The Learning Tree (1969)

It takes a special kind of person to be able to claim that they were the first Black director to helm a Hollywood studio film. It takes a polymath to able to make that claim, but also while having their directing career be just one of many creative pursuits that they received widespread acclaim for. That happens to be the case with Gordon Parks, whose The Learning Tree was a breakthrough in Hollywood studios becoming open to hiring Black directors. However, this came after Parks had already spent decades as a revered photojournalist, capturing the minutiae of mid-20th century African-American life, while he also published a few books before turning his semi-autobiographical novel The Learning Tree into his first film. And this was before he started scoring his own movies as well as painting in his spare time. Continue reading →

The Cremator (1969)

I’m a simple man. I see a movie labeled as “horror” in the Criterion Collection, I watch. What makes The Cremator a horror film? Going in I assumed it was because… well, cremation. What I didn’t know until now is that the scariest thing about The Cremator isn’t cremation, it’s Nazis. God, I hate those fuckers. This film hates Nazis too and shows us why they suck through one man’s slow descent into madness.

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Mothra vs. Godzilla (1964)

I honestly didn’t think I’d be stepping into the realm of the kaiju again so soon, but everything changed the day we watched Boiler Room on The Pick. The song that ends that particular early-2000s Ben Affleck movie is Pharoahe Monch’s “Simon Says”, something I definitely haven’t thought of in 20 years (which makes the lyrics “y’all know the name” feel ironic) but absolutely love for its big, phat, nasty hook. Unfortunately for Monch, it samples the theme to Mothra vs. Godzilla without Toho’s permission, which stopped distribution of Monch’s debut album. Fortunately for me, it was enough to get me to reopen my Godzilla box set, since I got to here those bold, brassy horns plenty of times during this movie.

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The Exterminating Angel (1962)

I’ve been watching a lot of The Zone lately (that’s what I call Twilight Zone) and let me tell ya man, this movie fits that mold just like a glove. Or maybe more like a crazy wacky glove that you can’t take off. Regardless, this one has been on my list for a long time. Was it everything I could have asked for? Yeah, I guess. Let’s get into it and then not be able to get out.

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Purple Noon (1960)

The theme of this year’s Criterion Month seems to be life getting in the way of me being able to get all my reviews published on time and to my own satisfaction, and Purple Noon is another example of that. I started reading Patricia Highsmith’s 1955 novel The Talented Mr. Ripley a few weeks ago, in the hopes of having finished it before watching Purple Noon, the first big adaptation of Highsmith’s classic tale of ex-patriotism, murder, identity, and Italian beachfront property. While I was only able to get a little over halfway through the book before the day to watch the film had arrived, it was still enough for it to be apparent that Purple Noon takes a fair amount of liberties with adapting its source material, not that there’s anything wrong with that. Continue reading →

The Virgin Spring (1960)

Last spring, I watched the 2009 remake of Wes Craven’s The Last House on the Left (underrated). While sitting there, watching Garret Dillahunt’s head explode in a microwave, I found myself pondering the earliest incarnation of the rape and revenge film. I had always assumed it was the original The Last House on the Left from 1972, a film so controversial, it ended up on the infamous “Video Nasty” list where it was banned in the UK.

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