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Post by DeepArcher on Jan 30, 2019 20:08:12 GMT
RIP Filmstruck thread Hello Criterion Channel thread! Officially set to launch on April 8: Anyone else hyped? Any other charter subscribers here? Personally can't wait myself, and I hope we can use this thread for discussion/recommendations of whatever we watch.
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Post by MsMovieStar on Jan 30, 2019 20:17:02 GMT
Oh honey, this is great!... but only if they are also showing extras like film related documentaries, etc. What I love about their DVDs are the extras...
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Post by Martin Stett on Jan 30, 2019 20:35:41 GMT
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Post by DeepArcher on Jan 31, 2019 5:43:26 GMT
Watched Mikey and Nicky tonight -- it's their "Movie of the Week," apparently they're dropping one each Wednesday until the service opens in full. This is a damn good film, seems like a bit of an under-the-radar '70s gem. John Cassavetes and Peter Falk are forces to be reckoned with here, larger-than-life theatrical performances that strike the magical balance of seeming incredibly grounded and plausible at the same time. They're a dynamite duo and you can really feel the history between them. It's a marvelous character study of these two troubled men and their even more troubled relationship. Takes awhile to get going but it creeps slowly but surely, the lingering tension boils over marvelously and then sort of erupts in a breathtaking conclusion that deserves iconic status. Really, really liked this even if it took a bit to win me over. Not sure how many people on here have seen it but I think it's one quite a few users here would appreciate. Big recommend.
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Post by DeepArcher on Feb 7, 2019 5:08:31 GMT
The new Movie of the Week is a personal favorite of mine, Chungking Express. Feels sort of bold of Criterion to put up a film that has been out of print for awhile much to the dismay and frustration of its fans. Maybe that's the point of selecting it? I dunno. Regardless, it proved once again to be a worthwhile revisit for me. One of the most kinetic love stories out there, so much about it is just deeply poetic without getting smarmy about it. Everything about is just charming. My favorite Wong hands down. Now if they could just start producing the Bluray again
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Post by DeepArcher on Feb 14, 2019 4:46:59 GMT
In loving memory of Albert Finney, the new Movie of the Week is a double feature of Saturday Night and Sunday Morning and Tom Jones. Great for me, given that after the announcement of Finney's death it saddened me to realize that I wasn't really familiar with most of his body of work. Anyway, tonight I watched the latter film. I know it's one of the more unpopular Best Picture winners and, uh, I can see why. But I think I enjoyed it more than a lot of people do. It's pretty clear how it would be funny to audiences fifty-six years ago, and while a lot of the bits haven't aged well, some of it still works. The film definitely has a tendency to be banal, but the animated performances and its general energy kept the whole thing alive for me. Nothing extraordinary, and it's certainly no Barry Lyndon, but at least for a time, I was charmed by it. Will watch the former film later in the week, probably. RIP Al
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Post by DeepArcher on Feb 16, 2019 20:37:37 GMT
I'm sad to say that I did not care for Saturday Night and Sunday Morning. Some thoughts-- It seems that every Western country with an established film industry at the time had the same sort of New Wave movement in the '60s -- and it's a brand of filmmaking that has almost never appealed to me. Albert Finney's take on this character trope is admittedly much more compelling than most others -- he's practically a better James Dean than James Dean in this. But, these tales of white male frustration are really only ever eyeroll-inducing to me. This film makes a habit out of constantly cutting away from the characters whose conflicts seem far more fascinating and meaningful. Instead we remain trapped in Arthur's despondent worldview, and it's never much more than tiresome to watch. ...Anyway, after they honored Finney this week, my money is on next week's featured movie being Wings of Desire
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Post by DeepArcher on Mar 2, 2019 16:27:41 GMT
Movie of the Week is Charles Burnett's To Sleep with Anger -- Led by a superbly menacing turn from Danny Glover as a drifter who begins to live with his old friends and their family and slowly manipulates and disrupts their lives, an old ghost of the inescapable past sneaking up on the present. Great performances from the entire cast that also interestingly enough happens to feature Regina King's sister Reina in one of her few ever film roles (albeit a pretty small one). The very end sort of feels like it comes out of a different, more Hallmark-y movie, but it is ultimately nice to see this conclude with a sense of hope in spite of everything. Really excellent movie all around, full in equal parts of soul and soft tension, with biting commentary that never quite gets overblown. There's this one brilliant moment with Glover's character mysteriously lurking in the darkened living room, his presence only occasionally illuminated by the car lights from outside, that's going to stick with me for quite some time. Also, its Criterion cover is freakin godly:
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Post by DeepArcher on Mar 8, 2019 3:15:36 GMT
Watched Wanda tonight -- Liked it quite a bit, didn't love it. I've written a bit before about how a lot of early New Hollywood stuff, as much as I appreciate the movement itself and its significance, tends to not be my thing and often comes off as way too austere. Wanda is, very obviously, in that same vein, but I think Loden is able to bring something really fresh to the table. The film sort of slowly develops into what feels like an unglamorous, often mundane take on the Bonnie and Clyde-esque myth, and it serves as a really compelling subversive take. Rendered in an appropriately ugly film grain, this quiet, modest little hallmark of American independent cinema gradually won me over, as bleak as hell as it is.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 8, 2019 17:36:59 GMT
Just subscribed! I can't wait to watch Wanda (one of Huppert's all time favorites!).
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Post by DeepArcher on Mar 14, 2019 3:57:18 GMT
Until today, I was somehow unaware of the fact that Brian Eno's Apollo was originally composed as a film score, despite the fact that it's one of my favorite albums of the '80s. So, thanks, Criterion, for bringing my attention to that. The new Movie of the Week is Al Reinert's documentary For All Mankind, basically a summary of the footage filmed during the Apollo missions. I really appreciated the film's unconventionality: no narration, no talking head interviews, not even any traditional structure. That said, it didn't really interest me all that much, especially considering a lot of the moments and stories featured here have been perpetuated so much since ... I can't say the movie presented anything new to me, or informed me on any part of these missions I wasn't already aware of, which made it pretty dry. A lot of the imagery is indeed absolutely breathtaking (would love to see this projected in a theater), and being accompanied by Eno's utterly beautiful music just adds to that transcendent effect. That alone makes it a pretty worthwhile achievement.
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Post by Tommen_Saperstein on Mar 22, 2019 17:55:45 GMT
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Post by DeepArcher on Mar 22, 2019 18:19:26 GMT
Your link isn't working for me ... here it is in tweet form if anyone else is having the same problem: But yeah, a glorious tease indeed.
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Post by DeepArcher on Mar 28, 2019 4:02:20 GMT
Movie of the Week is Karel Zeman's 1962 film The Fabulous Baron Munchausen (interestingly enough not even in the Collection...yet...) -- which I was not at all familiar with before watching it tonight. Criterion cites that it was a major influence on Gilliam, Burton, Wes Anderson, and all of that is very clearly evident. The film itself shows quite the Méliès influence, and indeed is sort of a silent film at heart, much of the story told through the motion/expressions of the characters. It's a pure absurdist adventure, very much a storybook of legend, a tale of childlike wonder that will surely inspire adults as well. The use of colors is utterly striking and that staggering cinematography along with the wonderful score and mise-en-scène truly make this something of true dreamlike/surrealist fantasy. It's witty, it's charming ... certainly a must-watch classic for any genre enthusiasts. Some of its social overtones felt to me a bit dated, to say the least, at times, but I've been mulling over its implications, i.e. how much we are supposed to identify with the Baron himself ... ultimately a far from ideal character ... which by the end I'm thinking is very little, so to some degree it subverts some aspects that seemed problematic to me. Ah, I'll think on it, but really, it's quite lovely and the significance is undeniable.
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Post by Viced on Apr 7, 2019 22:27:37 GMT
Launching tomorrow! Let's hope I'll actually be able to watch stuff... since Saturday Night and Sunday Morning was the only movie of the week that didn't give me an error message.
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Post by TheAlwaysClassy on Apr 7, 2019 23:49:40 GMT
Launching tomorrow! Let's hope I'll actually be able to watch stuff... since Saturday Night and Sunday Morning was the only movie of the week that didn't give me an error message. The old Filmstruck gave me all kinds of problems. It took me 3 and a half hours to watch Secrets and Lies. Hopefully this is better.
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Post by DeepArcher on Apr 8, 2019 2:08:49 GMT
Launching tomorrow! Let's hope I'll actually be able to watch stuff... since Saturday Night and Sunday Morning was the only movie of the week that didn't give me an error message. Damn...I've heard that others have been having issues, thankfully hasn't happened to me yet (also had minimal issues with Filmstruck, but it definitely gave me a shit ton of streaming errors), though getting kinda worried the problems will increase with the full launch. Keeping my hopes up, though.
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Post by DeepArcher on Apr 8, 2019 18:35:33 GMT
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Post by DeepArcher on Apr 9, 2019 3:06:16 GMT
Day one impressions: This is somehow even less user-friendly than Filmstruck was. Might be better off just searching whatever film comes to mind rather than attempting to browse. Jesus. Still, naturally wound up overflowing my watchlist to an extent that I'll never realistically get through. Managed to stream Nights of Cabiria tonight without any streaming issues, which is a good sign, though as I said I wasn't experiencing any problems before so take that with a grain of salt ... hoping that others will be able to use this without hindrance. Also: I was under the impression from the info they released beforehand that this would house the full permanent collection, which it does not, soooo ... But I've only noticed a few things absent that I wanted to see, it seems like most of it's there, and my watchlist is at least 100+ even with that factor, so I should shut my mouth. Looking forward to digging through all these gems!
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Post by Tommen_Saperstein on Apr 9, 2019 3:42:39 GMT
soooooo yes browsing is basically impossible and you are absolutely better off searching manually because there are items on this site that are impossible to find with their browsing section. You can't sort items by date, items are split up into what seem to be limited sub-sections and some up in double features, and when I tried to browse the "Criterion Editions" I see like 25 results in total, buuuuuut when I manually search films I find A TON that don't appear in that section (Code Unknown, Yi Yi, Under the Volcano, Cold Water, the list is endless). What gives?
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Post by Mattsby on Jun 1, 2019 22:08:02 GMT
About 60 new additions this month.
Some big ones that I don't think were on the major streamers: Ran Wicker Man Don’t Look Now 4 Months 3 Weeks & 2 Days
And a lot I haven't seen - Any fans of these??
About 10 from Alec Guinness - including The Prisoner and The Scapegoat
And... Something Wild (1961) - Carroll Baker Diamonds of the Night (1964) - Czech The Maids (1975) - Glenda Jackson Career Girls (1997) - Mike Leigh
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Post by Tommen_Saperstein on Jun 1, 2019 22:56:00 GMT
a lot of these newest additions are already in my watchlist but I'll definitely vouch for My Beautiful Laundrette which is an absolute must-see. A landmark in queer cinema featuring some lovely early work from DDL and terrific supporting performances by Saeed Jaffrey (The Man Who Would Be King) and Roshan Seth (Gandhi).
the ones from the list I most want to see are Something Wild, Ken Russell's Mahler and Joseph Losey's Eva.
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Post by pacinoyes on Jun 1, 2019 23:17:41 GMT
About 60 new additions this month. Some big ones that I don't think were on the major streamers: Ran Wicker Man Don’t Look Now 4 Months 3 Weeks & 2 DaysAnd a lot I haven't seen - Any fans of these?? About 10 from Alec Guinness - including The Prisoner and The ScapegoatAnd... Something Wild (1961) - Carroll Baker Diamonds of the Night (1964) - Czech The Maids (1975) - Glenda Jackson Career Girls (1997) - Mike Leigh I posted about Guinness' The Prisoner a few months back iirc (saw it on Arrow video!) It would be on the shortlist of "the best performances - and seriously that's ever - by big time actors but that no one has actually seen"........the winner of that honor imo is Olivier's Dance of Death from the late 60s, but The Prisoner is a tour de force from Guinness - it's a very difficult piece but he's superlative in it. Movie is great at its best too except for a parallel sub-plot which is a botch unfortunately. It's one of those tightly wound point pieces - you'll be reminded of a less witty/less edgy The Rite I would say or something like that but worth watching for Guinness and Jack Hawkins, his foil, both have a field day.
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Post by DeepArcher on Jun 2, 2019 1:24:33 GMT
Also newly added: Varda's One Sings, the Other Doesn't, most of Weerasethakul's filmography, Reygadas' Silent Light, Lee Chang-dong's Secret Sunshine ... all of which I'm very excited about.
I'm a big fan of a lot of the new stuff ... Don't Look Now is all-timer horror, Ran is a god-tier classic that's always worth revisiting, 4 Weeks, 3 Months, and 2 Days is more of a lowkey masterpiece ... I've somehow never seen The Wicker Man but I'm psyched to finally be able to get around to it at some point.
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Post by Mattsby on Dec 6, 2019 21:09:45 GMT
Lotta movies leaving at the end of the year, here are three I'd single out and they're all short --
Freaks (1932) - 64m, a unique early masterwork, almost in a special category of its own, one of Herzog's very fave movies The Curse of the Cat People (1944) - 70m, some of the script/perfs are broad but this is a great snowy watch, with really poetic visuals Raw Deal (1948) - 79m, a great starkly-shot noir with female narration
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