Picking up one of our cats and going “I’m gonna hold him and squeeze him and call him George” while cuddling them so close the cat stares at us in disdain is not uncommon in my household. Seemed like a good time to revisit the classic Chuck Jones cartoon that inspires those outpourings of affection. Bugs and Daffy take that wrong turn in Albuquerque and wind up in the domain of the Abominable Snowman. But the extent of his abominability is that he just might love you to death. Filled with classic Jones face-pulling and bright, minimalist backgrounds.

On paper, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang ought to be a film I absolutely love. Film noir homage? Check. Twisty turny crime plot? Check. Self-aware meta narration? Check. Robert Downey Jr? Check. Yet when I first saw the film several years ago I remember being underwhelmed and every time I’ve thought of the film since it’s been with a sort of vague discontent. But a lot of people who generally like the same stuff as I do constantly praise it and think it’s brilliant. I couldn’t really remember enough about the film to identify what it was that left me cold, so I figured it was time for a rewatch – maybe I’d get it this time, or at least be able to pinpoint what about it didn’t work for me.

The initial premise is pretty great, with RDJ as a small-time crook who stumbles into an audition as he’s running away from the cops after a badly botched job (in which his partner got shot and killed). Unwittingly playing along, he winds impressing the casting directors and is carted off to Hollywood, where he’s assigned to shadow a real detective (Val Kilmer) as preparation for this role he might get. Even though the detective, nicknamed Gay Perry (“because he’s gay”), insists that real life detective work is boring and not like the movies, bodies soon start piling up, seemingly unrelated events turn out to be intertwined, and RDJ ends up right in the middle of all of it. Meanwhile, he offers almost continual narration of the most self-aware type; he comments on how things like this play out in the movies (“don’t you hate in movies when it seems like that one guy died, and then it turns out he didn’t and jt’s so fake”) or how bad a narrator he is (going back to tell a part of the story he neglected to tell earlier).

And this self-awareness is something I both love and dislike about the movie. As a whole, I liked the movie better this time than the first time, but still have difficulty outright loving it. On the one hand, its pop culture pomo self-awareness is something I find very clever and humorous – the dialogue and narration are both extremely witty, and most of the notes I took while watching ended up just being quotes. On the other hand, it completely overwhelms everything else about the movie, creating a superficial veneer that ultimately makes the movie fairly empty, even as an homage.

There are a lot of interesting things going on in the plot, but that’s part of the problem, too – there is way too much plot for something that takes such a breezy tone. The plot is convoluted and difficult to follow anyway, but probably not a lot more intricate than something like L.A. Confidential (which I also rewatched recently), but by privileging meta humor to such a degree, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang actually encourages you not to pay attention to the plot – until the last third of the movie suddenly throws a gazillion plot turns at you and expects you to care about something it hadn’t shown a whole lot of interest in until then. I don’t mind complicated plots at all, but this movie doesn’t need such a convoluted one; that’s not what it’s about, and even once it starts to become about that it doesn’t commit to it, constantly shifting back into superficial meta mode constantly.

The problem with everything I just said, of course, is that I easily forgive meta, self-referential genre homage movies ALL the time. I like pomo stuff, and fully understand that part of that is divorcing the signifier from the signified, cutting the reference loose from the referent. Sometimes I don’t mind at all when a movie uses pop culture referentiality that’s essentially meaningless, as I think it is here. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is pulling on film noir tropes, but it isn’t really a noir film in any real way. Actual noir is marked by NOT being self-aware; it isn’t even a genre people knew they were making at the time. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang never has a single moment where it doesn’t know exactly what it is, yet precisely because of that, it fails to be what it’s homaging.

Yet, is that necessarily a bad thing? There’s no rule that a film that uses existing tropes has to be true to any pre-conception of what those tropes should be. KKBB is clearly a comedy first (and it succeeds at that), and a noir film second, if at all. Maybe I’m asking the film to be something it doesn’t intend to be. And maybe the convoluted plot is actually a joke in itself, poking fun at films like The Big Sleep that leave plot threads hanging entirely in order to focus on other things (in that case, the chemistry between Bogart and Bacall). Yet I can’t shake the feeling that there’s a missed opportunity here to be more than just a fun, wittily written spoof. I can’t shake the sense of uneasy tension I have watching the movie, a tension that stems from the comedy and the suspense being unbalanced, as the movie tries to do and be too many things without a solid basis.

So I rewatched, and I reconsidered, and I did come away with a greater enjoyment of the superficial qualities of the film, but I still can’t bring myself to call it brilliant, as so many of my friends do. It isn’t brilliant. It’s fun. And that’s it. And maybe that’s okay. But it still leaves me at a 3.5 out of 5 rating.

No other classic cartoon director was as visually inventive as Tex Avery, who could come up with a visual pun for just about anything. He was also able to take a joke far past the point where most other directors would’ve left it and vary it just enough to keep it hilarious. After a brief stint at Warner Bros., where he contributed greatly to the development of Bugs Bunny in A Wild Hare, he ended up at MGM directing the Droopy cartoons as well as a bunch of toons starring the nearly forgotten Screwy Squirrel. And also the trio of modernized fairy tales that perhaps stand as his finest legacy – Swing Shift Cinderella, Little Rural Riding Hood, and the one that started it all it, Red Hot Riding Hood. From breaking the fourth wall by having the characters demand a new version of the story to the sexed up Riding Hood as a burlesque dancer to the depiction of the wolf as a Hollywood womanizer to the manhunting grandma, this is the risque side of Avery turned up to eleven, and it is awesome.

Sometimes I think there are reasons why some Shakespeare plays remain largely unknown among his vast repertoire – I have never read Coriolanus or seen it performed, but assuming this is a fairly faithful adaptation in terms of the text itself, it’s just…not that interesting. Caius Martius (Ralph Fiennes, who also directs) is a great military leader in Rome (here modernized in everything but language, and acting styles to some degree) whose contempt for anyone not born patrician makes him no friend of the commoners rioting over their lack of food. After a successful war against the invading Volscian army, he’s granted the honorific “Coriolanus” and encouraged to run for the consul, which he does, even briefly gaining the support of the commoners before a pair of conniving tribunes double-cross him and, with the support of the crowd, call for his banishment. He joins the Volsci, becoming the right-hand man of his former blood enemy Aufidius (Gerard Butler) to attack Rome, until his wife and mother (Jessica Chastain and Vanessa Redgrave) beg him to stop.

All of the twists and turns in the plot seem to come out of nowhere, with people changing sides or points of view at the drop of a hat. The script is probably abbreviated from Shakespeare’s play (the film runs just over two hours, about an hour less than most Shakespeare done in full), which might explain some of the disjointedness, but unfortunately it also feels longer than it is. It’s hard to relate to Coriolanus, who has a highly developed sense of honor but is also a total dick a good portion of the time – his shifts from speechifying the commoners to get their support to denouncing them as unworthy to vote are practically bipolar, and so is the crowd’s instant reversals from distrust to support to anger. These may all be problems inherent to the source material, but the overwrought and unintentionally comical acting styles in this section don’t do anything to help it.

Setting the film in a modern-day setting, with modern military uniforms and business suits, tanks and guns, gives it a bit of an extra punch, and I’m definitely a proponent of modernizing Shakespeare – stage versions do this all the time, and I’m glad to see more films attempt the juxtaposition of modern dress and accessories with the original text. This one works fairly well in that regard, the dialogue usually playing fairly well and understandably, until one of the actors gets it into his head to revert to old-school Shakespearean acting for a bit. There’s nothing wrong with old-school Shakespearean acting in the right context, but this isn’t quite it – the art direction and costume design is minimalist, and calls for a much subtler take on the text than Fiennes and company give it here. Some of the film’s best moments, unsurprisingly, are the quiet ones, with Coriolanus lamenting his fall from grace or his mother urging him to reconsider his actions. When the film goes bombastic, it loses credibility quickly.

That said, I will make a slight exception for Vanessa Redgrave, who as Coriolanus’s mother is hands down the best thing in this film. Even when she gets angry and raises her voice, her scenes crackle, and she knows exactly when to bring it back down for quiet moments that carry a dangerous ferocity. Brian Cox as Menenius, the Senator of Rome, is the only one who can match her level of skill with this material. Everyone else, including Fiennes, has an “outrage” setting and a “dull as nails” setting, and little in between. Fiennes is effective here and there, and as director he tries to invest a fairly static story with some visual interest via close-ups and frenetic editing – the war scenes in the beginning are actually fairly well-done, and I’d be happy to watch Fiennes direct something that doesn’t allow him to indulge in red-faced angry outbursts to quite this extent. By the last scenes, when he verbally takes down Aufidius, I couldn’t make myself stop wondering when he was gonna just Avada Kedavra the guy already.

If you have an interest in Shakespeare adaptations, the film is worth watching for Redgrave and Cox alone. Otherwise, you’re likely to find this rough going. I’m enjoying playing “keep up with Jessica Chastain” this year as it seems like she’s in just about every film, but she’s given precious little to do here. That may again be the fault of the original play, or it may just be that Redgrave is so good Chastain never had a chance. She does fall into simpering a time or two, but there are flashes of the Chastain who’s so good in Take Shelter and The Tree of Life, but there’s just not much for her to work with. I’m definitely curious to see her in some meaty period roles, though – perhaps a Portia or a Viola. Ultimately, however, the film is too unwieldy, unable to balance the different acting styles and tones or adequately treat the shifting alliances to become a cohesive whole rather than a jumble of mostly mediocre scenes.

What are some of the best things you saw in 2011, regardless of release date?

Le cercle rouge (1967)

I had a feeling I was going to like this film, just based on how much I’ve liked Jean-Pierre Melville’s other films, especially Le samourai, which, if I recall correctly, topped my favorites list in 2010. I had no idea I’d like it as much as I did. Melville weaves several plotlines together, involving a criminal just out of prison, the mob he steals money from, a detective chasing a different escaped con, a former sharpshooter cop who’s now an alcoholic, and more. Each of them has their own narrative rise and fall, and each character has their own arc, but they all interplay in an incredibly intricate way, as different ones join up on a heist (one of the best heist sequences in cinema) and others try to track them down for their own reasons. It’s hard to explain, but very easy and clear to watch. Brilliant work on all levels.

Blue Valentine (2010)

This film just missed my 2010 best of list (I saw it mere days after last year’s posts were made), but it would’ve ended up about #4 on that list. It might be even higher now. The film parallels the beginning and end of a single romance, Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams (both in career-best performances), juxtaposing the courtship and the break-up of this couple to incredible emotional effect. Despite the temporal contrivance, the film is incredibly raw and realistic, with no easy answers for what causes a couple who seem so perfect for each other to hit the skids so badly. It’s heartbreaking and beautiful at the same time.

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)

Why in the world did it take me this long to watch this movie? That phrase actually applies to the next two as well, but the prestige of those two be darned, this is the one that I can’t get out of my head. The tales surrounding it are as legendary as the film itself, playing on the long-standing bitter rivalry between Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, who here play two aging showbiz sisters who have a long-standing bitter rivalry. It may be high camp, but this is quite possibly Bette Davis’s best performance – it’s mean and grotesque and pitiful and naive. And the movie itself is quite possibly the best example of Hollywood gothic, yes, even giving Sunset Boulevard a run for its money.

A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)

There is a reason I’d been avoiding watching this classic must-see. I’m not a big Brando fan. I’d seen On the Waterfront, Sayonara, The Godfather, and more, and I just didn’t really get the whole Brando thing. But I finally sat down with this one and suddenly GOT IT. He’s utterly magnetic here, and the film is far more stylistically interesting than I’d expected. It wears its stage origins on its sleeve, but in a heightened way that works, and the clash of Leigh’s old-school Hollywood acting with Brando’s muttering animalism is palpable. Now I want to go rewatch all those other Brando films – I bet I’ll like them more.

The Grapes of Wrath (1940)

And the reason I’d been avoiding this one was simply that I figured it’d be depressing and Important Movie-esque. (Also I dislike Steinbeck based on “The Red Pony” traumatizing me as a child.) Wrong on both counts. It’s certainly not a happy peppy movie, and a ton of bad things happen to this Dust Bowl family, but I wasn’t prepared for how gorgeously this is shot (Gregg Toland, should’ve known) and how intense it can be, sharing in this family’s troubles and little joys, as well as dealing with the subplot of Tom Joad’s fugitive status. His final speech is justly praised, but the whole thing is pretty great.

The Cat and the Canary (1927)

Often cited as one of the prime examples of the haunted house mystery comedy, a genre that was apparently prominent in the silent era, and rightly so. Simply a ton of fun from start to finish, as a group of people gather in a long-deserted mansion to read the will of their crotchety old relative. There are threats of insanity, a murderer running rampant, an asylum escapee on the loose, plus various positive and negative interpersonal interactions among the varied potential heirs. Moody cinematography counterbalances the humor in the plot.

For a Few Dollars More (1965)

I watched the Man with No Name trilogy all out of order (I’d already seen the other two…yeah, backwards), but my husband wasn’t about to let me get away with not having seen this one, which is his favorite. I still like The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly more, but there’s a lot I did like about this one, especially the way the story really follows Lee Van Cleef instead of Clint Eastwood – that was an interesting touch. Also, the bank robbery segment is just awesome. Next up – watching all three of these actually in order.

The Godless Girl (1929)

I always enjoy Cinefamily’s Silent Treatment nights because I get to see films that are rarely if ever screened and aren’t on DVD, plus learn a bunch about silent cinema and 1920s Hollywood and chat with film archivists. I’m always appreciative of the films I see, but to be honest, a lot of times, they’re mostly of historical significance. This is an exception, because this film is gangbusters fun. Directed by Cecil B. DeMille, it’s the story of a clashing set of teenagers – one the leader of a group of young Christians, the other the leader of a group of Atheists. After the groups get in a riotous fight, they’re carted off to reform school, where they get to know each other. Frankly, there are like five or six sections of story (and tones!). But they’re all crazy and fun, and it ends with a massive escape/chase sequence followed by a climactic fire, which is very technically impressive.

The Secret in Their Eyes (2009)

Seems like every year a film I’ve never heard of wins Best Foreign Film at the Oscars, upsetting one I either wanted to win or thought was a shoo-in. And then every year when I get around to seeing the actual winner, I’m blown away. This is an extremely solid mystery/character study of a detective flashing back to that one case, you know that one he never quite managed to solve. It’s tough to find the balance between mystery and character in films, but this one does it wonderfully, and with a lot of style to boot – just wait for the seemingly one-take stadium shot. It’s incredible.

The Naked Island (1960)

I happened to be volunteering on a night when Cinefamily screened this film, which I’d never heard of and knew nothing about – I hadn’t even read the blurb on the Cinefamily schedule. I stuck around to watch it anyway, and I’m certainly glad I did. An almost silent picture, depicting the day-to-day lives of a family struggling to maintain their farm on an unwelcoming island. Much of the film is just watching them cart water from the mainland, carry it up a treacherous hill, and water their crops one at a time. Sounds boring, but it isn’t, and when larger events do happen, they hit you like a ton of bricks.

The Illusionist (2010)

A sweet and simple ode to the entertainments of the past, the pleasures that progress has robbed us of in search of bigger, faster, louder thrills. The main character, once a popular vaudeville magician, finds himself less and less wanted as rock bands and television replace his craft – all except for one little girl, entranced by his magic. Like Sylvain Chomet’s previous film The Triplets of Belleville, The Illusionist is almost silent – as befits its origin as an unproduced script from Jacques Tati. Charming, simple, warm, and wistful.

Love in the Afternoon (1972)

Also known as Chloe in the Afternoon, this is one of Eric Rohmer’s Six Moral Tales films, and so far, I think it’s my favorite. Each of these films presents some sort of moral dilemma, but not in a didactic way – in this case a happily married man daydreams about other women, with no intention of taking action – until his friend Chloe decides to seduce him. Like most French New Wave films, it’s emotionally aloof in such a way that you actually end up supplying the emotions yourself, and this one presents its characters without judgement, but with a great deal of fairness and empathy. I love New Wave noncommital-ness, and this is right in my ballpark.

Night Train to Munich (1940)

I already knew director Carol Reed was more than just The Third Man, from having seen The Fallen Idol, but this would’ve clenched it – Night Train to Munich is a WWII spy story with double agents, concentration camps, undercover espionage, and daring mountaintop chases, all of which it does with a wit and panache that set it apart from most other spy films. It’s classy and silly and genuinely thrilling. Also, and this is not unimportant, it knows when to stop and doesn’t clutter everything up with needless denoument and codas.

The Man With the Golden Arm (1955)

Frank Sinatra may have already won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for From Here to Eternity two years earlier, but with this film he really cemented his standing as an actor. Pushing the envelope of the Production Code, the film tells of Frankie Machine, a card dealer and drug addict who just wants to get clean and play the drums, but he can’t get out of the gambling game – tied in by debts and drugs and a shrew of a wife. It’s not always easy to watch, and it does have an old-school social realism melodrama angle, but when it’s on, boy is it on. The withdrawal scene gave ME the DTs.

The Descent (2005)

Director Neil Marshall continually impresses me with his genre films, and this one was no different – a group of girlfriends tries to reconnect after one of them experiences tragedy by going spelunking. But in an unknown cave, anything can happen, and everything does. This film is great on every level, with the dangers of the cave itself creating enough intensity, but the film is hardly content to stop with that. The pacing, the use of sound design, and the thematic content all raise this film above your standard horror thriller.

My Winnipeg (2007)

Easily the most accessible Guy Maddin film I’ve seen so far, and thus my favorite, at least until I get more accustomed to his extremely unique style of filmmaking – this time he takes us on an idiosyncratic tour of his hometown of Winnipeg, a surreal blending of his childhood, his attempts at recreating his childhood to deal with past trauma, and legends and stories of the town itself. It’s associative, bizarre, dreamlike, and definitely an experience.

Wayne’s World (1992)

I totally did not expect to enjoy this film as much as I did – I had it mentally lumped in with a bunch of other early ’90s comedies that just struck me as stupid and juvenile, but my husband convinced me to watch it, and yeah. This one is much smarter than it seems on the surface, with a lot of clever writing and meta humor that worked like gangbusters for me. He already quoted this one a bunch (leaving me shrugging my shoulders in ignorance), but now we’re quoting it together ALL THE TIME. We even did a joint blog post about it.

Changing Husbands (1924)

Another hit from the Silent Treatment folks at Cinefamily, this one has Leatrice Joy (no, I’d never heard of her) in a double role as a bored rich housewife who wants to be an actress and a poor browbeated actress who just wants some peace and rest. Yep, you guessed it, they run into each other and decide to switch places for a bit, since the rich woman’s husband is out of town anyway. Surprise, he comes back and wants to take his “wife” on holiday. More mix-ups ensue, with a lot of sly innuendo and some great comic timing from all involved. It’s frothy, but great fun, and one of my favorite new-to-me silents of the year.

Batman: The Movie (1966)

I hesitate to put this movie (a big-screen film to go along with the campy ’60s TV show) into the “so bad it’s good” category, because I think the people who made it knew exactly what they were making, and did it all – the cheesy line readings, the over-abundance of villains, the ridiculous plot elements – totally on purpose. There’s no way they didn’t, there are too many self-referential jokes (“some days you just can’t get rid of a bomb”). If you go into this with the same kind of pure enjoyment of ridiculousity that they did, you’ll have fun. I sure did.

Woman in the Window (1944) / Scarlet Street (1945)

I’m lumping these two together because it’s hard not to. In 1944, Fritz Lang got together with Edward G. Robinson, Joan Bennett, and Dan Duryea, and made a quiet little noir film about a middle-aged man who falls for a younger woman and gets drawn into a crime because of her. It worked out so well, they all got together and did the same thing the next year. The details of the plot are different of course, but that trajectory is the same. Both films are solid noirs; it’s hard to rank them against each other, though, because WitW has a better and more interesting plot overall, but has a serious cop-out ending, while SS follows through on the ending beautifully, but has a less interesting/believable plot throughout. Both worthwhile, though, especially for noir fans.

Loves of a Blonde (1965)

Cinefamily did a series on the Czech New Wave a couple of years ago, but either they didn’t play this Milos Forman entry, or I missed that night. But seeing a few of those definitely gave me a taste for them, and I went into Loves of a Blonde with high hopes – which were not misplaced. With definite French New Wave influences, the film basically follows a young girl in a rural factory town in Czechoslovakia, who eschews the middle-aged men who remain in the town after most young men have been conscripted in favor of a pianist from Prague. But the story is less important than the individual scenes, vignettes like three leches macking on girls at a factory-sponsored dance, the girl getting lectured on propriety back at her hostel, and the encounter with the boy’s parents when she arrives unannounced on his doorstep. Take the focus on the youthtful and mundane from the Nouvelle Vague and add in a specifically Czech-under-communism austerity, and that’s this film.

49 Up (2005)

This can kind of stand in for the entire Up series of documentaries – it’s difficult to judge them separately, and this is the most recent one (though if they stay on schedule, 56 Up would be out this year). The premise of the series is that in 1964, a TV production team got a group of fourteen British 7-year-olds from different regions and class backgrounds and interviewed them on various topics. Every seven years they’ve gone back and interviewed the same people (though not all of them have agreed to be in every episode). It’s fascinating, both in the ways it upholds the original premise that a child’s future is set by the age of seven, in terms of societal status, and the ways it subverts those expectations – not to mention how it delves into the nature of documentary filmmaking itself. I don’t like documentaries that much, and this one is largely talking heads, but it is absolutely entrancing.

Vagabond (1985)

After being a huge fan of Agnès Varda’s Cleo from 5 to 7 last year, I wanted more Varda, but I put off seeing this one for a good while, largely because it just looked freaking depressing. And yeah, it kind of is. It’s about a twenty-something girl who roams the roads, hitchhiking, sleeping wherever she can, working for a while or living with people as she’s able. But the film opens with her dead in a ditch, then backtracks to how she got there, so you know it isn’t going to romanticize the life of the open road. Even though this was made long after the New Wave’s heyday, it does have that same kind of non-committal sympathy that works so well for me – Varda isn’t going to manipulate you into feeling sorry for the girl, she’s just going to show you want happened and allow your feelings to grow naturally. She’s not always an attractive character – often being rude or dismissive to those who would help her, until it’s too late – yet Varda’s technique works. It’s a really powerful, often hard to watch, but very rewarding film.

Robin Hood (1922)

I couldn’t pass up a chance to see a bunch of Douglas Fairbanks silents at Cinefamily earlier this year, and I think this was my favorite of the lot – it tells a good bit of the backstory to Robin Hood, depicting Robin of Locksley’s friendship with King Richard and his falling for Maid Marion before Richard ever went off to the Crusades, allowing Prince John to oppress the people and create the need for Robin Hood. Some of that gets a little long, but it’s a nice setup that most versions of Robin Hood skip over. After that, it’s really pretty similar to the Errol Flynn The Adventures of Robin Hood, but Fairbanks is even more athletic and exuberant than Flynn.

Zazie dans le metro (1960)

I still don’t quite know what to make of this early Louis Malle film, but I know I enjoyed watching it, and will likely enjoy it even more on future rewatches. Taken from a Raymond Queneau book (he was a prominent literary experimenter), the film is delightfully absurd, with basically no plot stringing along its series of nonsensical vignettes. The absurd sensibility definitely appeals to me a lot, but I’m sure there are also satirical elements that slipped by me entirely. Even so, it was a whole lot of fun.

Carrie (1976)

Finally got around to this horror classic this October, after meaning to for the past two Octobers and failing. Despite knowing all about the bullying and the prom scene already, this film was a LOT different than I was expecting. The crazy mother, for one thing, and then the whole ending that went on much past the prom scene and complicates it a lot. In some ways, I didn’t like where the ending went, but I am highly intrigued by it and wish people would talk about it more, rather than just accepting the film as a pro-feminist revenge-on-bullies story. In any case, the film is really effective at putting us on Carrie’s side through Spacek’s wide-eyed performance and the agonizing yet lovely leadup to the climax at the prom, even if DePalma does overdo the visual flamboyance when he doesn’t really need to.

A Man Escaped (1956)

I have a love-hate relationship with Robert Bresson. I love Pickpocket, but really dislike Lancelot du Lac and felt pretty ambivalent towards Diary of a Country Priest. This one seemed more on the Pickpocket wavelength, and sure enough, it joins the “love” side of Bresson’s filmography for me. The film takes its time, as the main character is member of the French resistance imprisoned by Nazi forces, who works carefully and patiently to plan and execute an escape. Despite the slow pace, though (something Bresson is known for generally), this film maintains tension perfectly, and doesn’t get dull at all.

Back to the Future II (1989)

When my husband found out I had only seen the first Back to the Future film and that I hardly remembered any of that, he sat me down with the whole trilogy almost immediately. Not only did I enjoy the first one a lot more than I initially had, but Part II instantly joined the ranks of sequels that are better than the originals. The way that II coils back on I with amazing intricacy is great, but I was also really taken by the future world (which is NOW, by the way, if you work the dates out…I’d say we failed to progress in certain areas quite as much as expected, but maybe we’re better off in other ways). Of course, being the history nut that I am, I also really enjoyed Part III, but not quite enough for it to make this list. It’s hovering right below it.

Bigger Than Life (1956)

Long before David Lynch (Blue Velvet) or Sam Mendes (American Beauty) satirized the underbelly of American suburbia, Nicholas Ray brought this scathing attack against suburban values – or the veneer that suburbia tries to uphold to hide the darker things lying beneath. Here James Mason secretly works two jobs to support his family, but a malicious disease takes its toll on him, the only thing that helps being large doses of painkillers – which he becomes addicted to. He eventually devolves into madness, and yes, there’s quite a bit of melodrama in the film, but if you go along with its excesses, you’ll find one of the darkest films about the ’50s ever made.

Born to Kill (1947)

I’d never heard of this noir film until a friend lent it to me, but hey, Robert Wise usually makes good pictures, right? Right. The always-impressive Claire Trevor leaves town after she finds a friend murdered, not wanting to get involved, but unbeknownst to her, the murderer (her friend’s jealous boyfriend) is insinuating himself into her life, ALSO not knowing that she knew the victim. It’s a crazy mess of fate, mutual attraction and repulsion, double-crosses, and both a femme fatale AND an homme fatale. Plus, Elisha Cook Jr. in a meaty supporting role. A lesser-known noir this may be, but that’s a mistake – it’s definitely one of the more interesting ones I’ve seen.

Taking Off (1971)

After making a splash with the Czech New Wave (see Loves of a Blonde, above), Milos Forman made his way to Hollywood success with One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and Amadeus. But first he did this little-known film, his first in the United States, about a teenage girl who runs away to be part of a group of hippies, and her parents trying to find her. It’s got its ridiculous parts (which have a strange tendency to turn sublime, like the scene where all the parents learn how to smoke a joint to try to understand their children better), but it’s ultimately a quite moving and wistful portrait of two generations, and the longing of both to find meaning and connection.

The Constant Nymph (1943)

Long kept out of circulation due to rights issues, TCM finally got it worked out to show this Oscar-nominated Joan Fontaine film at the TCM Film Festival this year, and it was pretty great to see it with a whole crowd of people who’ve been waiting for it for a very long time. It’s a bit of an unusual film, though, with Fontaine a spright of a girl who breathlessly falls in love with a family friend who still thinks of her as a child. It’s chockfull of melodrama, but Fontaine plays it all with such eager naivete that it’s impossible not to like her, despite the underlying ick factor their ages make kind of hard to ignore.

This is the Night (1932)

Hyped up at the TCM Festival for being Cary Grant’s debut feature, there’s a lot more than that here to like. Basically playing second lead to Roland Young’s hapless gentleman, Grant is an athlete whose wife Thelma Todd is stepping out with Young (no, it’s not believable, just go with it), but in order to keep Grant from finding out, Young hires an actress to pretend to be his wife. It’s convoluted, but thanks to a stellar lead and supporting cast and a solid script, it’s as witty and charming as any 1930s movie – it’s unfortunate that it’s so little known. Definitely deserves a look.

The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958)

Silly and nonsensical story? Check. Ridiculous line readings? Check. Cheesy stop-motion effects? Check. Actually, the special effects are kind of awesome, I love watching stop-motion animation. It’s not believable, but it has a tactile charm that CGI loses along the way. The story here is basic fantasy adventure stuff with sorcerers and princesses and giant monsters, but it’s all in good fun, and I had a great time watching it.

Good Morning (1959)

I’ve tried to watch Yasujiro Ozu’s Tokyo Story (generally touted as his best/most important film) at least two or three times and always failed, getting bogged down in my lack of knowledge of Japanese culture and the film’s deliberate pacing. A friend suggested I start with Good Morning instead to get into Ozu, and that was an excellent suggestion. This is a sunny, funny film, the loose plot centered on a pair of kids who want a television more than anything, but with plenty of time given to other vignettes around their apartment area. Charming and breezy.

Gremlins (1984)

I mostly snuck this one in here just because I was shocked at how much fun this film is – I thought it was just gonna be a horror film (and I knew the basic “don’t feed them after midnight” premise), but it’s REALLY goofy, and that’s what I liked about it. I loved all the inventions, I loved the gremlins having fun at the movies, I thought all that stuff was great – even more so because I had no idea all those parts existed.

You didn’t think I’d pass up this trailer, now did you? Take one part of the teaser trailer for Resident Evil: Apocalypse (still one of the best teasers ever made, for my money, regardless of how crappy the movie turned out), one part all-out global warfare (with very few zombies in sight, to be honest), and if that’s not epic enough, throw in music from The Who and Inception Tron: Legacy [my bad] and then top it all off with a bunch of Sony product placement, and there you go. Milla Jovovich is ready to kick ass as Alice for the fifth time in Resident Evil: Retribution. One thing I’m unclear about – wasn’t that Michelle Rodriguez? As I recall, her character is a little bit….uh…dead. Flashbacks, I suppose? I wonder how Paul W.S. Anderson will manage that level of complexity.

I’ll be out opening weekend. Such is the duty required of Milla adoration.

These things are popping out of the woodwork now, it seems. This one does an outstanding job of making the films “talk” to each other via carefully chosen dialogue snippets, forming little sections of story that blend into each other really well. I’m not a fan of all the music choices (though extra thumbs up for the David Lynch track), but in terms of creating a narrative and emotional throughline, this may be the best of the 2011 montages yet. Plus, it includes some films that the other two we’ve found haven’t included, especially some foreign stuff like Heartbeats, Love Crime, and A Separation. Kudos for variety!

A few choice new ones this week, including holiday favorites A Christmas Carol (the 1951 British version) and The Bishop’s Wife, plus iconic Newman film The Hustler, Amy Adams breakthrough film Junebug, Katharine Hepburn-Cary Grant collaboration Holiday (playing in a block with their other three films together), and Ingmar Bergman’s Fanny and Alexander.

Monday, December 12

6:00pm – MGM – A Shot in the Dark
Here’s your counter example for the “sequels are never as good as the original” argument. This second film in the Pink Panther series is easily the best, and stands as ones of the zaniest 1960s comedies ever.
1964 USA. Director: Blake Edwards. Starring: Peter Sellers, Herbert Lom.

8:00pm – TCM – A Christmas Carol
Usually considered among the best of the classic adaptations of A Christmas Carol, with Alastair Sim certainly playing a pretty definitive Scrooge surrounded by a great cast of British character actors.
1951 UK. Director: Brian Desmond Hurst. Starring: Alastair Sim, Jack Warner, Kathleen Harrison.
Newly Featured!

9:45pm – TCM – Oliver Twist
One of a couple of definitive film versions of Dickens’ novels that David Lean did in the ’40s. This is one of the few Dickens stories I actually do like, yet I haven’t gotten around to this version of it yet.
1948 UK. Director: David Lean. Starring: John Howard Davies, Alec Guinness, Robert Newton, Kay Walsh, Anthony Newley.

2:00am (13th) – TCM – Great Expectations
David Lean’s definitive version of one of Charles Dickens’ most well-known books, about the boy Pip and his rise to fortune through the aid of a mysterious benefactor. I’ve avoided this because of my distaste for Dickens, but hey. The movie can’t have time to ramble on like Dickens does, so maybe I’d like it.
1946 UK. Director: David Lean. Starring: John Mills, Tony Wager, Valerie Hobson, Jean Simmons, Bernard Miles, Martita Hunt.

4:15am (13th) – TCM – Pygmalion
A straight non-musical version of the George Bernard Shaw play that would later become My Fair Lady, with Leslie Howard as the prickly Professor Higgins who takes in street vendor Eliza Doolittle (Wendy Hiller) to turn her into a lady. A bit more acidic than the musical version.
1938 USA. Director: Anthony Asquith, Leslie Howard. Starring: Leslie Howard, Wendy Hiller, Wilfrid Lawson, Marie Lohr.

Tuesday, December 13

11:15am – IFC – My Life as a Dog
Lasse Hallstrom gives us this simple but effective coming-of-age story, focusing on the every day life of a young boy as he’s sent to live in a provincial village after acting out at home.
1985 Sweden. Director: Lasse Hallstrom. Starring: Anton Glanzelius, Tomas von Brömssen, Anki Lidén, Melinda Kinnaman.

3:10pm – Sundance – Man on Wire
One of the most highly-acclaimed documentaries of recent years tells the story of high-wire walker Philippe Petit as he embarks on perhaps his most dangerous stunt yet.
2008 UK/USA. Director: James Marsh. Starring: Philippe Petit, Jean François Heckel, Jean-Louis Blondeau.

8:00pm – IFC – American Psycho
A virtuoso performance from Christian Bale leads this controversial thriller about an affluent Wall Street investment banker leading a double life as a psychopath carrying out his amoral and misanthropic fantasies through sex and murder.
2000 USA. Director: Mary Herron. Starring: Christian Bale, Justin Theroux, Josh Lucas, Chloe Sevigny, Reese Witherspoon.
(repeats at 2:00am)

9:00pm – Sundance – Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead
Sadly this turned out to be Sidney Lumet’s final film before his death. But from what I hear, this is a fine one to have as a swan song, an intense and well-constructed heist thriller – something Lumet was certainly skilled at directing. I have got to get around to checking it out myself soon.
1997 USA. Director: Sidney Lumet. Starring: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke, Marisa Tomei, Albert Finney.

11:00pm – IFC – The Shining
Kubrick’s take on one of Stephen King’s most well-known novels may not stick that closely to King’s original story, but manages to capture the creepy factor of the Overlook Hotel and Jack Torrance’s descent into madness in a supremely cinematic way. Many memorable and disturbing scenes, and one of the few movies in which I actually like Jack Nicholson. So there’s that. Definitely not one to be missed.
1980 USA/UK. Director: Stanley Kubrick. Starring: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd, Scatman Crothers.
Must See

12:00M – MGM – The Great Escape
I expected to mildly enjoy or at least get through this POW escape film. What happened was I was completely enthralled with every second of it, from failed escape attempts to planning the ultimate escape to the dangers of carrying it out. It’s like a heist film in reverse, and extremely enjoyable in pretty much every way.
1963 USA. Director: John Sturges. Starring: Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson, Donald Pleasance, James Coburn, James Donald.
Must See

Wednesday, December 14

10:00am – Sundance – A Town Called Panic
One of the most delightful films I saw in 2009, a whacked out stop-motion film from Belgium that follows Horse, Cowboy, and Indian throughout a series of adventures, mostly focused on trying to rebuild their house which keeps getting stolen every night. This is mile-a-minute absurdity with more inventiveness in 75 minutes than I usually see all year.
2009 Belium. Directors: Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar. Starring: Stéphane Aubier, Jeanne Balibar, Bruce Ellison, Vincent Pater.
(repeats at 3:00pm)

1:00pm – Sundance – Flight of the Red Balloon
Hou Hsiao-hsien’s dreamy homage to the classic French film The Red Balloon, but with the Hong Kong director’s signature pacing and visual style. Action-filled it ain’t, but in it’s place is the lyrical nostalgia that Hou is so well known for.
2007 France. Director: Hou Hsiao-hsien. Starring: Juliette Binoche, Hippolyte Girardot, Simon Iteanu.
Newly Featured!

1:05pm – MGM – The Long Goodbye
One of the most delightful films I saw in 2009, a whacked out stop-motion film from Belgium that follows Horse, Cowboy, and Indian throughout a series of adventures, mostly focused on trying to rebuild their house which keeps getting stolen every night. This is mile-a-minute absurdity with more inventiveness in 75 minutes than I usually see all year.
2009 Belium. Directors: Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar. Starring: Stéphane Aubier, Jeanne Balibar, Bruce Ellison, Vincent Pater.

8:00pm – MGM – The Raven
Another of the several Edgar Allan Poe adaptations teaming up Roger Corman and Vincent Price, this time expanding greatly on Poe’s famous poem, making it about a bunch of magicians turning each other into ravens and fighting over the lovely Lenore, with a lot more comedy than you’d think one of the creepiest poems in literary history could inspire.
1963 USA. Director: Roger Corman. Starring: Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Boris Karloff, Hazel Court, Olive Sturgess, Jack Nicholson.

Thursday, December 15

8:00am – IFC – Mrs. Dalloway
Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway is likely my all-time favorite book or very close to it, and it’s a book that you’d never expect could be made into a good film. It depends an awful lot on stream of consciousness, internal monologue and memory, and a subjective experience of time – all stylistic and narrative elements that don’t translate well to film. However, this 1997 version of the novel with Vanessa Redgrave perfectly cast as the older Clarissa Dalloway and Natascha McElhone as flashback-Clarissa comes about as close as I think is cinematically possible. It doesn’t come close to matching the book for me, but it is a solid film and captures a lot of Woolf’s spirit.
1997 USA/UK. Director: Marleen Gorris. Starring: Vanessa Redgrave, Natascha McElhone, Michael Kitchen, Alan Cox, Sarah Badel, Lena Headey, John Standing.
(repeats at 2:00pm)

11:00am – MGM – Manon of the Spring
The sequel to the equally good Jean de Florette (but not really dependent on it), this quiet and pastoral French film focuses on Jean’s daughter Manon, who tries to right the wrongs done to her father.
1986 France. Director: Claude Berri. Starring: Yves Montand, Daniel Auteuil, Emmanuelle Beart, Hippolyte Girardo.

11:30am – TCM – Anatomy of a Murder
The sequel to the equally good Jean de Florette (but not really dependent on it), this quiet and pastoral French film focuses on Jean’s daughter Manon, who tries to right the wrongs done to her father.
1986 France. Director: Claude Berri. Starring: Yves Montand, Daniel Auteuil, Emmanuelle Beart, Hippolyte Girardo.

2:15pm – TCM – Witness for the Prosecution
This courtroom drama/thriller is among the last great films for all three of its stars, as Charles Laughton plays the crotchety judge overseeing the murder trial of Tyrone Power, with the major witness in the case being Power’s wife Marlene Dietrich. But not everyone is playing on the level here, and as the trial goes on, loyalties shift and double-crosses are revealed right and left.
1957 USA. Director: Billy Wilder. Starring: Charles Laughton, Marlene Dietrich, Tyrone Power.

6:00pm – TCM – In a Lonely Place
Simply a brilliant film from director Nicholas Ray – Humphrey Bogart gives probably his best performance as washed-up screenwriter Dixon Steele, who’s trying to make a comeback with a new adaptation. When a coatcheck girl gets murdered after he was the last to see her, he naturally comes under suspicion, but his neighbor Laurel (Gloria Grahame) gives him an alibi and soon the two begin a relationship which just might save Dix from more than a murder charge – or might not. There’s a raw intensity here that few films have ever matched.
1951 USA. Director: Nicholas Ray. Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Gloria Grahame.
Must See

10:00pm – IFC – Zodiac
One of David Fincher’s most acclaimed films, and deservedly so, tracing the obsession of one journalist (Jake Gyllenhaal) with the Zodiac serial killer. Years of following the case and the clues left by the Zodiac bring investigators no closer to success, but Gyllenhaal can’t let go – the story is much more a character study of him than a mystery of the killer, and it’s among the best of the genre.
2007 USA. Director: David Fincher. Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo, Anthony Edwards, Robert Downey Jr., Brian Cox.

10:35pm – Sundance – Tiny Furniture
Written, directed by, and starring Lena Dunham, this film has both staunch supporters and vocal detractors – some drawn to its DIY aesthetic and the post-grad ennui of the main character, others put off by those very things. When Criterion announced they were releasing it (part of their deal with IFC Pictures), it caused a good bit of controversy. That release is coming in February, but Sundance is running it now, so you can decide for yourself which side of the fence you’re on.
2010 USA. Director: Lena Dunham. Starring: Lena Dunham, Laurie Simmons, Grace Dunham.
Newly Featured!
(repeats at 3:35am on the 16th)

11:30pm – TCM – Mister Roberts
Henry Fonda is the title character, an XO on a cargo ship who often butts heads with the captain (James Cagney), who runs the ship with an iron fist. The tone is a satisfying combination of comedy and drama, and with a cast that also includes William Powell in his last role and Jack Lemmon in one of his first, you can hardly go wrong. Though John Ford and Mervyn LeRoy share credit for the film, it’s mostly Ford – LeRoy was brought in to finish it when Ford had to undergo emergency surgery, but he tried to emulate Ford’s style as much as possible.
1955 USA. Director: John Ford and Mervyn LeRoy. Starring: Henry Fonda, James Cagney, William Powell, Jack Lemmon, Betsy Palmer, Ward Bond.

2:15am (15th) – Fox Movie – Naked Lunch
This is a whacked out movie, more of an exploration of beat author William S. Burrough’s life and writing process than an adaptation of his novel of the same name, with addictive bug powder, murders, hallucinogenic trips, typewriters that turn into cockroaches, and espionage plots. I saw it ages ago when I probably wasn’t ready for it; ought to try it again sometime.
1991 Canada. Director: David Cronenberg. Starring: Peter Weller, Judy Davis, Ian Holm.

Friday, December 16

12:45pm – Sundance – Lolita
“How could they make a movie of Lolita?” runs the tagline, and indeed, it’s hard to imagine anyone even trying in 1962 – both because of the pedophiliac content and the interior nature of the narrative, very difficult to reproduce in cinematic form. But Stanley Kubrick decided he was up to the task, and though it isn’t considered one of his best films, it still rates pretty highly.
1962 UK/USA. Director: Stanley Kubrick. Starring: James Mason, Sue Lyon, Shelley Winters.

8:00pm – TCM – The Bishop’s Wife
Cary Grant is an angel sent to help Anglican bishop David Niven, but not in the way he expects – Niven wants to get a new cathedral built, but his single-minded drive is hurting his family and parish more than he realizes. This has never been one of my favorite Christmas movies, but most people I know seem to love it.
1947 USA. Director: Henry Koster. Starring: Cary Grant, Loretta Young, David Niven.
Newly Featured!

10:00pm – TCM – Christmas in Connecticut
The always-worth-watching Barbara Stanwyck is a magazine columnist who makes up a traditional country home for her column while living in New York, a subterfuge which causes no problems until a serviceman on leave wants nothing more than to spend Christmas on her farm and her editor thinks it’s a great human interest piece. Her attempts to recreate that world while falling for the serviceman are funny, warm, and enjoyable enough to add this to your holiday rotation.
1945 USA. Director: Peter Godfrey. Starring: Barbara Stanwyck, Dennis Morgan, Sydney Greenstreet, Reginald Gardiner, S.Z. “Cuddles” Sakall, Una O’Connor.

11:00pm – Fox Movie – The Hustler
One of Paul Newman’s early iconic roles as Fast Eddie Felson, an up-and-coming pool shark whose cockiness leads to a devastating loss. But the return from that loss with a new manager could cost him even more. Great character work from George C. Scott and Jackie Gleason support what remains one of Newman’s finest performances.
1961 USA. Director: Robert Rossen. Starring: Paul Newman, George C. Scott, Jackie Gleason, Piper Laurie.
Must See
Newly Featured!
(repeats at 2:00am on the 17th)

12:00M – TCM – The Shop Around the Corner
The original version of You’ve Got Mail has James Stewart and Margaret Sullavan as feuding employees of a shop who are unknowingly exchanging romantic letters. Ernst Lubitsch directs, bringing his warm European wit to bear.
1940 USA. Director: Ernst Lubitsch. Starring: James Stewart, Margaret Sullavan.
(repeats at 10:00am on the 18th)

Saturday, December 17

6:00am – IFC – Junebug
There’s not a whole lot to this film about a newlywed couple going to North Carolina to meet his family – a place the wife, a Chicago urbanite, can’t really relate to at all. But the real story is in his drifter brother, a solid role for O.C. alum Ben MacKenzie, and his pregnant wife, a breakthrough role for Amy Adams. These two overshadow the ostensible leads of the film completely, and they’re worth the movie.
2005 USA. Director: Phil Morrison. Starring: Embeth Davidtz, Alessandro Nivola, Amy Adams, Ben MacKenzie, Amy Adams.
Newly Featured!

3:30pm – TCM – Gypsy
One of the best shows ever written about stage mothers turns into a pretty decent film – it purports to be the story of vaudeville/burlesque performer Gypsy Rose Lee, but ends up being much more about her mother Mama Rose. It’s a good showcase for any actress, and Rosalind Russell, though not quite the singer that the role pulls on Broadway, does a fine job. Plus, it’s chock-full of showstopping tunes.
1962 USA. Director: Meryvn LeRoy. Starring: Rosalind Russell, Natalie Wood, Karl Malden.

5:30pm – IFC – The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou
Not Wes Anderson’s best perhaps – it skirts the line of self-consciously quirky and ends up a bit too awkwardly artificial even for him. But there’s still a lot about it to like, and the attention to detail is top-notch. It’s worth a watch for sure, especially for Anderson fans.
2004 USA. Director: Wes Anderson. Starring: Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, Anjelica Huston, Cate Blanchett, Willem Dafoe.

8:00pm – TCM – Bringing Up Baby
Poor Cary Grant just can’t get away from delightfully ditzy Katharine Hepburn, especially after her dog steals his museum’s priceless dinosaur bone. Oh, and after her pet leopard escapes (and a dangerous zoo leopard escapes at the same time). Incredible situation follows incredible situation in this zaniest of all screwball comedies.
1938 USA. Director: Howard Hawks. Starring: Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, May Robson, Barry Fitzgerald.
Must See

8:00pm – MGM – Blood Simple
The Coen Brothers’ first feature is already a pretty good indication of their style – a noirish thriller with a black comedy edge where everything goes more and more wrong the more people try to fix their mistakes. When the “mistakes” involve murder, leaving evidence at murder scenes, and having the worst time ever trying to get rid of a body, you’re in for a good time at pretty much every character’s expense.
1984 USA. Director: Joel Coen. Starring: John Getz, Frances McDormand, Dan Hedaya, M. Emmet Walsh.

8:00pm – Fox Movie – Young Frankenstein
My pick for best Mel Brooks movie of all time, yes, over Blazing Saddles and Spaceballs. Gene Wilder is the title character, a relative of the original Dr. Frankenstein who derides the research into the animation of dead tissue as poppycock. Until he inherits the Frankenstein castle and starts doing some experimenting of his own. And hilarity ensues. Pretty much right up there with the most quotable movies ever for me.
1974 USA. Director: Mel Brooks. Starring: Gene Wilder, Teri Garr, Cloris Leachman, Marty Feldman.
Must See
(repeats at 12:00M)

8:05pm – IFC – Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Easily one of the most absurd, random, hilarious, and quotable comedies of all time. A more hapless bunch of Round Table knights couldn’t be found, and Monty Python has never been better than they are here.
1975 UK. Directors: Terry Gilliam, Terry Jones. Starring: Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Michael Palin, Terry Gilliam, Terry Jones.
Must See
(repeats at 2:00am on the 18th)

9:55pm – MGM – Blue Velvet
I’ll be honest, this is not one of my favorite David Lynch films. There are a lot of things I like about it. The unsettling take on suburbia, the gorgeously disturbing photography, the kids playing detective, the severed ear, you know, the normal Lynch stuff. But then it just gets to be too cruel for me. Still, it’s a Lynch classic, and you oughta see it. And I oughta see it again, see if my opinion has changed.
1986 USA. Director: David Lynch. Starring: Kyle McLachlan, Laura Dern, Isabella Rossellini, Dennis Hopper.

10:00pm – TCM – The Philadelphia Story
Katharine Hepburn is Tracy Lord, a spoiled socialite about to marry Ralph Bellamy when ex-husband Cary Grant turns up. Throw in newspaper columnist James Stewart and his photographer Ruth Hussey, along with a bunch of great character actors filling out the cast, and you have both rollicking wedding preparations and one of the best films ever made.
1940 USA. Director: George Cukor. Starring: Katharaine Hepburn, Cary Grant, James Stewart, Ruth Hussey, Ralph Bellamy, Virginia Weidler.
Must See

10:05pm – IFC – Monty Python’s Life of Brian
After dismantling the King Arthur legends, Monty Python turn their attention to the Bible itself, satirically suggesting what might happen if a random 1st century baby got mistaken for the Messiah. Irreverent and hilarious, though not as consistently so for me as Holy Grail.
1979 UK. Director: Terry Jones. Starring: Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Terry Gilliam, Michael Palin.
(repeats at 4:00am on the 18th)

12:00M – TCM – Holiday
Overshadowed by the same year’s Bringing Up Baby, this Hepburn-Grant team-up is a really solid little film about a young man (Grant) engaged to a wealthy heiress. But her family doesn’t take too kindly to some of his more unorthodox ideas about business and life, except for his fiancee’s two black sheep siblings (Hepburn and Lew Ayres). Not up there with Baby or Philadelphia Story, but definitely worth watching.
1938 USA. Director: George Cukor. Starring: Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, Doris Nolan, Lew Ayres, Edward Everett Horton, Henry Kolker.
Newly Featured!

3:45am (18th) – TCM – Victor/Victoria
Pretty classic among gender-switching comedies, this one has Julie Andrews as a singer who finds she has more success pretending to be a man working as a female impersonator. Lots of fun and confusion ensues.
1982 UK/USA. Director: Blake Edwards. Starring: Julie Andrews, James Garner, Robert Preston.

Sunday, December 18

6:00am – TCM – Little Women
This first sound version of Little Women has a young Katharine Hepburn in the lead, along with a roll-call of great 1930s starlets and character actors. It’s a bit wooden compared to the 1994 version, but it’s got a lot of charm nonetheless.
1933 USA. Director: George Cukor. Starring: Katharine Hepburn, Joan Bennett, Paul Lukas, Edna May Oliver, Jean Parker, Frances Dee.

9:45am – IFC – Exam
Setting a film entirely in one room is a constraint that often results in some very interesting cinema, and Exam certainly sounds interesting, placing a bunch of people in a single room for a job interview that consists of only one question. But they aren’t told what the question is.
2009 UK. Director: Stuart Hazeldine. Starring: Adar Beck, Gemma Chan, Nathalie Cox.

1:00pm – TCM – Since You Went Away
A WWII homefront story of a middle America family offering a room for rent to help make ends meet while the husband/father is off at war. The great ensemble cast helps sell this, which covers day to day issues like food rations as well as major events like the daughter’s romance. Not as immediate or gripping as something like Mrs. Miniver, but still a solid and entertaining look at the American homefront.
1944 USA. Director: John Cromwell. Starring: Claudette Colbert, Monty Woolley, Jennifer Jones, Robert Walker, Joseph Cotten, Shirley Temple, Lionel Barrymore, Hattie McDaniel, Agnes Moorehead.

4:00pm – TCM – An American in Paris
Expat artist Gene Kelly in Paris meets Leslie Caron and woos her away from rival Georges Guetarey, all set to Gershwin music and directed with panache by Vincente Minnelli. All that plus Kelly’s ground-breaking fifteen-plus-minute ballet to the title piece.
1951 USA. Director: Vincente Minnelli. Starring: Gene Kelly, Leslie Caron, Oscar Levant, Georges Guetarey.
Must See

6:000pm – TCM – State Fair
The only musical Rodgers & Hammerstein wrote directly for the screen, and yeah, it’s fairly inconsequential, but it’s a lot of fun. And really made me want my dad to take me to the Iowa State Fair when I was a kid. He never did, so I never got to find out if it was as much fun as this. Probably not.
1945 USA. Director: Walter Lang. Starring: Jeanne Crain, Dana Andrews, Dick Haymes, Vivian Blaine.

10:00pm – TCM – The Man Who Came to Dinner
A rare comedic film for Bette Davis, though the film mainly focuses on Monty Woolley as an acerbic newspaper critic forced to take up residence with a midwestern family when he breaks his hip outside their house. Woolley was a great character actor here given the spotlight, and he takes it and runs with it. A great script by Julius and Philip Epstein (of Casablanca) doesn’t hurt, either.
1942 USA. Director: William Keighley. Starring: Bette Davis, Ann Sheridan, Monty Woolley, Jimmy Durante, Billie Burke.

12:00M – TCM – Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ
Everyone knows about Charlton Heston’s Ben-Hur. You know, the one that won eleven Oscars, a record which stood for, like, fifty years? This isn’t that one. This is the 1925 silent version of the same story, with pre-talkie hearththrob Ramon Novarro as Ben-Hur, and an equally impressive (for its time) chariot race sequence. In some ways, I actually prefer this version to the bombastic 1959 version, and it’s definitely worth a watch.
1925 USA. Director: Fred Niblo. Starring: Ramon Novarro, Francis X. Bushman, May McAvoy, Betty Bronson, Kathleen Key.

2:30am (19th) – TCM – Fanny and Alexander
One of Ingmar Bergman’s most beloved films, and one I’ve sadly yet to catch up with myself, about a pair of children who are uprooted from their theatrical milieu into an austere chancery when their mother marries a bishop after their father dies. TCM is showing the 189 min theatrical cut, not the longer TV edit.
1982 Sweden. Director: Ingmar Bergman. Starring: Pernilla Allwin, Bertil Guve, Börje Ahlstedt, Allan Edwall, Ewa Fröling.
Newly Featured!

I posted this on our Google+ page a little while ago, but it’s worth a post here as well. A really well-edited look back at the films of 2011 (I’m guessing the footage is all taken from trailers), split along different themes or tones. The way the editing makes the films “interact” with each other is pretty cool. There was one of these out last year for the films of 2010 that was excellent (found it!); this is not from the same person, but the person who did last year’s is apparently planning a followup as well, so we’ll have competing 2011 mashups before too long! In the meantime, enjoy this one. The YouTube description page starts with “Many good films came out this year.” Not all of these films are good, but there’s a surprising range once you get into the video a little way, and it is definitely a representative selection. Certainly makes me want to go back and revisit some stuff!

A bunch of summer release movies out this week that I…didn’t see. Seriously, I haven’t seen any of the new releases this week. Except the Dragon Tattoo films, and those are extended from the versions I saw. So there’s a lot of “I’m hoping to see this sometime…” in this post. Thankfully, I HAVE seen the two Criterion releases and I can recommend them wholeheartedly, and there are also some very excellent choices coming on Instant Watch, including all the James Bond films. Again.

New Release Picks of the Week

The Help
This seemingly innocuous little film about domestic race relations in the 1950s gathered a fair bit of critical controversy over the summer, but audiences generally loved it. I’m curious to check out the hullabaloo myself.
2011 USA. Director: Tate Taylor. Starring: Emma Stone, Viola Davis, Bryce Dallas Howard, Jessica Chastain.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

Cowboys & Aliens
Across the board negative reviews or not, I can’t shake my interest in checking this out, at the very least to see how bad a trainwreck it is. Are we talking Wild Wild West level horrific here?
2011 USA. Director: Jon Favreau. Starring: Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

The Debt
The second film out this week with Jessica Chastain, who was in eleventy billion movies this year, a flashback structured spy film that got a mixed reaction, but I’m still down to give it a shot.
2010 USA. Director: John Madden. Starring: Sam Worthington, Helen Mirren, Jessica Chastain.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

Dragon Tattoo Trilogy: Extended Edition
Now this sounds interesting. The second and third Dragon Tattoo films were apparently chopped down for theatrical release here, and these are the full versions that were on Swedish TV – 30-50 minutes longer. Here the whole trilogy is split into six segments, like a miniseries. Curious if this improves parts 2 and 3.
2009 Sweden. Director: Niels Arden Oplev, et al. Starring: Noomi Rapace, Michael Nyqvist.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray

OTHER NEW RELEASES
The Hangover Part II (2011 USA, dir Todd Phillips, stars Bradley Cooper; Blu-ray/Netflix)
Mr. Popper’s Penguins (2011 USA, dir Mark Waters, stars Jim Carrey; Blu-ray/Netflix)
Point Blank (2011 France, dir Fred Cavayé, stars Gilles Lellouche, Roschdy Zem; Blu-ray/Netflix)
A Christmas Wedding Tail (2011 USA, dir Michael Feifer, stars Jennie Garth, Brad Rowe; Netflix)
A Christmas Wish (2010 USA, dir Craig Clyde, stars Edward Herrmann, Kristy Swanson)
The Love We Make (2011 USA, dir Albert Maysles, stars Paul McCartney; Blu-ray/Netflix)

Classic Picks of the Week

Design for Living
One of Ernst Lubitsch’s best films, a late pre-Code about a love triangle that the participants try to resolve by simply all living together as “friends.” A bit scandalous for the time, carried off with wit, sophistication, and a bit of naughtiness by the sparkling cast.
1933 USA. Director: Ernst Lubitsch. Starring: Fredric March, Gary Cooper, Miriam Hopkins.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

Histoire(s) du Cinema
Jean-Luc Godard’s extended documentary about the history of cinema – something I’ve wanted to get my hands on for a long time. I’m sure it will be just as biased and idiosyncratic as the rest of his work, which for me will probably increase my enjoyment of it.
1997-2004 France. Director: Jean-Luc Godard.
Amazon DVD | Netflix

OTHER CLASSIC RELEASES
The Falcon Mystery Movie Collection Vol. 1 (1943 USA, dir Irving Reis, stars George Sanders)
Reach for the Sky (1956 USA, dir Lewis Gilbert, stars Kenneth More, Muriel Pavlow; Netflix)

Blu-ray Picks of the Week

The Lady Vanishes Criterion
One of Hitchcock’s finest British films (pretty near the top of all his films, to be honest) gets the Blu-ray upgrade treatment. It’s been too long since I’ve seen it; this is definitely a tempting release.
1938 UK. Director: Alfred Hitchcock. Starring: Margaret Lockwood, Michael Redgrave, Paul Lukas.
Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

OTHER BLU-RAY RELEASES
Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970 USA, dir Richard Fleischer, et al, stars Jason Robards; Netflix)

Television Picks of the Week

Portlandia: Season 1
I haven’t watched this IFC original series, but I’ve seen enough of Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein’s comedy stylings to be curious. It’s sure to be indie-awkward, and that often pleases me.
2011 USA. Created by and starring: Fred Armisen & Carrie Brownstein.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

The Simpsons: Season 14
I’ve not been a bit Simpsons watcher, though I do enjoy the show when I see it, so my first thought was “wow, the Simpsons has 14 seasons…” Then I realized the Simpsons is on its 23rd season. So yeah, this is just past the halfway mark.
2002 USA. Creator: Matt Groening. Starring: Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

Big Love: Season 5
A show about a polygamist isn’t quite what I’d call my thing, but I know a lot of people who really think highly of this show. And of course, HBO does very well with offbeat subjects. The whole series up to now is also releasing in a box set.
2011 USA. Creator: Mark V. Olsen, Will Scheffer. Starring: Bill Paxton, Jeanne Tripplehorn.
Amazon DVD | Complete Series | Netflix

OTHER TELEVISION RELEASES
Law & Order: Season 9 (1999 USA, creator Dick Wolf, stars Sam Waterston; Netflix)
Sarah Jane Adventures: Season 4 (2009 UK, creator Russell T. Davies, stars Elisabeth Sladen; Netflix)
Spongebob Squarepants: Season 7 (2009 USA, creator stephen Hillenburg, stars Tom Keny; Netflix)
Designing Women: Season 5 (1990 USA, creator Linda Bloodworth-Thomason, stars Dixie Carter; Netflix)
The Lucy Show: Season 5 (1966 USA, creator Lucille Ball, stars Lucille Ball, Gale Gordon; Netflix)

Instant Watch Picks of the Week

The Myth of the American Sleepover
Oh, awesome! I’ve championed this movie since seeing it at AFI Fest 2009, and now people actually have a decent chance to see it! It’s an unassuming but somehow deeply meaningful coming-of-age film…here, just read this.
2010 USA. Director: David Robert Mitchell. Starring: Claire Sloma, Marlon Morton, Brett Jacobson.

The Thin Red Line
Terrence Malick’s third film, and I guess the start of his burst of activity that saw him complete three films in thirteen years (yeah, that’s a lot for him). It’s one the two Malick films I haven’t seen yet, but I’m hoping to rectify that very soon.
1998 USA. Director: Terrence Malick. Starring: Nick Nolte, Sean Penn, George Clooney, Adrien Brody.

Apocalypse Now
I finally scratched this off my list of shame this year, but it’s the kind of film that I immediately put down on my rewatch list – might give it another go here one of these days.
1979 USA. Director: Francis Ford Coppola. Starring: Martin Sheen, Marlon Brando.

Goldfinger
Netflix is playing on-again, off-again with the Bond movies – all of them except the last two are back on, for now. I still hold this as the best of them all, so I’ll feature it. The rest are listed below for your linking convenience.
1964 UK. Director: Guy Hamilton. Starring: Sean Connery, Honor Blackman.

Witness for the Prosecution
Nearly the last film for most of its excellent cast, and among their collective best; a courtroom drama with plenty of backstabbing twists and turns, and a typically acerbic script from from Billy Wilder.
1957 USA. Director: Billy Wilder. Starring: Marlene Dietrich, Tyrone Power, Charles Laughton.

Black Books
This is one of the funniest British comedies I’ve ever seen, and it’s a shame that it doesn’t get more recognition outside of British comedy geek circles. Seriously. Check it out. Dylan Moran is awesome.
2000-2004 UK. Creator Dylan Moran, Graham Linehan. Starring: Dylan Moran, Billy Bailey, Tamsin Greig.

Spaced
The show that started it all, bringing Wright, Pegg, and Frost together before they went on to create some of the greatest film homages of the past decade. Spaced is the pinnacle of geeky awesome.
1999 UK. Creator: Edgar Wright. Starring: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost.

Ronin
“It’s just like Ronin!” If you always wondered what the heck the boys on the Cinecast are going on about when they say that, here you go.
1998 USA. Director: John Frankenheimer. Starring: Robert De Niro, Sean Bean, Natascha McElhone.

Rocky
This is one on my list of shame that I have very little actual interest in watching, but I feel like I ought to just so I can say I have. Netflix is making it harder to put off.
1976 USA. Director: John G. Avildsen. Starring: Stylvester Stallone, Carl Weathers.

Heathers
No one in my generation can believe I’ve never seen this movie. I’m going to fix that so they stop bugging me about it.
1989 USA. Director: Michael Lehrman. Starring: Winona Ryder, Christian Slater.

OTHER INSTANT WATCHES
The Bellboy (1960 USA, dir Jerry Lewis, stars Jerry Lewis, Alex Gerry)
Bird on a Wire (1990 USA, dir John Badham, stars Mel Gibson, Goldie Hawn)
Bowling for Columbine (2002 USA, dir Michael Moore)
C.H.U.D. (1984 USA, dir Douglas Cheek, stars John Heard, Daniel Stern)
Creepshow 2 (1987 USA, dir Michael Gornick, stars George Kennedy, Lois Chiles)
Diamonds are Forever (1971 UK, dir Guy Hamilton, stars Sean Connery, Jill St. John)
The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961-1965 USA, creator Carl Reiner, stars Dick Van Dyke)
Dr. No (1962 UK, dir Terence Young, stars Sean Connery, Ursula Andress)
Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas (1977 USA, dir Jim Henson, stars Frank Oz, Dave Goelz)
The English Patient (1996 UK, dir Anthony Minghella, stars Ralph Fiennes, Kristen Scott Thomas)
For Your Eyes Only (1981 UK, dir John Glen, stars Roger Moore, Carole Bouquet)
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir (1947 USA, dir Joseph L. Mankiewicz, stars Gene Tierney, Rex Harrison)
The Go-Getter (2007 USA, dir Martin Hynes, stars Lou Taylor Pucci, Zooey Deschanel)
GoldenEye (1995 UK, dir Martin Campbell, stars Pierce Brosnan, Famke Janssen)
Hammett (1982 USA, dir Wim Wenders, stars Frederic Forrest, Peter Boyle)
Hellraiser (1987 USA, dir Clive Barker, stars Andrew Robinson, Clare Higgins)
Hook (1991 USA, dir Steven Spielberg, stars Robin Williams, Dustin Hoffman)
How I Met Your Mother (2005-2010 USA, creator Craig Thomas, stars Josh Radnor, Jason Segal)
I’m Not Rappaport (1996 USA, dir Herb Gardner, stars Walter Matthau, Ossie Davis)
In Which We Serve (1942 UK, dir Noel Coward, David Lean, stars John Mills)
Jackass 3 (2010 USA, dir Jeff Tremaine, stars Johnny Knoxville, Bam Margera)
The Ladies Man (1961 USA, dir Jerry Lewis, stars Jerry Lewis, Helen Traubel)
The League (2010 USA, creator Jackie Marcus Schaffer, Jeff Schaffer, stars Mark Duplass)
Licence to Kill (1989 UK, dir John Glen, stars Timothy Dalton, Robert Davi)
Live and Let Die (1973 UK, dir Guy Hamilton, stars Roger Moore, Jane Seymour)
The Living Daylights(1987 UK, dir John Glen, stars Timothy Dalton, Maryam d’Abo)
The Longest Day (1962 USA, dir Bernhard Wicki, et al, stars John Wayne, Henry Fonda)
The Man with the Golden Gun (1975 UK, dir Guy Hamilton, stars Roger Moore, Christopher Lee)
Matinee (1993 USA, dir Joe Dante, stars John Goodman, Cathy Moriarty)
Moonraker (1979 UK, dir Lewis Gilbert, stars Roger Moore, Lois Chiles)
Never Say Never Again (1983 UK, dir Irvin Kershner, stars Sean Connery, Klaus Maria Brandauer)
The Nutty Professor (1963 USA, dir Jerry Lewis, stars Jerry Lewis, Stella Stevens)
Octopussy (1983 UK, dir John Glen, stars Roger Moore, Maud Adams)
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969 UK, dir Peter Hunt, stars George Lazenby, Diana Rigg)
One from the Heart (1982 USA, dir Francis Ford Coppola, stars Frederic Forrest, Teri Garr)
Peter Pan (2003 USA, dir P.J. Hogan, stars Jason Isaacs, Jeremy Sumpter)
Rumble Fish (1983 USA, dir Francis Ford Coppola, starring Matt Dillon, Diane Lane)
Set Up (2011 USA, dir Mike Gunther, stars Bruce Willis, Ryan Phillippe)
Short Circuit (1986 USA, dir John Badham, stars Ally Sheedy, Steve Guttenberg)
The Spy Who Loved Me (1977 UK, dir Lewis Gilbert, stars Roger Moore, Barbara Bach)
Tapeheads (1988 USA, dir Bill Fishman, stars John Cusack, Tim Robbins)
Terriers (2010 USA, creator Ted Griffin, stars Donal Logue, Michael Raymond-James)
Tetro (2009 USA, dir Francis Ford Coppola, stars Vincent Gallo, Alden Ehrenreich)
Thunderball (1965 UK, dir Terence Young, stars Sean Connery, Claudine Auger)
Traffik (1989 UK, stars Bill Paterson, Lindsay Duncan)
Twins (1988 USA, dir Ivan Reitman, stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, Danny DeVito)
Ultraviolet (1998 UK, stars Jack Davenport, Susannah Harker)
A View to a Kill (1985 UK, dir John Glen, stars Roger Moore, Christopher Walken)
Waiting for Superman (2010 USA, dir Davis Guggenheim)
The World is Not Enough (1999 UK, dir Michael Apted, stars Pierce Brosnan, Sophie Marceau)

See all new and upcoming titles.

Instant Watch Expiring Picks

Absolute Power (1997 USA, dir Clint Eastwood, stars Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman) [12/11]
Sleepers (1996 USA, dir Barry Levinson, stars Brad Pitt, Dustin Hoffman) [12/14]
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Undead (2009 USA, dir Jordan Galland, stars Jake Hoffman) [12/15]
Law Abiding Citizen (2009 USA, dir F. Gary Gray, stars Gerard Butler, Jamie Foxx) [12/17]
Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson (2007 USA, dir Alex Gibney) [12/18]
Sling Blade (1996 USA, dir Billy Bob Thornton, stars Billy Bob Thornton, Dwight Yoakam) [12/19]
The Boss of It All (2006 Denmark, dir Lars von Trier, stars Peter Gantzler, Jens Albinus) [12/20]
Manderlay (2005 Denmark, dir Lars von Trier, stars Bryce Dallas Howard) [12/20]

See all expiring titles.

Disclaimers

• Amazon links use my affiliate account, and will kick a small percentage of your purchase back to me. You pay the same price you would anyway.
• Not all new releases are available on Netflix immediately. Some studio films have a 30-day release window before Netflix can rent them, and some smaller releases are not picked up by Netflix immediately. Add them to your “saved” queue if you’re interested; that tells Netflix there is demand for the disc.
• Not all new Blu-ray releases are available on Netflix – Netflix usually buys both DVD and Blu-ray editions of new releases, but if a DVD has already been released, they don’t always get the Blu-ray when it comes out later.
• Instant Watch releases are not always 100% accurate – often the data from the API is not fully accurate until the actual day of release. I always check on release day to make sure things actually do hit Instant Watch, but for things that come out later than Tuesday when I publish this post, I won’t be able to tell.
• Instant Watch expirations are not always 100% accurate – sometimes they don’t expire after all, sometimes things expire with little advance warning. I always check to make sure the data is accurate to the best of my knowledge when I publish the post, but things could still change, especially since I’m giving expiration warnings up to two weeks in advance.

There’s no doubt that the future of cinema is going to be digital rather than film (as a physical format). Theatres are converting to digital projection right and left, with fewer and fewer 35mm film prints struck all the time, and the major camera manufacturers are ceasing production of film cameras to focus solely on digital cameras instead. It’s where the demand is. But this shift to digital doesn’t only affect new films, which are likely to be shot, edited, and projected digitally, never spending any phase of their creation on physical film – it also affects older films, which were shot on 35mm and meant to be projected on 35mm. Many Hollywood studios have declared their intention to stop producing 35mm prints of older films for use in repertory cinemas, museums, film forums, universities, etc, instead presenting those films only in digital formats as well.

On the one hand, it’s easy to see why this makes sense to them. Digital copies are much easier and cheaper to store and transfer to theatres than bulky 35mm film prints. And many people will argue that digital looks better anyway, or at least consumers won’t be able to tell the difference. I heartily disagree with that – I love the tactile, physical look that 35mm has vs. the sterility of digital. But my point of view is quickly labeled romantic and old-fashioned in a world where cinema is a business and 35mm is antiquated technology. To some degree, it is a romantic perspective. I certainly get a rush of emotion every time I walk into the Silent Movie Theatre and see the film canisters sitting there, ready to be lovingly threaded through the projector by the seasoned projectionist for the evening’s screening. I smile when I see the cigarette burns signalling a reel change. I feel a connection to other audiences when a print is flawed through its many uses in other cinemas, screened for other audiences in other places. But what do my emotions, certainly the emotions of a minority of cinemagoers, matter in this equation?

I’m definitely not alone in my love for seeing films projected on 35mm (or 70mm or whatever format was originally used to shoot them) – Julia Marchese of Los Angeles’s New Beverly Cinema, one of the foremost repertory cinemas in the country and one that would certainly feel the loss of 35mm prints, has started an online petition to Fight for 35mm. It currently has nearly 6,000 signatures of a hoped-for 10,000. Here’s the bulk of her plea:

I firmly believe that when you go out to the cinema, the film should be shown in 35mm. At the New Beverly, we have never been about making money – a double feature ticket costs only $8. We are passionate about cinema and film lovers. We still use a reel to reel projection system, and our projectionists care dearly about film, checking each print carefully before it screens and monitoring the film as it runs to ensure the best projection possible. With digital screenings, the projectionists will become obsolete and the film will be run by ushers pushing a button – they don’t ever have to even enter the theater.

The human touch will be entirely taken away. The New Beverly Cinema tries our hardest to be a timeless establishment that represents the best that the art of cinema has to offer. We want to remain a haven where true film lovers can watch a film as it was meant to be seen – in 35mm. Revival houses perform an undeniable service to movie watchers – a chance to watch films with an audience that would otherwise only be available for home viewing. Film is meant to be a communal experience, and nothing can surpass watching a film with a receptive audience, in a cinema, projected from a film print.

I feel very strongly about this issue and cannot stand idly by and let digital projection destroy the art that I live for. As one voice I cannot change the future, but hopefully if enough film lovers speak up, we can prove to the studios that repertory cinema is important and that we want 35mm to remain available to screen.

Pleading that digital takes away “the human touch” and devalues the “communal experience” may be a romantic argument, but I think it’s a true and valid one. Step by step we’re moving away from that, as we see more films isolated in our homes, individually on our computers and tablets, and in small groups of never-interacting people in multiplexes. The only places I’ve really had what I’d consider communal moviegoing experiences are festivals, where passholders generally spend 8-10 days bumping into each other constantly in lines and theatres, and in rep cinemas – and rep cinemas are far better at it even than festivals. Sure, you can get that with digital prints, because that doesn’t change the audience, does it? But it does, subtly, and a lot of rep cinemagoers are avid 35mm fans. I know people who won’t go to see screenings at Cinefamily if they weren’t able to get a 35mm print for it. Silly, perhaps, but on some level I understand their argument. Going digital is a loss, and it’s part of the loss of the specialness of going to the theatre. You can see digital versions of films in an isolationist bubble at home, so why go to the theatre for that? In a roundabout way, studios are killing their own business, by making the theatrical experience too close to the home experience. On a different but related note, there are many smaller cinemas spread throughout the country, both repertory and first-run, that simply don’t have the money to convert to digital. They’ll close, leaving small towns with few or no alternatives for moviegoing.

The other side of this coin is in the area of preservation. Digital preservation can be a wonderful thing – it provides a backup for fragile 35mm film that’s more stable, doesn’t deteriorate, and is easily reproduced and distributed as necessary. Unless the file becomes corrupted, or the data center crashes, or file formats change. In addition, it’s a fact known to archivists, scholars, and cinephiles that every time a format changes – from 35mm to VHS to DVD to Blu-ray to digital – more and more films are actually left behind. The myth is that once everything goes digital, everything will be available to everybody, but that’s not true. There are more films right now on 35mm than on any other format, because choices have to be made with every format what’s worth money to the studio to produce in the new format. Maybe the things left behind aren’t very good, or maybe no one’s interested in seeing them anyway. But that’s our cinematic heritage, and it is ALL worth saving – that is the backbone of preservation and restoration. Many people get interested in preservation through seeing 35mm prints of films and realizing that this is something special that ought to be preserved. Denying the importance of 35mm film is denying the importance of our cinematic history.

Movieline’s Jen Yamato brought up the issue in a discussion-generating post a couple of weeks ago, and generate discussion it did – with people both for and against. Taking on a few of those commenters, Dennis Cozzalio posted a lengthy but well-worth reading article. He covers a lot of different approaches to the subject, cogently and passionately but also with a lot of balance and understanding for the financial issues at stake. Please read it, he does a much better and more thorough job talking about this than I have. Admittedly, even if Marchese gets the 10,000 names she wants on the petition, how much are major Hollywood studios going to care about 10,000 people, however passionate, against their bottom line? Still, there are reasons enough to make our voices heard, and if 35mm is important to you, sign and share the petition, but also write about it on your own blogs and social networks, attend screenings in 35mm whenever you can (especially at rep cinemas – the New Beverly, Cinefamily, American Cinematheque, the Nuart, LACMA, the Academy in Los Angeles; Film Forum, Walter Reade Theatre, and MOMA in New York; TIFF Lightbox in Toronto; Pacific Film Archive and Castro Theatre in the San Francisco area; Alamo Drafthouse in Austin; and others), aid film preservation foundation and archives like UCLA, Eastman House, Film Foundation, the Academy, etc., and help preserve the love of actual, tactile, physical, visceral 35mm film in any way you can.

Pretty good grab bag of Newly Featured ones this week, from Christmas classics like A Christmas Carol (the 1938 version, Monday on TCM) and A Christmas Story (Tuesday on TCM) to more recent releases like Nights and Weekends (Wednesday on Sundance) and that thing you do! (Tuesday on Fox Movie Channel). Plus, W.C. Fields’ finest hour in The Bank Dick, playing Saturday on TCM.

Monday, December 5

11:45am – IFC – A Prairie Home Companion
One of Robert Altman’s final films, and one I’ve not yet gotten up to in my attempts to rectify my Altman blind spot. As much as I’ve enjoyed the films of his I have seen, though, I’m definitely putting his entire filmography higher on my to-watch list.
2006 USA. Director: Robert Altman. Starring: Woody Harrelson, Meryl Streep, Kevin Kline, Lindsay Lohan, Virginia Madsen, John C. Reilly, Maya Rudolph, Lily Tomlin.

12:15pm – TCM – The Man With the Golden Arm
Frank Sinatra gets one of his best acting roles as card dealer Frankie Machine, recently back from rehab and wanting to become a drummer, but held back and lured back into dealing and addiction by those around him. Solid direction and supporting performances, plus a great jazz score, make this a hard-hitting and excellent film.
1955 USA. Director: Otto Preminger. Starring: Frank Sinatra, Kim Novak, Eleanor Parker.

9:45pm – TCM – A Christmas Carol (1938)
Generally, the 1951 British version of Dickens’ classic novella is considered the best of the classic adaptations, but this 1938 version is pretty solid, too, with a solid group of character actors taking on the roles of Scrooge, Cratchit, and others.
1938 USA. Director: Edwin L. Marin. Starring: Reginald Owen, Gene Lockhart, Kathleen Lockhart, Leo G. Carroll, Ann Rutherford.
Newly Featured!

12:35am (6th) – IFC – Valhalla Rising
Nicholas Winding Refn’s nearly wordless take on the Viking action film, privileging visual storytelling and a somewhat surreal and philosophical feel.
2009 Denmark. Director: Nicholas Winding Refn. Starring: Mads Mikkelsen, Maarten Stevenson, Alexander Morton.
(repeats at 2:35am)

Tuesday, December 6

6:00am – TCM – Johnny Belinda
Jane Wyman won an Oscar for playing a deaf/mute woman surrounded by a rape/pregnancy scandal, and may have given the best acceptance speech ever. Paraphrased: “You gave this to me for keeping my mouth shut, and I think I’ll do the same now.”
1948 USA. Director: Jean Negulesco. Starring: Jane Wyman, Lew Ayres, Charles Bickford.

10:00am – IFC – Hero
Jet Li is the titular hero in this Zhang Yimou film, arguably the best of Yimou’s period action-on-wires films (though I’m partial to House of Flying Daggers myself). The story unfolds in flashback as Li explains to a warlord how he eliminated three would-be assassins (who happen to be three of Hong Kong cinema’s biggest stars, incidentally) – but all may not be precisely how it seems.
2002 China. Director: Zhang Yimou. Starring: Jet Li, Zhang Ziyi, Tony Leung, Maggie Cheung.
(repeats at 4:00pm)

4:00pm – Fox Movie – that thing you do!
Tom Hanks took his first turn behind the camera of a feature film with this film about a 1960s one-hit wonder band. It’s pretty slight, but it’s a lot of fun, with a rollicking soundtrack of oldies and imitation oldies.
1996 USA. Director: Tom Hanks. Starring: Tom Everett Scott, Liv Tyler, Steve Zahn, Tom Hanks, Charlize Theron.
Newly Featured!

6:00pm – Fox Movie – An Affair to Remember
For some reason, this has become one of the best-loved melodramas of classic Hollywood (possibly because its main plot point is memorialized in Sleepless in Seattle); it’s not one of my personal favorites in the genre, but as three-handkerchief romantic weepies go, it’s not bad.
1957 USA. Director: Leo McCarey. Starring: Cary Grant, Deborah Kerr.

8:00pm – IFC – Full Metal Jacket
Kubrick takes on the Vietnam war with one of his most highly-regarded films, following a unit of Marines from basic training under a tyrannical sergeant through fighting in the streets of Vietnam.
(1987 UK/USA. Director: Stanley Kubrick. Starring: Matthew Modine, Adam Baldwin, Vincent D’Onofrio, R. Lee Ermey.
(repeats at 11:00pm)

9:00pm – TCM – A Christmas Story
A staple on cable channels for years, this classic of childhood holiday cheer takes its turn on TCM (but only plays once, instead of all day!). The adventures of Ralphie are well-known to most everybody under the age of 40, but it’s always fun to revisit them around this time of year.
1983 USA. Director: Bob Clark. Starring: Peter Billingsley, Melinda Dillon, Darren McGavin.
Newly Featured!

9:00pm – Sundance – Hunger
A look at the last days of IRA member Bobby Sands, the leader of a 1981 hunger strike undertaken by IRA prisoners in the face of brutal prison conditions. I have yet to see it, but first-time director Steve McQueen’s stark yet artful style brought him huge amounts of critical acclaim, plus the film stands as Michael Fassbender’s breakout.
2008 UK. Director: Steve McQueen. Starring: Michael Fassbender, Stuart Graham, Laine Megaw, Brian Milligan.

10:05pm – Fox Movie – The Panic in Needle Park
A harrowing tale of NYC heroin addicts, exemplifying the dark side of youth culture that New Hollywood does so well. A star-making turn for Al Pacino, just a year prior to The Godfather.
1971 USA. Director: Jerry Schatzberg. Starring: Al Pacino, Kitty Winn, Alan Vint.
(repeats at 2:05am on the 7th)

12:00M – TCM – Miracle on 34th Street
The original classic Christmas tale of a Macy’s department store Santa who claims to be the real thing and the family whose cynicism is tested by his presence. One of Natalie Wood’s most memorable pre-growing-up roles, and an Oscar-winner for Edmund Gwenn as Kris Kringle.
1947 USA. Director: George Seaton. Starring: Maureen O’Hara, Natalie Wood, Edmund Gwenn, John Payne.

2:00am (7th) – TCM – Meet Me in St. Louis
The ultimate nostalgia film, harking back to the turn of the century and the year leading up to the 1903 St. Louis World’s Fair. Judy Garland holds the film and the family in it together as the girl who only wants to love the boy next door, but it’s Margaret O’Brien as the little willful sister who adds the extra bit of oomph, especially in the manic Halloween scene and the violent Christmas scene that carries the film from an exercise in sentimentality into a deeper territory of loss and distress.
1944 USA. Director: Vincente Minnelli. Starring: Judy Garland, Tom Drake, Lucille Bremer, Margaret O’Brien, Leon Ames, Mary Astor.
Must See

Wednesday, December 7

8:45am – TCM – You Can’t Take It With You
Capra won his third directing Oscar for this film (the others were for It Happened One Night and Mr. Deeds Goes to Town), but to me it’s not one of his more interesting pieces. Young couple James Stewart and Jean Arthur invite chaos when his staid, wealthy family meets her wacky, irreverent one.
1938 USA. Director: Frank Capra. Starring: Lionel Barrymore, James Stewart, Jean Arthur, Spring Byington.

10:45am – IFC – Dancer in the Dark
Bjork plays a factory worker whose increasing blindness threatens to keep her from being able to do her job, which will keep her from earning the money she needs for an operation that will prevent her son from suffering the same blindness. Add in the relationship with her not-as-happy-as-they-seem neighbors and a trenchant critique of the justice system and death penalty, not to mention several musical numbers juxtaposed throughout, and you have a film that’s unlike any other.
2000 Denmark. Director: Lars von Trier. Starring: Bjork, Catherine Deneuve, David Morse, Peter Stormare.

1:00pm – TCM – The Misfits
John Huston directs and Arthur Miller writes this final film for both Clark Gable and Marilyn Monroe. Though the film is remembered for that tragic fact, it’s also a pretty solid film on its own, about a divorcee caught between two rough and ready men of the west (Gable and Montgomery Clift), then opposing them when she discovers their plans for the wild horses in the area. And of course, with Miller behind it, there’s far more going on than just that.
1961 USA. Director: John Huston. Starring: Clark Gable, Marilyn Monroe, Montgomery Clift, Thelma Ritter, Eli Wallach.

3:15pm – TCM – How the West Was Won
Mostly notable for cramming pretty much every star in Hollywood (and three directors!) into the same film, this film is quite Hollywoodized from actual history and rather overlong in its attempt to tell a long and sprawling history, but for fans of westerns and cameos, it’s an enjoyable watch.
1963 USA. Director: John Ford, Henry Hathaway, George Marshall. Starring: Caroll Baker, Lee J. Cobb, Henry Fonda, Carolyn Jones, Karl Malden, Gregory Peck, George Peppard, Robert Preston, Debbie Reynolds, James Stewart, Eli Wallach, John Wayne, Richard Widmark, Walter Brennan, Andy Devine, Raymond Massey, Agnes Moorehead, Harry Morgan, Thelma Ritter, Russ Tamblyn.
Newly Featured!

3:30pm – MGM – Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
Tom Stoppard’s brilliant play about the “in-betweens” of Hamlet, following two minor characters around as they discuss existential philosophy and various other topics while the main action of the play happens elsewhere, becomes an almost-as-brilliant film. I still recommend seeing the play if you can, as it’s slightly different and I think better, but the film is still wonderful.
1990 UK/USA. Director: Tom Stoppard. Starring: Gary Oldman, Tim Roth, Richard Dreyfuss.

8:00pm – TCM – From Here to Eternity
There’s the famous part, yes, where Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr make love on the beach among the crashing waves. But there’s also a solid ensemble war tale, involving young officer Montgomery Clift and his naive wife Donna Reed, and embittered soldiers Frank Sinatra and Lee J. Cobb.
1953 USA. Director: Fred Zinnemann. Starring: Burt Lancaster, Deborah Kerr, Frank Sinatra, Donna Reed, Montgomery Clift, Lee J. Cobb.

10:45pm – Sundance – Nights and Weekends
Joe Swanberg and Greta Gerwig are two of the most visible faces in the Mumblecore movement, such as it is, and this is one of their more highly-regarded collaborations (both credited as directors, writers, and actors), with a typically lo-fi relationship-driven story of two people struggling through a long-distance relationship.
2008 USA. Director: Joe Swanberg, Greta Gerwig. Starring: oe Swanberg, Greta Gerwig, Alison Bagnall.
Newly Featured!

12:00M – MGM – Manon of the Spring
The sequel to the equally good Jean de Florette (but not really dependent on it), this quiet and pastoral French film focuses on Jean’s daughter Manon, who tries to right the wrongs done to her father.
1986 France. Director: Claude Berri. Starring: Yves Montand, Daniel Auteuil, Emmanuelle Beart, Hippolyte Girardo.

4:15am (8th) – TCM – They Were Expendable
There are films that don’t seem to be all that while you’re watching them – no particularly powerful scenes, not a particularly moving plot, characters that are developed but don’t jump out at you – and yet by the time you reach the end, you’re somehow struck with what a great movie you’ve seen. This film was like that for me – it’s mostly a lot of vignettes from a U-boat squadron led by John Wayne, the only one who thought the U-boat could be useful in combat. But it all adds up to something much more.
1945 USA. Director: John Ford. Starring: John Wayne, Robert Montgomery, Donna Reed, Jack Holt, Ward Bond.

Thursday, December 8

6:00am – Fox Movie – The Blue Angel
One of Marlene Dietrich’s early films, paired with her oft-director Josef von Sternberg – but even though she steals every scene she’s in and is the reason the film remains known at all, it’s really more about Emil Jannings’ tragic professor character, who is dragged from his respected life and social position by his infatuation with Dietrich’s showgirl. It’s a bit on the moralistic side, but with such a humanist touch that it’s tough not to be drawn into it at least a little bit.
1930 Germany. Director: Josef von Sterberg. Starring: Emil Jannings, Marlene Dietrich, Kurt Gerron, Rosa Valetti.

8:00am – IFC – Moulin Rouge!
Baz Lurhmann admittedly has a love-it-or-hate-it flamboyantly trippy aesthetic, especially in the informal Red Curtain trilogy which Moulin Rogue! closes. And sure, it’s over the top; sure, the story is fairly routine; sure, the acting is so-so. I love it to pieces anyway.
2001 USA. Director: Baz Lurhmann. Starring: Nicole Kidman, Ewan McGregor, Jim Broadbent, John Leguizamo.
(repeats at 3:15pm)

11:00am – TCM – Sweet Smell of Success
One of the most acidically witty films of the 1950s, Sweet Smell of Success turns its gaze on Broadway gossip columnist Burt Lancaster, who connives with press agent Tony Curtis to break up his sister’s romance – a searing indictment of unscrupulous newspaper men, yes, and a bitingly funny one to boot.
1957 USA. Director: Alexander Mackendrick. Starring: Burt Lancaster, Tony Curtis, Susan Harrison, Martin Milner, Sam Levene.

12:45pm – TCM – North by Northwest
Roger O. Thornhill (Cary Grant) gets mistaken for George Kaplan and pulled into an elaborate web of espionage in one of Hitchcock’s most enjoyable and funniest thrillers. So many great scenes it’s impossible to list them all.
1959 USA. Director: Alfred Hitchcock. Starring: Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, James Mason, Martin Landau.
Must See

5:45pm – TCM – Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Elizabeth Taylor and Sandy Dennis both won acting awards for their parts in Mike Nichols’ version of Edward Albee’s dysfunctional dinner party play. Remains probably the most well-remembered team-up of erstwhile couple Taylor and Richard Burton.
1966 USA. Director: Mike Nichols. Starring: Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Sandy Dennis, George Segal.

6:50pm – MGM – The Great Escape
I expected to mildly enjoy or at least get through this POW escape film. What happened was I was completely enthralled with every second of it, from failed escape attempts to planning the ultimate escape to the dangers of carrying it out. It’s like a heist film in reverse, and extremely enjoyable in pretty much every way.
1963 USA. Director: John Sturges. Starring: Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson, Donald Pleasance, James Coburn, James Donald.
Must See

11:30pm – TCM – My Man Godfrey
A great combination of two classic 1930s cinematic tropes: the dazzling screwball comedy, set in the world of wacky high society looneys, and the depression-era forgotten man story. The never-disappointing Carole Lombard is one of the society looneys who whimsically hires homeless derelict Godfrey (William Powell) as her butler; the film invites social commentary while never ever losing its comedic sparkle.
1936 USA. Director: Gregory LaCava. Starring: Carole Lombard, William Powell, Alice Brady, Gail Patrick, Eugene Pallette.

12:00M – Fox Movie – The Name of the Rose
A fine adaptation of Umberto Eco’s novel of medieval mystery and religion, with two monks tasked with finding a murderer in their midst. Not as esoteric as the novel, which is probably just as well for a film, but more thoughtful and deep than many mystery films.
1986 France/Italy. Director: Jean-Jacques Annaud. Starring: Sean Connery, Christian Slater, Helmut Qualtinger.

2:30am (9th) – TCM – Ziegfeld Follies
A plotless film, intended to recreate the revue-style musical show that Ziegfeld was so well known for in the early days of Broadway. Not every segment is worthwhile, but Fred Astaire’s three numbers (one of them with Gene Kelly, the only time they worked together until That’s Entertainment!) are great, and Judy Garland has a fun spot doing a Greer Garson parody.
1946 USA. Director: Vincente Minnelli. Starring: Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Judy Garland, Lucille Ball, Fanny Brice, Lucille Bremer, William Powell.

Friday, December 9

12:00N – TCM – A Streetcar Named Desire
A Streetcar Named Desire won Vivien Leigh her second Oscar as fading Southern belle Blanche DuBois, and made a star out of Marlon Brando – with good reason in both cases. The film is somewhat campy, but compellingly so, with Leigh’s classic Hollywood style battling Brando’s Method style, making their on-screen rivalry that much more powerful. Add in a stickily languid New Orleans setting that comes through despite the obvious heightened reality of Hollywood sets, and this is a much odder film than you might expect, but one that plays like gangbusters.
1951 USA. Director: Elia Kazan. Starring: Marlon Brando, Vivien Leigh, Kim Stanley, Karl Malden.

3:00pm – Fox Movie – Bedazzled
One of the best films of the British mod era, a comedic take on Faust with Dudley Moore a socially inept guy infatuated with the unattainable (to him) Eleanor Bron – granted seven wishes by Satan (Peter Cook), he tries to wish his way to her, but somehow fails hilariously every time.
1967 USA. Director: Stanley Donen. Starring: Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, Eleanor Bron.

4:00pm – TCM – Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
Tennessee Williams’ play hits the screen in Southern gothic glory with dying patriarch Big Daddy Pollitt reuniting with his alcoholic son Brick, whose wife Maggie struggles to get him away from the bottle. Lots of interpersonal drama here, with meaty roles for all involved.
1958 USA. Director: Richard Brooks. Starring: Elizabeth Taylor, Paul Newman, Burl Ives.

5:00pm – Fox Movie – Young Frankenstein
My pick for best Mel Brooks movie of all time, yes, over Blazing Saddles and Spaceballs. Gene Wilder is the title character, a relative of the original Dr. Frankenstein who derides the research into the animation of dead tissue as poppycock. Until he inherits the Frankenstein castle and starts doing some experimenting of his own. And hilarity ensues. Pretty much right up there with the most quotable movies ever for me.
1974 USA. Director: Mel Brooks. Starring: Gene Wilder, Teri Garr, Cloris Leachman, Marty Feldman.
Must See
(repeats at 4:00am and 2:00pm on the 10th)

8:00pm – Fox Movie – Big
One of Tom Hanks’ most popular roles, as the grown-up version of a 12-year-old boy who wishes he were big at a strange carnival kiosk. Amusing antics ensue, of course, as he’s still 12 on the inside, and reacts to everything – job, romantic entanglements, etc. – like a 12-year-old.
1988 USA. Director: Penny Marshall. Starring: Tom Hanks, Elizabeth Perkins, Robert Loggia, John Heard, David Moscow, John Lovitz.
(repeats at 11:00pm, and 2:00am on the 10th)

10:30pm – IFC – The Descent
There aren’t too many people better at straight-up genre fare with flair than Neil Marshall, and this spelunking adventure gone wrong is a prime example – claustrophobia mounts as our characters are trapped in a cave, but that’s not all they have to deal with down there.
2005 UK. Director: Neil Marshall. Starring: Shauna macdonald, Natalie Jackson Mendoza, Alex Reid.
(repeats at 1:30am on the 10th)

3:30am (10th) – IFC – Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Not everyone liked Tim Burton’s take on the macabre Sondheim musical, and I’ll admit the singing is, well, not that good. But the production design is among Burton’s best, and that’s saying a lot. I don’t love the film, either, but I enjoyed watching it.
2007 USA. Director: Tim Burton. Starring: Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Alan Rickman.

Saturday, December 10

6:00am – MGM – Judgment at Nuremberg
As the Cold War heats up, Nazi war trials are still going on, with four lesser Nazi judges up for trial. Meanwhile, outside the courtoom, German citizens try to put their life back together, providing a contrast for the Nazi atrocities discussed and even shown as evidence in the court. Judy Garland gives one of her few purely dramatic performances, and go an Oscar nomination for it, no less, among an extremely talented and diverse cast (Maximillian Schell did win an Oscar for his role).
1962 USA. Director: Stanley Kramer. Starring: Spencer Tracy, Burt Lancaster, Richard Widmark, Marlene Dietrich, Maximillian Schell, Judy Garland, Montgomery Clift, William Shatner.

7:30am – TCM – The Bank Dick
One of W.C. Fields’ most sustained comedies, with the henpecked Egbert Sousè skipping jobs a bit before landing as a bank detective. Not exactly the best man for the job, he convinces his daughter’s fiance to embezzle some money from the bank, but when the bank examiner shows up, all hell breaks lose. Great showcase for Fields, who’s ably supported by some of the best character actors in the business.
1940 USA. Director: Edward F. Cline. Starring: W.C. Fields, Cora Witherspoon, Una Merkel, Jessie Ralph, Franklin Pangborn, Shemp Howard.
Must See
Newly Featured!

1:30pm – TCM – High Sierra
Bogart’s breakout role as an on-the-run con man who gets involved with the lame Joan Leslie. (No, I mean actually crippled.) He’d been bumming around for a few years as a Warner second lead or villain, but with 1941’s double punch of High Sierra and The Maltese Falcon, he unequivocally arrived.
1941 USA. Director: Raoul Walsh. Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Joan Leslie, Ida Lupino.

3:40pm – MGM – Blue Velvet
I’ll be honest, this is not one of my favorite David Lynch films. There are a lot of things I like about it. The unsettling take on suburbia, the gorgeously disturbing photography, the kids playing detective, the severed ear, you know, the normal Lynch stuff. But then it just gets to be too cruel for me. Still, it’s a Lynch classic, and you oughta see it. And I oughta see it again, see if my opinion has changed.
1986 USA. Director: David Lynch. Starring: Kyle McLachlan, Laura Dern, Isabella Rossellini, Dennis Hopper.

8:00pm – TCM – The Caine Mutiny
Humphrey Bogart’s Captain Queeg is a piece of work, and by that I mean some of the best work Bogart has on film. He’s neurotic, paranoid, and generally mentally unstable. Or is he? That’s the question after first officer Van Johnson relieves him of duty as being unfit to serve and faces charges of mutiny.
1954 USA. Director: Edward Dmytryk. Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Van Johnson, Fred MacMurray, Jose Ferrer.

Sunday, December 11

10:00am – TCM – Christmas in Connecticut
The always-worth-watching Barbara Stanwyck is a magazine columnist who makes up a traditional country home for her column while living in New York, a subterfuge which causes no problems until a serviceman on leave wants nothing more than to spend Christmas on her farm and her editor thinks it’s a great human interest piece. Her attempts to recreate that world while falling for the serviceman are funny, warm, and enjoyable enough to add this to your holiday rotation.
1945 USA. Director: Peter Godfrey. Starring: Barbara Stanwyck, Dennis Morgan, Sydney Greenstreet, Reginald Gardiner, S.Z. “Cuddles” Sakall, Una O’Connor.

4:00pm – TCM – Pat and Mike
One of the several movies Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn made together, this time with Kate as a top-notch athlete who gets Spence as a trainer. It’s not one of my favorites of their outings, but it’s servicable, and the two are always watchable together.
1952 USA. Director: George Cukor. Starring: Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Aldo Ray.
Newly Featured!

6:00pm – Fox Movie – The War of the Roses
A modern take on the screwball comedy, with Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner as a divorcing couple battling with each other over who gets to keep the house – in typically screwball absurd fashion.
1989 USA. Director: Danny DeVito. Starring: Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, Danny DeVito, Sean Astin.
(repeats at 2:00am on the 12th)

8:00pm – MGM – Broadway Danny Rose
It’s lesser Woody Allen, but it’s still Woody Allen. Danny Rose (Woody) is a theatrical agent whose clients always leave him when they start becoming successful. His current client, a has-been tenor trying to make a comeback, gives him further grief by having an affair with a young woman (Mia Farrow) with gangster connections. Not very substantial, but enjoyable.
1984 USA. Director: Woody Allen. Starring: Woody Allen, Mia Farrow, Nick Apollo Forte.

8:45pm – IFC – From Dusk Till Dawn
An early collaboration between Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez (Rodriguez directing, Tarantino writing and acting) mixes crime action with vampire horror. Intriguingly, the film is split almost equally between the two, half an almost Coen-esque crime spree gone wrong, half an over-the-top claustrophobic gorefest. I rather like the first half better, but the second part has its moments, many of them thanks to Keitel.
1996 USA. Director: Robert Rodriguez. Starring: Harvey Keitel, George Clooney, Quentin Tarantino, Juliette Lewis.
(repeats at 12:00M)

10:00pm – TCM – Lilies of the Field
Sidney Poitier became the first African-American to win an Academy Award for Best Actor with this film in 1963, which follows a construction worker and his encounter with a group of Eastern European nuns who help him when his car breaks down.
1963 USA. Director: Ralph Nelson. Stars: Sidney Poitier, Lilia Skala, Lisa Mann.

10:00pm – MGM – New York, New York
Not generally considered one of Martin Scorsese’s better films, but still an intriguing attempt on his part to revive the classic Hollywood musical with a story of on-the-rise musicians and their rocky relationship. I personally enjoy seeing Scorsese bring his love of Golden Era Hollywood to the screen, successful or not.
1977 USA. Director: Martin Scorsese. Starring: Robert De Niro, Liza Minnelli, Lionel Stander.

I thought about holding this over for tomorrow’s Saturday Morning Cartoon, especially since it kind of mimics old-school cartoons to some degree, but I’m too excited that it’s online to wait even one more day. Dr. Breakfast was the last film in the animated shorts program at AFI Fest this year, and one of my favorite shorts of the whole fest (I saw three shorts programs this year). I’d just been wanting to check it out again and happened across director Stephen McNeary’s blog and discovered he’d put the whole thing online. Thanks, Stephen! It’s absurd and ridiculous, but awesome. Basically, the guy cooks a ginormous breakfast but doesn’t have anyone to share it with, then his soul breaks out through his eye (like I said, absurd) and gobbles up everything, then roams all over the earth and beyond in search of more breakfast. Meanwhile, a pair of deer care for the man’s catatonic body. It’s like 1960s cereal commercials got mixed up with A Town Called Panic and then just a little bit of Bill Plympton was sprinkled on top.

“Don’t be difficult, man.”

This week I can blame at least part of the lateness of this post on the windstorm and subsequent power outage that hit my area last night just as I was sitting down to finish it up. Ah, well. There are a WHOLE BUNCH of new releases this week, both crappy and solid, mainstream theatrical releases and indie/festival hits. But there’s not much of anything else, even on Instant Watch. The studios must be cranking out their recent releases in preparation for the holiday season.

New Release Picks of the Week

Tucker and Dale vs. Evil
I’m so pleased that this film got theatrical and DVD distribution; it’s one of the most enjoyable horror/comedy hybrids in recent years. A pair of well-meaning rednecks on vacation at their cabin in the woods get mistaken for backwoods murderers by a group of college kids. Some easy laughs, but overall clever and fun.
2011 USA. Director: Eli Craig. Starring: Tyler Labine, Alan Tudyk.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

Cave of Forgotten Dreams
My vote for best 3D film still falls to Herzog’s exploration of the Chauvet Caves, which should also be fascinating without the 3D. Herzog goes on some intriguing philosophical tangents, but by and large lets the ancient and beautiful cave paintings speak for themselves. Also on Instant Watch.
2010 USA/Germany. Director: Werner Herzog.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

The Future
Hard to believe this is only Miranda July’s second feature, but it’s a very strong one, with a couple’s relationship faltering because of their sudden awareness of their own mortality. Sounds heady, and it is, but it’s also very human, dark, and memorable.
2011 USA. Director: Miranda July. Starring: Miranda July, Hamish Linklater.
Amazon DVD | Netflix

Another Earth
I didn’t care for this sort of sci-fi existential crisis film as much as most people did, but I think I do owe it a rewatch – there were lots of elements I liked, I just found the tone and pacing offputting. But I’m in the minority.
2011 USA. Director: Mike Cahill. Starring: Brit Marling, William Mapother.
Amazon DVD/Blu-ray | Netflix

One Day
Reviews for this were not as strong as I’d hoped and I skipped it in theatres, but I’m still interested in checking it out on the strength of the cast and Scherfig’s previous work (An Education).
2011 USA/UK. Director: Lone Scherfig. Starring: Anne Hathaway, Jim Sturgess.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

OTHER NEW RELEASES
30 Minutes or Less (2011 USA, dir Ruben Fleischer, stars Jesse Eisenberg; Blu-ray/Netflix)
The Art of Getting By (2011 USA, dir Gavin Wiesen, stars Freddie Highmore; Blu-ray/Netflix)
Friends with Benefits (2011 USA, dir Will Gluck, stars Justin Timberlake, Mila Kunis; Blu-ray/Netflix)
Our Idiot Brother (2011 USA, dir Jesse Peretz, stars Paul Rudd, Elizabeth Banks; Blu-ray/Netflix)
The Smurfs (2011 USA, dir Raja Gosnell, stars Neil Patrick Harris, Anton Yelchin; Blu-ray/Netflix)
5 Days of War (2011 USA, dir Renny Harlin, stars Rupert Friend; Blu-ray/Netflix)
Adele Live at Royal Albert Hall (2011 UK, dir Paul Dugdale, star Adele; Blu-ray)
Chillerama (2011 USA, dir Adam Rifkin, Adam Green, stars Richard Riehle; Blu-ray/Netflix)
Kidnapped (2010 Spain, dir Miguel Angel Vivas, stars Guillermo Barrientos, Dritan Biba; Netflix)
Seven Days in Utopia (2011 USA, dir Matt Russell, stars Robert Duvall, Lucas Black; Netflix)
Snowmen (2010 USA, dir Robert Kirbyson, stars Bobby Coleman, Ray Liotta; Netflix)

Classic Picks of the Week

Eclipse Series 30: Sabu!
Only a couple of classics out this week, so I figured I’d feature them both, even though I’m woefully underprepared to write about them. Sabu was an actor in a bunch of India-set British action films in the early forties, and Criterion celebrates him with an Eclipse release of Elephant Boy, The Drum, and The Jungle Book.
1942 UK. Director: Zoltan Korda, et al. Starring: Sabu, etc.
Amazon DVD

Flying Guillotine
I haven’t seen anything from the Shaw Brothers’ Hong Kong production studio, except a few clips here and there on YouTube that look FREAKING INSANE. This is one from 1975, with an emperor developing the titular weapon and getting a little crazy using it on all his potential enemies. Yep, sounds insane.
1975 Hong Kong. Director: Meng Hua Ho. Starring: Kuan Tai Chen, Feng Ku.
Amazon DVD

Television Picks of the Week

30 Rock: Season 5
Other NBC shows have supplanted 30 Rock as the best comedy on TV, but even though it’s declining a bit, it’s still pretty high quality compared with sitcoms on other networks.
2010 USA. Creator: Tina Fey. Starring: Tina Fey, Alec Baldwin, Tracy Morgan, Jane Krakowski.
Amazon DVD | Netflix

OTHER TELEVISION RELEASES
The Amazing Race: Season 4 (2003 USA, creator Elise Doganieri, Bertram Van Munster; Netflix)
Mission: Impossible: The ’88 TV Season (1988 USA, creator Bruce Geller, stars Peter Graves; Netflix)
The Six Million Dollar Man: Season 1 (1974 USA, creator Harve Bennett, stars Richard Anderson; Netflix)
Smallville: Season 10 (2010 USA, creator Alfred Gough, Miles Millar, stars Tom Welling; Blu-ray/Netflix)

Instant Watch Picks of the Week

Elizabeth
Cate Blanchett’s breakout role as Queen Elizabeth I, surrounded by quality actors and gorgeous production design. I found the film a little cold personally, but perhaps that’s intentional.
1998 UK. Director: Shekhar Kapur. Starring: Cate Blanchett, Geoffrey Rush, Joseph Fiennes.

Morning Glory
I don’t have a whole lot of interest in this news station anchor comedy, despite its having a pretty solid cast, but it is a relatively major recent release, and it’s always good when Netflix can wrangle some of those for Instant Watch.
2010 USA. Director: Roger Michell. Starring: Rachel McAdams, Harrison Ford, Diane Keaton.

OTHER INSTANT WATCHES
Chillerama (2011 USA, dir Adam Rifkin, Adam Green, stars Richard Riehle)
Eye of the Beholder (2000 USA, dir Stephan Elliott, stars Ewan McGregor, Ashley Judd)
Final Destination 2 (2003 USA, dir David R. Ellis, stars Ali Larter, A.J. Cook)
Five Minutes of Heaven (2009 UK, dir Oliver Hirschbiegel, stars Liam Neeson, James Nesbitt)
I Sell the Dead (2008 UK, dir Glenn McQuaid, stars Dominic Monaghan, Ron Perlman)
Kidnapped (2010 Spain, dir Miguel Angel Vivas, stars Guillermo Barrientos, Dritan Biba)
Viva Riva! (2010 Congo, dir Djo Munga, stars Patsha Bay, Manie Malone)
Waiting to Exhale (1995 USA, dir Forest Whitaker, stars Whitney Houston, Angela Bassett)

See all new and upcoming titles.

Instant Watch Expiring Picks

Annie Oakley (1935 USA, dir George Stevens, stars Barbara Stanwyck, Preston Foster) [12/6]
Crank 2: High Voltage (2009 USA, dir Nevaldine-Taylor, stars Jason Statham, Amy Smart)
Absolute Power (1997 USA, dir Clint Eastwood, stars Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman)

See all expiring titles.

Disclaimers

• Amazon links use my affiliate account, and will kick a small percentage of your purchase back to me. You pay the same price you would anyway.
• Not all new releases are available on Netflix immediately. Some studio films have a 30-day release window before Netflix can rent them, and some smaller releases are not picked up by Netflix immediately. Add them to your “saved” queue if you’re interested; that tells Netflix there is demand for the disc.
• Not all new Blu-ray releases are available on Netflix – Netflix usually buys both DVD and Blu-ray editions of new releases, but if a DVD has already been released, they don’t always get the Blu-ray when it comes out later.
• Instant Watch releases are not always 100% accurate – often the data from the API is not fully accurate until the actual day of release. I always check on release day to make sure things actually do hit Instant Watch, but for things that come out later than Tuesday when I publish this post, I won’t be able to tell.
• Instant Watch expirations are not always 100% accurate – sometimes they don’t expire after all, sometimes things expire with little advance warning. I always check to make sure the data is accurate to the best of my knowledge when I publish the post, but things could still change, especially since I’m giving expiration warnings up to two weeks in advance.

Before Milos Forman was the Oscar-winning director of Amadeus and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, he was one of the foremost directors of the Czechoslovak New Wave, bringing French New Wave sensibilities to a Czechoslovak setting (but calling on universal themes) in films like Black Peter, Loves of a Blonde, and The Fireman’s Ball. In between those two career phases, he made his Hollywood debut with Taking Off (1971), made while he was still struggling with English and having to rely on writer/actor Buck Henry to help him with the line readings. But that doesn’t seem to matter too much, and the film, though something of an oddity, is more compelling than you might imagine.

Generally, it’s the story of a young girl who wants to be free from her parents’ loving but old-fashioned home and joins up with a group of free-loving hippies. But the film doesn’t focus on her, aside from a few sequences where we’re privy to a sort of impromptu concert from future stars like Carly Simon and a young Kathy Bates (billed as Bobo Bates), who provide a sort of wistful soundtrack. The rest of the time, we’re with her parents, searching for her fruitlessly, not really knowing where to turn until they stumble upon some other parents in the same situation and discover there’s a whole support group – the Society for the Parents of Lost Children, or SPLC for short. At one of the meetings of the SPLC, the leader suggests that everybody try marijuana – you know, to understand what their children are experiencing.

And then there’s this scene, with a young counter-culturalist (Vincent Schiavelli’s debut role) teaching these parents and grandparents how to smoke a joint. It’s a rather strange scene, like the movie, balanced between ridicule and understanding, between humor and freedom. There’s a lot going on in the film, showing the lostness of BOTH generations and the need for understanding going both ways. It’s a very funny and often awkward film, but with a lot of sadness and depth underneath. Forman knows both the younger and older culture, and he has great affection for the people of both, just trying to make their way through life and find joy where they can. This is pretty easily the most memorable scene of the film, and it definitely has its ridiculous aspects. Yet it becomes sort of beautiful by the end, too. (For reference, the couple at 4:09, with the woman asking about former smokers, are the main characters.)

Fairly low on newly featured ones this week, but TCM does have a John Carpenter double feature late Friday/early Saturday with They Live and The Fog, and are also showing Busby Berkeley extravaganza Dames on Tuesday and MGM has the mesmerizing visual tone poem Koyaanisqatsi on Sunday.

Monday, November 28

11:00am – Fox Movie – I Wake Up Screaming
Better known for bright and sunny musicals, Betty Grable took a turn for the noir in this crime film, playing the sister of a recently-murdered model with a rising career. It’s a slight noir, but fun nonetheless, especially for the chance to see Grable in a role unusual for her.
1942 USA. Director: H. Bruce Humberstone. Starring: Betty Grable, Victor Mature, Carole Landis.

2:00pm – Fox Movie – Call Northside 777
One of Jimmy Stewart’s first films after spending the war as a fighter pilot; he plays a reporter compelled to reopen an eleven-year-old murder case, coming to believe the wrong man was sentenced to life in prison. A good combo of film noir and mystery.
1948 USA. Director: Henry Hathaway. Starring: James Stewart, Richard Conte, Lee J. Cobb.

4:00pm – TCM – Stage Fright
An actress helps a friend try to defend his innocence when he’s accused of murder – but is she doing the right thing? This is one of the earliest examples I know of in film of an unreliable cinematic rendering of events; doesn’t follow through on it quite as well as Rashomon does (which was released the same year), but very interesting nonetheless.
1950 USA. Director: Alfred Hitchcock. Starring: Jane Wyman, Michael Wilding, Marlene Dietrich.

8:00pm – TCM – Doctor Zhivago
Idealistic Zhivago experiences the Bolshevik Revolution while also dealing with his conflicting feelings for his wife Tonya and young nurse Lara. There are a few things about the romance side of the story that bother me, mostly the fact that I liked Tonya way more than Lara, but I have to admit Lean knows how to make epic films, and Maurice Jarre’s score is unforgettable.
1965 UK/USA. Director: David Lean. Starring: Omar Sharif, Julie Christie, Geraldine Chaplin, Rod Steiger, Alec Guinness.

8:00pm – IFC – Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Not everyone liked Tim Burton’s take on the macabre Sondheim musical, and I’ll admit the singing is, well, not that good. But the production design is among Burton’s best, and that’s saying a lot. I don’t love the film, either, but I enjoyed watching it.
2007 USA. Director: Tim Burton. Starring: Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Alan Rickman.
(repeats at 12:30am on the 29th)

Tuesday, November 29

7:15am – TCM – Dames
Not really a top-notch entry in the Warner Bros-Busby Berkeley cycle of films, but it does have the requisite number of awesome Berkeley-choreographed dance numbers. In fact, the film helpfully loads them all at the end, so if you find the story a bit on the routine side, just fast-forward until the show starts.
1934 USA. Director: Ray Enright, Busby Berkeley. Starring: Joan Blondell, Dick Powell, Ruby Keeler.
Newly Featured!

9:00am – TCM – Gold Diggers of 1935
This movie is not nearly as good as Gold Diggers of 1933 (to which it is unrelated in plot), but it does have one thing that makes it eminently worth watching – the epic “Lullaby of Broadway” number that closes the show, with a full story-within-a-dance playing out through three verses of the song. It is possibly the most definitive number of 1930s backstage musicals.
1935 USA. Director: Busby Berkeley. Starring: Dick Powell, Joan Blondell, Gloria Stuart, Alice Brady.

4:00pm – MGM – The Party
It may not be quite politically correct to cast Peter Sellers as an Indian movie extra who accidentally gets invited to a big Hollywood party instead of being fired for bunglling a major stunt, but the movie certainly is hilarious, largely made up of a series of sight gags as Sellers bumbles his way around a swinging ’60s party.
1968 USA. Director: Blake Edwards. Starring: Peter Sellers, Claudine Longet, Natalie Borisova, Jean Carson, Marge Champion.
(repeats at 4:00am on the 4th)

6:00pm – MGM – A Shot in the Dark
Here’s your counter example for the “sequels are never as good as the original” argument. This second film in the Pink Panther series is easily the best, and stands as ones of the zaniest 1960s comedies ever.
1964 USA. Director: Blake Edwards. Starring: Peter Sellers, Herbert Lom.
(repeats at 2:00pm on the 3rd)

11:00pm – IFC – The Dreamers
Bernardo Bertolucci’s love letter to the French New Wave, with American Michael Pitt heading to Paris just in time to join the ’68 Cinematheque riots, becoming friends and eventually lovers with a siblings Louis Garrel and Eva Green, a pair of fellow cinephiles. Bertolucci draws on Band of Outsiders and Jules and Jim especially, as well as the history of the era and his own sensibilities. It loses me personally a bit in the eroticism of the second half, but the first part is fantastic.
2003 France/UK/Italy. Director: Bernardo Bertolucci. Starring: Michael Pitt, Louis Garrel, Eva Green.
(repeats at 3:30am on the 30th)

2:00am (30th) – TCM – Captain Blood
This was Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland’s first of eight films together, and it’s one of the best. Flynn is the eponymous captain, a dentist named Blood who gets captured by pirates and ends up escaping and taking over the pirate ship himself. Full of swashbuckling and derring-do.
1935 USA. Director: Michael Curtiz. Starring: Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Lionel Atwill, Basil Rathbone, Guy Kibbee.

2:00am (30th) – Sundance – Heartbeats
The second film from wunderkind Xavier Dolan isn’t quite as impressive as his debut I Killed My Mother, but it’s still a really enjoyable watch, with two best friends silently fighting over the androgynous object of both their affection. It’s stylized as all get out, but there’s a fair bit of depth beneath its New Wave-inspired superficial veneer.
2010 Canada. Director: Xavier Dolan. Starring: Xavier Dolan, Monia Chokri, Niel Schneider.

Wednesday, November 30

7:30am – TCM – White Heat
James Cagney in one of his most powerful roles as the slightly (okay, make that more-than-slightly) unbalanced criminal Cody Jarrett. Probably counts as one of the last truly great Warner crime films, too.
1949 USA. Director: Raoul Walsh. Starring: James Cagney, Virginia Mayo, Edmond O’Brien, Margaret Wycherly.

8:00pm – IFC – Zodiac
One of David Fincher’s most acclaimed films, and deservedly so, tracing the obsession of one journalist (Jake Gyllenhaal) with the Zodiac serial killer. Years of following the case and the clues left by the Zodiac bring investigators no closer to success, but Gyllenhaal can’t let go – the story is much more a character study of him than a mystery of the killer, and it’s among the best of the genre.
2007 USA. Director: David Fincher. Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo, Anthony Edwards, Robert Downey Jr., Brian Cox.
(repeats at 11:30pm)

8:00pm – TCM – To Catch a Thief
Not one of my personal favorite Hitchcock films, but certainly one of his classiest, most sophisticated entries. Cary Grant is a notorious cat burglar, Grace Kelly the Monte Carlo socialite he woos. It’s one of Kelly’s last films, and she’s already looking like the princess she was about to become.
1955 USA. Director: Alfred Hitchcock. Starring; Cary Grant, Grace Kelly.

10:0pm – TCM – Dial M for Murder
Glossy Hitchcock film with Ray Milland hiring a hitman to off his wife Grace Kelly after discovered she’d been unfaithful to him, but when she turns the tables on the would-be killer, Milland is forced to ever more devious cover-ups and plots. Really solid suspenser, if not quite top-level Hitchcock for me. Still a must-see if you’re a Hitchcock fan.
1954 USA. Director: Alfred Hitchcock. Starring: Grace Kelly, Ray Milland, Robert Cummings, John Williams, Anthony Dawson.

Thursday, December 1

6:00am – IFC – Maria Full of Grace
Once in a while a film comes out of nowhere and floors me – this quiet little film about a group of South American women who agree to smuggle drugs into the United States by swallowing packets of cocaine did just that. Everything in the film is perfectly balanced, no element overwhelms anything else, and it all comes together with great empathy, but without sentimentality.
2004 USA. Director: Joshua Marston. Starring: Catalina Sandino Moreno, Virginia Ariza, Yenny Paola Vega.
(repeats at 1:15pm)

7:00am – MGM – Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
Tom Stoppard’s brilliant play about the “in-betweens” of Hamlet, following two minor characters around as they discuss existential philosophy and various other topics while the main action of the play happens elsewhere, becomes an almost-as-brilliant film. I still recommend seeing the play if you can, as it’s slightly different and I think better, but the film is still wonderful.
1990 UK/USA. Director: Tom Stoppard. Starring: Gary Oldman, Tim Roth, Richard Dreyfuss.

9:00am – Fox Movie – Heaven Can Wait
In this unusual Lubitsch fantasy, a recently deceased man tries to convince Satan that he’s belongs in hell; unconvinced, Satan listens to him recount his life. As with anything Lubitsch, wit and sophistication abounds.
1943 USA. Director: Ernst Lubitsch. Starring: Don Ameche, Gene Tierney, Charles Coburn.

10:45am – IFC – Cache
Very deliberate but intensely thought-provoking film from director Michael Haneke, delving into issues from privacy and surveillance to war guilt and revenge. It’s a difficult film, and one that stretches the limits of the suspense thriller, but if you’re willing to go along with it, it’s well worthwhile.
2005 France. Director: Michael Haneke. Starring: Daniel Auteuil, Juliette Binoche, Maurice Bénichou.

8:00pm – IFC – The Shining
Kubrick’s take on one of Stephen King’s most well-known novels may not stick that closely to King’s original story, but manages to capture the creepy factor of the Overlook Hotel and Jack Torrance’s descent into madness in a supremely cinematic way. Many memorable and disturbing scenes, and one of the few movies in which I actually like Jack Nicholson. So there’s that. Definitely not one to be missed.
1980 USA/UK. Director: Stanley Kubrick. Starring: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd, Scatman Crothers.
Must See
(repeats at 11:00pm)

9:30pm – TCM – The Kennel Murder Case
William Powell is well-known for playing detective Nick Charles in the Thin Man series of movies, but he also played private eye Philo Vance in a less well-remembered series of films based on detective novels by S.S. Van Dine. This is probably the best of the lot, a witty mystery that’s not really too far off from the Thin Man vibe.
1932 USA. Director: Michael Curtiz. Starring: William Powell, Mary Astor, Eugene Pallette, Ralph Morgan.

10:00pm – MGM – Broadway Danny Rose
It’s lesser Woody Allen, but it’s still Woody Allen. Danny Rose (Woody) is a theatrical agent whose clients always leave him when they start becoming successful. His current client, a has-been tenor trying to make a comeback, gives him further grief by having an affair with a young woman (Mia Farrow) with gangster connections. Not very substantial, but enjoyable.
1984 USA. Director: Woody Allen. Starring: Woody Allen, Mia Farrow, Nick Apollo Forte.

12:00M – MGM – New York, New York
Not generally considered one of Martin Scorsese’s better films, but still an intriguing attempt on his part to revive the classic Hollywood musical with a story of on-the-rise musicians and their rocky relationship. I personally enjoy seeing Scorsese bring his love of Golden Era Hollywood to the screen, successful or not.
1977 USA. Director: Martin Scorsese. Starring: Robert De Niro, Liza Minnelli, Lionel Stander.

Friday, December 2

12:00N – Fox Movie – Bigger Than Life
Nicholas Ray delves deep into 1950s melodrama forms for his dark take on the ills of modern suburbia, with James Mason as a hard-pressed family man taking on two jobs just to try to maintain his family – throw in a debilitating disease for which the cure may be just as troubling in the form of dangerous addiction, and you won’t find this bleak and scary a look at the underbelly of the American Dream until Blue Velvet and American Beauty.
1956 USA. Director: Nicholas Ray. Starring: James Mason, Barbara Rush, Walter Matthau.

8:00pm – TCM – Knute Rockne All American
One of Ronald Reagan’s best-remembered films from back in his acting days, as the star player on the Notre Dame team coached by Knute Rockne (Pat O’Brien).
1940 USA. Director: Lloyd Bacon. Starring: Pat O’Brien, Ronald Reagan, Gale Page.
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10:00pm – MGM – The Great Escape
I expected to mildly enjoy or at least get through this POW escape film. What happened was I was completely enthralled with every second of it, from failed escape attempts to planning the ultimate escape to the dangers of carrying it out. It’s like a heist film in reverse, and extremely enjoyable in pretty much every way.
1963 USA. Director: John Sturges. Starring: Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson, Donald Pleasance, James Coburn, James Donald.
Must See

2:30am (3rd) – TCM – They Live
Of the (several) John Carpenter films I haven’t seen yet, this one is pretty much top of my list; a construction worker finds a pair of sunglasses that allow him to see the world as it really is – a dystopian world controlled by aliens through mind-subduing media. Sounds pretty awesome.
1988 USA. Director: John Carpenter. Starring: Roddy Piper, Keith David, Meg Foster.
Newly Featured!

4:15am (3rd) – TCM – The Fog
Carpenter knows how to wring the suspense out of most any situation, even a fog rolling into town. This fog holds vengeful spirits, ghost sailors who terrorize the harbor town at midnight. For me, this is one of the most downright enjoyable Carpenter films, even if the end does get a little hokey. Bonus: Mother-daughter scream queens Curtis and Leigh in the same film.
1979 USA. Director: John Carpenter. Starring: Adrienne Barbeau, Jamie Lee Curtis, Janet Leigh.
Newly Featured!

Saturday, December 3

6:00am – IFC – Paranoid Park
I go back and forth on whether I think Gus Van Sant is brilliant or a pretentious bore – maybe some of both. But I really quite liked the slow, oblique approach in this film about a wanna-be skateboarder kid who relishes hanging out with the bigger skateboarders at the titular skate park – but there’s a death not far from there, and it takes the rest of the movie to slowly reveal what exactly happened that one night near Paranoid Park. Gets by on mood and cinematography.
2007 USA Director: Gus Van Sant. Starring: Gabe Nevins, Daniel Lu, Jake Miller, Taylor Momsen, Lauren McKinney.
(repeats at 12:00N)

3:30pm – TCM – Mogambo
A remake of 1932′s Red Dust, also starring Gable, this suffers a bit in comparison by not being pre-Code, but with John Ford at the helm and Ava Gardner and Grace Kelly taking the Mary Astor/Jean Harlow roles, it can’t be all bad, and it isn’t. It’s still a solid little love triangle/adventure film.
1953 USA. Director: John Ford. Starring: Clark Gable, Ava Gardner, Grace Kelly.

5:30pm – TCM – Rio Bravo
A ragtag group made up of a sheriff, a cripple, a drunk, and an untried youth guard a man in jail against the expected rescue attempts by his brother, the local bad guy. One of the most enjoyable westerns ever made, with all the actors having a great time with their characters.
1959 USA. Director: Howard Hawks. Starring: John Wayne, Dean Martin, Ricky Nelson, Walter Brennan.
Must See

8:00pm – TCM – Out of the Past
Out of the Past comes up in most conversations about film noir. It’s got all the elements: low-key lighting (due in this case to budgetary concerns), an existential anti-hero (Robert Mitchum), a femme fatale (Jane Greer), etc. It’s honestly not my favorite noir, but it’s a good one to see once.
1947 USA. Director: Jacques Tourneur. Starring: Robert Mitchum, Jane Greer.

10:00pm – Sundance – Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead
Sadly this turned out to be Sidney Lumet’s final film before his death. But from what I hear, this is a fine one to have as a swan song, an intense and well-constructed heist thriller – something Lumet was certainly skilled at directing. I have got to get around to checking it out myself soon.
1997 USA. Director: Sidney Lumet. Starring: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke, Marisa Tomei, Albert Finney.

12:00M – TCM – While the City Sleeps
The head of a New York newspaper dies, leaving it in his son Vincent Price’s hands to choose someone to promote: managing editor Thomas Mitchell, lead reporter Dana Andrews, or a couple of other people. The way to get the job? Get the scoop on the serial killer taking out women around the city. It gets a little plot-heavy at times, but it’s so full of classic character actors and the noirish feel that director Fritz Lang does so well that it’s still very worthwhile.
1956 United States. Director: Fritz Lang. Starring: Dana Andrews, Rhonda Fleming, Thomas Mitchell, Vincent Price, Ida Lupino, George Sanders

Sunday, December 4

6:00am – MGM – Koyaanisqatsi
The first in a trilogy of Godfrey Reggio-directed, Philip Glass-scored tone poems on the nature of, well, nature and civilization. This one is the best of the three, dealing with the quiet of nature and the bustle of civilization, making its points with gorgeous time-lapse photography and an evocative score, with no traditional narrative or dialogue at all.
1982 USA. Director: Godfrey Reggio.
Newly Featured!

11:30am – MGM – The Long Goodbye
Robert Altman’s brilliant take on Raymond Chandler’s quintessential gumshoe Philip Marlowe complicates the hard-boiled detective genre with an apathetic and often ineffectual lead, while still bearing nostalgia for a time when the genre could be taken seriously. Works as homage, satire, elegy, and straight genre piece, which is something very hard to pull off.
1973 USA. Director: Robert Altman. Starring: Elliott Gould, Sterling Hayden, Nina Van Pallandt.
Must See

12:00N – TCM – Top Hat
For me, Top Hat and Swing Time battle it out for the top Astaire-Rogers film constantly, with the one I’ve seen more recently usually taking the crown. Mistaken identity follows mistaken identity here, as Ginger thinks Fred is her best friend’s husband, causing her a lot of consternation when Fred starts romancing her. That’s far from the end of it all, though. Also has the most definitive collection of Astaire-Rogers supporting actors.
1935 USA. Director: Mark Sandrich. Starring: Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Edward Everett Horton, Helen Broderick, Erik Rhodes, Eric Blore.
Must See

2:00pm – TCM – Libeled Lady
Throw William Powell, Myrna Loy, Spencer Tracy, and Jean Harlow all together in an MGM comedy, and you’re almost guaranteed a winner. And Libeled Lady delivers with a twisty story, fast-talking script, and the best these stars have to offer.
1936 USA. Director: Jack Conway. Starring: William Powell, Myrna Loy, Spencer Tracy, Jean Harlow, Walter Connolly, Charley Grapewin.

6:00pm – MGM – Blood Simple
The Coen Brothers’ first feature is already a pretty good indication of their style – a noirish thriller with a black comedy edge where everything goes more and more wrong the more people try to fix their mistakes. When the “mistakes” involve murder, leaving evidence at murder scenes, and having the worst time ever trying to get rid of a body, you’re in for a good time at pretty much every character’s expense.
1984 USA. Director: Joel Coen. Starring: John Getz, Frances McDormand, Dan Hedaya, M. Emmet Walsh.

9:45pm – TCM – Yankee Doodle Dandy
James Cagney won an Oscar putting on his dancing shoes to play song-and-dance man and Broadway composer George M. Cohan in this biopic. Though it seems strange to think of gangster picture regular Cagney in a musical, he actually got his start in show business as a hoofer, and returned to musicals many times throughout his career, though this remains the most notable example.
1942 USA. Director: Michael Curtiz. Starring: James Cagney, Joan Leslie.

10:00pm – TCM – Blue Velvet
I’ll be honest, this is not one of my favorite David Lynch films. There are a lot of things I like about it. The unsettling take on suburbia, the gorgeously disturbing photography, the kids playing detective, the severed ear, you know, the normal Lynch stuff. But then it just gets to be too cruel for me. Still, it’s a Lynch classic, and you oughta see it. And I oughta see it again, see if my opinion has changed.
1986 USA. Director: David Lynch. Starring: Kyle McLachlan, Laura Dern, Isabella Rossellini, Dennis Hopper.

There may be something wrong with me that I enjoy this cartoon so much (Flickchart says I put it at #273 out of over #2800 movies), but I do. Every time I see it, I’m fiendishly delighted all over again. It’s the timing. Yeah, that’s it. If you’re in the LA area and a fan of Don Hertzfeldt, he’s going to be at Cinefamily next Thursday presenting his new short “It’s Such a Beautiful Day” as well as a retrospective of his career as part of this year’s Animation Breakdown festival, which runs December 1-6. The festival is always a good time, and looks like this year will be no different.

Sorry for running a little late this week. I hope those of you in the US had a good food coma day yesterday; I certainly did! There are some great releases out in theatres this week, but there’s a few things to keep you busy at home, too, both new releases and classics, plus a solid chunk of new (or renewed) Instant Watches.

New Release Picks of the Week

Super 8
J.J. Abrams’ nostalgia love letter to 1980s Amblin Entertainment loses itself a bit in the last act to unnecessary bombast, but still remains one of the more enjoyable films of the year.
2011 USA. Director: J.J. Abrams. Starring: Joel Courtney, Elle Fanning, Kyle Chandler.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

The Devil’s Double
Worth seeing for Dominic Cooper’s excellent double role as Saddam Hussein’s psychopathic son and the man who unwillingly becomes his body double.
2011 USA. Director: Lee Tamahori. Starring: Dominic Cooper, Ludivine Sagnier.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

OTHER NEW RELEASES
Conan the Barbarian (2011 USA, dir Marcus Nispel, stars Jason Momoa; Blu-ray/Netflix)
Sarah’s Key (2011 France, dir Gilles Paquet-Brenner, stars Kristin Scott Thomas; Blu-ray/Netflix)
Spy Kids 4: All the Time in the World (2011 USA, dir Robert Rodriguez, stars Jessica Alba; Blu-ray/Netflix)
Carjacked (2011 USA, dir John Bonito, stars Maria Bello, Stephen Dorff; Blu-ray/Netflix)
The Green (2011 USA, dir Steven Williford, stars Cheyenne Jackson; Netflix)
Helldriver (2010 Japan, dir Yoshihiro Nishimura, stars Minoru Torihada; Blu-ray/Netflix)
Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas Special (2011 USA, stars Ciara Bravo, Queen Latifah; Blu)
Love Begins (2011 USA, dir David S. Cass Sr, stars Wes Brown, Julie Mond; Netflix)
A Madea Christmas: The Play (2011 USA, dir Tyler Perry, stars Tyler Perry; Blu/Netflix)
Making the Boys (2011 USA, dir Crayton Robey, stars Edward Albee; Netflix)
Nova: Fabric of the Cosmos (2011 USA, dir Paula S. Aspell, stars Brian Greene; Blu-ray)

Classic Picks of the Week

12 Angry Men
One of late director Sidney Lumet’s greatest films, with Henry Fonda leading a group of jurors from a facile “guilty” declaration through a more thorough and less prejudicial line of reasoning.
1957 USA. Director: Sidney Lumet. Starring: Henry Fonda, Ed Begley, Lee J. Cobb.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

OTHER CLASSIC/OLDER RELEASES
Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas (1997 USA, dir Andrew Knight, stars Paige O’Hara)
Beauty and the Beast: Belle’s Magical World (1998 USA, dir Cullen Blaine, stars Paige O’Hara; Netflix)

Blu-Ray Picks of the Week

Rushmore
Not Wes Anderson’s first movie, but the one that really put him on the map, with Murray and Schwartzman playing perfectly off each other. Criterion’s had the DVD out before, but Blu-ray upgrades are always welcome.
1998 USA. Director: Wes Anderson. Starring: Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman, Olivia Williams.
Amazon Blu-ray

The Birth of a Nation and Way Down East
Kino has been giving Criterion a run for their money lately when it comes to early American cinema, and here are Blu-ray releases of two of Griffith’s best films.
1915/1920 USA. Director: D.W. Griffith. Starring: Lillian Gish.
Birth: Amazon Blu-ray | Way Down East: Amazon Blu-ray

OTHER BLU-RAY RELEASES
Three Amigos (1986 USA, dir John Landis, stars Steve Martin, Chevy Chase)

Television Picks of the Week

The Adventures of Tintin: Season One
With the major Spielberg-Jackson-Moffat-Wright-Cornish adaptation of the TinTin comics coming to big screens, it’s a fine time to check out or revisit the fully animated TV series.
1991 France/Canada. Starring: Colin O’Meara, David Fox.
Amazon DVD | Netflix

Doctor Who: Season Six
Last week the second half of Season Six came out. This week the whole thing in one box set. A little double-dippy on the studio’s part, but ah well.
2011 UK. Showrunner: Stephen Moffat. Starring: Matt Smith, Karen Gillan.
Amazon DVD | Amazon Blu-ray | Netflix

OTHER TELEVISION RELEASES
The Gene Autry Show: Season 2 (1951 USA, stars Gene Autry, Pat Buttram)
Law & Order UK: Season 2 (2009 UK, creator Dick Wolf, stars Freema Agyeman; Netflix)
The L-Word: Complete Series (2004-2009 USA, creator Ilene Chaiken, stars Jennifer Beals; Netflix)

Instant Watch Picks of the Week

Limitless
Bradley Cooper’s bid for solo stardom, with an intriguing-sounding film about a writer who finds a drug that unlocks his full mental potential. I missed it in theatres, but I’m definitely curious to check it out.
2011 USA. Director: Neil Burger. Starring: Bradley Cooper, Robert De Niro, Abbie Cornish.

Firefly: Complete Series
One of the best TV series ever created, now once again on Instant Watch. Catch it before they decide to expire it again.
2002 USA. Creator: Joss Whedon. Starring: Nathan Fillion, Alan Tudyk, Gina Torres, Summer Glau, Jewel Staite, Adam Baldwin.

Bicycle Thieves
Hailed as one of the finest examples of the Italian Neorealist movement, and the hype is not lying – this film about a man who goes on a desperate odyssey with his young son to recover a stolen bike upon which his livelihood depends is heartbreaking and beautiful.
1947 Italy. Director: Vittorio De Sica. Starring: Lamberto Maggiorani, Enzo Staiola.

8 1/2
One of Federico Fellini’s most iconic films, with Mastroianni as a frustrated film director trying to overcome his creative block and deal with his many relationships with a variety of women.
1963 Italy. Director: Federico Fellini. Starring: Marcello Mastroianni, Sandra Milo.

Burn Notice
I’ve actually been waiting a LONG TIME for this to come on Instant. The first season about a cocky spy who gets “burned” (basically eliminated by the CIA) and tries to figure out why was a whole lot of fun, and I’ve been hoping for an easy chance to catch up with the rest.
2007-2010 USA. Creator: Matt Nix. Starring: Jeffrey Donovan, Bruce Campbell.

Fawlty Towers
John Cleese’s show about a hapless hotel owner and his attempts to improve its status is almost up there with Monty Python in terms of hilarity, though not quite to the same degree of absurdity.
1975 UK, creator John Cleese, Connie Booth, stars John Cleese, Prunella Scales.

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
One of the films that invented German Expressionism (or at least shows it at its extreme), Caligari uses its tale of madness and murder as an excuse for some of the most whacked out set design in any movie ever. Simply fantastic.
1919 Germany. Director: Robert Wiene. Starring: Werner Krauss, Conrad Veidt.

Nosferatu
F.W. Murnau couldn’t get the rights to make Dracula, so he just changed the name and made it anyway – creating one of the best versions of the book, authorized or not. You can also catch it on instant in the Gothic Industrial soundtrack version, if you wish.
1922 Germany. Director: F.W. Murnau. Starring: Max Schrenk, Gustav von Wangenheim.

The Birth of a Nation
Forever carrying the dual weight of being both a pioneering American epic and a racist screed, The Birth of a Nation continues to be simultaneously revered for its advances in narrative and editing techniques and reviled for its unavoidably offensive treatment of black Americans.
1915 USA. Director: D.W. Griffith. Starring: Lillian Gish, Henry B. Walthall.

Invader Zim
One of the most whacked out children’s shows (if it’s even appropriate for children) ever, Invader Zim is hilarious, absurd, and awesome. DOOM.
2001 USA. Creator: Jhonen Vasquez. Starring: Richard Steven Horvitz, Andy Berman.

The Game
An incredibly twisty-turny drama, with Michael Douglas as a man at the center of a hugely elaborate game that, for me, gets a little too unbelievable by the end. But many people like it much more than I do.
1997 USA. Director: David Fincher. Starring: Michael Douglas, Sean Penn.

Assault on Precinct 13
I’ve only seen the remake of this, which is a mistake I shall have to rectify at some point – Carpenter’s take on the prison assault drama is certainly going to be better than the remake, which is pretty crappy.
1976 USA. Director: John Carpenter. Starring: Austin Stoker, Darwin Joston.

Scarface
I’ve heard so many contradictory things about this movie (from great to horrible, to awesome, to overrated) that I really ought to check it out for myself. Also, so I can stop having to look like an elitist prick when I say I’ve only seen the 1932 version.
1983 USA. Director: Brian De Palma. Starring; Al Pacino.

Ken Burns docs
Ken Burns is known for his exhaustive (and potentially exhausting, given their length) documentaries on a wide variety of historical subjects, and several of them are coming to Instant Watch this week.
The Civil War (1990), Baseball (1994), Jazz (2001), The War (2007), The National Parks (2009)

The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
Yes, only The Two Towers is coming to Instant. Yes, that’s the middle one of a trilogy. No, I don’t understand that either.
2002 USA/New Zealand. Director: Peter Jackson. Starring: Elijah Wood, Viggo Mortensen, Sean Astin, Orlando Bloom.

OTHER INSTANT WATCHES
Adrift (2009 Brazil, dir Heitor Dhalia, stars Camilla Belle, Vincent Cassel)
Around the World in 80 Days (1989 UK, stars Pierce Brosnan, Eric Idle)
Astro Boy (2003 Japan, creator Osamu Tezuka, stars Candi Milo, Wally Wingert)
Bride Flight (2008 Australia, dir Ben Sombogaart, stars Karina Smulders, Anna Drijver)
Camelot: Season 1 (2011 USA, creator Michael Hirst, Chris Chibnall, stars Eva Green)
Canterbury’s Law (2008 USA, creator Dave Erickson, stars Julianna Margulies)
Cartoons That Time Forgot: UB Iwerks Collection (Vol. 2) (1934 USA, dir Ub Iwerks)
Cashmere Mafia (2008 USA, creator Kevin Wade, stars Lucy Liu, Frances O’Connor)
Conviction (2006 USA, creator Dick Wolf, stars Eric Balfour, Stepahnie March)
The Complete Superman Collection (1941 USA, dir Dave Fleischer)
Day Break (2006 USA, creator Paul Zbyszewski, stars Taye Diggs, Adam Baldwin)
The Dick Tracy Show (1961 USA, creator Chester Gould, stars Everett Sloane, Mel Blanc)
Dilbert (1999 USA, creator Scott Adams, stars Daniel Stern, Kathy Griffin)
Doctor Who: The End of Time (2009 UK, creator Russell T. Davies, stars David Tennant)
Dragnet (1951 USA, creator Jack Webb, stars Jack Webb, Harry Morgan)
Dylan Dog: Dead of Night (2010 USA, dir Kevin Munroe, stars Brandon Routh)
Fraggle Rock (1987 USA, creator Jim Henson)
The Glass Menagerie (1973 USA, dir Anthony Harvey, stars Katharine Hepburn)
Harper’s Island (2009 USA, creator Ari Schlossberg, stars Katie Cassidy)
H.R. Pufnstuf (1969 USA, creator Sid & Marty Krofft, stars Jack Wild, Billie Hayes)
Jet Li’s Fearless (2006 USA, dir Ronny Yu, stars Jet Li, Yong Dong)
Life on Mars (2008 USA, creator Scott Rosenberg, stars Jason O’Mara, Harvey Keitel)
My So-Called Life (1994 USA, creator Winnie Holzman, stars Claire Danes, Jared Leto)
Outbreak (1995 USA, dir Wolfgang Petersen, stars Dustin Hoffman, Kevin Spacey)
Pearl Jam Twenty (2011 USA, dir Cameron Crowe, stars Pearl Jam)
The Phantom of the Opera (1925 USA, dir Rupert Julian, stars Lon Chaney, Mary Philbin)
The Pink Panther Cartoon Collection (1969 USA, dir Friz Freleng)
Popeye Cartoons (1926 USA, dir Dave Fleischer)
The Romantics (2010 USA, dir Galt Niederhoffer, stars Katie Holmes, Anna Paquin)
The Stand (1994 USA, dir Stephen King, stars Gary Sinise, Molly Ringwald)
Submarino (2010 Denmark, dir Thomas Vintenberg, stars Jakob Cedergren)
Surface (2005 USA, creator Jonas & Josh Pate, stars Lake Bell, Jay R. Ferguson)
Sylvia (2004 USA, dir Christine Jeffs, stars Gwyneth Paltrow, Daniel Craig)
Take Me Home Tonight (2011 USA, dir Michael Dowse, stars Topher Grace, Anna Faris)
The Truth About Cats & Dogs (1996 USA, dir Michael Lehmann, stars Uma Thurman)
Tin Man (2007 USA, dir Craig Van Sickle & Steven Long Mitchell, stars Zooey Deschanel)
Walking with Dinosaurs (1999 USA, starring Kenneth Branagh)
White Collar (2009 USA, creator Jeff Eastin, stars Matthew Bomer, Tim DeKay)

See all new and upcoming titles.

Instant Watch Expiring Picks

Alice in Wonderland (2010 USA, dir Tim Burton, stars Mia Wasikowska) [11/24]
Chicago (2002 USA, dir Rob Marshall, stars Renee Zellweger, Catherine Zeta-Jones) [11/25]
The Long Voyage Home (1940 USA, dir John Ford, stars John Wayne) [11/25]
Torchwood: Miracle Day (2011 UK/USA, creator Russell T. Davies, stars John Barrowman) [11/25]
Cleaner (2007 USA, dir Renny Harlin, stars Samuel L. Jackson, Ed Harris) [11/26]
Red (2007 USA, dir Lucky McKee, stars Brian Cox, Tom Sizemore) [11/28]
In the Mouth of Madness (1994 USA, dir John Carpenter, stars Sam Neill) [11/29]
Animal Farm (1999 USA, dir John Stephenson, stars Pete Postlethwaite) [11/30]
The Bravados (1958 USA, dir Henry King, stars Gregory Peck, Lee Van Cleef) [11/30]
Carried Away (1995 USA, dir Bruno Barreto, stars Dennis Hopper, Amy Irving) [11/30]
The Gang’s All Here (1943 USA, dir Busby Berkeley, stars Alice Faye) [11/30]
Gypsy (1993 USA, dir Emile Ardolino, stars Bette Midler, Jennifer Rae Beck) [11/30]
I Wake Up Screaming (1941 USA, dir H. Bruce Humberstone, stars Betty Grable) [11/30]
In Old Chicago (1937 USA, dir Henry King, stars Tyrone Power, Don Ameche) [11/30]
Rumble Fish (1983 USA, dir Francis Ford Coppola, stars Matt Dillon) [11/30]
The Beach (2000 USA, dir Danny Boyle, stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Virginie Ledoyen) [12/1]
The Catherine Tate Show (2004-2006 UK, creator and star Catherine Tate) [12/1]
Dante’s Peak (1996 USA, dir Roger Donaldson, stars Pierce Brosnan) [12/1]
The Deadly Companions (1961 USA, dir Sam Peckinpah, stars Brian Keith) [12/1]
Easy Virtue (1928 UK, dir Alfred Hitchcock, stars Isabel Jeans, Robin Irvine) [12/1]
The Flintstones (1994 USA, dir Brian Levant, stars John Goodman, Rick Moranis) [12/1]
Gods and Monsters (1998 USA, dir Bill Condon, stars Ian McKellan, Brendan Fraser) [12/1]
The Hit (1984 UK, dir Stephen Frears, stars John Hurt, Tim Roth) [12/1]
Hoosiers (1986 USA, dir David Anspaugh, stars Gene Hackman, Dennis Hopper) [12/1]
King Kong (1976 USA, dir John Guillermin, stars Jessica Lange, Charles Grodin) [12/1]
LoudQUIETloud: A Film About the Pixies (2006 USA, dir Steven Cantor, Matthew Galkin, stars The Pixies) [12/1]
The Man in the Iron Mask (1998 USA, dir Randall Wallace, stars Leonardo DiCaprio) [12/1]
MI-5 (2002-2008 UK, creator David Wolstencroft, stars Matthew Macfadyen) [12/1]
Midway (1976 USA, dir Jack Smight, stars Charlton Heston, Robert Mitchum) [12/1]
Orgazmo (1998 USA, dir Trey Parker & Matt Stone, stars Trey Parker, Matt Stone) [12/1]
Picture Perfect (1997 USA, dir Glenn Gordon Caron, stars Jennifer Aniston) [12/1]
The Pope of Greenwich Village (1984 USA, dir Stuart Rosenberg, stars Eric Roberts) [12/1]
Quigley Down Under (1990 Australia, dir Simon Wincer, stars Tom Selleck) [12/1]
Red Dragon (2002 USA, dir Brett Ratner, stars Anthony Hopkins, Edward Norton) [12/1]
Red Dwarf (1998 -2009 UK, creator Rob Grant, Doug Naylor, stars Craig Charles) [12/1]
Rookie of the Year (1993 USA, dir Daniel Stern, stars Thomas Ian Nicholas) [12/1]
The Russians Are Coming! The Russians Are Coming! (1966 USA, dir Norman Jewison, stars Carl Reiner, Eva Marie Saint) [12/1]
Sid & Nancy (1986 USA, dir Alex Cox, stars Gary Oldman, Courtney Love) [12/1]
Ulee’s Gold (1997 USA, dir Victor Nunez, stars Peter Fonda, Christine Dunford) [12/1]
Untamed Heart (1993 USA, dir Tony Bill, stars Christian Slater, Marisa Tomei) [12/1]
Volcano (1997 USA, dir Mick Jackson, stars Tommy Lee Jones, Anne Heche) [12/1]
The Wizard (1989 USA, dir Todd Holland, stars Fred Savage, Jenny Lewis) [12/1]
The Name of the Rose (1986 France, dir Jean-Pierre Anaud, stars Sean Connery) [12/5]
Annie Oakley (1935 USA, dir George Stevens, stars Barbara Stanwyck) [12/6]

See all expiring titles.

Disclaimers

• Amazon links use my affiliate account, and will kick a small percentage of your purchase back to me. You pay the same price you would anyway.
• Not all new releases are available on Netflix immediately. Some studio films have a 30-day release window before Netflix can rent them, and some smaller releases are not picked up by Netflix immediately. Add them to your “saved” queue if you’re interested; that tells Netflix there is demand for the disc.
• Not all new Blu-ray releases are available on Netflix – Netflix usually buys both DVD and Blu-ray editions of new releases, but if a DVD has already been released, they don’t always get the Blu-ray when it comes out later.
• Instant Watch releases are not always 100% accurate – often the data from the API is not fully accurate until the actual day of release. I always check on release day to make sure things actually do hit Instant Watch, but for things that come out later than Tuesday when I publish this post, I won’t be able to tell.
• Instant Watch expirations are not always 100% accurate – sometimes they don’t expire after all, sometimes things expire with little advance warning. I always check to make sure the data is accurate to the best of my knowledge when I publish the post, but things could still change, especially since I’m giving expiration warnings up to two weeks in advance.

When asked what my favorite city is, I often say “movie Paris.” I like real Paris, too, but Paris in the movies is bright and clean, full of lights and romance, always with brimming cafes and wonderful restaurants, potential around every corner, artists everywhere, and music always playing. Movie Paris is perfect. And Pixar captured that perfectly in Ratatouille, rendering the excitement of movie Paris through the eyes of Remy, who’s just as starry-eyed about the place as I am.

***½~ (3.5/5)

Greta Gerwig both should and shouldn’t become a major star. She should because she’s amazing and her talent ought to be recognized outside of the indie film world where she’s already a well-known and respected name. And she shouldn’t because if she did, she might not have time to make charming little one-off films like this one. She’s already starting to break into the higher levels of indies, with Noah Baumbach’s Greenberg and Whit Stillman’s Damsels in Distress under her belt (and a supporting role in the non-indie No Strings Attached, which I didn’t realize until looking her up right now), but she’s honestly at her best in things like The Dish and the Spoon. A group effort between writer/director Alison Bagnall (who has acted, like Gerwig, in a few Joe Swanberg films), writer Andrew Lewis, and actors Gerwig and Olly Alexander, the film is slight but somehow enchanting despite the standoffishness of the main character and a few odd plot turns.

The film opens with Gerwig driving down the freeway in pajamas and an overcoat, sobbing loudly. She stops at a convenience store for donuts and beer (yeah…) and has to scrounge change from the car to pay for, even then only managing because the clerk takes pity on her obviously pitiable state. She’s running away from the husband she’s just found out cheated on her. I mention so much detail in this opening scene because it’s the little moments, the scenes like this that are the most charming in the film, and provide the bulk of it. Not much actually happens, but the way each moment is treated makes it special. She stops at a lighthouse and comes across a young British guy sleeping there, having traveled to the US under somewhat false pretenses and found himself without a place to stay. The unlikely pair team up, her because he has money and she craves company, him because he finds her fascinating. They balance each other well, and their random interactions with each other are the highlight of the film – in fact, they’re the basis of the film, which was made after Gerwig and Alexander met, hit it off, and wanted to make a quick film together in between other projects.

Most of the film is split between Gerwig trying to get revenge on her husband’s paramour, who seems never to be at home or at her job, and Gerwig and Alexander hiding out in her parents’ vacant vacation home and sort of “making house” together. Alexander starts taking this a bit more seriously than he should, as he starts falling in love with Gerwig, and she’s in no state for that, leading him on when she definitely shouldn’t. The plot is a bit haphazard, but it somehow fits with Gerwig’s very unbalanced way of viewing the world at this exact moment. She allows Alexander to fill in for her husband, and at one point, she even takes metaphorical control of her relationship with her husband by dressing Alexander up as a woman and wearing man’s clothes herself. It’s a rather strange and somewhat offputting sequence, but Gerwig brings it beautifully under the auspices of her character’s mental state.

In fact, Gerwig’s character here is not particularly likeable – she’s alternately listless or upset, euphoric or dejected, and can switch between them at a finger snap. One of the funniest cases of this is when she’s yelling outside her rival’s house about how she’s gonna wait there until she gets back and kill her and all this stuff, when she suddenly stops mid-sentence, gets in her car and drives away. In anyone else’s hands, this film would be hopelessly quirky and meaningless, with unbelievable characters led on by improbably plot turns. But Gerwig is utterly charming even when you want to smack some sense into her character, and it’s perfectly understandable and heartbreaking that Alexander falls for her as quickly as he does. Meanwhile, he lends a stability to her life far beyond his youth would indicate, his quiet affability the perfect foil for her unpredictable rawness.

It’s a slight movie, and unlikely to make many waves outside the indiest of indie circles, but it’s a wonderful showcase for Gerwig and Alexander especially, and a solid calling card for Bagnall (this is her sophomore feature, following 2003′s Piggie, which I know nothing about). I’ve yet to be disappointed in anything Gerwig does, excepting perhaps Greenberg, but this is the kind of film I find her best in, and I hope she continues to do these little character pieces in between her sure-to-be-increasing higher profile films.

Director: Alison Bagnall
Screenplay: Alison Bagnall, Andrew Lewis
Producers: Alison Bagnall, Peter Gilbert, Amy Seimetz
Starring: Greta Gerwig, Olly Alexander, Eleonore Hendricks, Adam Rothenberg, Amy Seimetz
Country/Language: United States, English
Running Time: 92 min

My two main recommendations among the newly featured ones this week are both kind of French New Wave-esque, though on opposite ends of the spectrum. Roger Vadim’s And God Created Woman (playing Monday night on TCM) is a precursor to the New Wave, catapulting Brigitte Bardot to stardom while showcasing her sexuality in a way films hadn’t done much up to that point. Xavier Dolan’s Heartbeats (playing late Saturday on Sundance), released in 2010 and hailing from Quebec instead of France, is a stylistic throwback to the brighter, more colorful side of the New Wave. Both films are definitely worth checking out.

Monday, November 21

8:15am – MGM – Judgment at Nuremberg
As the Cold War heats up, Nazi war trials are still going on, with four lesser Nazi judges up for trial. Meanwhile, outside the courtoom, German citizens try to put their life back together, providing a contrast for the Nazi atrocities discussed and even shown as evidence in the court. Judy Garland gives one of her few purely dramatic performances, and go an Oscar nomination for it, no less, among an extremely talented and diverse cast (Maximillian Schell did win an Oscar for his role).
1962 USA. Director: Stanley Kramer. Starring: Spencer Tracy, Burt Lancaster, Richard Widmark, Marlene Dietrich, Maximillian Schell, Judy Garland, Montgomery Clift, William Shatner.
Newly Featured!

11:15am – TCM – The Naked Spur
One of several westerns that teamed director Anthony Mann and James Stewart in the 1950, this one is a fine example of the darker turn that both the western as a genre and Jimmy Stewart’s roles took in the hands of Anthony Mann. Stewart is a bitter bounty hunter who takes on two suspect partners to track down a fugitive – a wily man indeed who psychologically manipulates the three men into turning on each other.
1953 USA. Director: Anthony Mann. Starring: James Stewart, Janet Leigh, Robert Ryan, Ralph Meeker, Millard Mitchell.

11:35am – MGM – Manon of the Spring
The sequel to the equally good Jean de Florette (but not really dependent on it), this quiet and pastoral French film focuses on Jean’s daughter Manon, who tries to right the wrongs done to her father.
1986 France. Director: Claude Berri. Starring: Yves Montand, Daniel Auteuil, Emmanuelle Beart, Hippolyte Girardo.

1:00pm – TCM – Kiss Me Deadly
Iconic noir film, with hard-boiled action, nuclear paranoia, and one of the more memorable non-Hitchcock McGuffins in movie history. Plus some great LA locations. One of the pulpier noir films, and one of the most enjoyable.
1955 USA. Director: Robert Aldrich. Starring: Ralph Meeker, Albert Dekker, Paul Stewart, Cloris Leachman, Marian Carr.

2:00pm – Fox Movie – Bedazzled
One of the best films of the British mod era, a comedic take on Faust with Dudley Moore a socially inept guy infatuated with the unattainable (to him) Eleanor Bron – granted seven wishes by Satan (Peter Cook), he tries to wish his way to her, but somehow fails hilariously every time.
1967 USA. Director: Stanley Donen. Starring: Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, Eleanor Bron.

3:00pm – TCM – Paths of Glory
A relatively early Kubrick film, with Kirk Douglas as a WWI army officer who defends his soldiers’ decsion to refuse an order to attack in an impossible situation, leading to court martial back at home. The combination of war and courtroom drama is very solid, as is the evocation of WWI and the almost complete disconnect between superiors planning attacks from safe bunkers and soldiers carrying them out in the trenches.
1957 USA. Director: Stanley Kubrick. Starring: Kirk Douglas, Ralph Meeker, Adolphe Menjou, George Macready, Richard Anderson.

8:00pm – IFC – From Hell
Johnny Depp takes on the role of a troubled Victorian police detective on the trail of Jack the Ripper in this adaptation of Alan Moore’s graphic novel. Not quite as memorable as would hope, but worth a watch.
2001 USA. Directors: Albert and Allen Hughes. Starring: Johnny Depp, Heather Graham, Ian Holm, Robbie Coltrane.
(repeats at 12:35am on the 22nd)

10:30pm – IFC – Valhalla Rising
Nicholas Winding Refn’s nearly wordless take on the Viking action film, privileging visual storytelling and a somewhat surreal and philosophical feel.
2009 Denmark. Director: Nicholas Winding Refn. Starring: Mads Mikkelsen, Maarten Stevenson, Alexander Morton.
(repeats at 3:05am on the 22nd)

12:00M – TCM – And God Created Woman
The film that really catapulted Brigitte Bardot to stardom, as a fickle and independent young woman who runs roughshod through a small seaside town, breaking hearts as she goes. She’s not simply a vamp, though, but a woman-child whose petulance gets her more than she bargains for. It’s an intriguing film, and not one easily pinned down – I still have my own doubts about the ending. But Bardot’s screen presence leaves no doubt at all.
1956 France. Director: Roger Vadim. Starring: Brigitte Bardot, Curd Jürgens, Jean-Louis Trintignant, Jane Marken.
Newly Featured!

12:00M – MGM – Coming Home
One of the most highly acclaimed Vietnam home-front films, with Jane Fonda and Jon Voight both winning Oscars for their roles – Jane as a soldier’s wife with her husband away in Vietnam, Jon as war veteran with a paralyzing injury.
1978 USA. Director: Hal Ashby. Starring: Jane Fonda, Jon Voight, Bruce Dern, Penelope Milford, Robert Carradine.

3:45am (22nd) – TCM – A Foreign Affair
A lesser Billy Wilder film, but Billy Wilder nonetheless, and though Jean Arthur’s opening plot line of an uptight congresswoman going to Berlin to “keep up morale” among the post-war occupying US soldiers (by which she really means “keep up morals”) gets old quickly, Marlene Dietrich’s worldly cabaret singer – and possible Nazi collaborator – keeps things interesting.
1948 USA. Director: Billy Wilder. Starring: Jean Arthur, Marlene Dietrich, John Lund, Millard Mitchell.

Tuesday, November 22

6:00am – IFC – Away from Her
A very strong directing debut film from actress Sarah Polley, about an older woman (Julie Christie) suffering from Alzheimer’s and her husband’s difficulty in dealing with essentially the loss of his wife as she has more and more difficulty remembering their life together. It’s a lovely, heartbreaking film, bolstered by great understated performances.
2006 Canada. Director: Sarah Polley. Starring: Julie Christie, Gordon Pinsent, Olympia Dukakis, Stacey LaBerge.
(repeats at 1:00pm)

8:00am – Fox Movie – Heaven Can Wait
In this unusual Lubitsch fantasy, a recently deceased man tries to convince Satan that he’s belongs in hell; unconvinced, Satan listens to him recount his life. As with anything Lubitsch, wit and sophistication abounds.1943 USA. Director: Ernst Lubitsch. Starring: Don Ameche, Gene Tierney, Charles Coburn.

8:00pm – TCM – Sweet Smell of Success
One of the most acidically witty films of the 1950s, Sweet Smell of Success turns its gaze on Broadway gossip columnist Burt Lancaster, who connives with press agent Tony Curtis to break up his sister’s romance – a searing indictment of unscrupulous newspaper men, yes, and a bitingly funny one to boot.
1957 USA. Director: Alexander Mackendrick. Starring: Burt Lancaster, Tony Curtis, Susan Harrison, Martin Milner, Sam Levene.

9:45pm – TCM – Red River
Howard Hawks’ brilliant transposition of Mutiny on the Bounty into the Old West has John Wayne as a tyrannical cattle drive leader and Montgomery Clift (in one of his earliest roles) as his adopted son who soon defies him.
1948 USA. Director: Howard Hawks. Starring: John Wayne, Montgomery Clift, Joanne Dru.
Must See

11:00pm – IFC – The Shining
Kubrick’s take on one of Stephen King’s most well-known novels may not stick that closely to King’s original story, but manages to capture the creepy factor of the Overlook Hotel and Jack Torrance’s descent into madness in a supremely cinematic way. Many memorable and disturbing scenes, and one of the few movies in which I actually like Jack Nicholson. So there’s that. Definitely not one to be missed.
1980 USA/UK. Director: Stanley Kubrick. Starring: Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd, Scatman Crothers.
Must See
(repeats at 2:00am on the 23rd)

12:00M – Sundance – The Silence of the Lambs
Only three films have ever swept the top five Oscars (Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, Screenplay), and this is one of them, managing both to be a solid serial killer thriller and something more, in its exploration of psychosis and the demons we all hide inside ourselves.
1991 USA. Director: Jonathan Demme. Starring: Jodie Foster, Anthony Hopkins, Ted Levine, Scott Glenn.
Must See
(repeats at 10:00pm on the 25th and 7:55pm on the 27th)

12:15am (23rd) – TCM – Gunga Din
Three British soldiers and an Indian water bearer join forces against an Indian cult gearing up for a murderous rampage. A classic adventure story, and one I should rewatch at some point.
1939 USA. Director: George Stevens. Starring: Cary Grant, Victor McLaglen, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., Sam Jaffe.

2:30am (23rd) – TCM – Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Frank Capra puts on his idealist hat to tell the story of Jefferson Smith (James Stewart), an inexperienced young man appointed as a junior senator because the corrupt senior senator thinks he’ll be easy to control. But Smith doesn’t toe the party line, instead launching a filibuster for what he believes in. Wonderful comedienne Jean Arthur is the journalist who initially encourages Smith so she can get a great story from his seemingly inevitable downfall, but soon joins his cause.
1939 USA. Director: Frank Capra. Starring: James Stewart, Jean Arthur, Claude Rains, Eugene Pallette, Thomas Mitchell.
Must See

Wednesday, November 23

6:00am – Fox Movie – The Snake Pit
One of the earlier films to deal with the realities of mental illness seriously, with Olivia de Havilland as a woman in an insane asylum, brilliantly moving back and forth between lucidity and falling back in the fog of illness. She got an Oscar nom for her role, based on a true story.
1948 USA. Director: Anatole Litvak. Starring: Olivia de Havilland, Mark Stevens, Leo Genn, Celeste Holm.
(repeats at 12:00N on the 26th)

10:00am – TCM – The Adventures of Robin Hood
I will state almost categorically that this is the greatest adventure film ever made. Maybe it’s a dead heat between this one and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Errol Flynn is Robin Hood, Olivia de Havilland is Maid Marion, a whole raft of fantastic character actors fill out the rest of the cast, and it’s all done in gorgeous Technicolor (it’s one of the earliest Technicolor films).
1938 USA. Directors: William Keighley & Michael Curtiz. Starring: Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Claude Rains, Basil Rathbone, Eugene Pallette, Alan Hale, Patric Knowles, Una O’Connor.
Must See

12:30pm – Fox Movie – I Wake Up Screaming
Better known for bright and sunny musicals, Betty Grable took a turn for the noir in this crime film, playing the sister of a recently-murdered model with a rising career. It’s a slight noir, but fun nonetheless, especially for the chance to see Grable in a role unusual for her.
1942 USA. Director: H. Bruce Humberstone. Starring: Betty Grable, Victor Mature, Carole Landis.

2:00pm – TCM – Tarzan, the Ape Man
Get your pre-code action right here, as swimming champion Johnny Weissmuller brings Tarzan to life and Maureen O’Sullivan teaches him the ways of the human world as Jane. Generally, the sequel Tarzan and His Mate is considered the best of the series, but hey. Gotta start somewhere.
1932 USA. Director: W.S. Van Dyke. Starring: Johnny Weissmuller, Maureen O’Sullivan.

6:00pm – TCM – Mogambo
A remake of 1932′s Red Dust, also starring Gable, this suffers a bit in comparison by not being pre-Code, but with John Ford at the helm and Ava Gardner and Grace Kelly taking the Mary Astor/Jean Harlow roles, it can’t be all bad, and it isn’t. It’s still a solid little love triangle/adventure film.
1953 USA. Director: John Ford. Starring: Clark Gable, Ava Gardner, Grace Kelly.

8:00pm – Fox Movie – The Verdict
Powerhouse filmmaker Sidney Lumet returns to his 12 Angry Men courtroom milieu for The Verdict, starring Paul Newman as an on-the-rocks lawyer who takes a medical malpractice suit to trial in a somewhat desperate attempt to salvage his career.
1982 USA. Director: Sidney Lumet. Starring: Paul Newman, Charlotte Rampling, Jack Warden.

12:35am (24th) – Sundance – Summer Hours
In what sounds like a very beautiful and meditative film, Olivier Assayas explores a French family as the matriarch prepares for her own passing and then the actions of her family after she does. It got the Criterion treatment almost immediately upon release, which is enough for me to get excited on its own, but I’ve also heard really good things about it.
2008 France. Director: Olivier Assayas. Starring: Juliette Binoche, Charles Berling, Jérémie Renier.

3:00am (24th) – TCM – My Favorite Wife
After being shipwrecked and believed dead for seven years, Irene Dunne returns home to her husband Cary Grant on the eve of his marriage to another woman. Oh, and she brought Randolph Scott, her fellow shipwreckee, with her. Hijinks ensue. Not quite as strong a screwball comedy as the earlier Grant-Dunne opus The Awful Truth, but still fun for fans of the genre.
1940 USA. Director: Garson Kanin. Starring: Cary Grant, Irene Dunne, Randolph Scott, Gail Patrick.

4:30am (24th) – TCM – The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer
In this slight but charming comedy, a nearly-grown-up Shirley Temple is the bobby-soxer crushing on Cary Grant’s bachelor, but he’s more interested in Temple’s sister Myrna Loy, a no-nonsense judge who’s caught Grant up on disorderly behavior more than once. There are a lot of great bits in here, including Grant’s attempt at the “man with the voodoo” patter.
1947 USA. Director: Irving Reis. Starring: Cary Grant, Myrna Loy, Shirley Temple, Rudy Vallee.

Thursday, November 24

9:00am – MGM – The Raven (1963)
Another of the several Edgar Allan Poe adaptations teaming up Roger Corman and Vincent Price, this time expanding greatly on Poe’s famous poem, making it about a bunch of magicians turning each other into ravens and fighting over the lovely Lenore, with a lot more comedy than you’d think one of the creepiest poems in literary history could inspire.
1963 USA. Director: Roger Corman. Starring: Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Boris Karloff, Hazel Court, Olive Sturgess, Jack Nicholson.
Newly Featured!
(repeats at 2:30pm and 8:00pm)

10:00am – TCM – Meet Me in St. Louis
The ultimate nostalgia film, harking back to the turn of the century and the year leading up to the 1903 St. Louis World’s Fair. Judy Garland holds the film and the family in it together as the girl who only wants to love the boy next door, but it’s Margaret O’Brien as the little willful sister who adds the extra bit of oomph, especially in the manic Halloween scene and the violent Christmas scene that carries the film from an exercise in sentimentality into a deeper territory of loss and distress.
1944 USA. Director: Vincente Minnelli. Starring: Judy Garland, Tom Drake, Lucille Bremer, Margaret O’Brien, Leon Ames, Mary Astor.
Must See

11:30am – Fox Movie – Anna and the King of Siam
The earlier/non-musical version of The King and I stars Irene Dunne in one of her last films and Rex Harrison in one of his earliest American ones. Both do a fine job.
1946 USA. Director: John Cromwell. Starring: Irene Dunne, Rex Harrison, Linda Darnell, Gale Sondergaard.
(repeats at 9:00am on the 25th)

1:45pm – TCM – The Music Man
A musical favorite of many (though not of me personally), with conman Robert Preston entering River City to play his con of selling the town on the idea of a marching band, then absconding with the money raised for instruments and uniforms. However, his plans run awry when he falls for the town’s librarian.
1962 USA. Director: Morton DaCosta. Starring: Robert Preston, Shirley Jones, Buddy Hackett, Hermione Gingold.

6:00pm – TCM – Miracle on 34th Street
The original classic Christmas tale of a Macy’s department store Santa who claims to be the real thing and the family whose cynicism is tested by his presence. One of Natalie Wood’s most memorable pre-growing-up roles, and an Oscar-winner for Edmund Gwenn as Kris Kringle.
1947 USA. Director: George Seaton. Starring: Maureen O’Hara, Natalie Wood, Edmund Gwenn, John Payne.

10:00pm – TCM – The Lady Eve
Barbara Stanwyck and her father Charles Coburn are cardplayers, cheating cruise ship denizens of their wealth. Millionaire (and snake afficianado) Henry Fonda is a good mark, especially since he’s a bit dense and spacey. Stanwyck’s plot is hugely elaborate, only a little muddled by her falling in love with Fonda as well, and she’s a delight from start to finish. As she usually is.
1941 USA. Director: Preston Sturges. Starring: Barbara Stanwyck, Henry Fonda, Charles Coburn, William Demarest, Eugene Pallette.
Must See

11:45pm – TCM – A Night at the Opera
One of the best of the Marx Brothers’ zany comedies finds them running awry through the world of opera. This is the one that contains the famous “how much stuff can we stuff into a stateroom” scene. And a subplot with Allan Jones and Kitty Carlisle, but that’s best ignored as much as possible.
1935 USA. Director: Sam Wood. Starring: The Marx Brothers, Allan Jones, Kitty Carlisle, Margaret Dumont.
Must See

1:30am (25th) – TCM – Monkey Business
If possible, the Marx Brothers were even crazier during their run at Paramount, before MGM took them over in 1935, and Monkey Business sets them loose on an ocean liner. The brothers are stowing away, but a bunch of gangsters force them into being their thugs, something that seems ludicrous already without adding in constantly having to evade the ship’s crew. Even more hijinks ensue after the boat lands.
1931 USA. Director: Norman Z. McLeod. Starring: The Marx Brothers, Rockliffe Fellowes, Harry Woods, Thelma Todd, Ruth Hall.
Newly Featured!

3:00am (25th) – TCM – Shall We Dance
Shall We Danceis not as good as most other Astaire-Rogers films, but I still love it to death every time I see it, due in no small part to a great Gershwin score. Here Fred’s a ballet dancer who wants to do tap, and is obsessed with meeting his idol, Ginger. When he does, somehow it all snowballs into rumors of a secret wedding and all sorts of things that just kind of get in the way of the dancing.
1937 USA. Director: Mark Sandrich. Starring: Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Edward Everett Horton, Eric Blore.

Friday, November 25

7:15am – IFC – Dear Frankie
Emily Mortimer is a young mother who writes responses to her son’s letters to his father; when her elaborate ruse to convince him his father is just away at sea starts to fall apart, she hires a handsome stranger to pretend to be his father. A charming and unassuming tale, and the Glaswegian accents don’t hurt either, at least for me.
2004 UK. Director: Shona Auerbach. Starring: Emily Mortimer, Gerard Butler, Jack McElhone.
(repeats at 1:45pm)

1:30am (26th) – Sundance – Lolita
“How could they make a movie of Lolita?” runs the tagline, and indeed, it’s hard to imagine anyone even trying in 1962 – both because of the pedophiliac content and the interior nature of the narrative, very difficult to reproduce in cinematic form. But Stanley Kubrick decided he was up to the task, and though it isn’t considered one of his best films, it still rates pretty highly.
1962 UK/USA. Director: Stanley Kubrick. Starring: James Mason, Sue Lyon, Shelley Winters.
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Saturday, November 26

1:30pm – TCM – Giant
The saga of a Texas cattle rancher and two generations of his family’s rivalry with a nearby rancher and oil tycoon. A bit sprawling and overlong for my tastes, but certainly has its moments, and is one of only three films James Dean made before his death.
1956 USA. Director: George Stevens. Starring: Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson, Carroll Baker, Mercedes McCambridge.

8:00pm – IFC – Saw
I have avoided all the Saw films myself, but from what I’ve heard, the first one is actually quite a well-made horror thriller with two men given increasingly horrific “games” to play to stay alive in the lair of the mysterious Jigsaw.
2004 USA. Director: James Wan. Starring: Leigh Whannell, Cary Elwes, Danny Glover, Ken Leung.
(repeats at 10:15pm)

10:00pm – Sundance – Moulin Rouge!
Baz Lurhmann admittedly has a love-it-or-hate-it flamboyantly trippy aesthetic, especially in the informal Red Curtain trilogy which Moulin Rogue! closes. And sure, it’s over the top; sure, the story is fairly routine; sure, the acting is so-so. I love it to pieces anyway.
2001 USA. Director: Baz Lurhmann. Starring: Nicole Kidman, Ewan McGregor, Jim Broadbent, John Leguizamo.

12:15am (27th) – Sundance – Heartbeats
The second film from wunderkind Xavier Dolan isn’t quite as impressive as his debut I Killed My Mother, but it’s still a really enjoyable watch, with two best friends silently fighting over the androgynous object of both their affection. It’s stylized as all get out, but there’s a fair bit of depth beneath its New Wave-inspired superficial veneer.
2010 Canada. Director: Xavier Dolan. Starring: Xavier Dolan, Monia Chokri, Niel Schneider.
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2:30am (27th) – TCM – She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
The first of John Ford’s informal “Cavalry trilogy,” which continued with Fort Apache and Rio Grande – all three films star John Wayne, though they’re unrelated in plot and character.
1948 USA. Director: John Ford. Starring: John Wayne, Joanne Dru.

4:15am (27th) – IFC – The Squid and the Whale
Jeff Daniels and Laura Linney are married writers/academics who finally drive each other too crazy to keep living together, bringing their two adolescent sons into their turmoil when they separate. Everything about the film works together to create one of the best films of the past few years. Writer/director Noah Baumbach has crafted a highly intelligent script which is achingly witty and bitterly funny; the acting is superb all around; the music fits beautifully, and even the setting (1980s Brooklyn) is something of a character.
2005 USA. Director: Noah Baumbach. Starring: Jeff Daniels, Laura Linney, Jesse Eisenberg, Owen Kline.
Must See

Sunday, November 27

8:00am – TCM – In a Lonely Place
Simply a brilliant film from director Nicholas Ray – Humphrey Bogart gives probably his best performance as washed-up screenwriter Dixon Steele, who’s trying to make a comeback with a new adaptation. When a coatcheck girl gets murdered after he was the last to see her, he naturally comes under suspicion, but his neighbor Laurel (Gloria Grahame) gives him an alibi and soon the two begin a relationship which just might save Dix from more than a murder charge – or might not. There’s a raw intensity here that few films have ever matched.
1951 USA. Director: Nicholas Ray. Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Gloria Grahame.
Must See

12:15pm – TCM – Some Like It Hot
After musicians Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon unwittingly witness the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, they have to escape the mob by impersonating women and joining an all-girls band. The fact that Marilyn Monroe is the band’s lead singer doesn’t help them stay undercover. Easily one of the greatest comedies ever put on film.
1959 USA. Director: Billy Wilder. Starring: Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon, Joe E. Brown, George Raft.
Must See

2:30pm – TCM – Gandhi
Ben Kingsley plays the titular figure with uncanny verisimilitude, tracing Mohandas Gandhi’s life and career throughout his quest for unbiased treatment of native peoples in British-held lands, especially India, where his leadership of a non-violent rebellion helped to gain India its independence from the British Empire.
1982 UK. Director: Richard Attenborough. Starring: Ben Kingsley, Candice Bergen, Edward Fox, John Gielgud, Trevor Howard, John Mills, Martin Sheen.

4:00pm – Fox Movie – Call Northside 777
One of Jimmy Stewart’s first films after spending the war as a fighter pilot; he plays a reporter compelled to reopen an eleven-year-old murder case, coming to believe the wrong man was sentenced to life in prison. A good combo of film noir and mystery.
1948 USA. Director: Henry Hathaway. Starring: James Stewart, Richard Conte, Lee J. Cobb.

6:00pm – TCM – The Maltese Falcon
Humphrey Bogart inhabits the role of Dashiell Hammett’s private eye Sam Spade, creating one of the definitive on-screen hard-boiled detective (vying only with Bogart’s Philip Marlowe in The Big Sleep, really). Not mention setting the early benchmark for noir films.
1941 USA. Director: John Huston. Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor, Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet, Elisha Cook Jr, Walter Huston.
Must See

6:30pm – IFC – Hard Candy
Ellen Page burst onto the scene as a teenage girl getting involved with an older guy she met on the internet – initially looks like a cautionary tale about internet chat relationships, but goes into even more twisted realms than that, with Ellen owning the screen every second.
2005 USA. Director: David Slade. Starring: Ellen Page, Patrick Wilson, Sandra Oh.
(repeats at 2:15am on the 28th)

8:00pm – TCM – There’s No Business Like Show Business
Not quite in the pantheon of great movie musicals, but you’ve got a pretty solid ensemble cast singing a lot of really good Irving Berlin tunes in an admittedly routine showbiz family story – and two of those ensemble cast happen to be Ethel Merman, who made very few films (instead focusing on her impressive Broadway career), and Marilyn Monroe, whose rendition of “Heat Wave” is worth watching the film.
1955 USA. Director: Walter Lang. Starring: Ethel Merman, Marilyn Monroe, Donald O’Connor, Mitzi Gaynor, Dan Dailey.
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Saturdays are times to relax after a week of work, and maybe take a few naps in between other leisure activities. Let Goofy help you, in one of the less athletic of his 1950s “How to…” series. Or is it?

Since I first heard it was happening, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim has been my most anticipated game of the year, promising a return to the vast world that ate up my life in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. When I first bought my Xbox360, Oblivion was among the first round of games I bought, taking it on faith that I’d enjoy it, since I hadn’t played any of the previous Elder Scrolls games. I ended up spending over 120 hours on the initial playthrough, and being completely unready for it to end when I finished. I’ve even restarted it a few times just to spend more time in the world of Tamriel. Of course, I’m cheap, so I didn’t get the expansion packs right away – in fact, I didn’t get them until a few weeks ago, when Xbox Live had an amazing sale on them, and I didn’t get to finish them before Skyrim came out. I’ll get back to them, but for now, my life belongs to Skyrim.

So far, I’ve only scratched the surface of Skyrim‘s world, so this is not a review, but just a catalog of the some first impressions of the game so far. I’ve put in roughly ten hours, and have completed only a very little bit of the main quest line. I tend to like doing the other things first, so I’ve done a lot of little tasks like clearing out a cave of bandits, sorting out an unhappy love triangle, recovering a family sword, those kind of things. You get those just by wandering around and talking to people – it’s amazing how many people need stuff done for them! There are also larger, multi-part side quests, and I’ve done a few of those as well. Then there are guilds and factions you can join, each of which starts its own questline. I’ve joined two of those so far. If you’ve played Oblivion and all this sounds familiar, you’re right. This game is essentially exactly like Oblivion from the general design to the branching questlines and random tasks to the hack-and-slash combat. If you’ve played Oblivion, you already know whether you’re going to like Skyrim or not. I haven’t been disappointed one bit – it’s like being back in the world I love with updated graphics, slightly better combat, a face-lifted menu system (which I quite like, actually, compared with Oblivion‘s), and what promises to be an even bigger world.

The events in Skyrim take place some 200 years after the end of Oblivion. The line of Emperors has died out without an heir, and Skyrim (the northern section of Tamriel) is embroiled in a civil war between those who want to stay loyal to a declining Empire and those who want to secede. There’s also strife with the Elves, as a major natural disaster forced the migration of many dark Elves out of Morrowind (where the third Elder Scrolls game was set) and into Skyrim, where they are unwelcome by a large portion of the population. At the beginning, you’re captured along with a bunch of secessionists who are about to be executed (though you’re not necessarily with them; your backstory is unknown) when a dragon attacks. Dragons haven’t been seen for ages, but they’re back now, perhaps heralding the end of the world. You don’t get to fight this one yourself, but believe me, you’ll get to fight others. And it ain’t pretty. Turns out you have a special connection to the dragons, and that’s about as far as I’ve gotten in the story.

A lot of people disliked the combat in Oblivion, because it isn’t very nuanced, and it’s pretty much the same here. There’s no turn-based element or VAT system like Bethesda added for Fallout 3. You basically just run up and slash at something until it dies, or you die, but there is some amount of strategy to be employed. You can also use ranged attacks via bow or magic, you can heal yourself during combat via potions or magic, and you can boost specific stats with other potions for a brief period of time. You have a limited amount of magic you can use before it has to recharge, same with stamina (which controls sprinting and swinging melee weapons). Balancing all that against a powerful enemy (or a large number of smaller enemies) can be quite tricky, and I’ve already been through several fights that required multiple tries, regrouping and trying different tactics each time. You can have companions who will help you fight, but you can’t control them or give them direct orders, like you can in Mass Effect or Dragon Age. I’m perfectly okay with that, frankly – I have enough to deal with handling myself without micromanaging NPCs.

Let’s talk customization. You can choose any of about ten different races – various races of human, elf, even orc and khajit (a cat-like creature) – which all have their own strengths and weaknesses in terms of skillset. Some are better warriors, others are better at stealth, others have an affinity for magic. Of course, you can still do all these things no matter what race you are, but you’ll have to work harder at things your chosen race isn’t good at. You have enormous control, too, over your physical appearance – I think I spend an hour just creating my character. After getting into the game, I really like how skills are leveled based on how much you use them. Using destruction spells a lot with increase your destruction skill, using the bow a lot will increase your archery skill, etc. This is pretty standard (and just like Oblivion), but it always gives a little thrill to be using something a lot and see the skill climb high – after all, why bother leveling things I never use? There is a system of perks on top of the basic skill leveling that’s good, as well – reaching certain levels in a skill unlocks perks you can add – like if you’re high in destruction magic, you can get a perk that decreases the amount of magicka the spell uses. (I keep using destruction magic as an example because I’ve found it very useful, and have already leveled it up a lot and gotten several of the perks.) But really what this means is that depending on your starting class and how you choose to play, you can get through the game a number of ways. Most of the questlines would be the same, and the game doesn’t have a strong good/evil balance the way a lot of current RPGs do, but you can focus on melee, ranged, or magic combat, or on stealth and avoid combat more often.

The main questline can supposedly be completed in 20 hours or so, but I’m expecting to spend over 100 hours on this, with side quests and all. And the developers have even promised that there will be an endless number of the “miscellaneous” tasks based on an auto-generating algorithm so you can keep playing ever after finishing all the main quests and major side quests. I’m not sure how endlessly entertaining these endless tasks will be, but I know I certainly would’ve continued playing Oblivion if there had been anything left to do in it, so we’ll see. The pacing of the game, split between frenetic real-time combat and walking around talking to people, works really well for me – games full of only combat are not my favorite anymore. I prefer a little quiet time in between to explore and enjoy the world, and world-building is something Bethesda does really well. Each race and city has its own characteristics, and they’ll respond to you differently based on your own race and clothing – not enough to REALLY matter in terms of getting things done, but it adds a touch of nuance to interactions.

Overall Skyrim doesn’t add a lot to Oblivion other than being another chapter in the (very long) saga; there are no vast changes to gameplay and, indeed, a lot of the sidequests seem like they’ll be pretty similar. You can again join a mages’ guild, a mercenary guild, an assassin’s guild, and a thieves’ guild, and I think another one I haven’t found yet, plus you can choose to join either the Imperial or rebel legion. Character creation and combat are pretty similar. The menu system and to some degree the leveling system are overhauled for the better (fewer attributes, but more skills, and the addition of perks). They’ve also added or improved the ability to create and improve your items at forges, workbenches, alchemy labs, even cooking spits – not something I’ve done a lot of yet, but I definitely forsee myself doing more of it in the future. But most of those changes are minor or cosmetic, so if you were so-so on Oblivion and were hoping Skyrim would vastly up the ante, you may be disappointed. But if you, like me, only wanted Oblivion to go on forever, then go get immersed in Skyrim today. And if you’ve never played either, then, well…assess very carefully how many waking hours you want to spend on a game before you jump in. I’m already getting antsy to fire it up tonight, the first game I’ve felt that way about since…Portal 2.

Anyone else losing their life to Skyrim right now? What other games are you playing?

***½~ (3.5/5)

[Tomboy opens in limited release in the US this week, so we're reposting and expanding our LAFF review.]

Moving into a new neighborhood means new kids to play with, and a chance for ten-year-old tomboy Laure (already androgynous with cropped hair, tank top, and shorts) to pretend to be a boy with her new friends. Introducing herself as Mikael, she passes quite well, playing sports with the boys and hanging out with new friend Lisa in a perhaps more than friendly way. At home she continues to be Laure, and her parents have no idea that she’s lying about her gender elsewhere – though they do perhaps have something of an inkling that she is not particularly comfortable identifying as a girl.

Ten seems fairly young to experience gender identity issues as strongly as this, but writer/director Céline Sciamma wisely keeps the film focused on identity rather than sexuality. Yet this also introduces a certain ambiguity that may or may not be a good thing – when I initially saw the film in June at the LA Film Festival, I left the film confused as to whether Laure really did identify as a boy, or whether she simply wanted to do “boy” things and wear “boy” clothes. In other words, is she really just the tomboy of the title living in a society that for some reason restricts girls from doing boy things while still identifying as girls, or does it go deeper than that? I’m more inclined now to see that ambiguity as a plus than a minus, but it’s still definitely there for me. Others are seeing the film as a fully LGBT film (in fact, it played in an LGBT sidebar at LAFF), but I don’t think it’s necessarily that simple.

As the summer goes on and school looms on the horizon, Laure resorts to increasingly elaborate attempts to keep her secret, but eventually it comes out, and the pain of both returning to her female gender and having to tell her friends (and their families) that she lied to them is almost palpable. It’s a great central performance from Zoé Héran, who gets across both the joy in the early scenes of small things like being able to take off her shirt to play football and the humiliation of having her secret revealed in subtle and believable ways. It’s a very still performance a lot of the time, but she breaks out when she needs to for emotional impact. Even better, though, is Malonn Lévana as her little sister Jeanne. In between cavorting outside with Lisa and the boys, Laure stays home and takes care of Jeanne, drawing and playing with her without pretense. Jeanne is a live-wire, all smiles and giggles where Laure is very quiet and solemn. She steals nearly every scene she’s in, and the film (which sometimes threatens to lose itself in its own stillness) comes alive whenever she’s on screen. She figures out Laure’s secret before long, but keeps it, somehow intuiting even at her young age how important this is to Laure.

The very end adds to the ambiguity, suggesting that Laure actually has a long way to go before she figures out her own identity, but that’s okay. It holds forgiveness and tentative friendship, the rebuilding of bonds that could well have been severed completely. The film stays fairly aloof from its own gender politics, something that frustrated me a little on initial watch but that I think is ultimately a strength – a willingless to simply observe Laure without making overt statements of its own. At the same time, it also seems like it’s trying to be a little more profound than it actually is – gorgeous cinematography make it quite watchable despite the slow pacing, but also lend it a veneer of depth that the film doesn’t entirely earn.

Writer/Director: Céline Sciamma.
Producer: Bénédicte Couvreur.
Starring: Zoé Héran, Malonn Levana, Jeanne Disson, Sophie Cattani.
Country: France
Running Time: 82 min.

After releasing a teaser trailer a few months ago, Pixar has just dropped the full theatrical trailer for their upcoming Scottish warrior princess film Brave. There’s been a lot of hype about this being Pixar’s first film with a female lead, and good on them for finally doing that and seeming to largely stay away from the Disney-esque princess mold, but that being said, there’s something very Mulan-meets-How to Train Your Dragon about this trailer. Obviously part of that is DreamWorks’ fault for choosing to have their Vikings speak with Scottish brogues – at least Pixar is using the Scottish accents honestly, and have grabbed some fine actors to provide voices, starting with the very underused Kelly MacDonald in the lead role, and also including Craig Ferguson, Robbie Coltrane, Billy Connolly, Emma Thompson, and Julie Walters.

I frankly prefer the mysterious undertones and thematic weight of the earlier trailer to this one, but that’s pretty much par for the course for me and Pixar. I usually love the teaser trailers, dislike the longer trailers, then love the movie. So I’ve still got high hopes for this.

Check out the trailer under the seats.