TheRetroCritic

Yes, you are reading this correctly. Mick Jagger, Emilio Estevez and Anthony Hopkins all cast in a movie together. An early 90's sci-fi movie no less! Actually... MUCH less. Freejack may look good on paper (trashy good) but alas, after a promisingly ass first act, this was one silly, low-budget B movie with very little to offer besides some shockingly not-even-trying performances, a lot of smoke, trucks and... night. Our lead is a particularly uncharismatic Emilio Estevez, he plays a racing car driver who is one day "freejacked" (read: teleported) into the future by an unknown mastermind who wants to take over his body... or something like that. Trust me, Freejack is near incomprehensible so reviewing it is like digging for patterns inside a mountain of dirt. Mick Jagger plays some bad dude who is after Estevez for some reason and Rene Russo is the latter's past girlfriend who mysteriously hasn't aged in nearly 20 years after his dramatic disappearance

Back in the day, Michael Keaton managed to fit this little flick in between Batman movies. One Good Cop isn't quite the big blockbuster you'd expect the man, The Bat-man, to take on but cop movies were in vogue so why not? The film sees Keaton and Anthony LaPaglia as NYPD cops, the former is married (to Rene Russo, typecast as a cop's wife in EVERYTHING back in the day), the latter is father to three kids, they follow various cases which always end up getting pretty messy. One day, Keaton's partner gets killed recklessly and he is left trying to deal with the best way to give his kids a new home. One Good Cop isn't so much a cop movie as it is a rough-edged melodrama with cops in it. A lot of emphasis is put on literally every character around Keaton so it's hard to pin his down, which means that when he finally does something completely out of character it's pretty jarring. The film's trying to tell this emotional story of a cop, a good guy with

So they're making a film about Alfred Hitchcock starring Anthony Hopkins as the legendary filmmaker and he looks like this: I honestly can't get over how bad this looks. I mean, have they ever  seen the real Hitchcock? This odd, plasticky fellow above looks more like French right-wing politician Edouard Balladur... Or even... Actually, he looks more like... Ok, to be fair the knife tie thing is pretty clever. Not sure it's clever enough to get me hyped for this one, though. After all, the tagline is "Good evening".

  Sure there was no need to continue Norman Bates' story...but Psycho IV figures: while we're here, might as well tell the whole bloody thing! And why not indeed, finally we are given a clear depiction of Norman's less-than cuddly childhood. Psycho IV: The Beginning sees Norman being released for a bit and taking the opportunity to call a radio show and tell his whole story. The verdict? For a TV movie this is actually really good and rather compelling from start to finish. As a film, it keeps the focused attention of Psycho II and adds the more modern and more graphic look of Psycho III but still, of course, falls way short of the original film. Norman's flashbacks are often genuinely unpleasant and we once again get to know the character a little bit better. Perkins is, of course, a little older still but does well regardless. Overall, the whole thing is still really only worth a look if you've seen the previous two films and want some Psyc

  Underrated second sequel to Psycho with Anthony Perkins doing a better job than in the previous film, and not only in front of the camera. His directing is obviously filled with Hitchcockian influence and as clunky as it can be, overall he does pretty well. Of course, there are silly moments here and there and it can get kinda messy but it is enjoyable nonetheless. I must warn you though, Psycho III is a very different monster to its predecessors. Psycho II took its flawed character seriously and told his unlikely story in a compassionate way. Sure the ending was silly but for the most part, Psycho II did ok to stay focused. Psycho III however, is classic slasher flick fare: Norman is back to his old tricks and there's no bullshitting around! This third instalment is often seen as the lesser of the Psycho sequels, and wrongly so. For one thing it's infinitely more entertaining than Psycho II and Perkins clearly has a ball going nuts once again and directing

Surprisingly watchable sequel with an ageing Anthony Perkins twitching his way through his fading sanity. There are clumsy, dated effects, although they add comedy value (the knife through the mouth is always a winner) and the ending is somewhat rushed but the film is saved by some clever shots and an interesting enough storyline. But seriously now: who asked for a Psycho sequel? Granted there was a sequel to Bloch's novel but waiting until right after Alfred Hitchcock's death to step on his feet feels somewhat unnecessary and kinda sneaky. Sure there's enough in Norman Bate's release from the institution to tell a story, it's just not a story we really needed to be told. Besides, 23 years is a very long gap between both films and attempting to match the original's class, style and mood so late in the game is futile to say the least. Then again, after the initial feeling of WTF, once you get into Norman's more personal story you soon find

A film so classic reviewing it is almost redundant, Psycho remains to this day one of The Master's finest hours and one of the best horror films ever. Over the following years Psycho was much imitated, continued, even cloned (!) but you can't touch the original and nothing has even come close since to match Hitchcock's unsettling masterpiece. Every frame is carefully crafted and Janet Leigh's famously early demise is as infamous and delightful as ever. It is however Anthony Perkins' haunting portrayal of a quietly disturbed Norman Bates which steals the show: this is one of the great performances and wannabe bad-guys should watch it on a loop thereby learning a few things about creating a convincing and most definitely not hammy antagonist. The reveal at the end may not quite carry the punch it once had and the doctor's simplistic and over-indulgent explanation at the end is always somewhat tedious but as a whole, this is an unavoidable classic