For this year’s Criterion Month, I decided to watch Richard Linklater’s beloved Before Trilogy. What I didn’t take into consideration is that I’d have to write about those films. How do you write about a film that’s all conversation? Do I just do a recap of the convos with the occasional interjection, “That’s a good point, Julie Delpy.” Don’t expect a deep dive here. I’ll just give a general summary of what I like about Linklater’s more thoughtful way of filmmaking.

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I took a Sporcle quiz a week ago (remember Sporcle?) that compiled results from different publications to make an unofficial list of the “100 Greatest Horror Movies.” Most of the list was business as usual; Halloween, The Exorcist, Rosemary’s Baby, yadda, yadda. What surprised me coming in at number 100 was Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me. Is this actually a horror movie? And do I, a horror fanatic, agree with this placement? And how does this movie fare for a fair-weather Twin Peaks “fan.”

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Sometimes Criterion Month feels like school. I watch a slow, long, sad foreign film and then have to bang out a half-assed essay at the 25th hour. The experience is usually rewarding, but it feels like eating your vegetables too. Which is why I get low-key excited when I get to watch a movie like Mona Lisa. There’s no pretension here. Just a schlubby Bob Hoskins wandering around London to a Phil Collins’ song. Now that’s my kind of movie.

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For a second, while watching Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, I thought we were heading back to Breaker Morant and military legal drama territory. However, it’s just one of the opening scenes that takes place at a military tribunal, while the rest of the film concerns the events leading up to that tribunal. Still, it does sound like it’s in similar territory as this other recently reviewed film, as it also depicts what happens to men on different sides of a war when influenced by their own allegiances and the muddy morals of wartime, and it even shares an actor in Jack Thompson. Continue reading →

With John covering Pink Flamingos a few days in addition to my earlier review of Multiple Maniacs as well as one of his key influencers, we’ve now covered a decent amount of John Waters during our Criterion Months. He’s an unlikely candidate for a director with multiple films in the Collection, since the Criterion Collection doesn’t tend to favor comedy or shlock all that much. Still, Waters’ renegade spirit and the way he turned trash and filth into extremely entertaining cinema absolutely deserves to be enshrined and appreciated, and I suppose we’ll see if Criterion continues to do more of his films, as there are still plenty to go around from his more mainstream, big studio era. Polyester is in many ways the bridge between that latter era and his earlier, low-budget movies made with the Dreamlanders, and offers a nice mix of what was great about both eras of his career. Continue reading →