In The Road Trilogy, one of their finest releases in some time, Criterion showcase three key early works by Wim Wenders, one of the finest filmmakers of the New German Cinema.
Criterion Blu-ray review: Wim Wenders’ The Road Trilogy (1974-76)
Author: Kenneth George Godwin
Recent viewing, May-June 2016, part one
Recent viewing ranges from smart B-movie horror to magic realist-inflected neo-realism, with excellent disks from Blue Underground, Shout! Factory and Arrow Video.
Criterion Blu-ray review: Jean Renoir’s La Chienne (1931)
Criterion’s release of a key but little-known feature by Jean Renoir, the conceptually and stylistically sophisticated La Chienne, is essential viewing.
Criterion Blu-ray review: Here Comes Mr. Jordan (1941)
A classic romantic comedy about death gets an impressive new release on Blu-ray from Criterion. Alexander Hall’s Here Comes Mr. Jordan (1941) features a witty script and an impressive cast headed by Robert Montgomery, Claude Rains and Evelyn Keyes in the story of a good-natured boxer snatched prematurely by one of Death’s messengers and returned to Earth in the body of a crooked businessman.
The pleasures of transgression
Two recent disks present transgressive sexuality from very different perspectives: Christian Marquand’s Candy is a glossy big budget production packed with star power, while Curt McDowell’s Thundercrack! is a scrappy underground epic.
The revival of Flipside
After a two year hiatus, the BFI has revived the Flipside series with three notable releases: Val Guest’s musical satire Expresso Bongo, Edmond T. Greville’s juvenile delinquent exploitation movie Beat Girl, and Jose Ramon Larraz’s “lost” horror film Symptoms.
Recent viewing: April & May 2016
Another eclectic selection from my recent viewing, from an old fondly remembered BBC sci-fi series to an unsettling French psychological thriller, from a nasty John Frankenheimer thriller to a pair of atypical Rossellini features striving to break out of the confines of neorealism.
Criterion Blu-ray review: In a Lonely Place (1950)
Criterion releases Nicholas Ray’s In a Lonely Place (1950) in a superb Blu-ray edition with plentiful special features to illuminate this bleak masterpiece about masculine insecurity and the roots of violence.
The art of silent film: Anthony Asquith’s Shooting Stars (1928)
It’s remarkable that it’s still possible to discover a previously unknown yet major film from the silent era, but the BFI’s new release of Anthony Asquith’s first feature, Shooting Stars (1928) is a revelation; a fresh, self-aware film about filmmaking and the intersection of real and imaginary lives.
Two More from Twilight Time
Twilight Time have released two very different movies on Blu-ray: Ralph Nelson’s religious parable Lilies of the Field, which won Sidney Poitier the first ever best actor Oscar for a Black star, and Richard Fleischer’s bleak 10 Rillington Place, the true story of British serial killer John Reginald Christie, which features Richard Attenborough’s finest performance.
Search
Indexes
Monthly Archives
Recent Posts