway + John Wayne = A great film, right? Well, that's what I thought when I went to see it the opening week in London in July 1964. Unfortunately it's not a great film. It's hardly even a good film. I wouldn't go so far as to say that it's a bad film, though. The main problem with this film is the script. Plus it's too long. It takes a good script to sustain a movie for 2 hours and 15 minutes. And with the exception of the fire sequence, this film is not very exciting. The capsizing of the circus ship is nicely done, but unfortunately comes off as rather unrealistic, I think. Several plot point are just left unfinished or unexplained. Who put up the poster and the article in Cardinale's wagon? How did the fire start? What happened with the lion tamer was talked into switching to tigers by his wife? Most of the actors are OK, but John Wayne doesn't get much to do. No fights, no shooting (except show shooting). Rita Hayworth doesn't appear until an hour into the film. Claudia Cardinale looks gorgeous, but it's a bit hard to understand why her character would sport a French accent if she had grown up with Wayne in the US. Seeing it again 50 years later with lower expectations I find it moderately entertaining. Three stars is probably more than it deserves, but I'll give it that because I liked Claudia Cardinale so much.
My rating

(From Reviews and ramblings by Gunnar on April 9th, 2014)

Notorious, a review by Jon

Notorious (1946)
5 out of 5



A beautiful, but supposedly immoral woman and daughter (Ingrid Bergman) of a convicted war criminal, is persuaded to spy on Nazis at work in Rio. Before the job begins, she and her agent contact, Devlin (Cary Grant), fall in love. Their real feelings must be hidden, even from each other when she marries one of the group, Alex (Claude Rains), and her situation grows desperate.

(From Alfred Hitchcock Marathon on June 21st, 2009)

The One Where It All Began: The Pilot Marathon, a review by DJ Doena

Angel



What's the show about?
To be honest, I don't really know since I haven't seen it yet. But I presume its about Angel fighting demons and vampires and saving the population of Los Angeles.

What happened before?
Angel left Sunnydale after the third season of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" since there's no way of him being together with Buffy.

"City of ..."
After Angel has moved into his basement apartment he comes across Doyle, a half-demon. Doyle gets visions from The Powers That Be regarding people whose lives Angel must touch; true redemption lies not just in saving lives, but in saving souls as well. In an attempt to help a waitress who is harrassed by her former boyfriend he meets a powerful vampire...

My Opinion
Obviously I can't have an opinion - yet.

The End

(From The One Where It All Began: The Pilot Marathon on January 7th, 2008)