Here we go again with yet another month of wonderful finds on cable that have fallen through the cracks of VHS and DVD distribution. This August is a veritable treasure trove, with rare screenings of a Carol Reed classic, a Robert Aldrich camp classic, and a Hong Kong shock cinema outing that takes the meaning of “visceral” to a whole new level. And that’s only the beginning. So grab your remotes and keep your TIVOs handy, an exciting month of channel-surfing lies ahead.

(Editor’s Note: This month, a lot of films on my list are screening between the hours of 12am – 5am. I’ve noticed that on some of these channel websites, they have a tendency to date middle-of-the-night films according to the prior day. I’ve chosen a literal approach. In other words, when I say that something is screening at 12am or 1am on August 21st, it means the night of August 20th/the morning of the 21st , not the night of August 21st/Morning of the 22nd).

1 - Outcast of the Islands (Sir Carol Reed, UK, 1952) – Nathan’s #1 Pick of the Month – Deemed a “marvelous” motion picture by no less than Pauline Kael and freely adapted from the novel by Joseph Conrad (Heart of Darkness), this drama explores the rocky and often tenuous relationship between “civilized” and “uncivilized” men and women. Trevor Howard stars as Willems, a Far East trading-post operator unceremoniously fired from his regular post, who scandalizes everyone by falling into a romance with a native girl, and then falls prey to the machinations of an unscrupulous politician. He ultimately becomes the object of a sweeping, obsessive, region-wide manhunt. Howard, Robert Morley, and Ralph Richardson have seldom been better. Screens on Turner Classic Movies, Friday 8/22 at 8pm.

2 - Alambrista! (Robert M. Young, USA, 1977) – Nathan’s #2 Pick of the Month – Shot entirely in Mexico as a directorial debut by the mercurially-uneven Young (One-Trick Pony, Extremities), this picture is a veritable cinematic legend and has turned up on the personal favorite lists of countless critics and academics. It tells of Roberto, a young Hispanic who in desperation makes an illegal border passage from Mexico to the United States, hoping to find work to support his needy family. Young handles the material with a gentle and tender hand, and laces the motion picture with intelligent and poignant observations about the immigrant experience. (The film, by the way, bears strong thematic parallels to Louis Malle’s Alamo Bay, and to Malle’s earlier incarnation of the story, done with Jean-Pierre Gorin – also the tale of a Mexican immigrant boy, but one that never materialized into a finished film and fell apart in the mid-1970s). Screens on Flix – Thursday 8/7 at 2:40pm, Friday 8/8 at 1:30am, Tuesday 8/12 at 4:45pm, Sunday 8/17 at 6:20pm, Friday 8/22 at 9:35pm.

3 - The Legend of Lylah Clare (Robert Aldrich, USA, 1968) - Last month, a post turned up on the AMIA (Association of Moving Image Archivists) listserv, where someone asked for help trying to locate a decent print of this certifiably eccentric Aldrich drama; another user promptly wrote back and basically said, “Good luck.” Apparently the bottom line is that decent copies of Lylah Clare are becoming close to extinct. But thankfully, TCM is still screening it in August – reason enough to keep those TIVOs handy. This is a bizarre, hallucinatory amalgam of Vertigo, Sunset Boulevard, and Aldrich’s own taboo-breaker The Killing of Sister George, that could have only been made during one decade and that has to be seen to be believed. Lewis Zarkan (Peter Finch) is an egomaniacal movie director who wields an almost otherworldly degree of control over everyone around him; Lylah Clare was the alluring foreign star whom he married just prior to her mysterious death, and Elsa Brinkman is a woman with an uncanny resemblance to Lylah whom Lewis brings in as his new star. (Certainly it must have given old Hitchcock a creepy sense of déjà vu when Kim Novak signed on to play Lylah and Elsa). A divisive movie to end all, Lylah Clare polarized critics and regular viewers, some of whom thought it one of the most awful pictures ever made, and others of whom praised it to no end as one of the most deliberately campy send-ups of late 60s Hollywood. At least this much is certain: it’s miles ahead of Myra Breckinridge. (But, then again, what isn’t?) - Screens on Turner Classic Movies, Wednesday 8/13, at 1:30am.

4 - Five Against The House (Phil Karlson, USA, 1955) – At a breezy 84 minutes, this seldom-seen and discussed caper outing anticipates the original Ocean’s Eleven (the Lewis Milestone version) by about five years and mirrors the premise of the novel that Chevy Chase’s character is writing in George Roy Hill’s Funny Farm. It concerns a bunch of college students who half-jokingly devise a nutty scheme to rob a Reno casino, until Brian Keith comes aboard; he plays a mentally-unbalanced character who gets wind of the plot and joins the men, but actually plans to go through with the scheme – pitching this film midway between noir thriller and buddy comedy and giving it a thoroughly unique tone. Screens on Turner Classic Movies, Tuesday 8/12 at 9:45pm.

5 - B.F.’s Daughter (Robert Z. Leonard, USA, 1948) – The luminous, inimitable Barbara Stanwyck stars in this now-forgotten drama that marked one of the first Hollywood romances with not simply hinted-at political undertones, but overt political themes. (Shades of The Way We Were). Stanwyck plays Polly Fulton, the daughter of a filthy rich entrepreneur (Charles Coburn). Going along with daddy’s wishes, she marries a politically-conservative economics professor (Richard Hart) but finds the embrace of a socialist, Thomas Brett (Van Heflin) far more welcoming. Lo and behold (per the reactionary arm of Louis B. Mayer, who stood firmly behind this film and apparently enjoyed using it to criticize then-president FDR), their marriage quickly turns unbearable – so Polly goes behind Thomas’s back and uses her father’s influence to make him successful. The Motion Picture Guide assesses this film as follows: “The script is gutsy, terse, and to the point… director Leonard’s guiding hand is firmly in control throughout and he wastes no time in boiling down and telling the difficult… story.” Screens on Turner Classic Movies, Tue. August 20th at 4am.

6 - Kentucky (David Butler, USA, 1938) – This southern romance stars Loretta Young and Richard Greene as two young Kentuckian lovers whose relationship is complicated by a bitter feud between their families. Director Butler and screenwriters John Taintor Foote and Lamar Trotti set the central tale against the backdrop of the said state’s most iconic sport – horse-racing. The premise may be centuries old, but with a presentation this top-notch (including a film-stealing performance by Walter Brennan as Young’s uncle) and a glorious use of onscreen color, it’s hard to complain. Screens on the Fox Movie Channel, Sunday 8/17 at 6am.

7 - Hudson’s Bay (1940) About eight years after his Oscar nod for Chain Gang, and three years after his Oscar nod for Best Picture-winner Emile Zola, Paul Muni – one of the most brilliant of all Hollywood actors – turned up in this historical saga. He plays Radisson, a 17th century fur trapper with an entrepreneurial vision who dreams of establishing the Hudson’s Bay trading company in Canada, and must persuade King Charles of England to finance it. He succeeds – but just barely – and must counter a war that nearly erupts when one of his associates gets drunk and causes some mayhem. The performance is absolutely as wonderful as one would expect from Muni, and the narrative extremely entertaining. Screens on The Fox Movie Channel, Sat. 8/23 at 6am.

8 - Kardia (Su Rynard, Canada, 2005) – Indie filmmaker Rynard helmed this gentle, reflective drama about a young woman named Hope (Mimi Kuzyk) who as a child (Ariel Waller) underwent a complex heart operation to repair a congenital defect – an experience that forever linked her to a gentleman donor. As the tale opens, Hope (who is now a pathologist) collapses after her heart momentarily stops beating – which prompts her to draw on her pathological knowledge to explore various aspects of her spiritual, emotional and physiological history. Screens on the Sundance Channel – Saturday 8/2 at 4:15am, Thursday 8/7 at 2:30am, Saturday 8/9 at 4:30pm , Thursday 8/21 at 7:30am.

9 - Dumplings (Fruit Chan, Hong Kong, 2004) – Just in terms of graphic content and premise, this full-blooded horror movie qualifies as the most visceral outing on this list or any of my prior lists, but it has substance and holds its own for fans of shock cinema. Miriam Yeung stars as Li Qing, a gourmet chef who happens upon a bizarre and vile method of bringing youth and longevity to her diners – the secret lies in dumplings that contain the most repulsive ingredient imaginable (which will not be disclosed here). Chan uses the film (an expansion of his episode in the omnibus horror film Three… Extremes) as an acidic commentary on contemporary society’s obsession with beauty and fear of aging. It’s as visually and aurally graphic as one can imagine. The most extreme form of Extreme Asian cinema, it hasn’t yet been able to secure a proper video release in the United States – putting it squarely into the same category as the British omnibus outing Destricted, which emerged at about the same time. Those with weak stomachs would be advised to stay away - as far away as possible. Screens on the Sundance Channel, Sunday 8/3 at 3am and Monday 8/25 at 5am.

10 - 100 Films and a Funeral (Michael McNamara, Canada, 2007) – With this film history piece, documentarist McNamara recounts the stunning tale of how megaproducer Michael Kuhn built and launched Polygram Filmed Entertainment in 1991, nearly from scratch – and turned it into one of the most lucrative studios in Europe, with such hits as The Usual Suspects, Four Weddings & A Funeral, and Fargo. Screens on The Sundance Channel, Monday 8/4 at 5:30pm and Wednesday 8/13 at 5am.

PLUS - Nathan’s Pick of the Month that is on Video:

-Because it technically has (or had) a U.S. video release it didn’t make the list, but it’s been out of print for so long that VHS copies are now going on Amazon for $150.00: James Toback’s dazzlingly original, perceptive 1990 documentary The Big Bang. Screens on Flix, practically every other day, through the end of August.

PLUS - Selected Films Held Over From Prior Lists:

Joanna – FMC, Pan/Scan – 8/23 4am
Down to the Sea in Ships – FMC, 8/30 7:45am
The File on Thelma Jordon – TCM 8/19 9:30pm
Dragonwyck – FMC 8/7 10:00am
Kid Blue FMC 8/14 1:30pm