Family Honor (1973)

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The long long unseen NY crime thriller Family Honor (1973) has finally surfaced by way of what looks to have been the director himself uploading his own copy to YouTube, more proof that if you look and wait long enough most things eventually turn up!

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I’d first heard of this very obscure thriller by stumbling on the trailer via YouTube, which made it looks like a total must see, take a watch here:

Looking around I was surprised to find that there was no way at all to see this great looking 70s crime Mafia thriller, there was no VHS, DVD, online version or seemingly any other way of watching this.

I’d filed it away in the back of my mind and hoped that one day it would surface, well that day is now here as we can now all watch it over on YouTube. The uploader shares the same name as the director: Clark Worswick, and the info says this copy if taken from one of only 3 film prints known to exist, so yes it looks like the director himself has had his own print transferred to digital and then uploaded it to YouTube.

So how is it? Well it’s a fun watch that feels so authentic as it’s all shot on grimy locations which really give you a feel for the time and the place. It’s quite talky as well, really more of a drama than a thriller, but I still had a great time watching this, plus the directors use of extreme close ups gives the whole things a tight claustrophobic feel. There also seems to have been a strange effect picked up in the transfer, in a lot of close up scenes the background seems to wobble and warp quite often, I kind of enjoyed this unexpected effect as it just adds to the strangeness of finally being able to see this film.

You can watch all 4-parts of the great Family Honor right here, just to note Part 4 is only about 5-minutes long, with a lot of black screen at the end. Enjoy this super rarity!

 

Essential! Cinema

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Ever heard of the Essential! cinema in Wardour Street, London? No, neither had we, that is until we found these two vintage programmes from it dating back to July & September 1981. A quick trip over to the always amazing Cinema Treasures website reveals its history as a screen that changed hands and styles many times during the 1970s and into the 80s. From a preview theatre, to a porn cinema and then in 1976 is turned into the Essential, which is what we’re interested in. These two programmes both date from 1981 and show that the programming there leaned heavily towards the cult, arthouse and music film side of things. In fact you could still programme all of these films today and have a very credible line up of films to show people. What’s great though is at the time a lot of these films were then fairly recent, especially the punk documentaries which they played in September, quite remarkable to think that we’re now so far away from this time. PLUS you know all of this would have been screened on 35 or 16MM, let’s hope one of two of the prints screened here still live on out in the wild somewhere!

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Grindhouse Cinemas are back on 42nd Street, sort of…

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Before heading to Philly for Cinedelphia I stopped off in New York for a few days, this was my first time back in the city for a few years and of course I took a walk down 42nd Street. What I found was something that really made my day, in the simplest way possible the grindhouse cinemas were back on the street, at least in picture form. Yes covering a section of work boarding was a nearly life size photo recreation of what the street looked like back in 1987, complete with a series of incredible theatre marquees. I still don’t fully understand why this was there, now that the street has been cleaned up so much I can’t tell if this is meant to show you how bad the street was, or if it’s a wistful look back to all the character that used to infuse the area.  Either way it was so great to stumble on, watch the video below and take a look at the pictures to get a slice of the 42nd Street experience.

And if you like the picture you can actually get a print from the original via Battman Studios right here. Only $25 and it’s 5-feet long, which seems like a great deal!

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