Sadly, I think I'll skip this sale. I already bought a boatload of Criterions this summer, as well as
Six Moral Tales a month ago. The shipping costs on Amazon are murderous at the moment, and with
Mulholland Drive and
Citizen Kane also coming in 4K in Europe, it would be best for me to wait. I might pair something up with
The Red Shoes or
The Piano in December-January if prices on Amazon remain low.
Instead, I'll recommend you all a bunch of underappreciated titles. If you feel like taking a chance with something you don't hear people talk about that often, all of these are fantastic choices as far as I'm concerned:
The Cremator - One of the absolute masterpieces of the Czech New Wave - vying for the top spot with
Marketa Lazarova in my view, although the two are very different - this film is at the same time disturbing, humorous, beautiful and highly intelligent. Fans of Lynch will surely appreciate its style, while those who are not don't need to fear anywhere near the same level of confusion from this poignant pitch-black comedy.
Beyond the Hills - Because I have to promote something from my own country, don't I?
While most of those who heard about Cristian Mungiu know him for
4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (another excellent pick!), this one is just as good. A look at an isolated Orthodox community faced with a troublesome outsider they want to help but don't quite have the means to understand, this film manages to be a scathing indictment of religious mores, while at the same time humanizing those who don't know any better but to rely on them.
Mandabi - More than just the first film in a Sub-Saharan African language and the first color film of Ousmane Sembene, dubbed the father of African cinema, this is quite a brilliant and beautiful tragicomedy, stylistically in step with the French New Wave. Having watched most of the
Six Moral Tales a couple of weeks prior, I couldn't help but notice parallels to Rohmer. To be sure, Sembene is not as vague with his dramatic and comedic moments, and the issues he is concerned with are very different, but he stops at times to show you unadulterated glimpses into Dakar and the surrounding villages just like Rohmer would show you glimpses into parts of France, and the characters feel complex and real in spite of the apparent simplicity of the story. I was very impressed with this one, and I'm looking forward to getting
Black Girl in the future (I bought the UK Studio Canal edition because it was more convenient, but the
Criterion uses the same restoration and also includes the written version of the story).
Dance, Girl, Dance - A film made by one of the few early female filmmakers, and future teacher of Francis Ford Coppola, Dorothy Arzner. The site reviewer sells this film woefully short. Far from being predictable, it surprised me with some of the turns it made! There is certainly a lot more depth to it than the glitzy cover would suggest, which might just be the point.
Bitter Rice - A seemingly lesser known Italian neorealist film, it is worth a watch if only for its novel and beautiful setting - the rice fields of Po Valley - and its incredible sex appeal. The
Criterion is not really packed with extras, but it also comes at a lower price, so it presents less of a risk. This was the scene that convinced me to check it out:
Girlfriends - Praised by Kubrick himself, this film is sort of like
Frances Ha, but from a time before young women searching for their path in life could afford the whimsy. Not that the film is bleak in any way, it's similar in themes and has its own silly moments (70s style), but overall I found it more down to earth and trenchant.
The Story of Temple Drake - One of the infamous "immoral" films made prior to the Hays Code, encouraging the restoration of more such titles should be reason enough for more people to buy it, but the film is certainly worth it on its own, as it features some great cinematography and the wonderful Miriam Hopkins, who has become somewhat of a favorite of mine after seeing her in Lubitsch's
Design For Living and
Trouble in Paradise. Mind you, this film is not a comedy, but Hopkins holds her own just as well.
The Cranes are Flying - A classic of Soviet cinema, I was surprised how few people around here have it. If the stairway scene featured on the film's page on
Criterion's site doesn't convince you this is a fantastic pick, I don't know what will...
Canoa, A Shameful Memory - A fantastic Mexican film exploring an episode of genuine, real life horror, this could even be a good - if artsy and actually thought provoking - pick for Halloween. It starts out documentary-style, with bright colors, wonderful shots and a bitterly sarcastic in-frame narrator, only to devolve into a literal slasher. The fact that the main villain (who only wields a censer and a microphone himself) seems plucked out of a Bond movie makes it seem even more surreal that it's all based on true events.
People on Sunday - A little experimental silent film made during the final years of the Weimar Republic, this is a window into what Berlin used to be before the Nazis came to power and it was later on destroyed. It has therefore a twofold historical value - both as a film, and as a documentary of sorts. Billy Wilder claimed to have worked on it as a scriptwriter, so for a full picture of his take on Berlin through the decades, with its inevitable pangs of sadness, but also acceptance and hope, you could follow it up with
A Foreign Affair and
One, Two, Three.
Edit: Heh! Glad to see someone took one of my recommendations even before I posted it!
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