Critics Wrap 2011 - December 15, 2011

Robert Horton
roberthorton.wordpress.com

1. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
2. Melancholia
3. Certified Copy
4. A Dangerous Method
5. Meek's Cutoff
6. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
7. La Quattro Volte
8. Poetry
9. Drive
10. Into Eternity

Jim Emerson
blogs.suntimes.com/scanners

Kathleen Murphy
msn.com

1. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
2. Melancholia
3. The Artist
4. A Dangerous Method
5. Le Havre
6. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives / La Quattro Volte
7. The Tree of Life
8. Drive
9. Meek's Cutoff
10. Black Venus

Andrew Wright
thestranger.com

1. Melancholia
2. Rise of the Planet of the Apes
3. Cave of Forgotten Dreams
4. 13 Assassins
5. Drive
6. The Tree of Life
7. Take Shelter
8. Hugo
9. The Descendants
10. Stake Land

November 20, 2011

A World in a Rear Window: The Cinema of Limited Perspective

August 21, 2011

The Anatomy Class: Cinema and the Body

Battleship Potemkin (directed by Sergei Eisenstein, 1924)
Olympia (directed by Leni Riefenstahl, 1938)
Chocolat (directed by Claire Denis, 1988)
Trouble Every Day (directed by Claire Denis, 2001)
Beau Travail (directed by Claire Denis, 1999)
Eraserhead (directed by David Lynch, 1977)
Persona (directed by Ingmar Bergman, 1966)
The Passion of Anna (directed by Ingmar Bergman, 1969)
Raging Bull (directed by Martin Scorsese, 1980)
The Machinist (directed by Brad Anderson, 2004)
Hunger (directed by Steve McQueen, 2008)
No. 4 (directed by Yoko Ono, 1966)
Forgetting Sarah Marshall (directed by Nicholas Stoller, 2008)
Old School (directed by Todd Phillips, 2003)

March 20, 2011

Once Upon a Movie: Cinema and Fairy Tales

Bluebeard (dir. George Melies, 1901)
Three Little Pigs (Walt Disney, 1933)
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (Walt Disney, 1937)
Fantasia (Walt Disney, 1940)
The Red Shoes (dir. Michael Powell/Emeric Pressburger, 1948)
The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (dir. Nathan Juran/Ray Harryhausen, 1958)
Beauty and the Beast (dir. Jean Cocteau, 1946)
Donkey Skin (dir. Jacques Demy, 1970)
Red Hot Riding Hood (dir. Tex Avery, 1943)
Fractured Fairy Tales: Sleeping Beauty (1959)
Cinderfella (dir. Frank Tashlin, 1960)
The Princess Bride (dir. Rob Reiner, 1987)
The Company of Wolves (dir. Neil Jordan, 1984)
The Little Match Girl (dir. Jean Renoir, 1928)
The Match Factory Girl (dir. Aki Kaurismäki, 1990)
Bluebeard (dir. Catherine Breillat, 2009)

October 10, 2010

Witch's Sleep: Cinema and the Victorian Occult

The Infernal Boiling Pot (directed by Georges Melies, 1903)
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (dir. Robert Wiene, 1920)
Haxan (dir. Benjamin Christensen, 1922)
Dr. Mabuse, the Gambler (dir. Fritz Lang, 1922)
The Magician (dir. Rex Ingram, 1926)
Vampyr (dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1932)
Dracula (dir. Tod Browning, 1931)
The Hound of the Baskervilles (dir. Sidney Lanfield, 1939)
The Picture of Dorian Gray (dir. Albert Lewin, 1945)
Houdini (dir. George Marshall, 1953)
The Innocents (dir. Jack Clayton, 1961)
Freud (dir. John Huston, 1962)
The Devil Rides Out (dir. Terence Fisher, 1968)
Taste the Blood of Dracula (dir. Peter Sasdy, 1970)
Fairy Tale: A True Story (dir. Charles Sturridge, 1997)
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (dir. Stephen Norrington, 2003)
The Prestige (dir. Christopher Nolan, 2006)

September 19, 2010

Mad Men and Women: Domestic Discontent in the Films of Sirk, Fassbinder, and Akerman

All That Heaven Allows (dir. Douglas Sirk, 1955)
There's Always Tomorrow (dir. Douglas Sirk, 1956)
Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (dir. Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1974)
Martha (dir. Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1974)
Jeanne Dielman, 2300 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (dir. Chantal Akerman, 1975)
Far From Heaven (dir. Todd Haynes, 2002)

August 15, 2010

The Far Country: Alaska in the Movie Imagination

Pack Mules on Chilkoot Trail (1898)
A Great Day in Skaguay (dir. Burton Holmes, 1918)
The Gold Rush (dir. Charlie Chaplin, 1925)
The Call of the Wild (dir. William Wellman, 1935)
Road to Utopia (dir. Hal Walker, 1945)
The Far Country (dir. Anthony Mann, 1954)
North to Alaska (dir. Henry Hathaway, 1960)
The Thing from Another World (dir. Christian Nyby/Howard Hawks, 1951)
Never Cry Wolf (dir. Carroll Ballard, 1983)
The Edge (dir. Lee Tamahori, 1997)
Limbo (dir. John Sayles, 1999)
Insomnia (dir. Christopher Nolan, 2002)
30 Days of Night (dir. David Slade, 2007)
Into the Wild (dir. Sean Penn, 2007)
Grizzly Man (dir. Werner Herzog, 2005)

January 24, 2010

The Movie Mashup: Wild Literary Adaptations

Adaptation (dir. Spike Jonze, 2002)
Prospero's Books (dir. Peter Greenaway, 1991)
Forbidden Planet (dir. Fred Wilcox, 1956)
I Walked with a Zombie (dir. Jacques Tourneur, 1943)
Spirits of the Dead/Toby Dammit (dir. Federico Fellini, 1968)
Beau Travail (dir. Claire Denis, 1999)
Shoot the Piano Player (dir. Francois Truffaut, 1960)
Contempt (dir. Jean-Luc Godard, 1963)
O Brother, Where Art Thou? (dir. Coen brothers, 2000)
The Long Goodbye (dir. Robert Altman, 1973)
There Will Be Blood (dir. Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007)

November 15, 2009

The Beats on Film

Pull My Daisy (dir. Alfred Leslie, Robert Frank, 1959)
Towers Open Fire (dir. Antony Balch, William S. Burroughs, 1963)
The Cut Ups (dir. Antony Balch, 1966)
The Discipline of D.E. (dir. Gus Van Sant, 1982)
Desistfilm (dir. Stan Brakhage, 1954)
Aleph (dir. Wallace Berman, 1959-66)
Odds and Ends (dir. Jane Conger Belson Shimane, 1959)
Shadows (dir. John Cassavetes, 1959)
Funny Face (dir. Stanley Donen, 1957)
The Beatniks (dir. Paul Frees, 1960)
The Bloody Brood (dir. Julian Roffman, 1959)
A Bucket of Blood (dir. Roger Corman, 1959)
High School Confidential (dir. Jack Arnold, 1958)
The Man with the Golden Arm (dir. Otto Preminger, 1955)
Dutchman (dir. Anthony Harvey, 1967)
Heart Beat (dir. John Byrum, 1980)
Naked Lunch (dir. David Cronenberg, 1991)

October 18, 2009

Dead Man (dir. Jim Jarmusch, 1995)

September 13, 2009

Cinema at the Stake: Movie Martyrs

The Passion of Joan of Arc (dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1928)
The Trial of Joan of Arc (dir. Robert Bresson, 1962)
Au hasard, Balthazar (dir. Robert Bresson, 1966)
The Passion of the Christ (dir. Mel Gibson, 2004)
The Last Temptation of Christ (dir. Martin Scorsese, 1988)
Letter from an Unknown Woman (dir. Max Ophuls, 1948)
Breaking the Waves (dir. Lars von Trier, 1996)
La Strada (dir. Federico Fellini, 1954)
Hunger (dir. Steve McQueen, 2008)
Milk (dir. Gus Van Sant, 2008)

August 16, 2009

The Music of Regret (dir. Laurie Simmons, 2006)

May 17, 2009

Hello Dollface: The Inanimate Object as Actor

Dead of Night (dir. Alberto Cavalcanti, 1945)
Team America: World Police (dir. Trey Parker, 2004)
Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story (dir. Todd Haynes, 1987)
2001: A Space Odyssey (dir. Stanley Kubrick, 1968)
A.I. (dir. Steven Spielberg, 2001)
The Navigator (dir. Buster Keaton/Donald Crisp, 1924)
Queen Christina (dir. Rouben Mamoulian, 1933)
Safe (dir. Todd Haynes, 1995)
Jeanne Dielman (dir. Chantal Akerman, 1975)

April 22, 2009

Monster Road (dir. Brett Ingram, 2004)
Special Guest: Bruce Bickford

March 22, 2009

Caligari's Children: The Great Age of German Cinema

Part Three: Retreat

Pandora's Box (dir. G.W. Pabst, 1929)
Diary of a Lost Girl (dir. G.W. Pabst, 1929)
The Holy Mountain (dir. Arnold Fanck, 1926)
The White Hell of Pitz Palu (dir. Arnold Fanck, G.W. Pabst, 1930)
Asphalt (dir. Joe May, 1929)
The Blue Angel (dir. Josef von Sternberg, 1930)
People on Sunday (dir. Robert Siodmak, 1930)
The Threepenny Opera (dir. G.W. Pabst, 1931)
Kuhle Wampe (dir. Slatan Dudow, Bertolt Brecht, 1932)
Liebelei (dir. Max Ophuls, 1933)
M (dir. Fritz Lang, 1931)
The Testament of Dr. Mabuse (dir. Fritz Lang, 1933)
The Blue Light (dir. Leni Riefenstahl, 1932)
Triumph of the Will (dir. Leni Riefenstahl, 1935)

February 22, 2009

Caligari's Children: The Great Age of German Cinema

Part Two: Summit

Phantom (dir. F.W. Murnau, 1922)
Nosferatu (dir. F.W. Murnau, 1922)
The Last Laugh (dir. F.W. Murnau, 1924)
Faust (dir. F.W. Murnau, 1926)
Dr. Mabuse, The Gambler (dir. Fritz Lang, 1922)
Die Nibelungen (dir. Fritz Lang, 1924)
Metropolis (dir. Fritz Lang,1927)
Spies (dir. Fritz Lang, 1928)
The Joyless Street (dir. G.W. Pabst, 1925)
The Loves of Jeanne Ney (dir. G.W. Pabst, 1927)
Variety (dir. E.A. Dupont, 1925)

January 25, 2009

Caligari's Children: The Great Age of German Cinema

Part One: Birth

The Student of Prague (dir. Stellan Rye, 1913)
Madame Dubarry (dir. Ernst Lubitsch, 1919)
The Oyster Princess (dir. Ernst Lubitsch, 1919)
The Wild Cat (dir. Ernst Lubitsch, 1921)
Different From the Others (dir. Richard Oswald, 1919)
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (dir. Robert Wiene, 1919)
Backstairs (dir. Leopold Jessner/Paul Leni, 1921)
Warning Shadows (dir. Arthur Robison, 1922)
The Golem (dir. Paul Wegener, 1920)

Books

From Caligari to Hitler by Siegfried Kracauer
The Haunted Screen by Lotte Eisner
The UFA Story by Klaus Kreimeier
Weimar Cinema and After by Thomas Elsaesser

November 16, 2008

David Lean's Arabia Campaign: The Enduring Lawrence

Lawrence of Arabia (dir. David Lean, 1962)

October 19, 2008

Alexandria…Why? (dir. Youssef Chahine, 1978)

September 21, 2008

The Cinematic Emporer: Images of Napoleon on Film with guest J. David Markham

Napoleon (dir. Abel Gance, 1927)
Conquest (dir. Clarence Brown, 1937)
Napoleon (dir. Sacha Guitry, 1955)
Waterloo (dir. Sergei Bondarchuk, 1970)
Love and Death (dir. Woody Allen, 1975)
The Emperor's New Clothes (dir. Alan Taylor, 2001)

August 10, 2008

Forever (dir. Heddy Honigmann, 2006)

May 18, 2008

After Life (dir. Hirokazu Kore-eda, 1998)

April 20, 2008

Classically Composed Hollywood: Film Scores by the European Emigres with guest Dave Beck, KUOW host and cellist

A Midsummer Night's Dream (dir. Max Reinhart, William Dieterle; 1935)
The Prince and the Pauper (dir. William Keighley, 1937)
The Adventures of Robin Hood (dir. Michael Curtiz, William Keighley; 1938)
Kings Row (dir. Sam Wood, 1942)
Spellbound (dir. Alfred Hitchcock, 1945)
The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (dir. Billy Wilder, 1970)
The Bride of Frankenstein (dir. James Whale, 1935)
Sunset Boulevard (dir. Billy Wilder, 1950)

March 16, 2008

American Splendor (dir. Shari Springer Berman, Robert Pulcini; 2003)

February 28, 2008

Comic Book Style on Film with critic Mark Rahner

Alphaville (dir. Jean-Luc Godard, 1965)
Modesty Blaise (dir. Joseph Losey, 1966)
Superman II (dir. Richard Lester, 1980)
Batman (dir. Tim Burton, 1989)
Sin City (dir. Richard Rodriguez/Frank Miller, 2005)
300 (dir. Zack Snyder, 2007)

January 27, 2008

Crumb (dir. Terry Zwigoff, 1994)

January 20, 2008

West Germany's Big Three: Herzog, Wenders, and Fassbinder

Even Dwarfs Started Small (dir. Werner Herzog, 1970)
Aguirre, the Wrath of God (dir. Werner Herzog, 1972)
The Mystery of Kaspar Hauser (dir. Werner Herzog, 1974)
Kings of the Road (dir. Wim Wenders, 1976)
The American Friend (dir. Wim Wenders, 1977)
Ali: Fear Eats the Soul (dir. Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1974)
The Marriage of Maria Braun (dir. Rainer Werner Fassbinder, 1978)

2007

December 7, 2007

Critics Wrap

November 18, 2007

The Surreal Shorts of Jan Svankmajer

Darkness-Light-Darkness (1989, dir. Jan Svankmajer)
Jabberwocky, (1971, Jan Svankmajer)
Dimensions of Dialogue (1982, Jan Svankmajer)
Food (1992, Jan Svankmajer)

October 21, 2007

Long Live the New Flesh: A Dialogue on Cronenberg With critic Jim Emerson

The Brood (1979 , dir. David Cronenberg)
Scanners (1981, David Cronenberg))
The Fly (1986, David Cronenberg)
Dead Ringers (1988, David Cronenberg)
Naked Lunch (1991, David Cronenberg)
A History of Violence (2005, David Cronenberg)
Eastern Promises (2007, David Cronenberg)

September 16, 2007

They Came from Outer Space: 1950s Sci-fi on Film

The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951, dir. Robert Wise)
The Thing from Another World (1951, dir. Christian Nyby, Howard Hawks)
Invaders from Mars (1953, dir. William Cameron Menzies)
The War of the Worlds (1953, dir. Byron Haskin)
It Came from Outer Space (1953, dir. Jack Arnold)
Earth vs. the Flying Saucers (1956, dir. Fred F. Sears)
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956, dir. Don Siegel)
Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959, dir. Edward D. Wood, Jr.)

August 19, 2007

Mandabi (dir. Ousmane Sembene, 1968)
Xala (dir. Ousmane Sembene, 1975)
Faat Kine (dir. Ousmane Sembene, 2000)
Moolaade (dir. Ousmane Sembene, 2004)
Hyenas (dir. Djibril Diop Mambety, 1992)
The Little Girl Who Sold the Sun (dir. Djibril Diop Mambety, 1998)
Life on Earth (dir. Abderrahmane Sissako, 1998)
Waiting for Happiness (dir. Abderrahmane Sissako, 2002)
Bamako (dir. Abderrahmane Sissako, 2006)
Yeelen (Brightness) (dir. Souleymane Cisse, 1987)
Daratt (dir. Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, 2006)

May 20, 2007

A Fool There Was (dir. Frank Powell, 1915)
Sunrise (dir. F.W. Murnau, 1927)
Double Indemnity (dir. Billy Wilder, 1944)
The Maltese Falcon (dir. John Huston, 1941)
Scarlet Street (dir. Fritz Lang, 1945)
The Lady from Shanghai (dir. Orson Welles, 1947)
Out of the Past (dir. Jacques Tourneur, 1947)
Detour (dir. Edgar G. Ulmer, 1945)

April 22, 2007

Carbide and Sorrel (1963, dir. Frank Beyer)

March 18, 2007

Good Bye, Lenin! (2003, dir. Wolfgang Becker)

February 18, 2007

In from the Cold: Films of the Iron Curtain and After

The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1965, dir. Martin Ritt)
One, Two, Three (1961, dir. Billy Wilder)
The Gleiwitz Case (1961, dir. Gerhard Klein)
The Second Track (1962, dir. Joachim Kunert)
Carbide and Sorrel (1963, dir. Frank Beyer)
The Rabbit is Me (1965, dir. Kurt Maetzig)
Born in '45 (1965, dir. Jurgen Bottcher)
The Legend of Paul and Paula (1973, dir. Heiner Carow)
Sons of the Great Bear (1966, dir. Josef Mach)
Good Bye, Lenin! (2003, dir. Wolfgang Becker)
The Lives of Others (2006, dir. Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck)

January 21, 2007

Masters of Sound in Cinema

Diary of a Country Priest (1951, dir. Robert Bresson)
A Man Escaped (1956, dir. Robert Bresson)
Pickpocket (1959, dir. Robert Bresson)
Seven Samurai (1953, dir. Akira Kurosawa)
Throne of Blood (1957, dir. Akira Kurosawa)
Ran (1985, dir. Akira Kurosawa)

2006

November 19, 2006

Querelle enfantine (dir. Louis and August Lumiere, 1895)
The River (dir. Jean Renoir, 1951)
Pather Panchali (dir. Satyajit Ray, 1955)
Streetwise (dir. Martin Bell, 1984)
Los Olvidados (dir. Luis Bunuel, 1951)
Pixote (dir. Hector Babenco, 1981)
Landscape in the Mist (dir. Theo Angelopolous, 1988)
Ponette (dir. Jacques Doillon, 1996)

October 15, 2006

Within Our Gates (1920, dir. Oscar Micheaux)
The Blood of Jesus (1941, dir. Spencer Williams, Jr.)
Glen or Glenda? (1954, dir. Edward D. Wood, Jr.)
Shadows (1959, dir. John Cassavetes)

September 10, 2006

The Seventh Seal (1957, dir. Ingmar Bergman)
Winter Light (1961, dir. Ingmar Bergman)
Persona (1966, dir. Ingmar Bergman)
Scenes from a Marriage (1973, dir. Ingmar Bergman)
Fanny and Alexander (1982, dir. Ingmar Bergman)
Faithless (2001, dir. Liv Ullmann)

August 20, 2006

Ball of Fire (1941, dir. Howard Hawks)
Double Indemnity (1944, dir. Billy Wilder)
Sunset Boulevard (1950, dir. Billy Wilder)
Some Like it Hot (1959, dir. Billy Wilder)
The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970, dir. Billy Wilder)

May 21, 2006

The Night of the Hunter (1955, dir. Charles Laughton)
Psycho (1960, dir. Alfred Hitchcock)
Detour (1945, dir. Edgar G. Ulmer)
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974, dir. Tobe Hooper)
Blue Velvet (1986, dir. David Lynch)
Twin Peaks (1990, dir. David Lynch)

April 23, 2006

Citizen Kane (1941, dir. Orson Welles)
The Magnificent Ambersons (1942, dir. Orson Welles)
Chimes at Midnight (1966, dir. Orson Welles)
L'Avventura (1960, dir. Michelangelo Antonioni)
Blowup (1966, dir. Michelangelo Antonioni)
The Passenger (1975, dir. Michelangelo Antonioni)

March 19, 2006

Last Year at Marienbad (1961, dir. Alain Resnais)

March 3, 2006

It Happened at the World's Fair (1963, dir. Norman Taurog)
The Parallax View (1974, dir. Alan J. Pakula)
James Cameron's Dark Angel (2002, dir. David Nutter)
Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999, dir. Jay Roach)
The Night Strangler (1973, dir. Dan Curtis)
Trouble in Mind (1985, dir. Alan Rudolph)
The Fabulous Baker Boys (1989, dir. Steve Kloves)
Bad Company (1995, dir. Damian Harris)
Money Buys Happiness (1999, dir. Gregg Lachow)
Police Beat (2005, dir. Robinson Devor)
Scorchy (1976, dir. Howard Avedis)

February 19, 2006

The 39 Steps (1935, dir. Alfred Hitchcock)
Shadow of a Doubt (1943, dir. Alfred Hitchcock)
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968, dir. Stanley Kubr