Speaking of Kirk Douglas, i saw Kubrick's Paths of Glory for the very first time this week. Can scarcely believe I've never caught this before. (It's the only Kubrick film I hadn't seen.) It's a great movie, an impassioned anti-war diatribe set in the thick of WWI, with stark yet gorgeous black-and-white photography and a passel of vivid performances. Without Douglas's active participation as green-lighter and producer (as well as star), however, it never would have gotten made. Much has been said about Kirk Douglas as the quintessential Hollywood egomaniac, but his heart could obviously be in the right place and he put his money where his mouth was. He's one of my very favorite movie stars.

He's supported briliiantly in Paths of Glory by George Macready, Ralph Meeker, and Adolphe Menjou. And Kubrick's direction is stunning--sometimes a touch arty, but tight and focused and unrelenting. This winds up as possibly my second-favorite Kubrick, and interestingly the cast includes Timothy Carey and Emile Meyer from my still-favorite SK movie The Killing.

I agree wholeheartedly with your comments, but there is a certain part that could have done better. Spoiler: I saw the movie three times and the scene very very near the end where they hang the men annoyed me with its length. The acting was very good and very disturbing, but SK dragged it tooooooo long.

Finally caught up to Svankmajer's Alice.
It's loosely based on Alice in Wonderland.
Svankmajer comes up with a number of clever ways of visualizing things. When the little girl shrinks she becomes a doll which is then animated with stop-motion techniques. When Alice is large, sometimes she is put into the small-scale sets. But a couple of times, the girl is inside a large paper-mache Alice doll, which is a weird effect.

I also liked how the Red Queen is a cut-out from the playing card and once she goes through a door whose opening is exactly her figure. Wonderfully weird and simple. I prefer his 2nd feature, Faust, but Alice is quite a good start to his feature filmmaking.

I've seen Shawshank more than once. It's a fantastic film, and together with Pulp Fiction constitutes one of my major exhibits in the Oscar-gets-it-wrong-most-of-the-time lecture. They both lost to Gump, and although most people disagree, I would give the Oscar to Shawshank over even Pulp Fiction.

Stand By Me is also based on Stephen King, as is Dolores Claiborne, far from a horror flick.