Cereal At Midnight

In our May spotlight on KINO LORBER, we're looking at over two dozen releases: John Waters on 4K, Bettie Page Teaserama, sci-fi and horror collections, deep cuts from the Paramount and Universal archives, and a title that's sure to end up on my BEST OF THE YEAR list! Further viewing:  Frank Tarzi Interview: https://youtu.be/MfFCws4M_gg Frank Tarzi Returns: https://youtu.be/h9t0JWwUqhk Frank Tarzi on Kino Lorber in 2024: https://youtu.be/_dUzqaW-aFs Pre-Code Primer https://youtu.be/VjbrjJ4LPDE Previous Kino Lorber monthly spotlights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfFCws4M_gg&list=PLms82QIo-B9m3xP_xBoKvqUSYQcUMsFdc Review Archive: CerealAtMidnight.com/p/reviews.html Shop: CerealAtMidnight.Threadless.com Ebay.com/usr/cerealatmidnight Patreon.com/CerealAtMidnight Facebook.com/CerealMidnight Twitter: CerealMidnight Instagram: CerealMidnight TikTok: OfficialCerealAtMidnight Letterboxd: CerealAtMidnite **************************************************************** When shoppin...

Set agains the backdrop of the Dust Bowl crisis, Under Western Stars  sees Roy Rogers squaring off against the water company who’s trying to charge the citizens for their precious H2O in a time of drought. In doing so, he gets himself arrested, but the townsfolk love him because he’s a man of the people. Before you know it, he’s nominated to be a congressman. His good looks and smooth voice make him a lock for the female vote, while his tenacity and grit give him wide appeal to the men. Smiley Burnett, Gene Autry’s old sidekick, appears alongside Roy for this adventure, but his gimmick—a frog-voiced multi-instrumentalist—is virtually identical. Carol Hughes plays the female lead here but, as with many of the roles at the time, there's not much for her to do other than be occasionally feisty and have the hero fall in love with her in the last reel. I also note that, just like Gene Autry in his films, Roy Rogers plays “Roy Rogers.” Under Western Stars was filmed during a Republic wa...

Warning: This video may contain ROY. Side effects may vary, consult a doctor if yodeling or singing persists for more than 5 hours. See it HERE  

A textbook example of mid-century cheap thrills, Republic's Daughter of the Jungle  (1949) serves up multiple genre elements in one package. You want gangsters? You got 'em! You want restless natives on the hunt for blood? You got 'em! You want a feisty young woman in a miniskirt who swings from the trees like Tarzan? Well, you can't have that...just kidding, she's here too! In many ways, Daughter of the Jungle exemplifies the high concept/low budget approach that Republic and other poverty row studios excelled at creating during the Cold War era.  The film opens on an airplane above the jungles of Africa. Inside the craft are a couple of gangsters being transported back to the States by two police officers, but because this is a jungle adventure film, the plane crashes within minutes and it quickly becomes an "every man for himself" situation. Deep in the bush, the emergency landing was witnessed by the plucky survivors of another plane crash, which occu...

Gene Autry did it all: a recording artist, a radio star, an entrepreneur and businessman, and the star of nearly 100 movies, mostly westerns. For nearly a decade, he was a bigger star than John Wayne and he remains the ONLY performer with stars in all five categories on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame. Let's talk about the man and his movies! Film Noir Primer: https://youtu.be/w3U_HLQTxnY Westerns Spotlight 1 https://youtu.be/k5rD2T8VmiI Westerns Spotlight 2 https://youtu.be/TuFB95idxN8 Western Spotlight 3: B-Western Heroes https://youtu.be/Mq9MgxJV7CE Randolph Scott Collection https://youtu.be/Sa-6_FKeFeY The Ranown Westerns https://youtu.be/96bb0cx-YE8 Quantez Review: https://www.cerealatmidnight.com/2021/12/review-quantez-1957.html **************************************************************** Review Archive: CerealAtMidnight.com/p/reviews.html Shop: CerealAtMidnight.Threadless.com Ebay.com/usr/cerealatmidnight Patreon.com/CerealAtMidnight Facebook.com/CerealMidnight Twitter: Cerea...

Republic's Angel on the Amazon  is perhaps most notable for its scarcity in the digital age, not for plot, performances, or production--but then again, such is the case for many of the programmers that flooded out of Poverty Row during Hollywood's Golden Age. At the very least, Angel  offers a lot of fun elements and a metaphysical plot device that could have been used for cheap thrills, but which is in service of something more mature here.  When their airplane goes down in the Amazon, Jim Warburton (George Brent) and Dr. Karen Lawrence (Constance Bennett) are found and rescued by a group of big game hunters, led by the fearless (and emotionless) Christine Ridgeway (Vera Ralston), resulting in a smitten Jim, who becomes obsessed with this mysterious woman. What he doesn't realize is that she's carrying a dark secret, one that prevents her from letting anyone get too close. No sooner has he set her in his sights (with a libidinous fervor that would make Pepé Le Pew pro...

The misnomered 1942 western The Sombrero Kid  is not unlike many other poverty row B-films of the era in that it does little more than serve up the bare minimum of action and story that will still qualify as a movie. The thrill for this fan, though, is in the magic of the production machine itself and in slotting another piece of the great puzzle into place.  The thin plot concerns Marshal Thomas Holden (Robert Homans) and his two sons Tommy (John James) and Jerry (Don "Red" Barry). There are actually a few twists here, so I'll avoid the details and say that what begins as a traditional effort to clean up a town and bring an outlaw (the fantastically-named Smoke Denton, in this case) to justice morphs into something else as the film progresses. By the mid-way point, the movie is more about justice and revenge, with Barry getting to play a character who walks the line between good guy and anti-hero. The requisite shootouts and saloon brawls are here, of course, but this mo...

We're digging deep into the SILVER SCREAMS CINEMA collection from Imprint. In this first installment, let's discuss a horror double feature from poverty row's Republic Pictures! Order yours here Want EVEN MORE Cereal At Midnight? We've got you covered! Support us on Patreon and gain access to our huge vault of exclusives, which includes over 90 videos that aren't available anywhere else. Find out more at Patreon.com/CerealAtMidnight! CerealAtMidnight.com Facebook/CerealMidnight Twitter: CerealMidnight Instagram: CerealMidnight Letterboxd: CerealAtMidnite Shop: CerealAtMidnight.Threadless.com

The Rocketeer, Commando Cody, Boba AND Jango Fett, and even The Mandalorian himself all owe a debt to Republic's 1949 12-part serial King of the Rocket Men! strap on your helmet and rocket pack and let's blast off into adventure as we explore the very first rocket hero of the silver screen!

It's time to share our pick-ups from another fantastic sale! In this episode, we talk about the Rue Morgue Midnight Movie Society sale presented by our friends at MVD Entertainment. With over 800 titles under the "midnight movie" banner included and with a whole host of labels and companies represented, there were tons of treasures to be discovered for all different tastes! Let's explore the dark corners of cinema past, shall we?