Stream this year's Christmas hit: John McPhail's ANNA AND THE APOCALYPSE

Likely to become a holiday classic -- thanks to its delightful and original combination of high school musical, zombie pic and Christmas movie -- ANNA AND THE APOCALYPSE snuck into theaters in limited release at the end of last year (garnering some very nice reviews in the process) and is now available to stream via Amazon Prime. The movie's a winner, a keeper, and an all-round wonder as it unfurls its very charming, funny and bizarre "take" on high school, love, friendship, Christmas pageants and zombies. Really, this is the best zombie movie since Train to Busan and the best original musical in several years (for my money it beats the too-precious La La Land all to heck).

As directed with a remarkably intuitive sense of tone and tenor by John McPhail (at left) and co-written -- with not just exceptional "smarts" but also an appreciation of and love for the genres they send up and add to -- by Alan McDonald and the late Ryan McHenry (to whom the work is dedicated), this little film finds its footing so quickly and securely that I suspect film buffs will recall it fondly and lovingly when many other more trumpeted, high-budget movies will have long faded from memory.

The story is simple and initially rather sweet. As Anna and her loving dad drive along the highway discussing Anna's future (for which they each have a different plan), on the radio we hear, "The CDC has announced that what it initially thought to be a contagious--", at which point Anna switches the radio off, and we continue with high school and teenagers, the trauma of growing up, falling in love (of course with the wrong person), and putting on the yearly Christmas pageant. Talk about a pointed but relatively subtle manner in which to introduce the expectation of zombies -- and then having the chutzpah to simply leave them offscreen for quite some time!

By the time we do see them, Anna (Ella Hunt, above center) and her friends are so immersed in teenage narcissism and song (a lovely, funny one, too) that they don't even notice the undead cavorting in their slow, zombie fashion behind them. (These zombies adhere to the better, slower George Romero version, which allows for a lot more leeway, escape routes and fun.)

Anna's friends include her "bestie," John (a sweet Malcolm Cumming (above, center), who clearly loves Ella in more than a best-friend way, and student investigative journalist Steph (no-nonsense Sarah Swire, at left, below),

and especially the school bully, Nick (Ben Wiggins, below), who turns out to have a bit more on the ball than bullies in other films. Wiggins also gets a great song midway along that reinforces how cleverly Anna and the Apocalypse plays with the genre conventions of zombie movies, high-school rom-coms, Christmas movies and so much else.

The supporting cast is terrific, too, with Paul Kay, below, left, as the succulently sleazy school headmaster, and Mark Benton, below, right, the very picture of a kindly, loving, over-protective dad.

Who survives and who does not may surprise you, and this certainly adds to the film's thrills and sometimes to its sadness. (As one of the songs tells us, "There's no such thing as a Hollywood ending.") I can't remember when a zombie movie made me laugh and touched me in the way this one does, yet even the moving moments don't seem too sentimental. They're all delivered with a wit and a style that seduce. (Who'd imagine a Christmas candy cane as a prime zombie-killing tool?)

Marli Siu (above) makes a sweet secondary love interest for the school's nerdy-but-nice photographer, a funny, on-the-mark Christopher Leveaux (below, center left). The musical numbers range from very good to OK, with more of the former than the latter, and they are produced and executed so well that they seem utterly organic to the rest of the film. In a movie that mashes this many genres, that took some doing.

Oh, yes, there's gore, too. This is a zombie film, after all. But even the blood is handled with the same kind of smart tone and subtlety as all else here. Boy, what a special little movie this is!

Streaming now via Amazon Prime, and also available for rental or purchase on DVD and Blu-ray, Anna and the Apocalypse is simply too good to miss. It'll take its place with other fine, dark Christmas movies, for folk who need a respite from the current feel-good holiday twaddle filling our network TV, cable and streaming services.

Israel and Palestine in a whole new light (and genre): Sameh Zoabi's TEL AVIV ON FIRE

What a low-key delight is the new genre-melding movie, TEL AVIV ON FIRE. Taking on the Israel-Palestine conflict -- which we've now seen in just about every manner one would imagine possible, from documentaries such as the questing/philosophic (David Hare's Wall), historical (Colliding Dreams) and the bring-us-together sort (In the Land of Pomegranates) to narrative thrillers (The Little Drummer Girl, either version), family sagas (The Other Son), love stories (Omar) and sex-tryst films (the recent Reports on Sarah and Saleem) -- it provides quite the new perspective.

The genre we have not seen much of regarding this particular subject is comedy. To which you might immediately respond, "And for good reason, dummy!" Until you've viewed the movie under consideration here, that is.

As written and directed by Sameh Zoabi (shown at right), Tel Aviv on Fire might best be described as shambling -- which is not simply deliberate but a huge part of its charm. The film starts slowly and moves even more so. Yet that quiet, unhurried pace builds continually into something near amazing: funny, feisty, satiric, ironic and quite delightful. At film's end TrustMovies was in a state of sheer joy at its underhanded accomplishment of casting the kind of light on this more than 70-year conflict that both upends it and forces you to view it differently.

Even the film's seemingly incendiary title (which doubles as the name of a Palestinian soap opera that is also quite popular with the women of Israel) is part of the fun here. Our hero, a shamblin' man named Salam (Kais Nashif, above), who works as a low-end go-fer at that soap opera which his uncle produces, in order to get back into the affections of his old girl-friend, as well as gain faster thoroughfare at the Palestinian checkpoint, tell a fairly minor fib -- he claims to be a writer on the soap -- which results in his liaison with a Israeli military officer (Yaniv Biton, below) that actually does lead him into that writer's position.

What happens after gets sillier, funnier and much more productive in terms of irony and even depth of perspective, as everyone from the cast, director, original writer, Salam's ex-girlfriend (the lovely Maisa Abd Elhadi, below, left), the lead actress in the soap (a very funny Lubna Azabal), and that military officer's wife all become involved in the goings-on.

One of the small but piquant joys of the film is how this Palestinian soap opera seems different in scale yet all too redolent of soaps around the world. Ditto how love stories resort to such similar schemes to work themselves out. And, yes, how the male ego -- whether Israeli, Palestinian, or any other culture/nation -- proves every bit as tender and typical as you might expect.

The movie may be low-key, but it's an absolute triumph in just about every way -- never more so than when it addresses the Israeli-Palestinian conflict without violence yet head-on, dead-on and with such unalloyed precision and delight.

From the Cohen Media Group, running 97 minutes, in Arabic and Hebrew (with English subtitles for both), Tel Aviv on Fire, after opening on the coasts earlier this month, hits South Florida this Friday, August 23. In Miami, look for it at the Coral Gables Art Cinema, in Hollywood at the  Cinema Paradiso, in Fort Lauderdale at the Savor Cinema, in Boca Raton at the Living Room Theaters; and at the Movies of Delray and Movies of Lake Worth. Wherever you live around the USA, to see if the film is playing anywhere near you, click here.

Restored and re-discovered: James Whale's black-and-white wonder THE OLD DARK HOUSE

Plenty of us avid moviegoers are familiar enough with the name James Whale. This guy, after all, directed the original Frankenstein (and The Bride of..., too) plus The Invisible Man, as well as the original filmed versions of Journey's End, Waterloo Bridge and Showboat. Many of us know him, too, from Ian McKellen's lovely portrayal of the filmmaker in Bill Condon's Gods and Monsters. What most of us don't know much about, however, is his 1932 movie THE OLD DARK HOUSE, a 72-minute, non-stop delight -- funny, scary, and full of surprises -- that was long thought to have gone the "disappeared" route of so many old and unfairly forgotten films.

Now, thanks to Cohen Media Group (as well as, or so we learn from one of the marvelous bonus features on the new Blu-ray and DVD, to the now-deceased filmmaker Curtis Harrington), a wonderful 4K restoration of the film opened in theaters earlier this month (after playing both the Venice and New York film festivals) and arrives on home video this coming Tuesday, October 24, on Blu-ray, DVD and digital format.

Director Whale (shown at right) with 23 credits on his resume, was gifted in a number of genres, but the amazement of The Old Dark House comes, as much as anything, via the masterly manner in which he mashes so many of these -- mystery, thriller, horror, comedy, romance, satire and even a look at class, economics, religion and morality of the day -- together so goddamned gracefully. It's a wonder.

The film is based on a novel by J.B. Priestley, and the cast assembled here is a wonder, as well. Where else might you possibly see Boris Karloff (below, left), Melvyn Douglas (above), Charles Laughton and Raymond Massey together in the same film? (Mr. Laughton is as likable and surprising here as you may ever have seen him.)

On the distaff side are three wonder women: Gloria Stuart (above, right, and yes, she who made that great comeback in a certain Mr. Cameron's over-rated Titanic) plays a gorgeous dish who fills out a negligee like few others; the beautiful, pert and utterly winning Lilian Bond (below, right), who bring such immediacy and delight to her been-around-the-block ingenue role that you'll not easily forget her; and Eva Moore, who manages the nutty-old-bat role as though we'd never seen such a thing before. (There's one scene between Moore and Stuart that is so jaw-dropping even now, that one wonders what audiences must have thought about it 85 years ago when the film first opened.)

The less said about the plot the better, for it is filled with such bizarre turns-of-events that you'll simply hang on for the ride. And yet, for all its sense of terror and dread, the movie is finally so surprisingly endearing that you may find yourself remembering it less as a fright film than as a sweet, sad, fractured movie about family -- both the blood kind and the sort that's created suddenly out of need and determination.

Whatever: don't let this one pass you by. Its home video release is scheduled for this coming week, and the bonus features on the Blu-ray and DVD are wonderful indeed, especially the interview with Mr. Karloff's daughter, Sara. Though the film runs just 72 minutes, the disc's extras are enough -- in quantity and quality -- to make this much more than merely an evening's entertainment.

THEY LIVE BY NIGHT: Nicholas Ray's "little" classic hits Blu-ray via The Criterion Collection

Who'd have thought that a relatively small, kids-on-the-run movie, with leading actors who were newcomers (or nearly so) and a first-time director with no reputation to speak of, would down the decades quietly burn itself into the canon, ending up as a Blu-ray disc as part of the prestigious Criterion Collection? Back in 1948, when THEY LIVE BY NIGHT was released, Nicholas Ray (shown below) had made none of the several groundbreaking movies -- from In a Lonely Place and Johnny Guitar to Rebel Without a Cause -- that would put him permanently, if always a bit bizarrely, on the map.

Watching today this fascinating, moving and entertaining melodrama that broke new ground visually and aurally at the time of its release is a rather grand experience. In addition to viewing the Oscar-caliber supporting performances from Howard Da Silva and Jay C. Flippen (shown left and center left, respectively, two photos below), we are also treated to two wonderful and memorable lead performances from Farley Granger (below, left, who would go on to make Hitchcock's Rope the same year) and Cathy O'Donnell (below, right, from The Best Years of Our Lives), who are as exceptional here and as they would ever be.

Ray combines bank robbery, thriller, romance, film noir and social justice into one unusual genre-jumping movie that, if it's no outright masterpiece, remains one of the most impressive directing debuts of its own time and even now (up there with the likes of The Usual Suspects), while the filmmaker's genuine concern for all his characters shines through, as always.

While it is now indeed a "period piece," the movie simultaneously seems to exist in its own special time and place: something that critic Imogen Sara Smith notes in her excellent critical appreciation of the film, which is part of the Criterion disc's Bonus Features and is "must" viewing. Ray's film is -- by turns -- exciting, sweet, charming, moving and surprising, even featuring, toward the finale, a first-rate musical number that exists beautifully on its own, while commenting on a number of themes to which we're being treated.

They Live By Night is first of all a romance between two genuinely nice-but-problemed kids, neither of whom have had anything approaching a helpful or normal childhood. We root for them both and especially as a unit because they work together so well. Mr. Ray allows us to understand this without piling on the sentimentality. If the finale must end in a kind of tragedy, even the character who betrays these two is given a measure of understanding and respect.

The new Blu-ray transfer is very good, as you would expect from Criterion, with new 2K digital restoration and uncompressed monaural soundtrack. The audio commentary is from a decade ago and features Farley Granger and film historian Eddie Muller, and the remaining "extras" include a new essay from film scholar Bernard Eisenschitz and just so-so audio excerpts from a 1956 interview with producer John Houseman.

The new Blu-ray, running 95 minutes, in black-and-white with an aspect ratio of 1.37:1, hits the street this Tuesday, June 20, as part of The Criterion Collection and will be available for purchase and rental.

DVDebut: Asif Kapadia/Christopher Hampton's featherweight but very pretty ALI AND NINO

A movie that has much in common with last week's offering, The Ottoman Lieutenant -- same time period (World War I) and same location (the middle east) -- ALI & NINO, from that very up-and-down director, Asif Kapadia, and similar screenwriter Christopher Hampton, has all the markings of a work-for-hire done by people who were not especially enamored by their subject matter but labored dutifully and professionally to produce a decent product.

They have, and at only 100 minutes, the movie is not difficult to sit through. Visually, in fact, it is quite a treat, what with its gorgeous interiors (homes/palaces of the uber-wealthy) and exteriors (it was filmed in Azerbaijan and Turkey in some pretty spectacular locales). But the writing by Mr. Hampton is merely workmanlike, telling its story pretty much as expected, while the direction by Mr. Kapadia (shown at right) is of the same ilk.

The two leads are played by Palestinian actor Adam Bakri (above, right) and Spanish actress Maria Valverde (above, left). Both are charming, attractive and play well together. Though limited by what they were given to do and say, they acquit themselves professionally. As does much of the oddly starry and underused supporting cast, led by Mandy Patinkin (below) and Connie Nielsen and Nino's parents, with the standout performance given by Italian actor Riccardo Scamarcio (at bottom, right), playing the rather quickly dispatched villain of the piece. He's hissable and more.

A lot of incident is packed into the movie's running time, and as this piles up, it simultaneously seems to somehow lessen in importance, even though it deals with issues like life and death and love. But we've seen it all before, even if not perhaps in such picturesque locations.

From IFC Films and after a very limited and don't-blink-or-you'll-miss-it theatrical release, the movie hits DVD this Tuesday, March 21 -- for purchase and/or rental. 

The Little (Sexy, Naughty) Mermaid and her sister show up in Agnieszka Smoczynska's genre-blending THE LURE

Whew! What to make of THE LURE, the new Polish movie from director Agnieszka Smoczynska and writer Robert Bolesto that my spouse insisted simply had to have been made during some former decade because every last one of its accoutrements -- its "look," production design, props, costumes, hair styles, even its music and lyrics -- seem so perfectly attuned to a time past. But, no: The film was indeed made in 2015 and is finally getting its U.S. theatrical release this week. Perhaps the best way to approach the movie is as a kind of singing-dancing, fairy-tale. fantasy, horror movie. It embodies each and all of those genres, and the most remarkable thing about The Lure is that it conflates these genres so well that it arrives on-screen and into our consciousness as something damned near sui-generis.

Ms. Smoczynska (at left) and Mr. Bolesto (below) have worked together previously on a short film and evidently have an awfully good rapport, so they have been able to create a kind of alternate universe in which the most bizarre things happen. And yet they happen so "reasonably" (given the oddness of the time, place and situations) that we simply accept them at face value -- even though that "face" is one we've never quite viewed before. After all, when a pair of young girls rise from the dark water, calling out to the men on shore for help -- while promising not to

eat them -- we've got to know that we're in pretty heady, unusual territory. Soon our girls, claiming to be named "Silver" and "Golden," are living with this on-shore family of entertainers who work in a kind of upper-end strip club, performing as a special attraction and using their ability to change from mermaid to fully human to give their audience an extra treat. And, boy, do they!  (The special effects here are used sparingly but they are done with such skill and imagination that they keep entirely within the movie's special blending of fantasy, sexuality, music, horror -- and romance. It is soon clear, however, that horror will be vying for top dog here (or, in this case, top fish).

The filmmaker's cast, which I will not single out individually, is remarkably good at delivering just what the writer and director ordered. Down the line, each actor's performance seem on target and able to convey via acting, singing, movement and more exactly what's required to keep us in the audience alternately charmed and flabbergasted but always entertained.

Channeling myth, folk tale, romance, sleaze and shock, while providing strange songs that will have you reading the English subtitles quickly and carefully for meaning and enjoyment, the movie races along from scene to scene as sex, romance -- along with the need to feed -- rears their rueful little heads.

TrustMovies did not notice any rating given for this movie -- which he suspects means that it remains unrated. The manner in which The Lure deals with nudity and sexuality (inter-species, at that) means that it most definitely is not for children -- unless parents are willing to spend a rather long time explaining things that may lose much of their magic and/or shock value in translation.

What does it all mean? That question is not even pertinent, I think. The film is what it is. And what it is proves outrageous and rather spectacular, colorful, breathtaking fun.

At the very least it might provide a nice corrective for those folk taken in by all the Hollywood hype over La La Land who were then a tad disappointed when they finally sat through this musical-of-the-moment.

From Janus Films and running a fleet and sometimes quite darkly funny 92 minutes, The Lure opens this Wednesday in New York City at the IFC Center. Elsewhere? I sure hope so. Laemmle's Noho 7 in Los Angeles is said to be presenting a movie called The Lure come early March, but one can't tell from the advance posting whether this is the same film discussed above. I don't understand why the Janus web site for the film is not more helpful in this regard. Posting playdates would be of great benefit to viewers who might want to see the movie.

Ducastel & Martineau's PARIS 05:59 THEO & HUGO -- the year's best love story, already?

We're not even one month into the new year, but if a better love story than PARIS 05:59 THEO & HUGO comes along, then we're in for quite a romantic 2017. Of course, the viewer who ventures into this new film needs to be warned: Before you meet and discover exactly who our two lovers are and why you should in any way care about them and their story, you will have to endure a quarter-hour or more of an hardcore orgy taking place at a gay after-hours club in Paris.

OK. Now that we've lost that part of our audience, let's continue. Even some gays may find the opening orgy difficult or tiresome to sit through. My spouse was ready to quit the film early on, but, suspecting that a real movie -- with characters, plot and progression -- was on tap, I convinced him to last it out. I had no trouble lasting it out because I enjoy hardcore now and again, particularly when it appears in films that offer much more than merely sex. I also have loved the

earlier movies by filmmaking duo Olivier Ducastel (above) and Jacques Martineau (at left), which include The Adventures of Felix and Côte d'Azure, and this new one turns out to be their best by far. Imagine a romantic comedy/drama in which the lovers engage in sex (with others, as well as with each other) at the very beginning and then proceed toward a much different and more important kind of intimacy, and you may get some idea of what is so odd and so very special about this film. Gays will understand this sort of experience perhaps better than straight audiences, as initial sex is often the trigger for a relationship (lasting or otherwise).

Here, one fellow, Théo (the slight, curly-haired and very well hung Geoffrey Couët, below, left), who, in the midst of being hit on by various other men, notices someone who more than catches his eye, and so he slowly proceeds, via various sexual iterations with one fellow and then another, toward his goal. This turns out to be Hugo (the more conventionally gorgeous, sleek, muscular and also well-endowed François Nambot), below, right.

In a scene that strikes me as both hot and original as any meet-cute I've seen, the two end up finally facing each other, even as they are simultaneously fucking different men. Their gaze and then their mouths meet, and -- voilà! -- we have perhaps the most unusual love-at-first-sight scene in movie history. They have terrific sex, climax, gather up their belongings, and leave the club together. Then the movie really begins.

Who are these two, and what might they find together? We soon begin to learn. The dialog in the film is spectacularly good: natural, real, but genuinely interesting and exploratory. Both young men are worth getting to know, and you can feel their interest in each other -- which began as something visual/emotional/sexual -- begin to bloom into something richer and possibly more lasting.

Ducastel and Martineau, together with their hugely appealing and emotionally on-point actors, make every moment count, and the visuals of early-morning, pre-dawn Paris are marvelous indeed. We only spend a couple of hours with these two, as their relationship grows (the movie seems to be taking place in near-real time) but by the end, we are with them, body and soul.

Along the way, we/they visit a hospital, meet a very odd "patient" (above) as well as a most helpful AIDS worker (newcomer Elodie Adler, below). They encounter a young man from Syria (Georges Daaboul) who works in the kebab house at which they hope to buy a breakfast,

and finally, on the subway, they engage in the most lovely conversation with a femme de chambre who works in one of the city's nicer hotels (a wonderful Marief Guittier, below, center)  The young men's conversation bounces from subject to subject, and sometimes gets interestingly social/political, but never leaves its goal of bringing the two young men closer together.

By the finale, which has got to be among the most beautifully romantic/poetic/engulfing/hopeful scenes in gay movie history, they and you should be walking on that proverbial cloud. Seldom has a film begun so very differently from where it ends. Théo and Hugo -- both the movie and the guys -- are not to be missed. This one will take your breath away.

From Wolfe Releasing, the movie opens this Friday, January 27, in New York City (IFC Center), Los Angeles (Laemmle's Music Hall 3), San Francisco (The Roxie) and Fort Lauderdale (The Gateway Theatre). And as the film is from Wolfe, it's sure to appear on DVD/VOD eventually.