The Manchurian Candidate is a brilliantly made political thriller picture with the most complex editing imaginable. Now, remember the book was written in 1959 and the film was released in 1962 which was more than one year before JFK's assassination. The President knew all about it and gave the filmmakers his expressed approval to go ahead with the project. Pretty chilling stuff.

Burt Lancaster achieves a remarkable transformation of himself into Robert Stroud, a world-famous ornithologist who's locked up in federal prisons most of his life. There's a lot to like about Birdman of Alcatraz: the direction, the black-and-white cinematography, the screenplay, and the supporting performances. Altogether, it's very difficult to stop the movie.

Chalk up The Train as one of the most exciting WWII pictures. Nothing beats the sight of Burt Lancaster in action. He going down the ladder quickly, jumping off the train while it's in motion, running across the bridge, and getting through the mountain range with a injured leg are some of the film's highest points. Also, it has some great aerial shots, especially when the railyard is bombed.

Path to War is maybe the most compelling picture on the Vietnam War, at least from a political perspective. For the final film of his long great career, John Frankenheimer details as much as possible about what went down at the White House with LBJ, Robert McNamara, and Clark Clifford, among others, dealing with the Vietnam War for 165 long minutes, and every bit of it is as fascinating as Citizen Kane.

Although there were many prisoner of war (POW) camps during the U.S. Civil War, Andersonville Prison, aka Camp Sumter, remains the most famous of them all, resembling an early Nazi concentration camp. Approximately thirty percent of 45,000 captured Union soldiers died in captivity at Andersonville Prison, mostly due to starvation and disease.

What matters the most to the red-blooded Americans is Super Bowl Sunday. The buildup to the anticipated climax is deliberate and methodical. The performances rendered by Robert Shaw, Bruce Dern, and Marthe Keller keep Black Sunday moving to the incendiary point of no return. It's beneficial to have two teams, the Dallas Cowboys and the Pittsburgh Steelers, playing each other to heighten the realism.

French Connection II is almost as good as the original even though it was a Best Picture winner. The follow-up is action-packed with the added international flavor. Moreover, the performances are outstanding, and Gene Hackman steals the show, doing some of the best acting of his career. His anguished cry of "Mickey Mantle sucks!" is quite funny. The last thirty minutes is brilliant.

Robert De Niro's acting is terrific. Remarkably done is the cinematography which was handled by Robert Fraisse that's mostly shot on location all over France. The best part is the Grand Prix-stylized car chase that seemingly takes forever. It must have been a very complicated task for everybody involved which included over 300 stunt drivers with John Frankenheimer being among them.

I once drove through Alabama on a long-distance trip, and wanting to get out of there ASAP, I immediately said to myself, "Yep, this is George Wallace's country." That's how bad Alabama's legacy is which all starts with racism. Often ranked among the worst in many categories, its motto should be: "Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever."

That's a good combination for The Holcroft Covenant: Michael Caine and John Frankenheimer. James Caan was slated to play Noel Holcroft and then dropped out one day before they were about to begin filming, so Michael Caine stepped in as a last-minute replacement. The former, I can see, but the latter is just perfect for the role. It becomes cospiracy thriller after Noel learns he's set to inherit $4.5 billion from three deceased Nazis.