Reservoir Dogs

Year of Release:  1992
Director:  Quentin Tarantino
Screenplay:  Quentin Tarantino
Starring:  Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, Steve Buscemi, Micheal Madsen, Chris Penn, Laurence Tierney, Quentin Tarantino, Eddie Bunker
Running Time:  94 minutes
Genre:  Thriller, Crime

When a jewelry store robbery goes badly wrong, the surviving robbers retreat to their warehouse rendezvous.  It soon becomes clear that one of them was an undercover cop.  As suspicions and accusations pile up, the survivors are soon violently out of control.

This was the film that introduced the world, for better or worse, to Quentin Tarantino.  While this was a moderate success upon it's initial US release, it was an absolute sensation in Britain, where it was very controversial due to it's violence.  Denied a home video release in Britain until 1995, the film played pretty much constantly in late-night screenings for almost three years. 
The film opens with a pre-credit sequence set in a diner where the characters banter and kvetch about Madonna and the ethics of tipping, and then you're pretty much thrown into the action.  It takes place almost entirely in the aftermath of this botched heist, and unfolds in real time in this derelict warehouse, with flashbacks delineating the backstories of various characters and the events leading up to and immediately following the robbery (which crucially we never actually see).  It's well-written with Tarantino's typically profane, pop-culture fueled dialogue, and well-performed by a talented cast of notable character actors.  It's a violent, bloody film but not quite as violent as it's reputation suggests, the famous ear-slicing scene is never actually shown in all it's gory details.
It's a gritty, funny and genuinely exciting thriller.  Tarantino has made better films, but none of them have the stripped-down, muscular grit of this one.

Micheal Madsen, Harvey Keitel and Steve Buscemi in Reservoir Dogs 
         

Bone Tomahawk

Year of Release:  2015
Director:  S. Craig Zahler
Screenplay:  S. Craig Zahler
Starring:  Kurt Russell, Patrick Wilson, Matthew Fox, Richard Jenkins, Lili Simmons, David Arquette
Running Time:  132 minutes
Genre:  Western, horror, action, adventure,

In the 1890s, grizzled Sheriff Franklin Hunt (Russell), his loyal, elderly deputy Chicory (Jenkins), ruthless, bigoted gunslinger Brooder (Fox) and cowboy Arthur O'Dwyer (Wilson), who has a broken leg, set off on a dangerous quest to rescue three people, including O'Dwyer's wife, Samantha (Simmons), who have been kidnapped by a hidden clan of cave-dwelling cannibals.

For a variety of reasons, the Western genre has declined greatly in popularity in recent years, but good ones are still made occasionally, and this is a good one.  It is a gripping, if bleak, blend of horror and Western, that plays like a mix of The Searchers (1956) and The Hills Have Eyes (1977).  The film is beautifully shot with stunning landscapes, contrasted with (literally) gut-wrenching violence.  Mostly it moves at a sedate pace, but keeps the tension high and there is a strong vein of dark humour throughout, which helps alleviate the film's often grim tone.  It's very well-performed by a great cast and always visually interesting.  The film really kicks into another gear with the action-packed climax, which feels as if it's been dropped in from another movie entirely.  The film's violence is pretty graphic, and the amount of gore may put off some viewers, while the film's largely slow pace may put off some of the horror fans, but it's worth giving it a go. 

Richard Jenkins, Kurt Russell and Matthew Fox saddle up for Bone Tomahawk
  

Batman

Year of Release:  1989
Director:  Tim Burton
Screenplay:  Sam Hamm and Warren Skaaren, from a story by on Sam Hamm, based on characters created by Bob Kane and Bill Finger
Starring:  Micheal Keaton, Jack Nicholson, Kim Basinger, Robert Wuhl, Billy Dee Williams, Micheal Gough, Pat Hingle, Jack Palance
Running Time:  121 minutes
Genre:  Action, science-fiction, fantasy, superhero

In Gotham City, reporter Alexander Knox (Wuhl) is investigating the mysterious "Batman" terrorizing the city's criminals.  No-one takes Knox seriously except photojournalist Vicki Vale (Basinger).  The trail leads them to eccentric billionaire Bruce Wayne (Keaton).  Meanwhile, the city's police department are desperate to bring down powerful crime boss Carl Grissom (Palance) and his ruthless enforcer Jack Napier (Nicholson).  Realising that Napier is having an affair with his girlfriend, Alicia (Jerry Hall), Grissom sets him up during a raid on a chemical works.  Batman intervenes and badly injures Napier, who is presumed dead.  Shortly afterwards Gotham City's underworld is taken over by a mysterious and deadly new criminal known as The Joker, who plans a horrific revenge on the good people of Gotham City.

This is kind of a difficult film because it gets a lot right, and when it's good it's brilliant, but it gets a lot wrong, and when it's bad it is terrible.  At the time it came out Batman was probably best known to general audiences from the campy 1960s TV series with Adam West and Burt Ward, but in the world of comics writers such as Frank Millar, Alan Moore and Grant Morrison were bringing a much darker and grittier version of the Dark Knight with critically acclaimed stories such as The Dark Knight Returns (1986), Year One (1987), The Killing Joke (1988) and Arkham Asylum (1989).  The film combines both aesthetics, despite the gloom and surprising levels of violence, a lot of it is as camp as anything in the TV series.  As you would expect from Tim Burton, the film has a lot of visual style.  Borrowing a lot from the shadowy world of traditional film noir, Gotham City is an almost surreal blend of 1920s, 1940s and 1980s styles.  Micheal Keaton does a great job as Bruce Wayne and Batman, although his casting was controversial at the time, with some fans deeming him not muscular enough for the role, as well as the fact that he was best known as a comedy actor.  He makes Bruce Wayne a strange and slightly sinister character (although to be fair, it is a little strange to dress up in an animal costume and beat up criminals every night), however it is slightly odd the amount of times that Batman get his ass kicked in the film.  He's knocked over a couple of times and gets knocked out and unmasked once by a gaggle of random goons (which include Mac McDonald, best known as Captain Hollister in Red Dwarf (1988-present)).  However Jack Nicholson is perfect as The Joker.  However, the film's biggest flaw is that it totally demystifies The Joker, because it gives him a definitive origin, whereas the character works better when he is ambiguous, as well as forcing a connection between the Joker and Batman.  Kim Basinger is good as Vicki Vale, although she is not given enough to do.  The film's unsung hero, however is Robert Wuhl as Alexander Knox.  It's an interesting idea to have a superhero story told from the point of view of an investigative journalist and Knox adds a lot of humour to the story, and he is the main character early in the film, but then he pretty much gets written out and abandoned. 
The film was released to huge publicity in the summer of 1989, and, when viewed with later Batman films, seems like kind of an oddity.  Tim Burton openly stated that he had no interest in comics, and the filmmakers don't really seem to connect with the Batman mythology and it's characters.  

Batman (Micheal Keaton) investigates The Joker (Jack Nicholson) in Batman

Destiny

Year of Release:  1921
Director:  Fritz Lang
Screenplay:  Fritz Lang and Thea von Harbou
Starring:  Lil Dagover, Walter Janssen, Bernhard Goetzke, Rudolf Klein-Rogge
Genre:  Fantasy, romance
Running Time:  99 minutes

In this silent German film, a young couple (Dagover and Janssen) on a journey encounter the personification of Death (Goetzke), who takes the life of the man.  Heartbroken, the woman finds her way into Death's realm to plead for the life of her beloved.  Touched by her plight, Death presents her with three tales of love and death:  One set in an ancient Middle Eastern city, the other in Renaissance-era Venice and the third in ancient China.  If the woman can change the tragic outcome of just one of the episodes, Death will release her lover. 

This is an early and unjustly neglected film from acclaimed director Fritz Lang.  The film's original German title translates as The Weary Death:  A German Folk Song in Six Verses, and it is like a folk story, with a dream-like, expressionist look and, for the time, innovative special effects.  The three love stories all have a distinctive flavour to them, they all have a unique look beyond the lavish costumes and production design.  Looked at today, the fact that the characters are all played by white people in heavy make-up is problematic, albeit standard for the time.  The story was inspired by Indian mythology.  The film depicts Death as a gaunt, pale man in a wide-brimmed hat, a strangely sympathetic character who is tired of his endless task, and being cursed and despised by the living (Lang claimed that his concept of Death came from a fever-dream he had as a child).  None of the other characters are as memorable are as well-imagined as Death.  Even today, the film is visually striking and endlessly imaginative, although not without it's problems.  There is humour in the movie, but it takes itself seriously and invites it's audience to take it seriously and some level to believe in it's dark magic. 

Bernhard Goetzke as Death in Destiny 

Trees Lounge

Year of Release:  1996
Director:  Steve Buscemi
Screenplay:  Steve Buscemi
Starring:  Steve Buscemi, Chloe Sevigny, Mark Boone Junior, Anthony LaPaglia, Elizabeth Bracco, Seymour Cassel, Carol Kane, Samuel L. Jackson
Running Time:  95 minutes
Genre:  Drama, slice-of-life

In a tough, working-class neighbourhood of New York City, alcoholic Tommy Basilio (Buscemi) is a fixture at the local bar, Trees Lounge.  His girlfriend of eight years has left him for his boss and former best friend, Rob (LaPaglia).  Rob subsequently fired Tommy from his job as a mechanic for stealing money form the till.  In between drinking at the Trees Lounge, Tommy spends his time half-heartedly looking for work, eventually being given an ice-cream truck, following the death of the owner.  He also manages to form a connection with Debbie (Sevigny), the seventeen-year-old niece of a former girlfriend.

This is a downbeat, slice-of-life drama, very much in the John Cassavetes school of gritty realism, and features Cassavetes regular Seymour Cassel.  By and large the film sticks with Tommy, but it also deals with the lives of other Trees Lounge regulars, all of whom seem to lead pretty miserable lives.  Some crucial elements in the film are left ambiguous, not depicted on screen we are left to decide for ourselves what really happened from the often differing versions of events that the characters give us.  Not much happens in the film and, in keeping with the lives these characters lead, there are no real conclusions, despite glimmerings of hope it looks as if they will keep doing the same things over and over again.  This is a strong debut from Buscemi as a writer-director making largely unlikeable characters sympathetic and giving the film a strain of dark comedy.  The film has a strong cast full of recognisable faces from nineties independent movies.  The film's largely plotless nature and slow pace may put off some viewers but it is worth sticking with because it is a well-performed and well-written drama.  Buscemi scripted and directed one other film Animal Factory (2003) and has directed a number of TV episodes, but Trees Lounge really makes me which that he had done more as a writer/director because, on the evidence of this, he could have become a notable filmmaker as well as an actor.     

Steve Buscemi in Trees Lounge