A new month means new programming on The Criterion Channel. April sports fresh collections and Criterion Edition debuts for several legendary filmmakers, and it kicks off a bit of a digital blaxploitation festival, along with other cinema compilations. Here are seven of the best offerings.
Across 110th Street (1972)
Available:April 1st
Directed by:Barry Shear
Written by:Luther Davis
Cast:Anthony Quinn, Yaphet Kotto, Anthony Franciosa
Providing a satisfying definition of “blaxploitation” requires squaring away the definition of “exploitation,” when it comes to sub-genres of film. Not everyone agrees on what the latter’s definition is, but there’s a lot of opinion overlap when it comes to their elements. They’re often inexpensively made (some might even say cheap), and involve dramatizing visceral impulses, often of an adult nature, with a free pass when it comes to indulgence. Violence, sex-but-maybe-not-romance, revenge of a bloody nature, foul language. In the 1970s, many more films were being made to serve African American (and globally Black) audiences, and many of them were exploitation films. The president of the NAACP, in 1972, coined the term blaxploitation to cast aspersion on the practice, but that term stuck, and now it’s what those tense, gleefully confrontational, often urban-set movies get called with fondness.
Across 110th Streetis one of the more expertly made entries in that canon.QuentinTarantinocompletists will recognize its famous theme song as a prominent needle-drop in that director’s homage to the era,Jackie Brown.110thhas all the trappings of a solid crime thriller and the 1970s commitment to not pulling punches. It concerns two cops—one white, jaded veteran of the force, one an African American rookie—tracking down a group of crooks who’ve robbed six-figures from the mob. Of course, the mob’s boss is ruthlessly evil, and of course he’s hunting down those crooks too. This film has got a procedural structure, dabbles in social commentary, but, above all, is a convincingly gritty action-noir. Well-shot, well-paced and well-edited.
Blue Velvet: Criterion Collection Edition (1986)
Directed by:David Lynch
Written by:David Lynch
Cast:Kyle MacLachlan, Isabella Rossellini, Dennis Hopper, Laura Dern
April may just be a noir-ish month. A slice of art likeDavid Lynch’sBlue Velvetis so versatile in its mental and sensory probing that ten viewers might walk away from it with ten different genre classifications in mind, and some may keep walking without bothering to classify at all. To be reductive about it,Blue Velvetis psychedelic film noir, with an energy so destabilizing it might register to the anxious as a horror picture. At this point, that Lynch can make unsettling narrative dreamscapes is taken for granted, but in 1986 he was coming offDune, a big-budget sci-fi adaptation that did not make a ton of money. In that commercial regard, the man felt that he had failed. That film itself was not entirely his own vision either—for all the studio tentpole reasons—and so he felt like he’d failed twice. Going forward, he committed to never failing that latter, artistic test again.
Blue Velvetis his debut under that new resolve, and it gained him an Oscar nomination for directing and a wave of mind-bending clout on which he still rides. So much ink has been spilt over this film, but the only logical thing to do with it is watch it.
The Last Picture Show (1971)
Directed by:Peter Bogdanovich
Written by:Larry McMurtry, Peter Bogdanovich
Cast:Timothy Bottoms, Jeff Bridges, Ellen Burstyn, Ben Johnson, Cloris Leachman, Cybill Shepherd
Many of director John Ford’s excellent films are in this month’s Criterion Channel programming, but this slot is dedicated to one of his acolytes,Peter Bogdanovich. Fans ofThe Sopranoswill know the late director as an actor, as he played Dr. Kupferberg, the therapist to Dr. Melfi.The Last Picture Showis his fourth directorial credit, and clearly the one that made the industry pay attention. It was nominated for eight Oscars and many of the other awards. Based on the novel of the same name by its co-screenwriter, authorLarry McMurtry(who is worth googling for the slew of other great movies his books have spawned), it tells the coming-of-age tale of two high-school friends in a lonesome, fictional Texas town. It’s got a Western’s energy but concerns this town’s going to seed, its booming oil days behind it, and any semblance of a future only existing outside its borders. Bogdanovich imbues it with the rambunctious, excited energy of youth, and with the sadness of an important moment in history coming to an end.
4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (2007)
Directed by:Cristian Mungiu
Written by:Cristian Mungiu
Cast:Adi Cărăuleanu, Luminița Gheorghiu, Mădălina Ghițescu, Vlad Ivanov
Set in the 1980s, this Palme D’or winner’s location is Romania, in the dying days of that country’s communist dictatorial rule. Its leads are two university students who must traverse the derelict, half-dark streets of Bucharest in search of an illegal abortion. At the time—in the country they call home—all abortions were illegal, meaning medical oversight to ensure a safe procedure was non-existent. The penalties were possible maiming, but also additional punishment for both girls by the communist government. Filmed in averité, documentary style, the film is a thriller, one that tells the story of a dangerous journey—with the requisite interesting, threatening characters a hero tends to meet on such quests—that is a descent into darkness, with palpable menace, art and drama to spare, along with the boldness required to pull off all its emotional acts.
Directed by:Alain Resnais
Written by:Alain Resnais
Cast:Delphine Seyrig, Giorgio Albertazzi, Sacha Pitoëff
Often described as a puzzle, this movie deconstructs the idea of the medium’s rules, offering an enigmatic drama of the French New Wave. It is surrealistic, serving events in the present as well as in the past. This past, however, might be completely invented. Its characters dress immaculately and hang out in an equally luxurious European hotel. They do not have names. The man wants the woman to believe that they’ve met before, but have they? The film never settles on an answer. It contains elements of parody without technically being wholly parodic. Its wonderful shot composition, music, sense of flow and diverting narrative nuggets place it on many lists of the best films ever made. Its refusal to hand out answers makes it highly rewatchable, and highly dissectable.
Better Luck Tomorrow (2002)
Directed by:Justin Lin
Written by:Ernesto Foronda, Justin Lin, Fabian Marquez
Cast:Parry Shen, Jason Tobin, Sung Kang, Roger Fan, John Cho
This Sundance-premiering, coming-of-age crime drama is the second feature film fromJustin Lin, who would—four years later—directThe Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, which would begin his road to being the godfather of that franchise.Better Luck Tomorrowunspools the account of a group of Asian American teens (doing great things with their lives in every measure) who get bored with the baggage of expectation and the doldrums of achievement, trading that in for a life of criminal misadventure. Far from a feel-good story of life in high school in sunny California, it delves into dark, Scorsese-influenced degradation and stylish, indie-film violence. It caused a bit of controversy for Lin, but found defenders inRoger Ebert(who vocally enjoyed it) and, curiously,MC Hammer(whose cash injection would help get the picture made in the first place). Viewer of theFast and Furiousfilms know that Lin directs with flair and energy, and both are on display here. It is a movie that tackles serious themes and tough material, but it is a Justin Lin movie, making it, therefore, a lot of fun to watch.
Ministry of Fear (1944)
Directed by:Fritz Lang
Written by:Seton I. Miller
Cast:Ray Milland, Marjorie Reynolds
One more Criterion-approved noir for the road. Based on the novel of the same name,Ministry of Fearhas quite the premise: an innocent man, recently released from a mental institution, wins a delicious cake, by accident. Inside of this cake is a roll of microfilm. On this microfilm are incriminating Nazi secrets. As to be expected, these wicked Nazis must hunt our hero down in search of this valuable MacGuffin. The Second World War wasn’t even over yet, and here was this picture, contending with its iconography to tell not a story of propaganda, but one of tension and fear so well-executed that theCoen Brotherswould pay tribute to one of its key scenes in their masterfulBlood Simple.Fritz Langwas a prolific director—his German-language offeringMan early entry in the serial killer subgenre, should also be sought out—and the air of doom he brought to his early German films is all over this Hollywood production.
