Man, I should really go back and tag all of these posts with relevant directors and so on. But who has time when you’re busy lobbying the Criterion Channel for a Boston Crime collection? And here we are, almost at Halloween, with November’s lineup to discover. I hope you and yours had an October filled with all the horror movies you felt like watching.
November is traditionally Noirvember in our household and sometimes Criterion feels the same way. Not as much this month, with the partial exception of a Starring Gene Tierney collection introduced by the always-awesome Imogen Sara Smith. Tierney was just generally great but Criterion’s correct to say she made her greatest impact in noir; I’ve seen all the noirs here but you should absolutely check out Laura and Leave Her to Heaven if you haven’t. I’m putting Rings on Her Fingers on the top of my month’s watchlist, sight unseen, just because I’m a sucker for con artist movies.
On the general topic of actor collections, we’ve also got Starring Nicolas Cage. I mean sure. I’m not gonna subject myself to his remake of The Wicker Man, even out of curiosity, but the 16 other movies in this collection make a strong case for Cage as one of the best actors of our era. Which is easy to forget sometimes. And I do need to see Leaving Las Vegas and Bringing Out the Dead.
From MTV to Hollywood is also a collection I’m pretty familiar with. This is the era I grew up in. I have seen the vast majority of these; I’ll highlight One Hour Photo as an underseen Robin Williams classic, Sexy Beast as a great noir which gave few hints of where Jonathan Glazer’s career would go, and — look, everyone’s seen Being John Malkovich, right?
I don’t know anything about producer Jeremy Thomas, who recently passed away and whom the Channel is celebrating with a collection. But I’ve wanted to see The Shout for quite a while. Discovering that he’s the producer behind Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, The Hit, and Sexy Beast makes me think that the movies in here I don’t know are going to be worth a look. Uh, and I just read the man’s Wikipedia article. He worked on The Harder They Come! He produced Naked Lunch! This is a brilliant career.
The Rediscoveries and Restorations section is interesting this month. I saw the trailer for No Picnic about a million times at the Beacon in Seattle over the summer and didn’t find myself compelled to watch yet another “scruffy, deadpan time capsule from the bohemian fringes of the 1980s neighborhood of choice here.” I know, I know, New York, blah blah blah. There’s a neat-looking Luis Guzmán bit in the trailer, anyhow. I’m more excited by Utu Redux as a Māori anti-colonial Western, though — I’m reminded of last year’s In the Fire of War and I’m enthused by the chance to compare and contrast.
The Criterion Collection Editions are hella musical. This Is Spinal Tap, The Last Waltz, and Trainspotting? Not bad. But my priority is Welcome II the Terrordome as a seminal work of Afrofuturism I’ve heard a lot about. I will no doubt once again fail to listen to the commentary despite good intentions. Oh, hey: maybe I’ll finally watch Rumble Fish, too.
Skipping ahead a bit while I’m thinking about music: the Music Films this month are one film, but it’s Laurie Anderson’s Home of the Brave, which is superb and I recommend it.
On to the Director Spotlights. My short shameful confession of the month: I haven’t watched anything by Ryusuke Hamaguchi. Will this confession spur me to finally do so? Keep an eye on my Letterboxd. I have seen a Roy Andersson movie as part of my running Friday night date series with S., and we’re both excited about seeing more in the Living Trilogy. Plus maybe his most recent movie, About Endlessness? I think it’s really interesting to see how a director’s work changes over the years; that’s one of the great opportunities afforded by the Criterion Channel. The last director spotlighted is Mary Stephen; she occupies the “director I never heard of but who seems very interesting” slot this month. I like Eric Rohmer and Ann Hui a bunch, both of whom she worked with closely. So add at least her shorts to the list.
Documentaries… oh, hey, more New York City movies. I know, it’s where Criterion is based, I get it. Moving on.
Closing out, Griffin Dunne’s Duke of Groove is a short film I’ve never heard of with a great cast. Udo Kier, Elliott Gould, Uma Thurman, and Tobey Maguire? I can make time for that.
Can’t say I’m intensely excited about this month’s additions, as I look at the whole, but there’s enough gold to make me happy once again.