July 2021

There were 32 posts published in July 2021 (this is page 4 of 5).

Criterion Month Day 11: Cléo from 5 to 7

Cléo from 5 to 7 (1962)

Back when I drafted Hiroshima mon amour, I remember joking about how pretentious the French New Wave’s left bank group must have been, given their reputation for considering right bank directors like François Truffaut, and Jean-Luc Godard “too commercial.” But now that I’ve seen movies from a couple left bank directors (and read Colin’s many reviews) I’m realizing I actually had it backwards. I think the left bank was poking fun at the right bank for taking cinema too seriously. It’s less that one side was more intellectual than the other, and more that the left bank filmmakers were willing to play looser and get more experimental. So in the case of a movie like Agnès Varda’s Cléo from 5 to 7, we get a film that seriously tackles existentialism and feminism, but isn’t afraid to get goofy with it sometimes.

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Criterion Month Day 10: The Housemaid

The Housemaid (1960)

I’d never heard of The Housemaid before I chose it for Criterion Month. For some reason, i’s hard for me to believe that were Korean movies before the 2000s. Korean Cinema had such a boom with the rise of directors like Bong Joon-ho, Park Chan-wook, and Kim Jee-woon ( to name a few) that its overshadowed a lot of pre-21st Century Korean cinema. Yet if it wasn’t for films like The Housemaid, that 2000s boom may not have been possible. In fact, Bong Joon-ho even said The Housemaid was a big influence on Parasite.

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Criterion Month Day 9: Journey To Italy

Journey To Italy (1954)

As you explore the outer edges of the Criterion galaxy as we do each year, you often are reminded of what a momentous movement the French New Wave was to the cinema world. Not just because there are so many French New Wave films in the Criterion Collection (and by extension the classic and arthouse cinema cannon), but also because there are so many important films that were either influenced by or ended up influencing the French New Wave. Today’s film falls into the latter category, as it wasn’t a huge hit in Italy or internationally when it came out, but it was championed by the critics at Cahiers Du Cinema that would soon start directing movies of their own. It also must be a film that had at least somewhat of an impact on Italian cinema, since it’s hard not to think of Antonioni’s L’Avventura while watching the couple at the heart of this story aimlessly search for meaning against the backdrop of coastal Italy. Continue reading →

Criterion Month Day 7: Godzilla

Gozilla (1954)

The Criterion Collection made a big deal out of spine #1,000 by releasing their biggest box set yet: Godzilla: The Showa-Era Films, a collection of the first 15 Godzilla movies. (The title refers to the period of Emperor Shōwa’s reign.) The set comes in an oversized hardcover book filled with dozens of beautiful illustrations and essays that make it equally at home as a display piece on the mantle or a coffee table book. I’m proud to own it and show it off… but I do have one dark secret: I’m not sure I deserve to own such a exquisite prize. You see, before this month, the only Showa-Era movie I’d seen is the first King Kong vs. Godzilla. And now that I’ve finally watched the original Gozilla, I don’t foresee see myself checking out the other 13 movies any time soon. That’s not great, because if I was just going to watch the first one, Criterion already released that forever ago. Let me try to explain why my eyes are bigger than my stomach when it comes to kaiju movies.

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Criterion Month Day 6: Stray Dog

Stray Dog (1949)

We watch some heady stuff for Criterion Month. You know, films that make you feel stupid. Or at least make me feel stupid. What I love about Akira Kurosawa is that he feels like the workingman’s Criterion filmmaker. He makes beautiful films with profound statements and ideas but they are also very entertaining. Kurosawa is never boring. His films move quick (even his longer ones) with tight scripts, action, suspense, and a lot of people getting pissed off at other people. In most cases, one of those people is Toshiro Mifune. Kurosawa is one of the few filmmakers in the Criterion Collection that I will happily watch outside of Criterion Month and he’s got a lot of good films to choose from. Stray Dog is one of them.

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Criterion Month Day 5: Dance, Girl, Dance

Dance, Girl, Dance (1940)

Like a lot of somewhat snobbish institutions, it seems that Criterion has made an effort to make representation a cornerstone of its business in the past few years. This is what has (thankfully) led to an overlooked director like Dorothy Arzner having some of her films recently enter The Collection, as Arzner was essentially the only female director working in Hollywood during the ’30s and ’40s. This could lead one to ask whether Arzner’s work is only worth revisiting just because she was the first to do it. However, that question becomes silly when you take into account that most barrier-breakers are able to do so because they’re so impeachably talented that the gatekeepers of their industries are forced to reckon with them. Continue reading →