Michele Lagny, “The feeling gaze: Jean Renoir’s La Bête humaine (1938)” – The essay traces some of the context of the film’s release, particularly the way it was somewhat ordained to…
The Rules of the Game (dir. Jean Renoir, 1939) – It was time to revisit the great work. Christopher Faulkner makes a great analysis of the film through an ethnographic mode.…
Pépé le Moko (dir. Julien Duvivier, 1937) – A masterpiece of setting and staging. It’s in Algiers, within the Casbah, and it treats its environs and those native to it…
Thérèse Raquin (dir. Marcel Carné, 1953) – A step back from the poetic realism of Carné’s big-budget, big production Children of Paradise and lower-budget Port of Shadows, this is a melodrama that zooms…
Elevator to the Gallows (dir. Louis Malle, 1958) – Am going to need to read up on this one, on account of its excellence. Am also going to need to…
Les Enfants Terribles (dir. Jean-Pierre Melville, 1950) – Started watching this one thinking it was a 1929 film directed by Jean Cocteau, only to find out this is the 1950…
Play Time (dir. Jacques Tati, 1967) – This was goofy but not only that, maybe something approaching a Chesterton comedy, Father Brown or something. A clear critique of all things…
Sometimes you just need, like, a year-long break, you know? Drive (dir. Nicolas Winding Refn, 2011) – It has the kind of pacing that rewards patience, and even assumes it…
Topper (dir. Norman Z. MacLeod, 1937) – As with all of these, it was awhile ago, invoking the question, why bother? That’s fair. To answer, probably just as a record,…
Breakfast at Tiffany’s (dir. Blake Edwards, 1961) – Been way too long since this one. It’s hard to watch it “objectively,” largely on account of its status as the origin…
Sex and the Single Girl (dir. Richard Quine, 1964) – A Tony Curtis marathon was obviously in order, following the old fella’s death recently at the ripe old age of…
A most fascinating, most worthwhile viewing. In this one, Harlow is about as objectified as they come, as the title more than indicates. Early shots in the film (presumably before…
