I actually had something else in mind last night, but the Rita Hayworth collection caught my eye on the front page and that was that. A couple of these films are new to me but I suspect I'll have time for all of them, including yet another viewing of "Gilda".
I'm finally gonna make it through all the Melville films I haven't seen thanks to the Criterion channel. I love his movies! I just watched Un Flic. This was his last film and gets mixed reviews. I loved it and thought the look of it was great with the blue tint and the amazing opening jewelry heist scene. I'm curious what others think of it? The only problem with it is it's not as good as many of his other movies. It is still better than most directors best. The entire toy train and helicopter scene was surprising since he has done amazing train shots in past movies. I love the train scene at the start of Le Cercle Rouge. He obviously knew what he was doing. I am sure the fake looking toy shots had a purpose for him. I actually liked it. It suddenly felt like a Wes Anderson film. All in all I say it's definitely worth your time especially for the opening sequence. 8/10
Because of the pandemic I have the desire to only watch films or read books or listen to music that is inspiring. Glad to have Criterion right now. I hope this will continue after the pandemic is over.
Yes, I can see why it got mixed reviews, aside from the toy train and helicopter. Some of it is just not plausible. But I like how visually modernist it is, and it has some great moments.
Just watched this again. This is such a smart film, so I've had to see it a few times before I could see it. Palance is great as the bombastic American producer and Fritz Lang playing himself has seen it all. Contempt Directed by Jean-Luc Godard • 1963 • France Starring Brigitte Bardot, Michel Piccoli, Jack Palance Jean-Luc Godard’s subversive foray into commercial filmmaking is a star-studded Cinemascope epic. CONTEMPT stars Michel Piccoli as a screenwriter torn between the demands of a proud European director (played by legendary director Fritz Lang), a crude and arrogant American producer (Jack Palance), and his disillusioned wife, Camille (Brigitte Bardot), as he attempts to doctor the script for a new film version of “The Odyssey.”
This is charming! The Machine That Kills Bad People Directed by Roberto Rossellini • 1952 • Italy A demon bestows on a self-righteous working photographer's camera the power to smite from the Earth "evil-doers". Naturally, the indignant photographer turns his new weapon on, one by one, his entire village, beginning with the wealthy or illustrious. Soon, the poor he is so supposedly so enamored of become his victims too, so rife with impatience and contempt is he, that the slightest flaw is cause for smiting. Inevitably, he embarks on a task to destroy everyone.
I started watching this last night. Recommended by Wes Anderson and written by the great Antoine de Saint-Exupery. "But its special status resides in its screenplay, the sole work in that writing genre by renowned aviator/author Antoine de Saint-Exupery (1900-1944), whose credits also included The Little Prince."
Let's try to put the descriptions alongside the graphics. I'm always excited to see everyone's recommendations! Here's the description for the one above: Cry, The Beloved Country Directed by Zoltán Korda • 1951 • United Kingdom Starring Canada Lee, Charles Carson, Sidney Poitier Alan Paton’s classic anti-apartheid novel receives a moving adaptation courtesy of director-producer Zoltán Korda. Shot on location in South Africa, this firsthand look at a bitterly divided country follows rural minister Stephen Kumalo (icon and activist Canada Lee in his final film role) as he travels to Johannesburg in search of his estranged son and discovers the devastation that apartheid has wrought. In one of his first screen roles, Sidney Poitier costars as a clergyman who guides Kumalo on his journey through the city.
This is up next: Too Late To Die Young Directed by Dominga Sotomayor • 2018 • Chile Starring Demian Hernández, Antar Machado, Magdalena Tótoro Dominga Sotomayor's intoxicating teenage daydream floats by in a haze of gorgeously gauzy images. Chile, 1990: in a remote artists' commune in the shadow of the Andes, a small band of families builds a new world far removed from the tumult of the city and the emerging freedoms that have come with the country's transition to democracy. It's in this time of change and reckoning that sixteen-year-old Sofia (Demian Hernández) confronts love, fear, and the dangerous unpredictability of nature. As the New Year approaches, Sofia begins to realize that you can't shut the real world out forever.
I just watched this one last night. I stumbled on it after someone else recommend Pale Flower, which is another film by the director, Masahiro Shinoda. I have to say I much preferred Double Suicide over Pale Flower. A very unique and strange movie. Double Suicide Directed by Masahiro Shinoda • 1969 • Japan Many films have drawn from classic Japanese theatrical forms, but none with such shocking cinematic effect as director Masahiro Shinoda's Double Suicide. In this striking adaptation of a Bunraku puppet play (featuring the music of famed composer Toru Takemitsu), a paper merchant sacrifices family, fortune, and ultimately life for his erotic obsession with a prostitute. Criterion is proud to present Double Suicide in a stunning digital transfer, with a new and improved English subtitle translation.
I was probably the one who spoke up about Pale Flower. Anyway, Shinoda doesn’t go as far “out” as say, Nagasi Oshima does, but he is definitely more abstract than the Japanese directors more commonly know in the west, Kurosawa, Ozu, or Mizoguchi. If you like jazz, he is kind of like Andrew Hill in that sense that Hill falls between Horace Silver (not as straight as) and Cecil Taylor (not as far out as) when it comes to film making. Shinoda will abstract the form, but not so far as to alienate some viewers. You might like some of his work as well as dislike some, but if you like being a bit challenged give more of his films a try. Just because I love his films doesn’t mean that others will. I just try to explain why I like them and let the person I am talking to decide for themselves because there is nothing I dislike more than somebody passing something of as the reinvention of the wheel, i.e. “you have to see this it is the greatest thing ever” completely oblivious to the other person’s tastes.
I love Japanese movies and Kurosawa is a favorite. I also love Kaneto Shindo movies like Kuroneko and Onibaba. I love the recommendation for other Japanese movies. I already have several more I want to watch from Shinoda and now Oshima.
A rollicking and excruciating comedy and a kind of forerunner to the more recent The Daytrippers, IMO. Another Wes Anderson recommendation. The Out-of-Towners Directed by Arthur Hiller • 1970 • United States Starring Jack Lemmon, Sandy Dennis, Sandy Baron Scripted by Neil Simon, this black comedy of mishaps follows an Ohio couple (Jack Lemmon and Sandy Dennis) as they travel to New York City for a job interview, a doomed thirty-six-hour excursion during which they experience all the frustrations, headaches, and horrors that the 1970s Big Apple had to offer, from transit woes to muggings and more. Crackling with Simon’s typically snappy, razor-sharp dialogue, THE OUT OF TOWNERS offers a painfully funny, all-too-real take on the chaos of life in the city that never sleeps.
Hilarious! How to Get Ahead in Advertising Directed by Bruce Robinson • 1988 • United Kingdom, United States Richard E. Grant is the endlessly suave Dennis Bagley, a high-strung advertising executive whose shoulder sprouts an evil, talking boil. The boil speaks only to Bagley, is silent to the rest of the world, and seems to be growing. This caustic satire reunites the talented team behind the cult classic Withnail and I to create a tour de force of verbal jousting and physical comedy.
Solaris (1972, Andrei Tarkovsky) The first 20 minutes or so of this film are utterly beautiful, even fascinating, as we begin unravel the mystery of the planet Solaris from Earth. Trouble is, once Kris, the main character, get there the mystery ends and we're left with the ghosts that he takes with him. Apparently, everyone who has ever travelled there succumbs to their own demons as well. It's all, frankly, a bit dull. Tarkovsky on Earth is far more intriguing.
I recently watched 'Valerie and Her Week of Wonders'. A magical film about the way a young woman feels entering her womanhood, her interaction with the world outside and the changing world inside her.
A joy every time I see this: The Adventures of Baron Munchausen Directed by Terry Gilliam • 1988 • United Kingdom Starring John Neville, Eric Idle, Sarah Polley Terry Gilliam’s lavish fantasy bursts with wit, invention, and eye-popping imagery as it brings to life the fantastical exploits of the eponymous eighteenth-century German adventurer (John Neville) whose journeys take him from the belly of a sea monster to the moon and beyond. A notorious box-office failure in its day, THE ADVENTURES OF BARON MUNCHAUSEN can now be appreciated as one of the most audacious examples of auteurist vision run riot ever to be bankrolled by a Hollywood studio as well as for its astounding special effects, achieved without the assistance of CGI. Look out for Robin Williams in an uncredited cameo as the King of the Moon.
