Something for everyone on this channel. But I'm a Cheerleader ('99). A fun little comedy. Parents determine their daughter is a lesbian and ship her off to a conversion therapy camp, hijinks ensue. Miami Blues ('90). Alec Baldwin is scary good as a live wire ex-con who takes up with a naive young hooker and together they give a seemingly hapless detective all he can handle. Days of Heaven (’78). Not sure how I've missed seeing this movie over the years. A beautifully shot story of love and murder. Oscar winning cinematography. Very impressed by the performance of the young girl co-star and her very moving, poetic narration.
I like her, just watched her in Miami Blues above, and she was great in Tarantino's The Hateful Eight, but her voice can wear me out sometimes. I started watching Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle on the channel but had to bail on that one part way thru, was becoming an endurance test.
She was great in Short Cuts (not on the Criterion collection this month). She played a phone sex worker (that was a thing in the 90s) and Robert Altman said she came up with her own dialog for the scenes where she's on the phone with customers. Robert Altman said she made him blush.
Some recent viewings. Come and See (’85). A young resistance fighter experiences relentless horror and despair as the Nazis roll into Belarus. An epic anti-war film, not for the faint of heart, amplified by outstanding cinematography. The title is a Biblical reference taken from Revelation 6 and the Apocalypse. White Material (2009). Caught up in a rebel uprising, a stubborn colonial family is driven to madness in a struggle to maintain their African coffee plantation. Good movie, driven by the compelling performance of Mme Huppert and the excellent soundtrack by Tindersticks. No Bears (2022). A dissident Iranian filmmaker, the persona of the director himself, has decamped to a small backward village near the Turkish border, becoming involved in parallel storylines that turn to tragedy. A fascinating movie, seemed like cinéma vérité.
It's not often I watch a Criterion Channel movie that I hated, but it happened today. I love Marilyn, but this was one of the most repugnant and awful films I have ever watched. I only finished it because I was in shock with how bad it was. It blows my mind that Don Murray was nominated for an Oscar. What a despicable character and annoying performance. I highly suggest watching any other Marilyn film before this one. The Misfits is my favorite and what I think is a brilliant film. Bus Stop Directed by Joshua Logan • 1956 • United States Starring Marilyn Monroe, Don Murray, Arthur O’Connell This comedic drama, adapted from the play by William Inge, marked Marilyn Monroe’s return to Hollywood following her studies at the Actors Studio in New York. Adopting an Ozark accent, she garnered some of the greatest critical accolades of her career for her multilayered performance as Chérie, a nightclub singer whose dreams of making it as a star in Hollywood are waylaid when she meets Bo (Don Murray), a naive, lovestruck rodeo cowboy who resolves—by any means necessary—to bring her back to Montana and marry her.
I've watched two of the movies in the Anthony Mann directs James Stewart collection. Winchester 73 and Bend Of The River are excellent Westerns. I'm looking forward to watching the rest in this collection.
I also recently watched Winchester 73. I enjoyed it, but didn't love it. I would like to watch more from that collection.
I can recommend Sound It Out, a documentary about a Northern England record store. If you like this forum, you'll probably find plenty familiar in this doc.
I downloaded the Criterion Channel app last night. My TV is plugged right into my ethernet cable. I get good streams from a lot of platforms. Is the Criterion Channel usually this poor quality? There is a lot of digital junk in the streams. I tried several movies and even let them buffer a bit, if I could. Understand, I'm watching on a LG C1 77" OLED at 6.5ft away. It just seems like poor streaming output. Am I wrong?
The plot is far-fetched, but Jennifer was effective in Single White Female. If you want to see how far an actor will go to embody a part, see Georgia, as hard as it is to watch. Ironically, Mare Winningham got the Oscar nod for a very understated supporting role. Jennifer owns every frame of this film, playing a trainwreck of a person if there ever was one.
You aren't wrong. I occasionally have loading problems when the movie will stutter and die. I duck out of the app and then back in and it usually works again. I read somewhere on Reddit that it's a Vimeo issue, comes and goes. Hang in there.
Godland. I saw those landscapes in Iceland first hand just a couple weeks ago. The movie is two and a half hours long and beautiful to look at, but very slow. And don't be surprised if you're a little confused as to what happened.
Most recently. Spirit of the Beehive (’73). A rewatch and a new appreciation of this excellent film. A young girl is haunted by the image of Frankenstein’s monster after a travelling projectionist shows the movie to a captivated audience in her rustic village in Spain. Takes place at a time when that country’s Civil War is ending and the dictator Franco has taken power, so a political subtext may be explored. The Cremator (’69). A soft-spoken, rather stolid funeral director reveals his true nature, becoming increasingly more deranged as Nazi influence begins to take hold in late 30s Czechoslovakia. Good camerawork and editing. Psychological horror by way of the very darkest shade of black comedy. Godland (2022). Newest addition to the channel, worth checking out for sure. Commented on this one in another thread. An impressive film, a slow burner set in the late 1800s sees a Danish priest begin to self destruct when sent to Iceland on a mission to build a church and begin a ministry. Some amazing shots throughout of the Icelandic terrain.
A bit late to this retrospective... Method Acting: A Place in the Sun (1951, George Stevens) A poor boy gets a job working for his rich uncle and ends up falling in love with two women. Love the young lookers, Montgomery Clift and Liz Taylor, in this Stevens classic but the kooky and wonderful Shelly Winters makes it memorable for me. In the YT post above Winter talks about the film, Stevens, teaching and and demonstrates a pinch of the method with tv host, Skip Lowe in '89.
Love Place in the Sun. I’d read the book first and flew through it. Clift and Taylor are at their best and both the epitome of beautiful movie stars. And Shelly plays her part perfect too.
Respect, but I think I'd need a palate cleanser every once in a while. Enjoyed this one a few days ago. Supermarket Woman (’96). Two Japanese supermarkets compete for customers. Very nice screwball comedy. Another gem from Itami, the director of Tampopo, starring his wife, the talented actress who featured in most of his other films as well.
It's one of my all-time favorite movies. Incredibly good. The score (mostly by Ennio Morricone, though Doug Kershaw and Leo Kottke also contributed) is sublime.
