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Tag: criterion collection

Bicycle Thieves: So Simple, So Basic, So Completely Unattainable.

Bicycle Thieves: So Simple, So Basic, So Completely Unattainable.

Released: November 1948. Directed by: Vittorio De Sica Cast: Lamberto Maggiorani, Enzo Staiola, Lianella Carell, Elena Altieri, Gino Saltamerenda, Giulio Chiari, Vittorio Antonucci, Michele Sakara, Carlo Jachino as A Beggar. Few films are so simple, yet so profound, honest, emotional, and 76 years after its original release, so brutally relevant today. Bicycle Thieves is that movie. The story is simple, Antonio Ricci (LamBerto Maggiorani) is an unemployed man with a wife and two small children. Antonio gets a job, but…

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Suspense: Everything You’d Want From a Thriller.

Suspense: Everything You’d Want From a Thriller.

Released: July 1913 Directed by: Lois Weber, Phillips Smalley. Cast: Lois Weber, Valantine Paul, Sam Kaufman, Douglas Gerrard, and Lule Warrenton as the Maid. First time viewing. Suspense has everything you could want in a thriller. Tension, jeopardy, a villain without a conscience, a young mother in life threatening danger, a desperate husband trying to save his wife and baby, a car chase, trigger happy cops, sinister camera angles, nail-biting pacing, justice, a happy ending, and a maid who quits…

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Ministry of Fear: An Eccentric, Flawed Masterpiece.

Ministry of Fear: An Eccentric, Flawed Masterpiece.

Directed by: Fritz Lang Released: October 1944 Cast: Ray Milland, Marjorie Renolds, Carl Esmond, Hillary Brooke, Percy Waram, Dan Duryea, and Alan Napier as Dr. Forrester. Spoilers. There are a few. You could say Ministry of Fear is something of a flawed masterpiece. Simply put, Ministry of Fear is a wonderfully eccentric film where the climax can’t bear-up under the weight of the eccentricity. Just released from an insane asylum, Stephen Neale (Ray Milland) buys a train ticket to London….

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A Matter of Life and Death: Life and Death and So Much More.

A Matter of Life and Death: Life and Death and So Much More.

Released: December 1946 Directed by: Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger Cast: David Niven, Kim Hunter, Roger Livesey, Marius Goring, Robert Coote, Kathleen Byron, Richard Attenborough, Abraham Sofaer, and Raymond Massey as Abraham Farlan. First time viewing. A Matter of Life and Death is a movie about love, but it also about so much more. Life and death to be sure. The afterlife without theology to gum up the works, but rather humanity as a whole needing to embrace and begin…

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Hiroshima mon amour: ‘…the Obvious Necessity of Remembering…’

Hiroshima mon amour: ‘…the Obvious Necessity of Remembering…’

Released: 1959 Dir.: Alain Resnais First time viewing reaction. I’ve known about Alain Resnais’ Hiroshima mon amour for years but knew absolutely nothing about it. And that’s how I went into the film when I watched it for the first time Monday night. It is a beautiful, yet devastating film. I understand that the main characters, who are unnamed in the film, but are identified in cast listings as, Elle (Emmanuelle Riva) and Lui (Eiji Okada), can be interpreted as…

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Dishonored: ‘I Am Not Afraid of Death Either’.

Dishonored: ‘I Am Not Afraid of Death Either’.

Released: 1931 Dir.: Josef von Sternberg Vienna. On a rainy night in 1915, a prostitute committed suicide and her body is being removed from her apartment. With neighbors looking on, Marie Kolerer (Marlene Dietrich), a fellow lady of the evening, replies to a snarky remark about her facing the same fate. Marie replies, ‘No I am not. I am not afraid of life. Although I am not afraid of death, either.’ Marie’s remark is overheard by the Chief of the…

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Ivan’s Childhood: Time Standing Still.

Ivan’s Childhood: Time Standing Still.

Released: 1962 Dir.: Andrei Tarkovsky First-time viewing reaction. Many of the films I’ve seen dealing with the Second World War recently have been very personal stories. Most of them were made within the following 25-30 years after the war’s conclusion. All of them from countries that suffered staggering, incomprehensible losses, such as the nations of continental Europe, Japan, and the Soviet Union. Films such as Kanal, Fires on the Plain, Rome Open City, The Bridge, and Come and See have…

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Tunes of Glory: Mills. Guinness. An Epic Clash of Wills.

Tunes of Glory: Mills. Guinness. An Epic Clash of Wills.

Released: 1960 Dir.: Ronald Neame Acting Col. Jock Sinclair (Alec Guinness) is in command of a Scottish Highland Regiment in the peacetime years following the Second World War. He took command when the regiments Colonel was killed during the Battle of El Alamein in North Africa and saw the battalion through to the wars end and beyond. Jock is a hard drinking career man who worked his way up the ranks the hard way, beginning as a regimental piper. If…

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Night and the City: Hollywood Noir Meets British Noir.

Night and the City: Hollywood Noir Meets British Noir.

Released: 1950 Dir.: Jules Dassin First time viewing reaction. When you mix Hollywood Noir with British Noir, add Richard Widmark, Gene Tierney, and a healthy dose of Herbert Lom, you get Night and the City. A gripping non-stop story of ambition exceeding one’s grasp. Harry Fabian (Richard Widmark) is a hustler on the loose in London. He works hard and talks fast for what amounts to peanuts, but there is big money to be had in London and that comes…

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Living on Tokyo Time: The Sins of Being Nice

Living on Tokyo Time: The Sins of Being Nice

Released: 1987 Dir.: Steven Okazaki First time viewing reaction. Living on Tokyo Time is about the culture clash between Japanese and Japanese Americans, and it’s fascinating on that level alone. However, the film resonated with me on a different, and personal level. Kyoko (Minako Ohashi) comes to San Francisco after ending her engagement to an unfaithful fiancé in Japan. Although she has a job, her visa expires, and she wants to stay in the U.S. A co-worker sets her up…

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