Jackie Brown (1997)

Low key compared to some of his other films but this is one of Quentin Tarantino's best.

Jackie (Pam Grier) is an ageing flight attendant working for a budget airline, she's augmenting her salary with some less legal work on the side. She smuggles money for Ordell (Samuel L Jackson) but gets caught by the Feds in the form of Nicolette (Michael Keaton). He tries to get her to turn on Ordell.

Jackie meanwhile has a plan to get her hands on Ordell's ill-gotten gains and get the Feds to get rid of Ordell for her. She will also need the help of her bail bondman Max (Robert Forester)...

Influenced by blaxploitation movies and with an amazing soundtrack of mostly 1970s soul this is a very cool movie. Not as fast moving or violent as some of Tarantino's other films though has loads of cool dialogue and a great involving story. It also has a great cast also including Robert De Niro and Bridget Fonda.

Charlie Chan's Murder Cruise (1940)

Charlie Chan hunting a criminal on a cruise ship, what more could you want?

A notorious strangler has struck again and again and it is thought he is one of the passengers on a cruise ship that has docked at Honolulu. The strangler is being hunted by British policeman Duff (C. Montague Shaw) but after Shaw is murdered at Charlie Chan's (Sidney Toler) office, the famous Chinese detective joins the cruise ship and hunts for the criminal as the boat heads for California. The strangler could be one of a party of people on the boat.

There are a number of potential suspects though, could it be Dr Suderman (Lionel Atwill), Professor Gordon (Leo G. Carroll), Walters (Charles Middleton) or Pendleton (Leonard Mudie)? They all look suitable villainous in their various ways. Charlie Chan comes up with a fiendishly complicated ruse to trick the strangler to unmask himself...

Another entertaining entry in the long-running Charlie Chan series. At times Chan seems a bit lost as to whom the strangler is and his final plan does seem a bit risky!

Forbidden Jungle (1950)

Limited but largely inoffensive sub-Tarzan nonsense.

Big game hunter Burton (Don Harvey) turns up in the jungle with a group of natives and a tiger in a cage, however he is not here to massacre defenceless animals, he is hunting for a boy. A boy who is rumoured to have been bought up by chimpanzees after his parents were killed in a plane crash. That does sound a bit familiar doesn't it?

Tawa (Robert Cabal) has in fact been bought up by Trader Kirk (Forrest Taylor) and his friendly natives who live alongside chimps. Burton tries to lure Tawa back to civilisation using the image of the lights of Broadway as the best thing in the universe. This is truly a very strange film.

Not a great deal happens in this film, it has all the usual jungle and noble savage tropes and is padded out with plenty of stock footage of wild animals. Ray "Crash" Corrigan also turns up with his gorilla suit to do his usual unconvincing ape act. Not a good film by any means but watchable enough especially if you like seeing chimpanzees messing about.

Taxi Driver (1976)

A classic dark tale of a troubled man pushed over the edge.

Travis (Robert De Niro), a veteran and somewhat mentally unstable, takes a job as a taxi driver on the night shift as he can't sleep. Here he is exposed to all of the sin of the big city lights, some of which he likes to partake in especially porn. He falls in love with (or maybe obsessed with) Betsy (Cybill Shepherd) who is working for an aspiring politician, though his date with her ends badly when he takes her to a porn cinema!

Travis then sees Iris (Jodie Foster), a twelve year old prostitute pimped by Sport (Harvey Keitel). Travis tries to get her to leave her terrible life. He shaves his head and heads out with his guns, he wants to save Iris and make a difference and doesn't expect to survive...

A superbly crafted and paced film, a true highlight of 1970s cinema. A story that will shock but also surprises, especially the final twist.

Thrill of Youth (1932)

This promises a lot though largely fails to deliver. It remains an average though not uninteresting view of early 1930s society.

Big game hunter Chet (Matty Kemp) returns, from butchering innocent animals, to his neglected girlfriend Marcia (Caryl Lincoln). However, Chet isn't very faithful, and soon he is chasing the local vamp Jill (June Clyde). Unfortunately Chet's brother Jack (Allen Vincent) is also very keen on her. Things get very complicated when Jack and Jill spends the night together (innocently) at a log cabin leading to conflict between the brothers...

Pre-code but fairly tame nowadays, and probably not that racy back in 1932 for most. The plot doesn't make a great deal of sense, with various threads left up in the air.