Don Druker
Don Druker's reviews only count toward the Tomatometer when
published at the following Tomatometer-approved publication(s):
Chicago Reader,
Globe and Mail
| Publications: | Chicago Reader, Globe and Mail |
Movie Reviews Only
| Rating | T-Meter | Title | Year | Review |
|---|---|---|---|
| 85% | Applause (1929) |
Though this is Mamoulian's earliest, it's possibly his freshest film.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Apr 7, 2016
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| 89% | The Harder They Come (1973) |
With this 1972 cult hit, Jamaican filmmaker Perry Henzell produced a proud, forthright indictment of national and personal corruption.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Oct 2, 2015
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| 82% | Papillon (1973) |
Director Franklin J. Schaffner has succeeded in making a two-and-a-half-hour film that seems like six.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Sep 23, 2015
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| 92% | Shoot the Piano Player (Tirez sur le pianiste) (1962) |
Made with enthusiasm and audacity, it still seems fresh.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Sep 23, 2015
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| 100% | The Lost World (1925) |
Harry Hoyt directed, combining incredible special effects (the monsters) and unbearable melodrama (the actors).‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Jun 8, 2015
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| 44% | Brother Sun, Sister Moon (Fratello sole, sorella luna) (1972) |
Soft-focus spiritual gunk.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Mar 11, 2015
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| 100% | Salesman (1968) |
This 1968 study of door-to-door Bible salesmen in the Boston area and in the south is a superb and truthful look at an American institution -- and at the troubling relationship between fact and fiction, materialism and spiritual values.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Mar 9, 2015
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| 100% | Shonen (Boy) (1969) |
Oshima, the Japanese filmmaker most often compared with Godard, treats the material in a matter-of-fact manner that serves to heighten the dramatic impact and to create one of the most interesting films about children ever made.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Oct 16, 2014
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| 91% | The Lion in Winter (1968) |
James Goldman's screenplay, so chic and sophisticated to the ears of suburbanites, is chock-full of the worst kind of sophomoric fiddling with what Goldman takes to be genuine highfalutin lingo.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Jul 14, 2014
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| 88% | Bang The Drum Slowly (1973) |
The material is trite, but Hancock's slow-motion treatment of the experience of athletic performance is adroit and graceful.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted May 7, 2014
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| 100% | Såsom i en Spegel (Through A Glass Darkly) (1961) |
Elaborately rhetorical at the end, this 1961 film nevertheless develops its theme lucidly and with some of Bergman's most unforgettable sequences.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Jul 23, 2013
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| 80% | Riten (The Rite) (The Ritual) (1969) |
A rarely seen but thoroughly captivating example of filmed chamber theater.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Jul 22, 2013
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| 100% | The Gang's All Here (1943) |
Busby Berkeley's most audacious film.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Jun 13, 2013
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| 91% | Tell Them Willie Boy Is Here (1969) |
A thoughtful, intelligent film that nearly makes up in style and conviction what it lacks in dramatic substance.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted May 1, 2013
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| 25% | Detroit 9000 (1998) |
A gritty, disturbing evocation of the ambiguities of big-city police work.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Apr 4, 2013
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| 100% | Woman in the Dunes (Suna no Onna) (1964) |
A bizarre film, distinguished not so much by Kobo Abe's rather obvious screenplay as by Teshigahara's arresting visual style of extreme depth of focus, immaculate detail, and graceful eroticism.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Mar 4, 2013
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| 90% | Pandora's Box (1929) |
One of the classic films of the German silent era.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Feb 27, 2013
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| 98% | Bicycle Thieves (Ladri di biciclette) (1949) |
Undeniably the most important neorealist film after Rossellini's Open City.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Jan 14, 2013
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| 95% | Beauty and The Beast (La Belle et la bête) (1946) |
A sublime, sumptuous film directed by Jean Cocteau with the help of Rene Clement.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Dec 7, 2012
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| 94% | Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939) |
This is classic Capracorn.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Aug 29, 2012
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| 84% | Operation Petticoat (1959) |
Blake Edwards directs with his customary wit, breeziness, and acute sense of pacing.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted May 15, 2012
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| 90% | Magnificent Obsession (1954) |
[Sirk provides] a coolly formal approach to otherwise unwieldy projects.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Apr 30, 2012
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| 92% | Mister Roberts (1955) |
Henry Fonda stars, as brilliant as ever.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Feb 10, 2012
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| 97% | The Thin Man (1934) |
One of the most popular comedies ever made.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Feb 10, 2012
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| 100% | I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang (1932) |
Based on a true story, its style is simple, direct, forceful -- even after more than six decades.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Feb 10, 2012
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| 95% | Stage Door (1937) |
While it sometimes lapses into pure corn, it nevertheless manages to capture the manic-depressive dormitory atmosphere of young actresses trying to make it in New York.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Feb 10, 2012
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| 100% | Captain Blood (1935) |
Michael Curtiz, the most polished of Warner's studio technicians, starts Flynn off royally.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Feb 10, 2012
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| 71% | The Towering Inferno (1974) |
Irwin Allen, the Busby Berkeley of natural disasters and other people's troubles, teams up with John Guillermin, a competent if undistinguished action director.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Feb 3, 2012
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| 94% | Wanda (1971) |
A brilliantly atmospheric film with a superb performance by Loden.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Sep 22, 2011
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| 89% | Thieves Like Us (1974) |
At times unbearably objective.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted May 23, 2011
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| 100% | National Velvet (1944) |
A good movie for kids and armchair Freudians.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Mar 23, 2011
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| No Score Yet | Bank Shot (1974) |
The best thing about the film is Harry Stradling Jr.'s super photography - but that's scarcely enticement to see a really minor Scott vehicle.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Mar 23, 2010
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| 100% | Ikiru (1956) |
Akira Kurosawa's greatest film.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Apr 27, 2009
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| 100% | The Dark Corner (1946) |
A pretty good thriller.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Apr 3, 2009
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| 98% | Chinatown (1974) |
Polanski's film suggests that the rules of the game are written in some strange, untranslatable language, and that everyone's an alien and, ultimately, a victim.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Mar 27, 2009
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| 100% | There Was a Father (1942) |
A delicate, straightforward exhortation to duty and sacrifice, presented with both humor and a kind of unforced serenity.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Oct 18, 2008
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| 82% | On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969) |
Director Peter Hunt manages to inject some life into this 1969 exercise with a wonderful ski chase, but otherwise the film is a bore.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Oct 13, 2008
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| 91% | The Women (1939) |
[Cukor is] at his best with a cast that includes Rosalind Russell, Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford, Hedda Hopper, Ruth Hussey, Paulette Goddard, and Joan Fontaine.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Sep 11, 2008
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| 76% | Charlotte's Web (1973) |
It preserves some of the form and language of White's original but fattens and sweetens his lean and pungent prose with songs by Richard and Robert Sherman.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Sep 9, 2008
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| 88% | Fantastic Planet (1973) |
The film has a flat quality that cannot entirely be overcome by the sensational animation and the obvious good intentions of its creators.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Sep 9, 2008
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| 90% | Pat and Mike (1952) |
The best of the Spencer Tracy-Katharine Hepburn cycle.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Aug 4, 2008
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| 95% | Der Blaue Engel (The Blue Angel) (1930) |
The first film collaboration between Josef von Sternberg and Marlene Dietrich, this reeks with decay and sexuality.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Jul 28, 2008
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| 80% | Richard III (1956) |
Laurence Olivier's classic rendition (1956) of Shakespeare's total villain contains one of his most engaging performances and reveals some of his best spatial manipulation of action.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Jul 9, 2008
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| 63% | The Way We Were (1973) |
A for effort; C for execution.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted May 26, 2008
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| 90% | Monty Python's And Now for Something Completely Different (1972) |
Fans will have most of it memorized by now.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted May 14, 2008
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| 100% | The Big Heat (1953) |
Brutal, atmospheric, and exciting -- highly recommended.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Apr 9, 2008
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| 100% | The Killers (1946) |
An example of film noir at its most expressive.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Apr 8, 2008
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| 90% | Blazing Saddles (1974) |
One of the funniest awful movies ever made.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Apr 2, 2008
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| 93% | California Split (1974) |
Robert Altman's masterful 1974 study of the psychology of the compulsive gambler.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Mar 25, 2008
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| 55% | Jesus Christ Superstar (1973) |
The music quickly becomes monotonous, and the operatic dialogue is silly right from the start.‐ Chicago Reader
Read More | Posted Mar 19, 2008
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