A random selection of recent viewing, from Nazi propaganda to British Angry Young Men, from classic sci-fi to the 1960s revival of a French criminal mastermind as slapstick pastiche.
Recent miscellaneous viewing
Comedy
Bill Forsyth’s Local Hero (1983): Criterion Blu-ray review
Following the surprise international success of Gregory’s Girl (1980), writer-director Bill Forsyth was given greater resources by producer David Puttnam and made what on the surface was a whimsical comedy reminiscent of Ealing Studios in the ’50s; three-and-a-half decades later, the delightfully charming Local Hero (1983) can be seen as a subtly prescient warning about the most urgently pressing issues we now face – climate change and the need to find sustainable ways to inhabit the planet.
Ernst Lubitsch’s Cluny Brown (1946): Criterion Blu-ray review
Criterion’s Blu-ray release of Ernst Lubitsch’s final completed feature, Cluny Brown (1946), presents this richly layered comic gem in a luminous 4K restoration. This underrated romantic comedy which skewers rigid British class attitudes on the eve of World War Two is one of Lubitsch’s masterpieces.
Ozu Yasujiro’s The Flavor of Green Tea Over Rice (1952):
Criterion Blu-ray review
Ozu Yasujiro’s melancholy social comedy The Flavor of Green Tea Over Rice (1952), which reflects major shifts in Japanese life in the post-war period, receives an excellent release from the Criterion Collection.
Marcel Pagnol’s The Baker’s Wife (1938):
Criterion Blu-ray review
Criterion once again showcases the prodigious talent of French writer and filmmaker Marcel Pagnol with their Blu-ray release of The Baker’s Wife (1938), considered to be his best film.
More from Indicator
Recent disks from Indicator present a wide variety of styles and genres from bleak ’60s espionage to slick 1970s big studio exploitation, charming period comedy to enjoyable if less-than-scary horror.
Brief comments, part two
More brief notes on recent random viewing choices; another mixed bag of classic fantasy, generic thrillers, dramas drawn form real life, spectacular martial arts and gritty war action, and a scattershot, off-the-wall satire by “the world’s worst living director”.
Recent viewing: March-April 2018
A round-up of recent reviewing across multiple genres – western, black comedy, musical, animation, road movie.
Rhyming Pairs
Recent viewing has included three pairs of movies – two Anime features from 2016 (In This Corner of the World and Your Name), two thrillers from 1967 and 1972 by English directors (Point Blank and Pulp), and a pair of gritty horror-tinged thrillers from 1979 and 1981 which transcend their exploitation roots (The Driller Killer and Ms. 45).
Preliminary Notes on Twin Peaks 2017
By turns funny and frightening, gripping and frustrating, David Lynch’s revival of Twin Peaks is a prodigiously inventive television epic.
