Saint Omer (2022)

We in no way planned it, but it is pretty fun that we’ll be reviewing Saint Omer and Anatomy of a Fall back-to-back today and tomorrow. For whatever reason, these two legal dramas were also two of the biggest arthouse exports from France these last couple years, and having already seen Anatomy, it was hard not to think of it while watching Saint Omer. There are plenty of differences between the two movies, but they also more or less explore the same overall idea that as cold and exacting as the criminal justice system can be, it becomes a lot more complicated when things like love and relationships and motherhood are involved. Continue reading →

Flowers of Shanghai (1998)

When I’m tasked with watching and reviewing 10 Criterion movies each year, my fear usually isn’t that one of the movies I watch will be bad. After all, Criterion has such a proven track record as cinephile tastemakers, that they rarely put a film in the collection that doesn’t have at least some artistic or cultural significance. That’s why the biggest fear for me is watching a film where I recognize the artistic merit of the film and can easily see why it would encompass Criterion’s aims of “gathering the greatest films from around the world”, but I just don’t connect with it. Flowers of Shanghai is certainly that kind of film, where I see why it’s innovative from a storytelling and filmmaking perspective, but I wasn’t all that emotionally invested in it. Continue reading →

Desert Hearts (1985)

When we picked our movies on the Criterion Draft podcast, I clearly didn’t know exactly what this movie was, since I referred to it both as a “road movie” and taking place in “Reagan’s America”. Neither of these things are true, since pretty much all of the film takes place in and around one city (Reno, Nevada), and I must have forgotten that this movie takes place in 1959 when we recorded that podcast. Still, Desert Hearts nonetheless had more or less the vibe I was hoping it would have, since it does feature a lot of scenes in cars of characters getting to know each other better (like in a road movie) and also features two women having to hide their romantic feelings for each other, much like they would have to in most places in Reagan’s America that weren’t New York or San Francisco. Continue reading →

The Marriage of Maria Braun (1979)

Well here I am, once again reviewing the first part of a loosely-defined trilogy from a director synonymous with the ’70s. The Marriage of Maria Braun is the first in Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s “BRD Trilogy” which is also a Criterion box set that traces three films by Fassbinder about Germany’s post-war period seen through the eyes of a female protagonist. I have not seen the other two films in this trilogy (1981’s Lola and 1982’s Veronika Voss) nor have I seen any other Fassbinder films since Ali: Fear Eats The Soul, my first foray into the German New Wave director several Criterion Months ago. After seeing The Marriage of Maria Braun, I would say I’m still curious to check out more of his massive body of work, though I’m not sure to what extent exactly. Continue reading →

Klute (1971)

When you think of the term “70s paranoia thriller”, you probably think of director Alan J. Pakula, even if you’re someone like me who hasn’t actually seen a ton of Pakula movies. He’s so synonymous with this decade-specific subgenre that people often forget that he directed a pretty notable film outside this genre in Sophie’s Choice (or at least I do). He even kept directing movies of this variety when his sensibilities still didn’t quite mesh with modern thrillers, as was the case with The Pelican Brief, one of our somewhat recent Picks. Well, Klute was where it all started. It’s the first movie in Pakula’s “paranoia trilogy” along with The Parallax View and All The President’s Men, and it also set the tone for a decade where everyone (including the president) was recording each other’s conversations. Continue reading →