Like a big old slice of Americana, Top Gun: Maverick throttles us back onto the ‘highway to the danger zone’ a whopping thirty six years after the original was released in 1986. Helmed by Joseph Kosinski (Oblivion), it harkens to a time when men were men, box office success screamed for pro-American storylines (for example, Rocky IV – which was released just a year earlier in 1985), and Tom Cruise was a bankable movie star (I guess some things haven’t changed). Oozing a most unique brand of joyous buoyancy, this sequel will likely find you grinning from ear to ear through large portions of the action seen onscreen. Following the titular Maverick (Cruise), not much has changed for the talented pilot. Never having progressed past the ranking of Capt., his call sign is aptly given... as his maverick ways have always hindered him from moving up the ranks.

Coming off as a low grade imitation of a Steven Seagal style movie... but without the flair, 1989's Red Surf, co-written and directed by H. Gordon Boos, is perhaps most intriguing for featuring George Clooney in one of his first cinematic starring roles, and Gene Simmons as his demented moral compass and kick-ass compatriot (or maybe it should be kiss-ass). Beating Point Break to the surfer storyline by a full two years, Clooney plays former hang ten icon Remar, who, after some knee issues, has decided to get his highs from smuggling and using drugs instead. Surrounded by a team of just as impressive low lifes, including number two Attila (Doug Savant) – funnily enough, ‘hun’ works quite well to describe him

Back in the late 1970s, then first time co-writer/co-director Kathryn Bigelow, along with Monty Montgomery, were fortunate enough to have spotted one Willem Dafoe on the stage – a member of the Wooster Group experimental theater company. Asking him to be a part of their movie, it would also become the actor’s first credited role. That film would eventually be called The Loveless (1981)... prior to that, it was known as US 17 and Breakdown. Set in the 1950s and infused with a post-punk flair, the narrative follows Vance (Dafoe), an enigmatic nihilist with an intoxicating allure. A quiet biker wearing black leather and equally as dark Brylcreem’d back hair, he oozes an indifferent quality of danger and sexuality. Living on the edge of life (or perhaps more accurately, a knife), he’s the type of conundrum that stops to help a lady with a flat tire, only to nab a controversial kiss and then take the money from her wallet for payment as he departs... leaving her all shook up in more ways than one.

An intriguing reworking of Daniel Defoe’s classic 1719 novel “Robinson Crusoe”, director Byron Haskin, who in 1953 brought aliens from Mars to Earth with the epic The War of the Worlds, this time flips the script and takes us to the red planet with the sci-fi cult classic Robinson Crusoe on Mars (1964). Though falling comfortably within the sci-fi genre, Paramount’s promotional team clearly reveled in the movie’s attempted accuracy – the trailer and advertising posters reading: “This film is scientifically authentic. It is only one step ahead of present reality”. And, in many ways, it was impressively accurate for what was known at that moment. Released at the perfect time in history, 1964 was just one year prior to the first spacecraft fly by of Mars... before that, all that we knew was by way of observation through telescope.

Set at a luxurious Italian seaside hotel during the much less touristy off season, the location is the stuff a vacation dream is made of... unless you’re in a giallo plot, then things might take a nosedive right off that very cliff-side. This is the setting of the sexy giallo The Sister of Ursula (1978), written and directed by Enzo Milioni. Following a pair of sisters, Dagmar (Stefania D’Amario) and Ursula (Barbara Magnolfi), they are on a mission – as the rather horrid death of their father has led them to search for their runaway mother... who left them when they were very young – after she made it famous as an actress. This search has brought them to the aforementioned resort

A late entry into the realm of the giallo, 1986's The Killer is Still Among Us, directed by then first time film maker Camillo Teti, comes across as rather meta and self-aware... after all, how often do you see a couple go to a giallo in a giallo? Based off of the true story of a serial killer known as “the Monster of Florence”, poor young couples, looking for love in all the wrong places (and by that, I mean in secluded, wooded areas), are being picked off by an unknown assailant... sometimes using a gun, at others, a knife.