cryptexcode/MPST huggingface dataset:
Birdman of Alcatraz

Plot synopsis:
Robert Stroud (Lancaster) is imprisoned as a young man for committing a murder in Alaska. He is shown as a rebellious inmate, fighting against a rigid prison system: on his way to jail by train he breaks open the window to allow the suffocating inmates to breathe. His rebellious attitude puts him in conflict with Harvey Shoemaker (Malden), the warden of Leavenworth Prison.
While in jail, Stroud learns that his mother (Ritter) tried to visit him but was denied and told to return later in the week. Outraged, he attacks a guard over the issue and the man is killed. Stroud is sentenced to death, but his mother runs a successful campaign and he is commuted to life in prison. The terms of the sentence require that he be kept in solitary confinement for the rest of his life.
To break the monotony, Stroud adopts an orphaned baby sparrow as a pet. This starts a trend and he and the other convicts acquire birds, such as canaries, as gifts from the outside. Before long, Stroud has built up a collection of birds and cages. When they fall ill, he conducts experiments and comes up with a cure. As the years pass, Stroud becomes an expert on bird diseases and even publishes a book on the subject. His writings are so impressive that a doctor describes him as a "genius".
Stroud later meets bird-lover Stella Johnson (Field) and agrees to go into business, marketing his bird remedies. He and Stella later marry, but his mother disapproves and this causes a rift between mother and son. He is abruptly transferred to the federal penitentiary at Alcatraz (the "Rock"), a new maximum security institution where he is not permitted to keep birds. He is now growing elderly but still shows a rebellious side, writing a history of the U.S. penal system that is suppressed by Shoemaker, now warden of the Rock.
Still at odds with authority, Stroud nevertheless manages to help stop a prison rebellion in 1946 by throwing out the guns acquired by the convicts. He then assures the authorities that they can now re-enter the premises without fear of being shot. Although Stroud has been a thorn in his side for decades, Shoemaker acknowledges that he has never lied to him and takes him at his word.
Although constantly denied parole, Stroud is eventually transferred to another prison in Missouri after a petition campaign. During the move, he meets several reporters and displays a range of knowledge on more than just birds, such as the technical details of a passing jet aircraft. He even gets to meet Thomas E. Gaddis (Edmond O'Brien), the author of the book based on his life.

Tags: violence, murder

Review:
Gakuen Alice

Plot synopsis:
Mikan Sakura grew up with her grandfather in the Japanese countryside. When her best friend, Hotaru, transfers to a prestigious school in Tokyo, Mikan follows her. The school is actually an elite Academy for gifted people with "Alices," an ability that is unique depending on the individual being. Once Mikan arrives at the gates of the school, she encounters an Alice teacher named Narumi, gets enrolled due to a series of events, and is told that she possesses a rare Alice. Despite her initial view of the so-called greatness to the school, Mikan slowly discovers that beneath the grand facade of the Academy, there is a never-ending stream of lies and buried secrets. The school's increasingly manipulative and sinister actions towards her make it a dangerous place to be. Little does Mikan know that her enrollment in Alice Academy set the gears in motion to an even greater tragedy. As she discovers the reality of the "Alices", she also unfolds her heritage and how it is connected to the academy. As the mystery of the academy draws her into an endless pit of misery and series of trials to survive, she also discovers the how the strength of friendship is important to her and guides her to her destiny.
=== Differences between manga and anime ===
The anime episodes are similar to the first 28 manga chapters, but some events are changed or combined. There are events after the Alice Festival added in that did not occur in the manga. The manga's darker tones (graphic violence, blood scenes, and the deaths of certain characters) are left out in the anime to suit younger viewers. Characters in the anime may have different hair and eye color than their manga counterparts. The anime series leaves the love triangle between Mikan, Ruka, and Natsume unresolved; Mikan remains oblivious to their feelings. The mystery of Mikan's parents and family history, along with others' past, remains unrevealed. In the first episode, she catches a taxi to Alice Academy and no one knows about Alices in the anime. The anime has Reo as the antagonist while the manga has the Elementary School Principal. The anime does not reveal the intents of the Elementary School Principal or other antagonists.

Tags: fantasy

Review:
Baiorensu jakku: jigoku-gai-hen

Plot synopsis:
The series takes place in the ruins of the Kanto region, after a massive earthquake (which in the OVAs was triggered by a Comet strike) dubbed 'The Great Kanto Hellquake'. Cut off from the rest of the world, The survivors of the disaster are divided between the strong and the weak. Violence Jack is uncovered amongst the rubble and demolished granite by the inhabitants of a ruined city, asking him to help the weak people and helping them destroy what, in most cases, are the strong groups commanded by killers and rapists (this is the story line of "Violence Jack: Evil Town"). In the three OVAs, Jack is requested to help different groups, such as the Zone A (later he ends up helping Zone C women) or a small town, as shown in "Hell's Wind". As for the manga, the stories change drastically, the first being the story Violence Jack helping a group of female models in a tropical forest in Kanto by possessing a boy living in said forest in order to fight off a roving tribe of bandits. Even though Jack contains the figure of a ruthless, evil character, he always helps the weak section of people, in trade for nothing.
When it was originally published there were several hints that pointed out the relationship between Devilman and Violence Jack. The final chapter reveals that the apocalyptic world in Violence Jack is in a world re-created by God. Satan (Ryo Asuka) is punished by being constantly humiliated by Slum King (Zenon). Jack is actually Akira Fudo, and is one of three parts that form Devilman, the others being a child Jack and woman Jack, both of which were normally seen as birds around Jack from time to time. They merge in order to stop the recently awakened Satan. This time Devilman manages to stop Satan.

Tags: violence

Review:
Mr Hublot

Plot synopsis:
Mr. Hublot is a man who lives in a tiny apartment located in a crowded steampunk city. He wears several layers of eyewear and has an odometer-like counter in his forehead which runs forward and backward. Mr. Hublot also displays several OCD symptoms, such as turning the lights on and off several times before leaving the living room and meticulously straightening the pictures on his wall.
Mr. Hublot sees a tiny puppy-like robot shivering in a box. When the box is taken away for garbage disposal, Mr. Hublot, concerned for the puppy's welfare, takes the robot to his house.
The robot gets bigger and bigger and is soon much bigger than Mr. Hublot. After the creature causes extensive damage to the apartment, Mr. Hublot appears to attack the creature, which seems suddenly frightened, with a screwdriver.
After some time has passed, Mr. Hublot is shown in his home, with everything returned to normal. To the surprise of the audience, it is revealed that, far from destroying the creature, Mr. Hublot has instead moved from his tiny apartment to the warehouse across the street so that he could accommodate his oversized pet. They both seem happy and Mr. Hublot continues to turn the lights on and off before leaving the room.

Tags: sci-fi

Review:
Outpost: Black Sun

Plot synopsis:
Beginning immediately after the events of the first film, Nazi-hunter Lena (Catherine Steadman) is on the trail of a notorious war-criminal scientist, Klausener, who at the close of World War II had begun trials of a frightening new technology that can create an immortal army. While interrogating Neurath, one of Klausener's old Nazi colleagues, he dies from a heart attack. She searches his body and finds a map of Eastern Europe and documents relating to Hunt, the man from the first movie who was hired to locate an abandoned SS bunker that was the Site of Klausener's experiments. This indicates that Neurath and Klausener were the ones who hired Hunt, as well as the fact that the second mercenary team sent in to check out the bunker by Klausener report to him that they can find "no trace of your operative or his team", obviously referring to Hunt, D.C and the other mercenaries. Lena's search for Hunt, whom she believes can take her to Klausener, leads her to a war zone in Eastern Europe (although the exact location is never mentioned, maps clearly show former Yugoslavia). There she runs into an acquaintance, a physicist, Wallace (Richard Coyle). He informs her that Hunt and his mercenary bodyguards went to find the bunker and never returned. He encourages her to stop her search because he knows what is coming and she refuses. So, pooling resources, they end up helping a professional military unit they meet take on the advancing army, the product of Klausener's experiments, a battalion of zombie Nazi Storm Troopers. Their leader, Brigadefuhrer Gotz, also known as the 'breather' and another of Klausener's old SS associates, has attached Hunt to the large generator that controls the undead soldiers. Using Hunt, Gotz has managed to increase the range of the electro-magnetic field emitted by the generator. This has enabled him and his soldiers to travel beyond the bunker and massacre scores of people. Lena, Wallace, and the unit aim to shut down the source of the evil army and prevent a Fourth Reich.

Tags: violence

Review:
Mouchette

Plot synopsis:
The film opens with a gamekeeper, Mathieu (Jean Vimenet), watching a poacher, Arsène (Jean-Claude Gilbert), as he sets his snares in the sunlit woods. Mouchette (Nadine Nortier), whose name means "little fly," lives in an isolated French village with her alcoholic father and bedridden mother, where she takes care of her infant brother and does all the housework.
She is first introduced at her school, in bedraggled clothes and oversized clogs, where she is mocked by her classmates and chastised by her teacher, first for refusing to sing, and then for singing off-key. To correct this, her teacher grabs her by the head, orienting Mouchette's ear toward the piano keys, while striking the correct note several times. Later, Mouchette throws mud at several girls in her class who run away.
Later, in a contrast to the misery of her daily life, Mouchette goes to the fair and rides on the bumper cars. She meets a young man who bumps his car into hers several times. She bumps into his a few times. Despite the physical shocks incurred upon her during the activity, Mouchette seems to overlook them, and even likes the young man. Afterwards her father abruptly intervenes, slapping her on the face before she can speak to the boy.
While walking home from school one day, she gets lost in the woods and must seek shelter under a tree when a fierce rainstorm falls. Arsène, an alcoholic epileptic, stumbles upon her and takes her to his hut. He fears he has killed a man with whom he had fought and attempts to use Mouchette as an alibi to disabuse him of the blame. After she agrees to repeat the story he gives her, Arsène rapes her. By early morning, Mouchette gets away and walks home. Returning home and finding her mother's condition worsening, she attempts to assuage her fears by comforting her. After her mother eventually succumbs to this sickness, Mouchette goes on an excursion for milk. On the way she has several encounters with the townspeople, in each of which she is insulted and dehumanized.
Later on, when confronted about the events of the previous night in the woods, she tries to offer the story agreed upon with Arsène. Reluctantly she states that she was at Arsène's house through the night because they were lovers. Finally, she is invited into the house of an elderly woman, who gives her several dresses and a shroud to cover her mother upon her mourning. The elderly woman is very condescending to Mouchette. On her way out, Mouchette insults her and damages the elderly woman's carpet. She goes to a nearby lake. Mouchette waves to a man on a tractor, is ignored, covers herself in the shroud and rolls downhill into the water.

Tags: bleak

Review:
Hearts in Atlantis

Plot synopsis:
Hearts in Atlantis tells the story of Robert "Bobby" Garfield, a middle-aged man recollecting his past, in particular the summer when he was eleven years old. During that summer, he and his two friends, Carol Gerber and John "Sully" Sullivan, experienced many things together, the most mysterious of which was meeting an older gentleman named Ted Brautigan.
Bobby lives with his single mother, the self-centered Liz Garfield, who takes in Brautigan as a boarder. Ted takes the lonely Bobby under his wing, while his mother is busy with her job - including entertaining her boss as a way of paying off debt supposedly left by Bobby's late father. The two form a paternal father-son bond, and it slowly becomes evident that Ted has some psychic and telekinetic powers. These same powers are the reason that Brautigan has come to this sleepy town. In due course Ted entrusts Bobby with the knowledge that he has escaped the grasp of the "Low Men", strange people who would stop at nothing to get him back in their control.
After reading Bobby's mind and realizing that the boy dreams of owning a bicycle; Ted kindly offers Bobby $1 a week in exchange for his reading a newspaper out aloud. Bobby quickly figures out that Ted has some other purpose in mind. Mysteriously, Ted asks Bobby to keep an eye on the neighborhood looking for any signs of the "low men", like announcements about missing pets. Bobby sees one, but does not tell Ted, afraid to lose his new friend.
Bobby, Carol and John have frequent conflicts with the local town bully, Harry Doolin, whom Ted is able to scare away by looking into his mind and finding out that his violence is used to cover up the fact that he is secretly a cross-dresser. However, at one point, Harry hurts Carol, and when Ted manipulates her dislocated shoulder into place, Liz arrives, after being raped by her boss, and mistakenly believes that Ted is a child molester. She is confronted by Ted's ability to tell her the truth about what she has been through, and how her behavior is affecting her relationship with her son, providing another reason that Ted must leave. That and the "low men" are closing in on him.
Ted is eventually captured with the help of a tip from Liz. As some form of closure, Ted yells to Bobby as he is being driven away that he wouldn't have missed a moment "not for all the world", and later Bobby mirrors the same feelings. Bobby is later confronted by Harry but Bobby grabs the latter's baseball bat and beats him with it. Liz later finds a new job in Boston and moves the family there. Before he leaves, Bobby and Carol say their goodbyes and share a final kiss.
At the end of the film, a grown up Bobby (who has travelled back to attend Sully's funeral) meets a young girl named Molly, who turns out to be Carol's daughter. Bobby produces a picture of a young Carol (who died in recent years) and gives it to Molly to keep.

Tags: paranormal, suspenseful, storytelling, flashback

Review:
Across the Bridge

Plot synopsis:
Carl Schaffner (Steiger) is a crooked English (previously German) businessman who flees to Mexico after stealing company funds. While travelling by train, Schaffner decides to evade authorities. He drugs and switches identities with fellow train passenger Paul Scarff, who looks like him and has a Mexican passport. He throws Paul Scarff off the train, injuring Scarff. Carl later discovers that Scarff is wanted in Mexico as a political assassin. Carl then tracks down Scarff, who is resting from his injuries, to get back his original passport. Carl arrives in Mexico and is captured by the local police, who mistake him for Scarff. Carl then fights to show his true identity to the local police. The plan seems foolproof until he is forced to care for the dog of Scarff. The local police chief and Scotland Yard inspector Hadden conspire to keep him trapped in the Mexican border town of Katrina in an effort to get him to cross the bridge back into the U.S. and face justice. The misanthropic Schaffner has grown attached to Scarff's pet spaniel and is tricked into going across the dividing line of the bridge to get the dog. He is accidentally killed trying to escape the authorities. The final irony is that the discovery of his own humanity has cost the cynical, friendless Schaffner his life.

Tags: murder

Review:
Captain Barbell

Plot synopsis:
In every version of the story, major changes in the story plot are applied, but the core story remains the same. Enteng, a poor, wimpy and skinny but kindhearted boy always gets bullied by other people because he is undersized and easy to pick on. He tries to practice weight training and exercise to improve his physique, but his poor status prevents him to do it properly. He ends up buying (or finding in other versions) an old, secondhand and rusty barbell for him to practice on. He later discovers that the Barbell contains hidden powers, when he lifts it in one hand and shouts the name "Captain Barbell", he transforms to Captain Barbell, a superhero possessing invulnerability, super strength, x-ray vision, incredible speed and the power of flight. With his newfound powers, he fights evil forces and protects the weak and helpless.
In the 2006 TV series, Captain Barbell is shown to have a weakness: Exposure to the element, Askobar.
The movie versions of Captain Barbell had to be redesigned from the comic's original because they're not as muscle bound as the comics version and were not body builders but actors. That's why they have the yellow top and now carry the "CB" symbol on their chest as opposed to the belt buckle logo-and-shirtless-look of 1963.
During times of great upheavals, nature finds a way to expel the magic rock to restore the balance between good and evil and seeks out a host to wield its great power and champion its cause. (There seems to be a possibility that this power source may be the same as Darna's and Lastikman's, both of whom's origins also involved magic "falling stars"). The champions it chooses are usually those who have been victims of society's evils, the disenfranchised, and the meek ones. This is why the power found four social outcast individuals to wield its abilities. But there is a condition: the wielder must only use the power for unselfish purposes and the good of humanity. The abuse of this power holds dire consequences. Unfortunately, when the rock first hit the Earth and got absorbed into the ground, fragments of the rock broke off and in the wrong hands could be very destructive. This is exactly what happened when (in addition to Enteng) extra fragments homed in on the beings that eventually became "Lagablab", "Freezy", and "Dagampatay".

Tags: good versus evil

Review:
Within Our Gates

Plot synopsis:
The film opens with Sylvia Landry (Evelyn Preer), a young African-American woman, visiting her cousin Alma in the North. Landry is waiting for the return of Conrad as they plan to marry. Alma also loves Conrad, and would like Sylvia to marry her brother-in-law Larry, a gambler and criminal. Alma arranges for Sylvia to be caught in a compromising situation by Conrad when he returns. He leaves for Brazil, and Larry kills a man during a game of poker. Sylvia returns to the South.
Landry meets Rev. Jacobs, a minister who runs a rural school for black children called Piney Woods School. The school was overcrowded, and he cannot continue on the small amount offered to blacks for education by the state. With the school facing closure, Landry volunteers to return to the North to raise $5,000.
She has difficulty raising money, and her purse is stolen, but it is recovered by a local man, Dr. Vivian. Almost hit by a car as she saves a young child playing in the street, Landry meets the owner(Owner of what? this is vague. Please clarify), Elena Warwick, a wealthy philanthropist. Learning of Sylvia's mission, she decides to give her the needed money. When her Southern friend, Mrs. Stratton, tries to discourage her, Warwick increases her donation to $50,000. This amount will save the school and Landry returns to the South.
Meanwhile, Dr. Vivian has fallen in love with Sylvia. He goes to Alma, who tells him about Sylvia's past: these flashback scenes are portrayed in the film. Sylvia was adopted and raised by a poor black family, the Landrys, who managed to provide her with an education.
During her youth, the senior Landry was wrongfully accused of the murder of an unpopular but wealthy white landlord, Gridlestone. A white mob attacked the Landry family, lynching the parents and hunting down their son, who escaped after nearly being shot. The mob also lynched Efrem, a servant of Gridlestone. Sylvia escaped after being chased by Gridlestone's brother, who was close to raping her. Noticing a scar on her breast, Gridlestone's brother realized that Sylvia was his mixed-race daughter, born of his marriage to a local black woman. He had paid for her education.
After hearing about her life, Dr. Vivian meets with Sylvia; he encourages her to love her country and take pride in the contributions of African Americans. He professes his love for her, and the film ends with their marriage.

Tags: violence, murder

Review:
Breakfast of Champions

Plot synopsis:
Kilgore Trout is a widely published, but otherwise unsung and virtually invisible writer who is invited to deliver a keynote address at a local arts festival in distant Midland City. Dwayne Hoover is a wealthy businessman who owns much of Midland City, but has become increasingly unstable mentally. The novel is achronological and frequently shifts focus between Hoover and Trout, as well as supporting characters like Hoover's son, Bunny, and Wayne Hoobler, and Kurt Vonnegut himself, who appears as the author of the book. "The novel's structure is a simple one, yet it employs simultaneously evolving plots from different times and spaces." Early on, Vonnegut as narrator/creator says he's going to purge himself of mental clutter, and, throughout the novel, can be found examining and refuting disparate concepts, from the 'discovery' of the new world in 1492 to euphemisms for genitalia.
When Kilgore finally arrives in Midland City he piques the interest of Dwayne. A confused Dwayne demands a message from Kilgore, who hands over a copy of his novel. Dwayne reads the novel, which purports to be a message from the Creator of the Universe explaining that the reader – in this case Dwayne – is the only individual in the universe with free will. Everyone else is a robot. Dwayne believes the novel to be factual and immediately goes on a violent rampage, severely beating his son, his lover, and nine other people before being taken into custody. While Kilgore is walking the streets of Midland after Dwayne's rampage the narrator of the book approaches Kilgore. The narrator tells Kilgore of his existence, and lets Kilgore be free and under his own will. Kilgore begs to be made young again, and the novel ends with a full-page drawing of Vonnegut crying.

Tags: absurd, avant garde, satire, comedy

Review:
Victory at Entebbe

Plot synopsis:
On June 27, 1976, four terrorists belonging to a splinter group of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine under the orders of Wadie Haddad boarded and hijacked an Air France Airbus A300 in Athens, Greece.
With the permission of President Idi Amin (Julius Harris), the terrorists divert the airliner and its hostages to Entebbe Airport in Uganda.  After identifying Israeli passengers, the non-Jewish passengers are freed while a series of demands are made, including the release of 40 Palestinian militants held in Israel, in exchange for the hostages.
The Cabinet of Israel, led by Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin (Anthony Hopkins), unwilling to give in to terrorist demands, plans a top-secret military raid. This commando operation, military code name: "Operation Thunderbolt", will be carried out over 2,500 miles (4,000 km) from home and will take place on the Jewish Sabbath.
While still negotiating with the terrorists, who now numbered seven individuals, the Israeli military prepared two Lockheed C-130 Hercules transports for the raid. The transports refuelled in Kenya before landing at Entebbe Airport under the cover of darkness. The commandos led by Brigadier General Dan Shomron (Harris Yulin) had to contend with a large armed Ugandan military detachment and used a ruse to overcome the defenses. A black Mercedes limousine had been carried on board and was used to fool sentries that it was the official car which President Amin used on an impromptu visit to the airport.
Nearly complete surprise was achieved but a firefight resulted, ending with all seven terrorists and 45 Ugandan soldiers killed. The hostages were gathered together and most were quickly put on the idling C-130 aircraft. During the raid, one commando (the breach unit commander Yonatan Netanyahu (Richard Dreyfuss), brother of future Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu), and three of the hostages, died. 
With 102 hostages aboard and on their way to freedom, a group of Israeli commandos remained behind to destroy the Ugandan Air Force MiG-17 and MiG-21 fighters to prevent a retaliation. All the survivors of the attack force then joined in flying back to Israel via Nairobi and Sharm El Sheikh.

Tags: violence

Review:
The Day Lincoln Was Shot

Plot synopsis:
The movie shows the events leading up to and after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, as well as a look into the personal lives of both men. Lincoln is relieved that Richmond has fallen and the Civil War is over. He has contentious discussions with his Cabinet about the treatment of the defeated South. They want the Confederates punished while Lincoln argues for mercy. The President is despised by many Southerners and receives numerous death threats. Lincoln has a rather fatalistic attitude about these, however he has a disturbing dream about hearing cries in the White House and seeing a coffin in the East Room surrounded by mourners crying out that an assassin has murdered the President. Booth is the most popular actor in the country (it is pointed out that only Lincoln has his picture taken more). Coming from an acting family, he feels overshadowed by his father and brother and longs to make his mark on history. A fanatical Confederate sympathizer, Booth sees Lincoln as a tyrant and slavery as a proper way of life. He assembles a motley group of Confederates including former Soldier Lewis Paine and simple-minded David Herold. They form a plot to kidnap the President. However, the war ends and Booth is outraged when he hears Lincoln making a speech promising African-Americans citizenship and the vote. His plan to kidnap turns into a murder plot. He decides to assassinate Lincoln at Ford's Theatre and orders Paine to kill Secretary Of State William Seward and orders another accomplice to kill Vice President Andrew Johnson. Booth kills Lincoln and escapes after breaking his leg jumping to the stage. Paine attacks Seward who survives and the Vice President is unharmed. After an intense manhunt, Booth is shot and killed inside a burning barn surrounded by federal troops. He dies on the front porch saying that he died for his country. The credits reveal that Booth's confederates were put on trial and hanged. Ironically, Lincoln's successor Johnson was much harsher on the defeated South then Lincoln would have been.

Tags: tragedy, violence, murder

Review:
Conversations with Other Women

Plot synopsis:
At a wedding reception, a man in his late thirties (Eckhart) approaches a bridesmaid (Bonham Carter) of about the same age, and offers her a glass of champagne. As conversation ensues, they begin to flirt. Witty small talk about such topics as the wedding party and their own past relationships gradually reveals to the viewing film audience that they are not strangers, but in fact that they share an intimate past. A series of flashback scenes shows much younger versions of the two of them as lovers.
Despite having significant others (22-year-old Sarah the dancer and Geoffrey the cardiologist, both absent) the couple choose to go upstairs to her hotel room together. However, their decision to sleep together is one which is clearly complex and fraught with emotional baggage for each of them. Again with flashbacks, a series of vignettes juxtaposes their earlier selves against the older, perhaps wiser couple in the hotel room.
The two reminisce and reassess their feelings for each other. He appears to have ambiguous feelings about the direction of his life, while she seems more adjusted to her life choices. The emotional fulfillment the two experienced in their youth has the appearance of causing them to reflect on their current lives in comparison to the choices and options they had while much younger.
She must catch a transatlantic flight home to London in the morning, so the two leave the hotel together in the early morning. As they return to their separate lives, each speculates with their cab driver on the future and the difficulty of being happy.

Tags: realism

Review:
They Drive by Night

Plot synopsis:
Brothers Joe (George Raft) and Paul Fabrini (Humphrey Bogart) are independent truck drivers who make a meager living transporting goods. Joe convinces Paul to start their own small, one-truck business, staying one step ahead of loan shark Farnsworth (an uncredited Charles Halton), who is trying to repossess their truck.
At one stop, Joe is attracted to waitress Cassie Hartley (Ann Sheridan). Later, the brothers pick up a hitchhiker going to Los Angeles; Joe is pleased when it turns out to be Cassie, who quit after her boss tried to get a bit too friendly with her. While en route, they witness a truck, its driver asleep at the wheel, go off the road and explode in flames. When they return to Los Angeles, Paul is reunited with his patient though worried wife, Pearl (Gale Page), who would rather have Paul settle down in a safer, more regular job. Joe finds Cassie a place to stay, and starts seeing her.
Just after the brothers finally pay off Farnsworth, Paul falls asleep at the wheel, causing an accident that costs him his right arm and wrecks their truck. Lana Carlsen (Ida Lupino) has wanted Joe for years, but Joe has always rebuffed her advances, especially since she is married to trucking business owner and former driver Ed Carlsen (Alan Hale, Sr.), a good friend of Joe's. When Ed hires Joe as a driver, Lana persuades her husband to make him the traffic manager instead (and starts dropping by the office frequently).
Joe spurns Lana's advances. One night, when Lana drives a drunk, unconscious Ed home from a party, she murders him on impulse, leaving him in the garage with the car motor still idling. When the police investigate, she persuades them it was an accident. She later gives Joe a half-interest as a partner in the business in a subsequent attempt to attract him.
Bitter over his inability to support his wife, Paul returns to work as a dispatcher for Joe. Joe does a fine job managing the business, but when Lana learns he plans to marry Cassie, she becomes so enraged, she reveals to him that she killed Ed so that she could have him. She then goes to the police accusing Joe of forcing her to help commit murder. During the trial, the weight of circumstantial evidence looks bad for Joe, but a guilt-ridden Lana breaks down on the witness stand, laughing hysterically and claiming the electric garage doors made her do it. The case against Joe is dismissed after Lana is determined to be insane. Joe considers going back to the road, but Cassie, Paul and the boys manage to convince him otherwise. He thus returns to the trucking business that he had dreamed of owning, with Paul as his traffic manager and Cassie as his bride-to-be.

Tags: insanity, romantic, humor, murder

Review:
En brazos de la mujer madura

Plot synopsis:
When war breaks out in 1936, the boys at a Catholic boarding school in Republican territory are sent home. Andres is one of these boys. Finding that his widowed mother's flat in Gerona is requisitioned and she is far away in La Coruña, he decides to rejoin her by bicycle. Reaching the Aragon front, he is stopped by an Anarchist unit under the charismatic commander Dávalos and is conscripted to help the cook Honorio, who is having an affair with a peasant woman Pilar. Also stopped are a wealthy Englishman and his American wife, la Condesa, for whom Andrés acts as interpreter and is rewarded. He is then sent to safety in Barcelona where he starts an affair with Julia, the virgin daughter of the house, but is evicted before consummation. To live, he starts dealing on the black market and one night tries a prostitute, but she is so bored that he leaves in disgust. The war over, his mother comes back and is set up in a flat by her Falangist lover Victor. Above them lives a married woman Marta, who lends Andrés books and starts an affair. But she and her well-off husband were Republicans and are taken away by the secret police. In the street, Andrés sees Pilar, the working class girl from the front, and they have a night together. Then at a concert he falls for Irene, an Italian violinist, and they have a brief idyll. Her orchestra's next engagement is in Vichy France and at the frontier station of Canfranc Andrés rejoins her.

Tags: romantic

Review:
SF: Episode One

Plot synopsis:
The plot centers on Inukai Heishirō (Mitsuru Fukikoshi), the son of a clan officer. One of his clan's most precious heirlooms, a sword given them by the Shogun, has been stolen by the samurai Kazamatsuri (Tomoyasu Hotei). Against his father's advice, Heishirō insists on retrieving the sword himself. His father sends two ninja after him to make sure he doesn't do anything stupid.
Kazamatsuri wounds Heishirō, and kills one of his companions. The young noble ends up staying with an older samurai (Morio Kazama) and his daughter Koharu (Tamaki Ogawa) while he heals from his wound and plans his next move. The older samurai tries to dissuade him from fighting, but Heishirō's honor won't allow him to leave Kazamatsuri alive. The older samurai, who turns out to be the master Hanbei Mizoguchi, convinces him to fight Kazamatsuri by throwing rocks rather than with swords.
Meanwhile, Kazamatsuri settles for a few days at a gambling house owned by Lady Okatsu (Mari Natsuki), who falls in love with him. Then one night one of the ninja sent to protect Heishirō bribes her to poison his sake for one thousand gold. She does, but Kazamatsuri tastes the poison and kills Okatsu. He then kidnaps Koharu in an attempt to get the master Mizoguchi to fight him.
Mizoguchi reveals to Heishirō that he killed Koharu's father, and has since never drawn his sword on another man, despite his immense skill. They then go to find Kazamatsuri and rescue Koharu. While Mizoguchi stalls Kazamatsuri, Heishirō takes Koharu aside and says he will marry her if Mizoguchi wins. Kazamatsuri fights Mizoguchi, who only draws his sword after his opponent destroys his wooden sword. He then disarms Kazamatsuri near a cliff. Kazamatsuri, admitting defeat, commits suicide by jumping off the cliff. Heishirō and the others go to the bottom, where there is no sign of Kazamatsuri's body, but Koharu spots the stolen sword at the bottom of the river, where Heishirō retrieves it.
Flash forward one year. Heishirō has married Koharu, the sword is restored, and Mizoguchi is now an official in Heishiro's clan.

Tags: revenge, psychedelic

Review:
Le cercle rouge

Plot synopsis:
In Marseille, a prisoner named Corey is released early for good behaviour. A warder tips him off about a prestigious jewellery shop he could rob in Paris. He goes to the house of Rico, an associate of his with whom his former girlfriend now lives, where he robs Rico of his money and gun. Then he goes to a billiard hall, where two of Rico's men find him. After killing one and taking his gun, Corey buys a large car and, hiding the guns in the boot, starts for Paris. On the way, he stops at a roadside grill to eat.
The same morning another prisoner, Vogel, who is being taken on a train from Marseille to Paris by the policeman Mattei, escapes in open country. Mattei orders roadblocks to be set, and returns to face his superiors. Vogel comes upon the roadside grill and hides in the boot of Corey's car. Realising someone is in the boot, with his guns, Corey drives into an open field and orders Vogel to get out. After a tense confrontation, the two decide to co-operate. Shortly after, with Vogel back in the boot, a car with two more of Rico's men forces Corey off the road. They take his money and are about to kill him when Vogel, emerging from the boot, shoots both dead.
Corey takes Vogel to his empty flat in Paris and starts to plan the robbery. For this he needs a marksman, to disable the security system by a single rifle shot, and a fence to buy the goods. At the same time, Mattei is planning how to locate the murderer of Rico's men and to recapture Vogel. He puts pressure on Santi, a night club owner who knows most of the underworld, to find them.
Corey recruits Jansen, an alcoholic ex-policeman and a crack shot, together with a fence, and successfully empties the shop one night. However, his fence refuses to take the goods, having been warned off by Rico, and suggests that Corey asks Santi for a lead. Santi tips off Mattei, who poses as a fence and asks Corey to bring the goods to a country house. Corey does so, taking Jansen as backup and leaving Vogel at his apartment with the rose he had earlier received from a waitress at Santi's. After Corey arrives at the country house, Vogel appears from nowhere and tells Corey to run with the jewels, acting on his suspicion that Corey is not safe with this new fence. A bloody confrontation follows in which all three criminals are shot dead by the police.

Tags: suspenseful, murder, atmospheric

Review:
Chief Charlie Horse

Plot synopsis:
Woodcarver Woody Woodpecker specializes in wooden Indians and wooden nickels who is hard at work on his latest creation: a life-sized statue of an Indian chief, which, by coincidence, is an exact likeness of notorious bandit Chief Charlie Horse. The telephone rings, and a customer asks if Woody has any wooden Indians for sale. Woody replies that he has one he has just finished.
Meanwhile, outside Woody's shop, all is confusion as the sheriff and his posse are trying desperately to capture Chief Charlie Horse. They cart the wooden Indian away, believing him to be the real thing. Woody believes that the sheriff is the customer who telephoned, and he thinks that he has been slightly overpaid. Now Chief Charlie Horse himself enters Woody's shop, seeking a hiding place. The sheriff, realizing that he made an error, returns to Woody's shop to search for the live Indian. Charlie hides the statue in a crate, and then, when the sheriff enters the room, he poses as the wooden Indian. Both Woody and the sheriff fall for the trick and believe that Charlie has gotten away. The sheriff takes back the reward money, and Woody starts to work on his model again. When Woody has finished, he tacks a "sold" sign on the carving, and Charlie lets out a resounding yell. Thinking that the real Indian is the wooden Indian, the sheriff throws Charlie out of jail.

Tags: psychedelic, violence

Review:
Murder at the Vanities

Plot synopsis:
Jack Ellery (Oakie) is staging a lavish musical revue, starring Eric Lander (Brisson), Ann Ware (Carlisle), and Rita Ross (Michael), supported by a cast of a hundred background singers/dancers (almost all women, and many scantily clad) and two full orchestras. On opening night, just before the show, somebody tries to kill Ware several times. Ellery calls in police lieutenant Murdock (McLaglen) of the homicide squad to investigate. During the show a private detective and then Rita are murdered. Ellery hides this from the rest of the performers, claiming the victims are just sick, and talks Murdock into investigating while the revue continues on, otherwise Ellery will go broke.
Several twists and turns follow, but finally the murders are solved just after the show ends. In the last scene, Nancy (Wing), a squeaky pretty blonde showgirl, finally gets to tell Ellery and Murdock what she has attempted to tell Ellery several times throughout the show. However, he kept putting her off, she was just trying to gain his attention, and he was too busy staging the show. She actually had a vital piece of information that would have solved the first murder much sooner, and might have prevented the second murder. Now that the show is over and a success, Ellery's attention is finally on her, and they go out for the night to celebrate. She giggles once again and moves off stage left in front of him, and then Oakie breaks the fourth wall just momentarily, looking into the camera with a devilish grin, before he follows her.

Tags: mystery, murder

Review:
Scrapbook

Plot synopsis:
Scrapbook begins with opening credits rolling while a kidnapped woman has a frantic discussion in the dark with an incoherent female voice. As the credits conclude, the door to the van opens and the woman discovers, to her horror, that the incoherent voice belonged to a disemboweled woman. A man reaches in and removes the disemboweled woman.
We then see a flashback about a child named Leonard. He looks in on his sister, who is half-naked and apparently aroused. She notices him, and takes him into her room, where she proceeds to molest him. A young man enters the room, and is disgusted with Leonard. He angrily pulls him downstairs, where he proceeds to rape the boy.
The film then cuts to the present, where Leonard has grown up into a young man and kidnapper of the females from the introduction. Clara is his latest victim. Leonard has her tied to a chair in a large, unkempt trailer home in the middle of nowhere. The walls and furniture are adorned with photos and body parts of his past victims. He reveals his scrapbook to Clara, in which he forced his past victims to document their horrific experiences at his hands. He then tells her that he plans for her to be his "last chapter", before he tries to have the book published, which he believes will lead to fame and fortune. Leonard then drags Clara into a room with the words "I'm winning" scrawled on the wall, presumably in blood. He then violently beats and rapes her, and then urinates on her.
Clara is beaten, raped, and abused in various ways throughout the movie, as she tries to find a way to escape. Finally Clara comes to realize that in order to survive she must manipulate him through what he writes in the Scrapbook. Slowly Leonard starts to give her food and clothes. Clara pretends that she wants to make love to Leonard and uses duct tape to tie his arms and legs to the cot. Thereafter, she stabs Leonard on the bottom of his feet with a knife and takes pictures of him in pain. She puts those pictures in the Scrapbook and the film ends with her walking away from the house.

Tags: revenge, romantic

Review:
Last Rites

Plot synopsis:
Father Michael is a New York priest with close ties to the Mafia crime syndicate — his father is a don. The priest's brother-in-law Gino, a mafia boss, is murdered while having sex with Angela, a mistress. She narrowly escapes by hiding in a bathroom and locking the door.
Pursued by hitmen, the mistress comes to the priest for confession. She is afraid to go to the police so Father Mike agrees to meet her at her choice of location. A cab driver transports him to a loft apartment, telling him a sorrowful tale of how Angela has helped him and his wife with the grief over losing a young son. Father Mike confronts her about knowing his relationship to Gino. She denies knowing the connection. When the two encounter the hitmen, the priest is wounded and one of the hitmen recognizes Father Mike.
Angela hides in his church. She tells him it was Gino's wife who shot him. Gino is buried, and Father Mike glares across the casket at his sister Zena, having seen her with the hitmen when he was shot. He speaks to his father, who says he expects to lose at his racketeering trial and be sent to prison. The Don tells the priest that his sister wants to run the business, but he has said no since she's a woman. As they leave the cemetery, the hitman tells the Don and Zena that he recognized Michael.
Zena comes to confession and tells Father Mike that she knows of him helping the girl. The priest begins to fall in love with Angela. He meets best friend Nuzo, a detective and godson of his father. Nuzo tells him not to trust her. He tells Mike that Gino gave evidence to a rival crime syndicate, which sealed the Don's fate, in return for 5 million dollars. Nuzo tells him to sit tight while he makes an arrest, but Nuzo is gunned down, dying in Mike's arms.
Father Mike and Angela flee to Mexico, heading for her village. For the first time the priest violates his vows and they have sex. In the morning she is gone. Meanwhile, the Don finds out they are in Mexico and sends Zena to kill the girl. Father Mike races to catch up to Angela, thwarting another hitman along the way. He arrives in the village in time for a festival.
Angela is a fraud who set Gino up and took the money. She is also married to the "cabbie" she sent to pick him up. Now she instructs her husband to kill him. He stops at the festival and Michael spots him. He witnesses the cabbie drive away in the rental car Angela took.
Michael goes to the hotel and finds a surprised Angela. He lies that he loves her and they have sex again. She awakens to see Michael sitting in a chair, staring at her. He stands, walks to the door and leaves her, saying "via con Dios" as he goes. She is stunned to see Zena step through the door. Zena shoots her as Michael continues down the steps past the body of the "cabbie." He gets into a limo and waits for Zena. She sits next to him and says "thank you, brother." He takes her hand and kisses it as they drive away.

Tags: paranormal, flashback

Review:
The St. Valentine's Day Massacre

Plot synopsis:
An organized crime war breaks out between two rival gangs in Chicago during the Roaring Twenties. The leader of the Southside Mob is the notorious Al Capone, who resents his nemesis George "Bugs" Moran's activity in the city. Moran, too, wants control of the town's bootlegging and gambling operations. His lieutenants Peter and Frank Gusenberg use threats and intimidation to make tavern owners do business with them in exchange for "protection." Peter Gusenberg also argues and fights with his moll, particularly over her extravagant spending of his money.
Moran gives the order to have a crony of Capone's eliminated as the Chicago body count escalates. Inclusive are flashbacks to a lunchtime attack on Capone at a restaurant outside of Chicago by Hymie Weiss and Moran in September 1926 and the murders of Weiss in October 1926 and Dion O'Banion in November 1924 by Capone's gang.
In a bid to get rid of Moran once and for all, Capone goes to his winter home in Miami, Florida to establish an alibi while his henchmen, some dressed as cops, ambush and execute seven members of Moran's gang, including Peter Gusenberg, in a northside garage on February 14, 1929. Also at the garage - and caught in the attack - were Johnny May (Bruce Dern), a mechanic, and Reinhardt Schwimmer, an optician who enjoyed being around gangsters. Of the victims, only Frank Gusenberg, Peter's brother survives and is taken to a hospital. Despite knowing that he will soon die, Frank refuses to tell the police anything. Ironically, Moran himself, the apparent focus of the attack, was not in garage, and escaped certain death.
Each character is given a verbal voiceover biography as they are introduced, and in some video releases, the biographies of Rheinhard Schwimmer and Adam Heyer, two of the massacre victims, are removed from the soundtrack, possibly due to protest from surviving family members.
In the aftermath, Al Capone is shown dispatching those responsible for carrying out the attack. Moran dies in prison. No one is ever charged for the murders of St. Valentine's Day of 1929.

Tags: murder

Review: