tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-87963712012-01-25T08:45:51.934-08:00I'm going to watch every last DVD in the Criterion Collection. Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.comBlogger1281100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-54347445397796275722011-11-29T16:52:00.000-08:002011-11-30T12:50:47.193-08:00

Mon Oncle, 1958, directed by Jacques Tati, written by Jacques Tati, with the artistic collaboration of Jacques Lagrange and Jean L'Hôte. Not even Triumph of the Will announces its visual strategy as succinctly as Mon Oncle, which opens with the following credits: Followed immediately by the film's title: It's cold, sterile modernity versus warm, chaotic life, down to the adorable pack of

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-85218603720383488492011-10-04T00:03:00.000-07:002011-10-04T00:07:01.000-07:00

M. Hulot's Holiday, 1953, directed by Jacques Tati, written by Henri Marquet, Jacques Tati, Pierre Aubert, and Jacques Lagrange. It's easy to forget just how much comedy is fueled by misanthropy until you encounter a film like M. Hulot's Holiday. As something of a misanthrope myself, I have mixed feelings about this kind of movie. On the one hand, it's a gentle, affectionate film that manages to

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-89940230574050823272011-07-06T02:10:00.000-07:002011-07-06T02:14:50.957-07:00

The Scarlet Empress, 1934, directed by Josef von Sternberg, screenplay by Eleanor McGeary, from the diaries of Catherine II, arranged by Manual Komroff. From the Poetics right up until the post-structuralists blew everything up, literary critics spent a surprising amount of time on taxonomies of genre. Although it has glaring omissions, I think Northrop Frye's was one of the most elegant, if for

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-42597850431235751492011-06-09T23:11:00.000-07:002011-06-09T23:12:05.803-07:00

The Rock, 1996, directed by Michael Bay, screenplay by David Weisberg & Douglas S. Cook and Mark Rosner, story by David Weisberg & Douglas S. Cook. Here's Michael Bay on the commentary track for The Rock, talking about his decision to insert a stand-alone car chase into the film, a sequence that, for all its sound and fury, accomplishes exactly nothing that has anything at all to do with the

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com22tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-29222078594665707272011-04-08T18:23:00.000-07:002011-04-08T18:48:39.228-07:00

Mona Lisa, 1986, directed by Neil Jordan, screenplay by Neil Jordan and David Leland. As anyone who has ever been a teenager will tell you, romantic obsession is more about subject than object. Proust grasped this completely: No doubt very few people understand the purely subjective nature of the phenomenon that we call love, or how it creates, so to speak, a supplementary person, distinct from

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com21tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-31767565598743262412011-03-13T18:55:00.000-07:002011-03-23T00:34:17.384-07:00

Coup de Torchon, 1981, directed by Bertrand Tavernier, screenplay by Bertrand Tavernier and Jean Aurenche, from the novel Pop. 1280 by Jim Thompson. One of my favorite types of novel doesn't really have a name, but if it did, it would be something like "books with possibly unreliable narrators who are morally reprehensible but can also be quite charming, because, after all, they're the narrator.

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-73432425409428359322011-02-25T01:38:00.000-08:002011-03-17T15:54:29.085-07:00

Spartacus, 1960, directed by Stanley Kubrick, screenplay by Dalton Trumbo, from the novel by Howard Fast When most actors discover they didn't get a role they wanted, they react like you or I would: by driving to Las Vegas and spending the rent money on blackjack and cocaine. But Kirk Douglas was never most actors. So when William Wyler gave the role of Ben Hur to Charlton Heston, Douglas

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com29tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-20438445219241016802011-02-01T01:12:00.000-08:002011-02-01T10:21:32.771-08:00

Double Suicide, 1969, directed by Masahiro Shinoda, written by Masahiro Shinoda, Tôru Takemitsu, and Taeko Tomioka, from the play by Monzaemon Chikamatsu. It's a truism that film has its roots in theater. Less remarked upon is how shallow those roots usually are: most movies owe more to melodrama and vaudeville than to Shakespeare. And they owe twentieth century drama almost nothing. Okay,

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-3727768741040513062011-01-02T18:35:00.000-08:002011-01-04T13:22:56.082-08:00

The Lady Eve, 1941, written and directed by Preston Sturges, from a story by Monckton Hoffe. It's nearly impossible to write about The Lady Eve without violating Richard Brody's dictum that "the past should be used to nourish the present, not bludgeon it." In the general case, I think Brody's skepticism toward the TCM Industrial Complex is salutary: nostalgia for classical Hollywood cinema is

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-41484115782555438362010-11-01T01:44:00.000-07:002010-11-01T01:44:41.023-07:00

The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, 1972, directed by Luis Buñuel, written by Luis Buñuel and Jean-Claude Carrière. It's a truism that the 1970's were a golden age for mainstream recognition of difficult films. But if you want to really demonstrate to someone exactly what that means, don't sit them down in front of Mean Streets or The Conversation. Put in The Discreet Charm of the

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-54594219051296140732010-10-05T02:31:00.000-07:002010-10-05T10:51:19.271-07:00

Cries and Whispers, 1972, written and directed by Ingmar Bergman. In Harold Pinter's marvelous play Moonlight, a woman tells her terminally ill husband, "Death will be your new horizon." It's the most quietly chilling sentence I know, and it would have made the perfect epigraph for Cries and Whispers. The film is concerned with the business of dying, and not in an abstract way. Harriet Andersson

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com24tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-19839193407105188822010-08-21T19:30:00.000-07:002010-08-22T10:22:43.549-07:00

Beastie Boys Video Anthology, 1981–2000, videos directed by Evan Bernard, Adam Bernstein, Tamra Davis, Nathanial Hörnblowér, Spike Jonze, Ari Marcopoulos, and David Perez. The only type of film that gets less critical attention than music videos are commercials, and that's a shame on both counts. For one thing, the consumerist dystopia in The Flowbee Home Haircutting Show is crying out for

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com19tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-20721609445037825652010-07-16T02:50:00.000-07:002010-07-30T11:45:55.285-07:00

Gimme Shelter, 1970, directed by David Maysles, Albert Maysles, and Charlotte Zwerin. Some films enter the canon the minute their last frame clears the projector at a critics' screening. Other films need time and context before their greatness becomes apparent. Gimme Shelter, David Maysles, Albert Maysles, and Charlotte Zwerin's magnificent film about the Rolling Stones' 1969 tour of the States,

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com24tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-83083746085689032942010-06-03T00:44:00.000-07:002010-06-03T00:46:47.799-07:00

L'Avventura, 1960, directed by Michelangelo Antonioni, screenplay by Michelangelo Antonioni, Elio Bartolini, and Tonino Guerra, story by Michelangelo Antonioni. Film genres have observable lifecycles. Comedy has survived pretty much unchanged since L'Arroseur Arrosé, like those bacteria that have been alive since before the dinosaurs. Westerns are more like cicadas: they burrow underground for

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com25tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-286516728276784162010-04-01T10:24:00.000-07:002010-04-01T10:26:07.976-07:00

Hot Tub Time Machine, 2010, directed by Steve Pink, from a screenplay by Josh Heald and Sean Anders & John Morris. Some films suggest their own marketing campaigns by having a simple, easy to communicate concept. Take L'Avventura, for example: a woman is missing. There's your premise, there's your trailer, there's your Super Bowl ad, and everyone in marketing can take the rest of the day off,

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-25986629717393827822010-03-22T02:48:00.000-07:002010-03-22T14:04:25.266-07:00

Do The Right Thing, 1989, written and directed by Spike Lee. It's hard to believe it now, but on its initial release, Do The Right Thing caused a genuine public uproar. Critics wrote that Spike Lee's film would inflame racial hatred, incite riots, and, perhaps worst of all, doom the mayoral campaign of David Dinkins. Actually, the only person who made that last claim was Joe Klein, who

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com25tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-58536273206893347982010-01-08T01:26:00.000-08:002010-01-08T01:50:47.084-08:00

Written on the Wind, 1956, directed by Douglas Sirk, screenplay by George Zuckerman, from the novel by Robert Wilder. I thought that All That Heaven Allows was about as over-the-top as Sirk could get. I gravely underestimated him. The credits may claim that Written on the Wind is based on a novel by Robert Wilder, but it seems to me to be a film adaptation of the paperback rack at a low-end

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com18tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-14481540855346293832009-12-30T11:07:00.000-08:002009-12-30T11:35:23.363-08:00

If you're arriving here from Roger Ebert's incredibly gracious article about this project, welcome! If it's your first time here, here are links to some of the essays I'm happiest with: Rushmore Ivan the Terrible - Parts I & II Vagabond Brazil Hamlet The Harder They Come The Last Temptation of Christ And a big thanks to Jeff McMahon, who loaned me most of the DVDs in the photo that

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-50701101741988350832009-12-08T02:26:00.000-08:002009-12-11T17:06:26.484-08:00

All That Heaven Allows, 1955, directed by Douglas Sirk, screenplay by Peg Fenwick, from a short story by Edna L. Lee and Harry Lee. After a couple of weeks in Hollywood, you realize that there's a definite hierarchy of film critics in this town, and there's only a very small A-list. Don't get me wrong: creative executives read second-tier critics—your Roger Eberts, your A. O. Scotts, even

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-10209215478213219382009-11-03T11:21:00.001-08:002009-11-03T12:38:11.568-08:00

Here are some of the films from the Criterion Collection that are showing in the Los Angeles area in the month of November. The month starts off slow but the Aero seems to be having a Criterion Laserdisc festival at the end. If you know of any listings (or shows in other geographical areas) that I've missed, please drop me a line and I'll add them. I'm including one non-Criterion film for

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-32980210067749441292009-10-01T12:51:00.000-07:002009-10-01T14:24:04.757-07:00

Here are some of the films from the Criterion Collection that are showing in the Los Angeles area in the month of October. Not a lot going on this month as the Cinefamily and New Beverly gear up for halloween (horror is not Criterion's best-represented genre). LACMA has an Alain Resnais series. If you know of any listings (or shows in other geographical areas) that I've missed, please drop me

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-31313960438569859152009-09-07T14:30:00.000-07:002009-09-09T18:49:44.078-07:00

I Know Where I'm Going!, 1945, written and directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. After having such mixed feelings about the gap between the formal and technical brilliance of Black Narcissus and its toxic cultural context,1 it was a relief to see Powell and Pressburger on less cringeworthy ground. Thematically, a lot of I Know Where I'm Going! is familiar: a Western worldview runs

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-48444983780190178412009-09-01T00:47:00.000-07:002009-09-01T14:24:45.248-07:00

I saw Play Time on 70mm at the Aero a few weeks back, and it occurred to me that this site's focus on DVDs obscures the fact that virtually everything in the Criterion Collection was designed to be seen in a theater (with a few exceptions). So for those of you in Los Angeles, here are some of the films from the Criterion Collection that are showing in movie theaters during the month of September

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-12686718760640597272009-08-25T02:14:00.000-07:002009-08-25T02:27:21.486-07:00

Black Narcissus, 1947, directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, screenplay by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, from the novel by Rumer Godden. Cinema's a multidisciplinary medium. In a perfect movie, all of its various elements would work together toward a unified goal: writing, acting, cinematography, editing, score, and so on. But one can't have everything; even Citizen Kane

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com30tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-86546404670524346062009-06-15T10:36:00.000-07:002009-07-03T19:08:19.503-07:00

Fiend Without A Face, 1958, directed by Arthur Crabtree, screenplay by Herbert J. Leder, from the short story "The Thought Monster" by Amelia Reynolds Long. Some movies are brilliant from the first frame to the last. Some are irredeemable drek all the way through. And some have flashes of greatness. Fiend Without A Face falls into the last category, although it's not so much a flash as a

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-5086792867430242792009-05-03T17:55:00.000-07:002009-05-07T12:57:10.067-07:00

The Blob, 1958, directed by Irwin S. Yeaworth, Jr., screenplay by Kate Phillips and Theodore Simonson, from an idea by Irvine Millgate. It's an article of faith among film critics that the schlock sci-fi of the fifties can be mapped onto the fears of the era: Godzilla is about fear of the atomic bomb, Invasion of the Body Snatchers is about fear of conformity, and Forbidden Planet is about fear

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-26851101831361466282009-03-25T16:18:00.000-07:002009-03-25T16:18:53.325-07:00

Kwaidan, 1965, directed by Masaki Kobayashi, screenplay by Yôko Mizuki, from short stories written by Lafcadio Hearn. In American horror films, one of the obligatory shots for building tension is a tracking shot down a hallway to an unopened door. Jonathan Demme talks about it in the commentary to The Silence of the Lambs, and there's a version of it in just about any slasher or horror film you

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-17052920896242711622009-01-27T17:00:00.000-08:002009-01-27T17:10:20.518-08:00

So you're no longer reading the Criterion Contraption, a blog by Matthew Dessem. Say hello to the award-winning Criterion Contraption, an award-wining blog by award-winning blogger Matthew Dessem. That's right; thanks to your votes, the Criterion Contraption was named the Best Cult Blog in the www.totalfilm.com Movie Blog Awards, 2009. The official award logo will be up as soon as I'm back at

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-22489054438813435492009-01-16T12:50:00.000-08:002009-01-16T13:05:10.487-08:00

The Criterion Contraption has been nominated for a Totalfilm.com 2009 Movie Blog Award in the "Cult" category. So shave your heads, dear readers, and let's get ready for that sweet, sweet flying saucer to heaven. I'll make kool-aid. In any event, I'm currently running a respectable second place. With seven votes. If you'd like to be lucky number eight, you can vote here, until January 25.

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-28869305972552668932009-01-14T02:04:00.000-08:002009-01-28T13:48:27.420-08:00

Sisters, 1973, directed by Brian De Palma, screenplay by Brian De Palma and Louisa Rose, story by Brian De Palma. When is a travesty not a travesty? When it's a De Palma movie. Actually, the right answer is when the travesty succeeds on the same terms as its model, no matter how over-the-top and exaggerated it is. That's what makes Starship Troopers a parody of dumb action movies and an

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-25021607084848275532009-01-04T22:57:00.001-08:002009-01-04T23:03:22.767-08:00

Many of you have been wondering where I've been—thank you for those of you who wrote with concern or just telling me I should get back in front of the computer. The short answer is I've been all over: I got a new job, a new apartment, some new furniture, wrote a couple of new screenplays, and on and on. Today is the first day that I've had a reliable internet connection that wasn't at my office

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-23486506506059376742009-01-04T22:57:00.000-08:002009-01-06T09:31:03.369-08:00

Ivan the Terrible, 1945–1946, written and directed by Sergei Eisenstein. I was wrong about Sergei Eisenstein. What I'd seen of his work had led me to believe he was only of historical interest: a master of technical innovations that have since been so thoroughly absorbed into cinematic grammar that they no longer seem remarkable. The person who invented the wheel undoubtedly changed the world

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-78410241212900679912008-09-01T02:56:00.000-07:002008-09-01T14:35:47.878-07:00

Alexander Nevsky, 1938, directed by Sergei Eisenstein, written by Sergei Eisenstein and Pyotr Pavlenko. In Frank S. Nugent's review of Alexander Nevsky for the New York Times, he wrote that Sergei Eisenstein had a "talent for doing great things so well and little things so badly." Nugent (who went on to write The Searchers, among other films), had Eisenstein dead to rights. Alexander Nevsky is a

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com22tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-10929643459760563952008-09-01T02:30:00.000-07:002009-01-04T23:04:17.313-08:00

Spine #86 in the Criterion Collection is assigned to the Eisenstein: The Sound Years box set, which comprises the following two films. As each has its own spine number, they are reviewed separately. #87: Alexander Nevsky #88: Ivan the Terrible - Parts I & II

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-57469081831224790402008-08-07T01:06:00.000-07:002008-08-07T01:10:04.965-07:00

Pygmalion, 1938, directed by Anthony Asquith and Leslie Howard, written by George Bernard Shaw, W. P. Lipscomb, Cecil Lewis, Ian Dalrymple, Anatole de Grunwald, and Kay Walsh, from the play by George Bernard Shaw. Pygmalion is the story of a beautiful young woman who moves in with a pedantic jerk. And yet it was written nearly 100 years before my girlfriend and I found an apartment together.

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-13939883925373091082008-04-28T02:52:00.000-07:002008-05-02T12:31:48.896-07:00

Good Morning, 1959, directed by Yasujiro Ozu, written by Yasujiro Ozu and Kôgo Noda. A day or two after I first saw Good Morning, I received an email from Ozu fan and Criterion Contraption reader Lewis Saul urging me to watch any of his other films before this one. Apparently, Good Morning isn't emblematic of his work, and he was afraid I would get the wrong impression about Ozu if I started

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com18tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-23067341059452690922008-04-17T21:23:00.001-07:002008-04-17T21:24:28.572-07:00

I know, I know, I'm supposed to write about Good Morning. Soon. In the meantime, why not enter The Uwe Boll Movie Challenge?

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-90863063968242619172008-03-10T00:58:00.000-07:002008-03-10T01:33:24.792-07:00

As some of you know, I currently work as a systems engineer for New Line Cinema. If you read the news, you know it won't be long before I no longer work for New Line Cinema. I don't know when my last day will be, and I want to work until then, so I get my severance package. But I'm thinking about my next move. I know some of the people who read this blog work in the entertainment industry

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-64276849676019832212008-03-10T00:46:00.000-07:002008-03-10T00:56:34.692-07:00

The Harder They Come, 1973, directed by Perry Henzell, written by Perry Henzell and Trevor D. Rhone. In August of 1973, my father and mother moved into a strange little house on Massachusetts Avenue in Cambridge, where my father was starting law school. The house belonged to an elderly woman who promised her husband before his death that she wouldn't sell the home they'd shared. So while the

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-39927091549384127752008-02-24T02:20:00.000-08:002008-02-24T19:22:34.827-08:00

Hamlet, 1948, directed by Laurence Olivier, screenplay by Laurence Olivier and Alan Dent, from the play by William Shakespeare. Staging Hamlet requires a special sort of madness, feigned or genuine. It's not just the greatest work in Western literature. It's not just the most fully realized portrait of human consciousness and self-consciousness, with all the miserable paradoxes they entail. The

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com24tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-22013596350109248352008-01-17T03:05:00.000-08:002008-01-17T03:14:58.672-08:00

Variety Lights, 1950, directed by Federico Fellini and Alberto Lattuada, screenplay by Federico Fellini, Alberto Lattuada, and Tullio Pinelli, story by Federico Fellini.The showbiz movie has two basic archetypes, positive and negative. In the positive version, an innocent gets discovered and rises to the top: the conflict comes when they have to choose between violating some core principle and

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-60428200100929814362007-12-16T15:00:00.000-08:002008-01-22T21:58:27.853-08:00

The Element of Crime, 1984, directed by Lars von Trier, written by Niels Vørsel and Lars von Trier. I rarely like dream sequences. They're usually a solution of last resort when a filmmaker needs to cram in some exposition about a character's mental state and can't find a way to do it elegantly. Even in Ratatouille—which I think is near-perfect—Linguini's nightmare about Ego doesn't add anything

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com28tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-16483635558705539192007-11-16T01:05:00.000-08:002008-01-22T21:59:24.764-08:00

W. C. Fields - Six Short Films, 1915–1933, various directors and writers. In The Bank Dick, W. C. Fields says, "In the old Sennett days, I used to direct Fatty Arbuckle, Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton and the rest of them... Nights, I used to tend bar." Six Short Films gives viewers a chance to see the product of that kind of schedule. The results are pretty much what you'd expect. Here are the

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-16020812284976197872007-10-17T23:31:00.000-07:002008-01-22T21:59:53.543-08:00

The Bank Dick, 1940, directed by Edward Cline, screenplay by W. C. Fields (credited as Mahatma Kane Jeeves, as in "M'hat, m'cane, Jeeves!"). In its rough outline, The Bank Dick sounds almost hard boiled. A misanthropic drunk with a miserable family life lies his way into a job as a bank security guard. Once there, he convinces a coworker (and son-in-law to-be) to embezzle money and invest it in

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-2952294826636804432007-10-09T09:51:00.001-07:002007-12-18T12:17:06.465-08:00

The second part of Christopher Zane's interview of me (and probably the only time my words will run with a still from Josie and the Pussycats) is here. And I highly recommend you check out the rest of his blog.

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-84039343299974655992007-10-08T21:58:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:00:56.435-08:00

And God Created Woman, 1956, directed by Roger Vadim, screenplay by Roger Vadim and Raoul Lévy. After 76 Criterion films, we finally arrive at straight exploitation. And God Created Woman has a joke of a plot, terrible acting, retrograde sexual politics, and exactly three good qualities: eye-popping colors, CinemaScope, and Brigitte Bardot. And the first two aren't that important. And God

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-71248675665820119402007-10-08T09:29:00.000-07:002007-10-08T09:37:58.926-07:00

And God Created Woman is nearly done. In the meantime, Christopher Zane interviewed me over the weekend for his blog. Part one of two is posted here.

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-66520026348922402372007-10-02T00:10:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:01:44.959-08:00

Brief Encounter, 1946, directed by David Lean, written by David Lean, Noël Coward, Anthony Havelock-Allan, and Ronald Neame from the play Still Life, by Noël Coward. Brief Encounter is the epitome of a genre that has completely vanished from cinema: the woman's picture.1 Jim Shepard memorably described this type of film as stories that: ...trundled through decades of forbearance: slow-moving,

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com22tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-8982919788983965882007-09-23T23:35:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:02:19.628-08:00

Chasing Amy, 1997, written and directed by Kevin Smith. Everyone has a moment when they're rudely forced to accept that they aren't as young as they'd like to believe. Martin Amis's day of reckoning came on May 21st, 1976, when the Rolling Stones played Earls Court. Here's what he wrote at the time: Perhaps I'm too old for this sort of thing now—too old to buy fruitless discomfort at £1 an

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com25tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-27183255806289668332007-09-10T13:38:00.000-07:002007-12-18T13:41:36.204-08:00

Hello, all -- I've moved, and won't have internet access at my place until next weekend, so I apologize for the lag in posting. A few things I wanted to pass on to you: Criterion has redesigned their website. Give it a look -- They're asking for feedback and any errors you might find, which can be sent to testing@criterion.com. You'll notice something very nice in the "Links" section of

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-46624575013230728192007-08-23T01:50:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:06:27.157-08:00

Vagabond, 1985, written and directed by Agnès Varda. In Cléo from 5 to 7, Agnès Varda made frequent use of tracking shots to follow Cléo along Parisian streets, and she does a lot of the same kind of camerawork in Vagabond. But while the narcissistic Cléo is nearly always in the center of the frame, Vagabond's protagonist, a homeless young woman named Mona Bergeron, can barely stay in the

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-83383638989666958162007-08-16T12:23:00.000-07:002007-12-18T13:40:58.385-08:00

I have a short essay in the September/October issue of GOOD Magazine, available at finer newstands everywhere. But why not subscribe? $20 gets you a year subscription, and 100% of your subscription fee goes to the charitable organization of your choice (the magazine is supported by ad revenue). If you're the kind of person who can't wait for a paper copy, you can read the article online here

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-45963644437615758812007-08-01T03:00:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:06:52.805-08:00

Cléo from 5 to 7, 1962, written and directed by Agnès Varda. Depending on how anal-retentive your English teachers were, you may have been given a handout at some point with a list titled TYPES OF CONFLICT. The one I got looked like this: Man Versus HimselfMan Versus ManMan Versus NatureMan Versus Society And so on. According to my seventh-grade Xerox, all conflicts in literature fit into

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-38130283016555867652007-07-04T15:27:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:07:23.832-08:00

Le Million, 1931, directed by René Clair, written by René Clair, from the play by Georges Berr and Marcel Guillemaud. Comedy doesn't travel well. When a movie is going to be translated and dubbed or subtitled, post-production gives translators a giant binder with an annotated version of the closed captioning, explaining every idiom, allusion, and pun. The goal is to give the translators

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-31801963201228842422007-06-15T01:06:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:07:49.549-08:00

The Magic Flute, 1975, directed by Ingmar Bergman, from the opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. When someone says the name Ingmar Bergman, two words spring immediately to mind: Comic. Opera. Someone at Sveriges Radio made the obvious connection and hired Bergman to direct a film of Mozart's The Magic Flute to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the network. Filming

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-84192600209575741832007-05-24T23:28:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:08:18.330-08:00

The Last Temptation of Christ, 1988, directed by Martin Scorsese, screenplay by Paul Schrader, from the novel by Nikos Kazantzakis. A little thought experiment. As I write this, Spiderman 3 has grossed $754,924,527 worldwide. It's one of the most successful movie franchises in history. And anyone will tell you that's because most people are already familiar with the characters (it certainly

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com46tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-66753978117529424912007-05-03T01:21:00.000-07:002007-12-20T13:14:34.626-08:00

Spine #66 in the Criterion Collection is assigned to the Orphic Trilogy box set, which comprises the following three films. As each has its own spine number, they are reviewed separately. #67: The Blood of a Poet #68: Orpheus #69: Testament of Orpheus

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-26170247664069207522007-05-03T00:49:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:09:15.302-08:00

Testament of Orpheus, 1959, written and directed by Jean Cocteau. Like most lovers of cinema, my response to Testament of Orpheus is constrained by the way I reacted to Armageddon. At the time, I wrote that it didn't make sense to judge Michael Bay and Andrei Tarkovsky by the same standards, since their goals had so little in common. My reference for that point was David Foster Wallace's

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-10797654439573710722007-04-18T22:45:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:09:53.141-08:00

Orpheus, 1949, written and directed by Jean Cocteau. If I were an American Idol contestant, I'd want to immediately follow Sanjaya's performance whenever I could. Orpheus has a similarly lucky slot in the Criterion Collection. After The Blood of a Poet, any film seems coherent and easy to follow. The disadvantage is less obvious: it's difficult to think of Orpheus without comparing it to The

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-52070414339457863672007-03-22T01:08:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:10:32.712-08:00

The Blood of a Poet, 1930, written and directed by Jean Cocteau. The Blood of a Poet might have been titled The Limits of Surrealism, or The Breakdown of Communication. Any interpretation of the film is going to be difficult to defend well, but most people would agree that Cocteau intended it to be an allegory about the development of an artist. Well, allegory isn't easy. I can think of only

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1169774514634347992007-02-09T22:47:00.000-08:002008-01-22T22:11:23.978-08:00

Rushmore, 1998, directed by Wes Anderson, written by Wes Anderson and Owen Wilson. Wes Anderson has the dubious honor of being perhaps the most polarizing director of his (and my) generation. This is not entirely his fault. Since Rushmore, he's served as a proxy target in cultural wars that were only marginally related to his work. To be fair, he brought the first of these on himself, by

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com34tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1168245379656804942007-01-15T22:02:00.000-08:002008-01-22T22:11:49.385-08:00

The Third Man, 1949, directed by Carol Reed, written by Graham Greene. The first time we see Joseph Cotten as Holly Martins, the hapless protagonist of The Third Man, he's craning his head out of a moving train as it pulls into the station. He does a lot of that throughout the movie. Martins has the perpetual cocked head of a dog trying hopelessly to puzzle something out. And as the third shot

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com24tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1165195127320060852006-12-27T16:43:00.000-08:002008-01-22T22:12:16.564-08:00

Carnival of Souls, 1962, directed by Herk Harvey, written by John Clifford. I write a lot about comedy as though it were the great neglected genre. And it's true; comedies don't get a lot of critical acclaim. But nobody gets less respect than horror movies. Except for B-horror movies from the sixties. And the only films that get less respect than B-horror movies are B-horror movies made in

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com26tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1162547715508251512006-11-07T23:45:00.000-08:002008-01-22T22:12:42.317-08:00

The Passion of Joan of Arc, 1928, directed by Carl Theodor Dryer, written by Joseph Delteil and Carl Theodor Dryer. I've watched this movie five or six times in the last few weeks, and I haven't come close to plumbing its depths. It's searing, harrowing, pick your adjective. I've been trying to describe the effect it had on me, the experience of watching it, and I don't think I'm a good

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com45tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1159852323183797362006-10-15T21:08:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:13:20.458-08:00

Monty Python's Life of Brian, 1979, directed by Terry Jones, written by Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin. Comedy is one of the hardest genres to write about. Even Robert McKee, who has rules for everything (Sorry! Not rules! Principles!) admits that when it comes to comedy structure, most bets are off. He adds: Comedy is pure: if the

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1158560905659275272006-09-20T00:09:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:22:45.921-08:00

Autumn Sonata, 1978, written and directed by Ingmar Bergman. Philip Larkin doesn't get a credit on Autumn Sonata, but the movie does seem at times like it was adapted from "This Be The Verse." That's the one that starts like this: They fuck you up, your mum and dad. They may not mean to, but they do. They fill you with the faults they had And add some extra, just for you. Bergman's movie

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1157613890654357522006-09-10T23:02:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:27:11.462-08:00

The Night Porter, 1974, directed by Liliana Cavani, screenplay by Liliana Cavani, story by Barbara Alberti, Liliana Cavani, Italo Moscati, and Amedeo Pagani. About halfway into The Night Porter, one character says (of therapuetic "trials," of which more later), "the more shock value they have, the more effect they have." This is advice that Liliana Cavani seems to have taken to heart. And The

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com19tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1154200550140174852006-09-04T00:57:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:27:35.699-08:00

Peeping Tom, 1960, directed by Michael Powell, screenplay by Leo Marks. I can't remember who said it, but here's a bit of career advice. If you've never directed a film, you're supposed to accept any piece of crap directing job you can get, just to get your name on a feature film, any film. Once you've convinced someone to put you behind the camera, even if that camera is filming How To Stuff A

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1150700788465864372006-07-02T20:38:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:28:09.187-08:00

Charade, 1963, directed by Stanley Donen, screenplay by Peter Stone, story by Peter Stone and Mark Behm. Studios and critics have alternated between celebrating and excoriating the Hollywood star system since Florence Lawrence first got her name in lights. For the purposes of this blog, I'm going to ignore the economic considerations of casting a star. This is really the only part of the whole

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1149487092718629942006-06-09T01:13:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:28:54.513-08:00

The 39 Steps, 1935, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, adaptation by Charles Bennett, dialogue by Ian Hay, from the novel by John Buchan. Nobody but paranoiacs goes to see a paranoid thriller for penetrating insights into the inner lives of the characters. There's no sense in this kind of movie wasting any time putting the characters into mortal peril; nobody wants a long scene of Roger Thornhill

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1148265217644009662006-05-25T22:00:00.000-07:002007-12-26T12:36:05.854-08:00

The Unbearable Lightness of Being, 1988, directed by Philip Kaufman, screenplay by Jean-Claude Carrière and Philip Kaufman, from the novel by Milan Kundera. The back of the Criterion edition of The Unbearable Lightness of Being refers to the movie as "the screen version of Milan Kundera's 'unfilmable' novel." The Unbearable Lightness of Being isn't the most unfilmable novel ever written, but

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com18tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1145418422608846672006-04-23T21:00:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:29:39.258-08:00

For All Mankind, 1989, directed by Al Reinert. In the "America in the 60's" montage that used to play in my head when someone mentioned the era, the moon landing got about five seconds. And you know exactly what five seconds they were; the blurry television feed we've all seen of Neil Armstrong dropping the last few feet to the moon's surface. Altamont got more screen time than Neil,

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1144564909608384132006-04-10T00:03:00.000-07:002007-12-26T13:03:18.325-08:00

Sanjuro, 1962, directed by Akira Kurosawa, screenplay by Ryuzo Kikushima, Akira Kurosawa, and Hideo Oguni, from the novel Peaceful Days, by Shugoro Yamamoto. I don't envy anyone who works in film marketing. Most companies have years to build up a customer base and a brand. But a studio might sell fifteen different movies in a year, and the marketing department has to build an audience out of

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1142836732718847592006-04-03T00:12:00.000-07:002007-12-26T13:08:37.104-08:00

Yojimbo, 1961, directed by Akira Kurosawa, written by Ryuzo Kikushima and Akira Kurosawa. I've always had a sentimental affection for antiheroes, from Nic Cage's Yuri Orlov straight back to Milton's Satan. It's no surprise, then, that I enjoyed Yojimbo, Akira Kurosawa's skillful fusion of archetypes from gangster movies and Westerns. Toshirô Mifune plays Sanjuro, a samurai with no master, and

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1140986432212234572006-03-08T00:20:00.000-08:002008-01-22T22:30:31.209-08:00

Brazil, 1985, directed by Terry Gilliam, written by Terry Gilliam, Charles McKeown, and Tom Stoppard. In Brazil, Terry Gilliam asks the audience to imagine a world where the government wages a never-ending war with shadowy terrorists, a world where civil liberties are being destroyed in the name of security, a world where torture becomes official state policy in order to conduct more efficient

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com35tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1138866868965089492006-02-07T21:00:00.000-08:002008-01-22T22:30:54.892-08:00

And the Ship Sails On, 1984, directed by Federico Fellini, written by Federico Fellini and Tonino Guerra. The tenth literary rule Mark Twain accused James Fenimore Cooper of breaking in "James Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses" goes like this: ...the author shall make the reader feel a deep interest in the personages of his tale and in their fate; and... he shall make the reader love the

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1138324581787065972006-01-27T01:04:00.000-08:002008-01-22T22:31:30.224-08:00

Nights of Cabiria, 1957, directed by Federico Fellini, screenplay by Ennio Flaiano and Tullio Pinelli, with additional dialogue by Pier Paolo Pasolini. If I made a list titled "Good Settings For Physical Comedy," I think "An Aging, Low-End Prostitute's Descent Into Penury" would be toward the bottom. Which means I would never have made Nights of Cabiria, a film that owes as much to City Lights

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1136878219897128072006-01-16T17:12:00.000-08:002008-01-22T22:32:02.976-08:00

Black Orpheus, 1959, directed by Marcel Camus, screenplay by Jacques Viot, from the play Orfeu da Conçeicão by Vinicius de Moraes. Critics often write about movies as though they exist in a vacuum. Although they'll trace one filmmaker's influence on another, the ways a film can bleed into the rest of the culture isn't usually part of the conversation (the notable exception is right-wing

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1136274389081056832006-01-07T23:32:00.000-08:002010-12-02T22:18:00.635-08:00

Insomnia, 1997, directed by Erik Skjoldbjærg, written by Nikolaj Frobenius and Erik Skjoldbjærg. Insomnia begins with a scene that opens a thousand police procedurals: a man on a plane looks at a grainy photostat of a corpse. We all know how to read it, too: she's just been murdered, he's been called in to solve the crime. It's comfortable and familiar. Until the detective takes out a ballpoint

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1135930044598398122005-12-31T00:27:00.000-08:002008-01-22T22:32:59.987-08:00

The Most Dangerous Game, 1932, directed by Irving Pichel and Ernest B. Schoedsack, screenplay by James Ashmore Creelman, from the short story by Richard Connell. The Most Dangerous Game seems doomed to languish in the shadows of the other film Schoedsack and producer Merian C. Cooper were working on in 1932; an obscure art-house gem called King Kong. But although it's not a groundbreaking

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1135643675049196192005-12-27T23:45:00.000-08:002008-01-22T22:33:28.771-08:00

Taste of Cherry, 1997, written and directed by Abbas Kiarostami. Everyone who has written about Taste of Cherry has to find some way to deal with the fact that this is an incredibly slow movie. Some people describe it as "languid," or "deliberately paced." Everyone uses the word "meditation" at some point. One synopsis reads, "When Kiarostami directs, the doors are opened to metaphysical

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1133856883230047592005-12-25T12:12:00.000-08:002007-12-26T21:21:32.504-08:00

The Red Shoes, 1948, directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, screenplay by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, additional dialogue by Keith Winter. Brian Eno famously observed that only 100 people bought the Velvet Underground's first album when it was originally released, but they all started bands. The Red Shoes may well be the cinematic equivalent. Over the years, The Red Shoes

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1131518046194810472005-11-30T22:32:00.000-08:002011-12-22T11:35:20.455-08:00

Lord of the Flies, 1963, directed by Peter Brook, from the novel by William Golding. On his pseudo-commentary track for Lord of the Flies,1 William Golding tells a story about a student in a creative writing class who goes to his teacher and says, "I've finished the story I was writing. Now should I go back and put the symbols in?" You can't do it that way, of course; symbols are either an

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1130133632173328192005-10-26T21:15:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:34:18.251-08:00

Fishing With John, 1992, written and directed by John Lurie. This is the first title in the collection that's not a feature. Instead, Fishing With John is a six-episode documentary fishing show in which actor/musician John Lurie goes fishing with celebrities. At first glance, Fishing With John has everything one would expect from a fishing show: bad video cinematography, dull conversation, and

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1128244257813191442005-10-02T01:39:00.000-07:002007-12-26T22:02:30.714-08:00

Henry V, 1944, directed by Laurence Olivier, screenplay by Dallas Bower, Alan Dent, and Laurence Olivier, from the play by William Shakespeare. It's not surprising that Great Britain produced a propaganda film during World War II in which an absolute ruler uses a flimsy historical pretext to justify an invasion of France. What's surprising that the ruler in question is the hero of the movie,

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1126511637526220642005-09-14T02:20:00.000-07:002007-12-26T22:16:56.678-08:00

Armageddon, 1998, directed by Michael Bay, screenplay by Jonathan Hensleigh and J. J. Abrams, adaptation by Tony Gilroy and Shane Salerno, story by Robert Roy Pool and Jonathan Hensleigh (I have no idea what work those writing credits actually correspond to). Armageddon seems like an odd choice for a Criterion edition, but if the collection is intended to provide a representative sample of film

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com44tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1125891918673328372005-09-04T19:10:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:35:00.735-08:00

Tokyo Drifter, 1966, directed by Seijun Suzuki, written by Yasunori Kawauchi. This is another one of Seijun Suzuki's movies for Nikkatsu, and, like Branded To Kill, it has a pretty banal script but is worth seeing for its lurid style. Suzuki got to shoot this one in color (he never made this decision himself, as he explains in an interview on the disc) and, well, never let it be said that he

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1125381635807121562005-09-04T14:37:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:35:27.065-08:00

Branded To Kill, 1967, directed by Seijun Suzuki, written by Hachiro Guryu, Takeo Kimura, Chusei Sone, and Atsushi Yamatoya. Any country with a developed film industry makes two types of movies: export films designed with world markets in mind, and native films that are not intended to leave the country (and usually don't). My introduction to the latter category was S.P.Q.R. 2000 ½ Anni Fa, a

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1123472501915203902005-08-21T23:31:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:35:52.883-08:00

Time Bandits, 1981, directed by Terry Gilliam, written by Michael Palin and Terry Gilliam. In 1980, Terry Gilliam was depressed because he couldn't get Brazil out of development. To get his mind off things one weekend, he sketched out an outline for what became Time Bandits. The movie feels kind of slapdash and ramshackle; it's a minor film, but it doesn't take itself too seriously, and it's a

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1123406637003701262005-08-07T00:27:00.000-07:002007-12-27T17:01:13.820-08:00

Wages of Fear, 1953, directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot, screenplay by Henri-Georges Clouzot and Jérôme Géronimi, from the novel by Georges Arnaud. After trying to avoid ruining Diabolique for anyone, it's nice to write about something without a twist ending. You could make a case that Wages of Fear is an insightful critique of globalization, particularly relevant during our occupation of Iraq.

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1123378827396392992005-08-06T18:40:00.000-07:002008-01-22T22:41:55.887-08:00

Diabolique, 1954, directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot, screenplay by Henri-Georges Clouzot, Jérôme Géronimi, Frédéric Grendel and René Masson, from the novel Celle qui n'était plus, by Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac. It's extremely rare for a marketing department or critic to hail a film as the best ever made, or the funniest, or the saddest, or anything else, with one exception: movies are

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1122350992790885602005-07-27T23:27:00.000-07:002008-01-22T23:13:57.148-08:00

Andrei Rublev, 1966, directed by Andrei Tarkovsky, written by Andrei Tarkovsky and Andrei Konchalovsky. Here's a minor incident in Andrei Rublev that illustrates the film's moral landscape. A Russian prince is building a new house; he hires stoneworkers to do part of the construction. They finish the work on time and under budget, but the prince isn't happy; he wants the whole place redone

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1121144407449325762005-07-11T21:13:00.000-07:002008-01-22T23:35:12.124-08:00

Nanook of the North, 1922, written and directed by Robert J. Flaherty. When I was maybe four or five years old and I'd get bundled up to play in the snow, my parents used to say that I looked like Nanook of the North. It was one of those things that delighted me at that age; it was so weird and silly and fun to say. Try it: Nanook, Nanook, Nanook! Of the North! Anyway, I got it in my head that

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1120899255249934702005-07-09T01:00:00.000-07:002008-03-18T10:13:24.173-07:00

Oliver Twist, 1948, directed by David Lean, screenplay by Stanley Haynes and David Lean from the novel by Charles Dickens. John Howard Davies plays Oliver, a workhouse-raised orphan who escapes from his apprenticeship, flees to London, and falls into the clutches of his evil half-brother and a nearly-as-evil thief named Fagin. This is Lean's second Dickens adaptation, made two years after Great

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1117504695251746992005-06-23T22:19:00.000-07:002008-01-23T18:23:39.284-08:00

Great Expectations, 1946, directed by David Lean, screenplay by David Lean, Ronald Neame, Anthony Havelock-Allan, Kay Walsh, and Cecil McGivern, from the novel by Charles Dickens. Novels rely greatly on tone and style, which don't have exact equivalents in filmmaking. Films rely on structure and plot. I think this is why Dickens is appealing to filmmakers; his novels are very plot-heavy and

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1116995698260764072005-05-24T20:56:00.000-07:002011-09-01T12:01:36.962-07:00

M, 1931, directed by Fritz Lang, written by Thea von Harbou and Fritz Lang. Wer ist der Mörder? Who is the murderer? That question is the starting point for any number of serial killer movies, from The Lodger to Identity. And the answer is usually pretty structurally simple: "That's him, officer," or "It was you, all along!" But although we see this question again and again in M, the

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1116053121879490152005-05-13T22:20:00.000-07:002008-01-30T17:05:45.132-08:00

Flesh for Frankenstein, 1973, written and directed by Paul Morrissey, characters created by Mary Shelley. Paul Morrissey made this movie immediately before Blood for Dracula; I liked it less, although it's pretty good. (I do mean "immediately before," incidentally—they wrapped Flesh for Frankenstein one fine morning, had lunch, and started shooting Blood for Dracula). As with Blood for

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1115785999924881042005-05-10T21:17:00.000-07:002008-01-30T17:15:11.446-08:00

Sid and Nancy, 1986, directed by Alex Cox, written by Alex Cox and Abbe Wool. What can you say about a twenty-year-old girl who died? Well, if she was Nancy Spungen, you can't say much about her being beautiful or brilliant. I don't think she loved Mozart or Bach, and I'm sure she didn't love the Beatles. But she loved Sid Vicious. And I don't think Alex Cox wanted to make Love Story, anyway.

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1115180784243677972005-05-03T20:44:00.000-07:002008-01-23T13:52:33.494-08:00

Picnic at Hanging Rock, 1975, directed by Peter Weir, screenplay by Cliff Green from the novel by Joan Lindsay. I imagine in most video stores this is filed under "Drama," but in my book it's a horror movie. Of course, if I were running a video store, I'd put it in drama, too—I don't think most viewers would find this an adequate substitute for Saw. Still, there were parts of it that scared

Matthew Dessemhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09288268335735601918noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8796371.post-1114760086846880532005-04-28T23:51:00.000-07:002008-01-30T17:21:12.020-08:00

Blood For Dracula, 1974, written and directed by Paul Morrissey, characters created by Bram Stoker. You may remember Bob Dole extolling the virtues of True Lies during the 1996 presidential campaign, and the press's reaction. If he'd mentioned Blood For Dracula instead, nobody could have criticized him. I think the moral here is clear: if you want to be President, you'd better put in some time

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