Photo by Dan Smith for Lionsgate
The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare
The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare
Abigail
(In Theaters April 19)
Kidnapping a crime lord’s 12-year-old daughter seems unwise when carried out by six criminals anticipating a huge ransom. The kidnappers are slow to figure out that their captive, Abigail (Alisha Weir), is a powerful vampire. Initially, she looks like an ordinary girl clad in her pink ballet tutu, but she’s a frightful sight once she begins pirouetting and biting her way through her captors. Intent upon giving gore-fans the goods, directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett drench the interior of their set, an old mansion, with the blood of Abigail’s keepers. Played by Angus Cloud, Kathryn Newton, Kevin Durand, Dan Stevens, Melissa Barrera and Will Catlett, the kidnappers exhibit varying degrees of irredeemable and redeeming qualities. Transfused with dark humor and memorable characters, this gory romp has been widely acclaimed. (Lisa Miller)
The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare
(In Theaters April 19)
Loosely based on the book by Damien Lewis, this Guy Ritchie film turns the heroics of real-life special operators into a smarmy action-comedy that lacks high stakes. The mission comes to life when Gus March-Phillips (Henry Cavill) is summoned from prison by Ian Fleming (Freddie Fox). Winston Churchill (Rory Kinnear) and Fleming intend to field a top-secret operation to cut off supplies to Hitler’s U-boats from a port in West Africa. Phillips agrees to lead that mission provided he selects its team members. We quickly meet a dozen recruits comprised of criminals, rogue spies and sociopaths (including those portrayed by Alan Ritchson, Alex Pettyfer and Cary Elwes). Instead of clever schemes and well-choreographed action, Ritchie delivers dumbbell Nazis mowed down in their hundreds with virtually no resistance. The film’s forgettable dialog and poor pacing combine with its anachronistic soundtrack to diminish this team’s astounding feats, instrumental in turning the tide of World War II. (Lisa Miller)
The Scarface Mob
(Arrow Films Blu-ray)
In 1959, Desilu (“I Love Lucy”) produced The Scarface Mob, a film from pilot episodes for the television series that became “The Untouchables.” The Scarface Mob introduced Robert Stack as Eliot Ness, the door-busting Prohibition cop bent on busting up Al Capone’s beer-and-booze industry.
Prohibition was among the most unpopular federal projects ever, and it seems odd to cast one of its agents as the hero. However, the enemy was the real-life underworld, whose methods included murder, and the network of corruption it wove around 1920s Chicago. Ness assembled a team of “seven honest men”—one of them “a full-blooded Cherokee”—to defeat the criminals. The unusual ethnic casting may have been suggested by executive producer Desi Arnaz, a Cuban American.
The Scarface Mob represents the cul-de-sac of film noir on early network television. Directed by a veteran of the genre, Phil Karlson (The Phenix City Story), the settings are nocturnal, with overhead lights casting deep shadow and every twitch dramatized by a brassy jazz soundtrack. Quinn Martin was involved in the production, and the template for his ‘60s series (“The FBI” among them) was in place with Scarface’s terse tone and rat-a-tat narrative. (David Luhrssen)
