This is in part an experiment to figure out if I can keep to a monthly posting cadence on a particular topic. Unsurprisingly, it’s about movies — specifically, what’s coming to the Criterion Channel next month? Criterion themes their months around collections, which typically stick around for several months thereafter; any given collection is usually a mix of new to the channel movies and existing faves. Here’s a rundown of October’s collections and some specifics which caught my eye.
As is traditional, there are a few horror-themed collections this year. Horror F/X focuses on practical F/X, ranging from Frankenstein (1931) to The Fly (1986). It’s a bit of a stretch but there are a lot of good movies in there, along with Lifeforce. (Which is very watchable, just not so good.) My pick from all of these is The Fog, since I’m pretty close to having seen all of Carpenter’s work and I like the NorCal setting.
I think Witches is actually more interesting; it’s a really varied set of movies which speaks to the wide array of ways witches have been contextualized in culture. If there’s a through line, it’s about how film makers have shifted from making movies about witches to making movies about their particular interests, using witches as a storytelling mechanism. I’m going to make a point of seeing The Girl on the Broomstick — it’s Czech 70s film, which sounds like it’ll be interesting, plus as a relatively mainstream looking movie it’ll contrast to the Czech New Wave.
The third horror collection is Japanese Horror. It’s really quite good, particularly for the J-horror wave of films. The four movies prior to Cure are all over the map; to be fair, House and Tetsuo: The Iron Man are outliers on any map you could draw. They’re still worthwhile, and the rest of the collection is a very decent overview of J-horror from the 90s onward. I may take the time to watch the two Ju-On movies.
The last horror collection is Stories by Stephen King and I don’t have much to say here. It’s a mere handful of movies, none of them are among the best King adaptations, and he’s disowned one of them (Lawnmower Man).
The Winona Ryder collection feels a bit like someone noticed they had a few of her movies in the permanent collection, plus The Crucible for the Witches collection, so why not add a few more and make a collection of it? Don’t care, it’s cool, most of them are worthwhile. Night on Earth is a must-see for Winona Ryder and a slew of other great actors.
What’s next? The usual handful of new Criterion disc releases which make their way to the Channel; The Night of the Hunter is the real standout here. If you haven’t seen this, you should. Rosemary’s Baby is supposed to be good but also you can decide for yourself how much Roman Polanski you want in your life, and then Haxan is a classic which may be awesome mostly for historical reasons? But they’re including a version narrated by William S. Burroughs so that’s intriguing. The disc releases usually carry over some of the special features.
Onward! Oh, there are more horror collections after all. Rediscoveries and Restorations is all horror movies this month and man, this is really exciting. Spider Baby has a great rep as an exploitation film. I’ve never heard of Deep Crimson but I am up for a period Mexican film. John Carpenter TV work, more weird Japanese horror that for some reason didn’t get into that collection… this is excellent.
We have a pair of horror-themed director spotlights, one for David Cronenberg (mostly his early work plus The Fly) and one for Stephanie Rothman, who is probably less familiar to most. I’ve seen The Velvet Vampire and found it pretty interesting even if the acting was poor; I might be willing to follow that up with The Student Nurses. Rothman was inspired to make movies by The Seventh Seal yet never managed to break out of the exploitation genre; really fascinating filmmaker.
Down to the obscure material. There’s a documentary collection for Lionel Rogosin. Wikipedia tells me he was a well-off World War II Navy veteran who dedicated his life to confronting racism and fascism, winding up as a significant figure in New American Cinema. Looks like interesting stuff. A few of the movies are shorts, which is awesome because it boosts the chances that I’ll dip into this collection.
Along similar lines, we get a documentary and a feature film by Arthur J. Bressan Jr., a queer filmmaker of the 70s and 80s. These also look good. Then there’s a trio of Raul Julia films which are legitimate highlights of his career — Kiss of the Spider Woman! Finally, returning yet again to the October horror theme, two International Classics: The Wailing, which I know nothing about except that most of my Letterboxd mutuals loved it, and The Babadook, which I guess I have to watch now that it’s easily available.
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