Country: United States
Genre: Action/ Comedy/ Mainstream
Director: Renny Harlin
Year: 1996

Rating:

TRASH CINEMA ESSENTIAL MOVIE
I’m not sure why The Long Kiss Goodnight wasn’t a bigger success when it came out. It is certainly entertaining enough. Maybe the leftist politics woven into the plot alienated patrons in the flyover states.
After all, the idea that a US Government agency […]

Country: Hong Kong
Genre: Action
Director: Yuen Wo-Ping
Year: 1988

Rating:

TRASH CINEMA ESSENTIAL MOVIE
After enduring the lackluster Danger Has Two Faces, I felt like I owed myself a treat, so I finally sat down and watched the legendary Tiger Cage, which I’d only seen in bits and pieces up until now.
Tiger Cage starts out with a blistering action […]

Country: United States
Genre: Horror
Director: Pascal Laugier
Year: 2008

Rating:

TRASH CINEMA ESSENTIAL MOVIE
Martyrs starts out disturbing and only gets worse as it goes along, or better, depending on your point of view.
When she is around the age of 10, Lucie (Mylène Jampanoï) escapes from imprisonment and torture in an industrial area. Traumatized, she is placed in an […]

Country: United Kingdom
Genre: Drama
Director: Neil Jordan
Year: 1986
Rating:

TRASH CINEMA ESSENTIAL MOVIE
Within a minute of the opening credits of Mona Lisa, you know you’re watching a classic. The visuals, editing, and music form a seemless whole and you’re moved, without quite knowing why. With one single image, writer/director Neil Jordan lets you understand that the fireplug-shaped […]

Country: United States
Genre: Comedy
Director: Martin Scorsese
Year: 1985
Rating:

TRASH CINEMA ESSENTIAL MOVIE
After Hours is director Martin Scorcese’s backhanded valentine to New York City. It’s a tossup whether the ultimate New York movie is After Hours or Taxi Driver, but After Hours is definitely in the running. The cast of eccentrics, which would be familiar to anyone […]

Country: Korea
Genre: Action/Drama/Romance
Director: Ha Yu
Year: 2008

Rating:

TRASH CINEMA ESSENTIAL MOVIE
Leave it to the Koreans to create a love story that shames Hollywood with an intelligent adult treatment of forbidden love.
As a young man, the King (Jin-mo Ju) decides to create an honor guard that he can fully trust, drafting young boys and having them trained […]

Country: Hong Kong
Genre: Action/ Martial Arts
Director: Wilson Yip
Year: 2008

Rating:

TRASH CINEMA ESSENTIAL MOVIE
Ip Man is the rare modern Hong Kong movie that is almost flawless. The script by Edmond Wong and Chan Tai-Li is tight. The physical production is immaculate — no crappy CGI or lousy matte paintings to ruin the illusion. The martial arts, […]

Country: Korea
Genre: Horror/ Suspense/ Comedy/ Drama/ Action
Director: Hong-jin Na
Year: 2008

Rating:

TRASH CINEMA ESSENTIAL MOVIE
American critics are fond of saying that today’s movies are “dark.” The Dark Knight Returns is dark. Sin City is dark. Watchmen is dark. Bullshit. You want dark? Watch Korean movies.
A case in point is Chaser.
After Joong-ho Eom (Yun-seok Kim) was […]

Country: United States
Genre: Action/ Suspense/ Horror/ Comedy/ Science Fiction
Director: Brian De Palma
Year: 1978

Rating:

TRASH CINEMA ESSENTIAL MOVIE
I have to admit, I was taken aback at how well The Fury plays, 30 years after it was first released. Brian De Palma’s visuals are as beautiful as ever. For example, take the scene in which Gillian Bellaver […]

Country: Hong Kong
Genre: Action/ Bullet Ballet / Romance
Director: Kirk Wong
Year: 1988

Rating:

TRASH CINEMA ESSENTIAL MOVIE
Gunmen is a classic Golden Age of Hong Kong flick in the hard hitting 80s style.
In the closing days of a civil war in China, Ding Chun-Bei (Tony Leung), and his three compatriots, Chang (Waise Lee), Lau Fook-Kwong (Mark Cheng), and […]