Claude Chabrol’s La cérémonie (1995): Criterion Blu-ray review

Sophie (Sandrine Bonnaire) and Jeanne (Isabelle Huppert) become allies against the bourgeois Lalievres family in Claude Chabrol’s La cérémonie (1995)

Four decades into a career which began with the New Wave, Claude Chabrol delivered a masterpiece with La cérémonie (1995), a psychological mystery adapted from a Ruth Rendell novel. Sandrine Bonnaire and Isabelle Huppert play a pair of working class women whose bitterness and resentment drive them on a collision course with the bourgeois Lelievre family. Criterion’s new Blu-ray edition provides some illuminating supplements on the director and his two stars.

Bo Widerberg’s New Swedish Cinema from Criterion

A circus tightrope-walker (Pia Degermark) is swept away by romance in Bo Widerberg's Elvira Madigan (1967)

Criterion’s new four-disk Blu-ray set Bo Widerberg’s New Swedish Cinema introduces the work of a filmmaker who deserves to be better-known; a critic who rebelled against the dominant work of filmmakers like Ingmar Bergman which ignored issues of politics, economics and class, Widerberg drew on the French New Wave and New British Cinema to create politically engaged and expressive films which reflected contemporary Swedish society and recent history.

Carl Franklin’s One False Move (1992): Criterion Blu-ray review

Fantasia (Cynda Williams) just wants to get home to see her child in Carl Franklin's One False Move (1992)

One False Move (1992), a slow-burn character study of small-time criminals and a small-town cop punctuated by disturbing burst of violence, gave Tom Paxton his best role and launched the careers of director Carl Franklin and writer-actor Billy Bob Thornton. This low-budget independent production gets an impressive restoration from the Criterion Collection in a dual-format 4K UHD/Blu-ray release.

Joseph Losey’s The Servant (1963): Criterion Blu-ray review

Architecture reflects social divisions in Joseph Losey's The Servant (1963)

Criterion’s new 4K restoration of Joseph Losey’s The Servant (1963) provides an excellent showcase for this pitch-black satire about the collapse of the British class system after World War Two and the dissolution of Empire. Harold Pinter’s script (adapted from Robin Maugham’s novella), Losey’s direction, Douglas Slocombe’s rich black-and-white cinematography and and a superlative cast – Dirk Bogarde, James Fox, Wendy Craig and Sarah Miles – combine to create one of the defining British films of the 1960s.

Steve McQueen’s Small Axe (2020): Criterion Blu-ray review

Martha (Amarah-Jae St. Aubyn) loses herself to the music in Steve McQueen's Lovers Rock (2020)

Small Axe (2020), Steve McQueen’s five-part film series for the BBC, corrects a glaring omission in British film and television’s treatment of the post-war history of social and political struggle and change; while the lives of the working class became increasingly visible in the ’60s and ’70s, issues of race remained largely unaddressed until this belated project created something like a parallel history to go alongside the classic work of filmmakers like Ken Loach and Alan Clarke. Criterion’s three-disk Blu-ray set also includes Uprising (2021), McQueen’s powerful three-part documentary (co-directed by James Rogan) about the New Cross fire and the subsequent Brixton Riots, which gives added context to the stories told in Small Axe.

Two Films by Marguerite Duras: Criterion Blu-ray review

Vera (Claudine Gabay) is trapped by emotional inertia in Marguerite Duras' Baxter, Vera Baxter (1977)

Criterion has released a two-disk set of Marguerite Duras’ mid-’70s features India Song (1975) and Baxter, Vera Baxter (1977), highlighting the novelist’s idiosyncratic approach to cinema, particularly striking in the separation of image from sound in the earlier film, though the languid pacing and slow, exploratory camerawork gives both a hypnotic effect in their exploration of bourgeois marriage, infidelity and ennui.

Political thrillers, horror and metaphor

Three recent releases blend reality and fiction to explore political themes, with varying success. Alain Jessua’s Les Chiens (1978) is an allegory of Fascism, while Jean-Claude Lord’s Mindfield (1989) and Jayro Bustamante’s La llorona (2019) are both rooted in real crimes, the former turning history into pulp entertainment, the latter into a haunting exploration of national trauma.

Blasts from the past

Fall 2023 viewing, part two

John Saxon 1936-2020

Recent Viewing: July 2013

Ken Russell (1927-2011)

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