These Movies Matter

DVDS Worth Watching, Oct 20, 2006

How to Get the Films We Recommend:

Sources for the movie titles we recommend can be found by clicking the "read full review" link at the end of each critique below.

• Featured Title(s)
• Recommended Titles
• Classics
• Worth a Mention
• Overlooked Comedy
• Better Mainstream
• Our Boxed Set Pick(s)

Welcome to our first edition of These Movies Matter the Free Newsletter from our new site: www.moonrise movies.com. We're doing our best to make this transition as seamless as possible and we invite you to be our "eyes" and "ears" and notify us of any glitches you find, along with comments on what you think of our expansion and improvements. Please contact us if you have any questions or comments. Thank you for your ongoing support of our efforts to create an intelligent yet entertaining DVD review site; we couldn't have done it without you. Enjoy the Movies! Angela Pressburger Editor-in-Chief

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Featured Title(s)

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REDS (25th Anniversary Edition), 1981, 194 min., Subtitles, Color

Genre: Drama
Release Data: October, 2006
Director(s): Warren Beatty

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An extraordinary film … a big romantic adventure movie, the best since David Lean's “Lawrence of Arabia”. The New York Times, 1981 Editor’s Note: We don’t often pick old films as our Featured offering, but this film is an exception – and by far the most extraordinary film released over the past two weeks. It has been called the greatest romantic epic since Gone With the Wind, but when it was first released theatrically many North Americans didn’t know what to make of it. It was long – three hours with an intermission, unheard of in movie palaces at the time; the hero was an American communist who became the only American to be buried within the Kremlin walls; and the timing – it was made at the height of the Reagan administration’s cold-war – was not auspicious. Public opinion was sharply divided among critics and audiences alike, and the film didn’t make it onto VHS tape until 1998. Twenty-five years after its making, this wonderful film is finally readily available on DVD.

What It's About: The true story of radical American journalist John Reed (played by director Warren Beatty) and his love affair with fellow journalist, photographer and feminist Louise Bryant (Diane Keaton). The two met in their youth, in 1912, in Portland, Oregon, when Reed, who hailed from Portland, was giving a political lecture there. Bryant, married to an Oregon dentist at the time, left her husband and followed Reed back to Greenwich Village. There, during the heady days of World War I, they found themselves at the center of a group of radical thinkers, poised in a moment of a creative ferment when American society seemed open, impassioned and up for anything. Bryant became an important feminist and radical in her own right, while Reed found himself right where he wanted to be, at the centre of the action. In 1917, when the Russian Revolution began and the US entered World War I, they went to Russia to witness the making of history first-hand. The result was an impassioned love-affair with both each other and the societal opportunities promised by communism. Reed’s subsequent book, 10 Days That Shook the World, has never been out of print since.

Upon their return to the US, fuelled by a desire to bring the spirit and idealism of the Russian Revolution to the US, Reed tried to build an American communist party. In 1919, he again traveled to Moscow – this time illegally due the beginnings of the “Red Scare” in America – in order to gain recognition for his party from one of the country’s leaders, Grigory Zinoviev (Jerzy Kosinski). The politburo dragged its feet and Reed’s health began to deteriorate. Unable to return to the US because of the communist-closed borders and the surrounding White Russian armies, Reed began to be disillusioned with communism, but he was stuck, and died in Russia in 1920. Meanwhile, the intrepid Louise makes an almost impossible journey across the frozen wastelands of Finland in order to find a place to cross the sealed border and be with her beloved.

What to Look For: Although Reed remained a card-carrying Communist until his death, this is not really a Communist propaganda film, but more a great big juicy vista of an era when American optimism was in its prime and ideas flourished. It is about the excitement of being young, idealistic and foolish in a time when everything still seems possible; and it is about the sort of great romance that hits you like a thunderbolt and colors everything for the rest of your life. And it works because the personal and the political are, in this case, both larger than life. Most of all, this is a triumph of filmmaking over the capitalist Hollywood studio system – perhaps only Warren Beatty could have raised $35 million to make a movie about a man who hated millionaires.

I was lucky to have made this film during the time that I made it, because today I would have never been able to do so.
Director, Warren Beatty

Why It Matters: Look for inspired casting, superb performances, impressive cinematography, an intelligent script and strong direction. Don’t miss Louise’s affair with playwright Eugene O’Neill (Jack Nicholson, whose performance comes close to stealing the show), and novelist Jerzy Kosinski, who is very, very good as the smarmy Bolshevik politburo bureaucrat, Grigory Zinoviev. Appreciate the director’s inspired idea of using “witnesses,” – real-life surviving participants of the events portrayed – including Henry Miller and Rebecca West. Their presence gives the film a “documentary” feel and an authenticity that is unusual now, and was unique at the time. These are real people, and we care about them. Marvel at the recreations of “great moments in history” such as the Bolshevik storming of the Winter palace in Petrograd. The film's scenes of these epic events (actually recreated and shot in Finland and Spain) are stunning.

Notes: Note: For a more complete picture, you can watch another multi-Oscar® winning romantic epic set against the background of the Russian Revolution, but told from the other side, in David Lean’s 1965 film Doctor Zhivaog (197 min.), based on the Nobel-prize-winning novel of the same name by Boris Pasternak.

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

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Recommended Titles

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BILLY WILDER SPEAKS, 2006, 71 min., Subtitles, Color

Genre: Documentary
Release Data: October, 2006
Director(s): Volker Schlöndorff (The Tin Drum) and Gisela Grischow

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"Everyone in the audience is an idiot, but together they're a genius. - Billy Wilder Editor's Note: My father worked with Billy Wilder when they were both young screenwriters at the famous UFA Studios, in Berlin, before the First World War. Wilder wrote the prologue to my father’s biography: Emeric Pressburger: the Life and Death of a Screenwriter (Faber & Faber)) so I was eager to see this film by the brilliant German director, Volker Schlöndorff. Wilder was a “classic”, and well-known for his feisty remarks and this is the best part of this film. If you have an interest in film history, this is one you shouldn’t miss.

What It's About: Brilliant and ascerbic director and screenwriter Billy Wilder, who won a staggering number of awards and honours, including six Oscar® wins (The Apartment, Sunset Boulevard and The Lost Weekend) and 13 Oscar® nominations. His most famous films also include: Some Like It Hot, Sabrina, Stalag 17, and A Foreign Affair – all still good choices for watching on DVD.

Born in 1906, in a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire which became Poland after the first world war, young Billy originally studied to become a lawyer, but quickly found he was much more excited by journalism. As he tells it in the film, he wangled his way to Berlin – then the centre of European cultural activity – as a publicist for a big American jazz band. He subsequently worked for the city's largest tabloid until he broke into films as a screenwriter in 1929. By the time Hitler came to power in 1933, Wilder had made quite a name for himself, but he was quick to realize that his Jewish ancestry would not be welcome in the Third Reich and lost no time in fleeing to Paris, and later America. Although he spoke no English when he arrived in the US, he quickly made friends who recognized his talent and was able to break into the Hollywood studios.

What to Look For: Good interviews are so hard to find and here we are treated to some really natural interactions with one of the 20th century's most entertaining men. The entertaining part is hearing Wilder tell all these hilarious tales with his trade-mark wicked grin – but you’ll have to see the movie to find out!

Why It Matters: Wilder was hard to pin down as an interviewee, but Schlöndorff managed to get started by piggybacking on someone else’s interview under the guise of doing a "rehearsal" for a “possible” interview later. We don’t know what happened to the “official” interview, but our director managed to get two weeks of reminiscences from Wilder, with only one restriction: the interviews would not be shown until after his death, which occurred in 2002, at the age of 96. (Apparently, Wilder quipped: “after I’m gone, who cares?”)

At the time of the interviews, Schlöndorff had already known Wilder for some twenty-five years, and he spoke German – both tremendous pluses for the project, and no doubt the reason why he managed to capture some very original material on camera. It’s fascinating to hear Wilder reminisce about his interactions with Humphrey Bogart, Charles Laughton, Marlene Dietrich and Marilyn Monroe, and hear his descriptions of Jack Lemmon's work ethic and Shirley MacLaine's doubts that The Apartment will be a success. And, we meet his generally well-hidden sentimental side when he talks about his long-time collaborator, I.A.L. Diamond, who died shortly before these interviews took place – Wilder recalls, with a big grin, that the initials stood for "Interscholastic Algebra League."

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

THE FOREST FOR THE TREES, 2003, 81 min., Subtitles, Color

Genre: Drama
Release Data: October 2006, (Canada Only)
Director(s): Maren Ade

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What It's About: The tartly comic tale of mousy Melanie (the amazing Eva Löbau), a first-time teacher on the verge of a nervous breakdown. As the film begins, she’s about to take a big step out into the world; she dumps her long-time boyfriend and leaves her small town to move to the city and her first job as a teacher. Armed with alternative methods and bright-eyed optimism, Melanie has high hopes for her new life. However, she is both idealistic and naïve – one of the worst combinations in terms of life skills – and she has no idea how to jump-start a new career and get a new social life going. At school, her unruly students soon realize she has no confidence and take every opportunity to take advantage of her so that the class soon spirals out of her control. On the social front, Thorsten, another teacher at the school tries to make friends but she feels he is “taking advantage” and doesn’t want to pursue things further than a professional friendship. Seeking companionship, she orchestrates a “chance meeting” with her next-door neighbour, Tina, who works at a trendy fashion boutique and seems to have all the pizzaz that Melanie lacks. As the loneliness of big city life begins to take its toll, Melanie tries to live vicariously through Tina – but she is not made for that life. Melanie is way out of her depth, and the only person who wants to help her is Thorsten… but she will have none of him…. The ending is ambiguous, but Melanie does finally glimpse “the forest” beyond the trees.

What to Look For: This was a hugely popular movie on the international film festival circuit, we think because the story is so immediate and real. There are no drugs, no addiction, no mental illness, just the quiet desperation of a young woman who cannot get her life back on track. Despite being the kind of person you’d like to either shake, or cross the street to avoid, Melanie still manages to generate enough sympathy to make you wish for a happy ending – a situation all too familiar to most of us, in real life. And when the heroine’s painfully awkward journey seems to be about to rise above the trees and see the forest, you can identify completely.

Why It Matters: This is not only the director’s first feature, it was her film school graduation work. Watch for what you can do with a low budget and a sharp script. Note how the story plays out with astonishing realism. And appreciate actress Eva Lobau as she manages to be so spinelessly annoying without ever loosing your sympathy.

Notes: DVD available only in Canada

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

IRAQ FOR SALE, 2006, 75 min., Color

Genre: Documentary
Release Data: October, 2006 (US Only)
Director(s): Robert Greenwald (Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price, Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism)

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For those who have let the war drift into the background noise of talking heads,Iraq for Sale is a much needed reminder of the criminal negligence of those who led the troops into this mess and those who have gotten rich off of it. The Village Voice

What It's About: A look inside the lives of American soldiers, truck drivers, widows and children whose lives have been deeply affected by the profiteering that has taken place in the course of the reconstruction of Iraq. The director, like a dog with a bone, persists in his research until he has uncovered clear connections between private contractors making a killing in this war-torn country and the decision-makers who allow them to do so. The film traces connections between corporations like Halliburton, Blackwater Security Consulting and CACI International and the Republican Party to expose a shocking morass of greed, corruption and incompetence, the buying of influence, and questionable accounting practices, and explore the accompanying waste of taxpayers’ money.

What to Look For: This movie opens a number of doors that may make many US citizens feel uncomfortable. Yes, this film is emotionally manipulative, but the director wants to get you thinking. And, yes, he’s not subtle – but then, neither are his targets. The business of war is big business, with billions of dollars at stake, but the greed and graft embodied in the collusion between corporations and the US military, as presented in this film, is astounding. The director also addresses a related topic not often discussed openly: the effect of soldiers hired from the private sector on the military’s ability to retain its conscripts and maintain their morale: Why work for $3,000 a month when you can earn six figures with a corporation? This film is just one piece of a much bigger picture, but we do recommend it as part of your education.

Why It Matters: A positive barrage of interviews with both ordinary citizens and the military exposing the groundswell of those questioning the wisdom, and the morality of current US action in Iraq. Starting from US Army Brigadier General Janis Kapinski’s question: "Can the Secretary of Defense, the Vice President, this administration, take the military to war to feed the greed of contractors?" the director presents military personnel, journalists, former Abu Ghraib prisoners and former employees of the companies in question as they present a litany of shocking accusations.

Notes: DVD available in the US only

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

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Classics

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HAIL MARY (je vous salue, Marie), 1985, 107 min., Subtitles, Color

Genre: Drama
Release Data: October, 2006
Director(s): Jean-Luc goddard

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A modern retelling of the Virgin birth set in Switzerland, in which “Marie” is a young student who plays basketball and works at her father’s gas station, while Joseph is her school-drop-out boyfriend who drives a cab. One day, her well-to-do Uncle Gabriel arrives on a jet plane to tell her the good news while she’s pumping gas: she is to have a child, despite the fact that she is still a virgin. Marie, knowing without question that ''the hand of God'' is upon her, goes to see a gynecologist for confirmation, but Gabriel has a hard time getting Joseph to accept that his girlfriend was indeed a virgin and was also always faithful to him In the end, the “angel” prevails and Marie and Joseph end up in a platonic relationship in which Joseph is Mary’s greatest support. Beautifully shot, with much of the story punctuated by gorgeous imagery of the natural world (the sun, moon, clouds, flowers, water, etc.), and set to an almost surreal score that mixes the music of Dvorak, Bach and John Coltrane, this is an appealing film. Unfortunately, it’s not nearly as funny as you might imagine; in fact it’s rather overly serious and reverent. Condemned by the Pope and some Church organizations – but acclaimed by some other Christian groups – this is certainly one of the great Godard’s most controversial films. However, we feel the directors’ sensitivity to the demands of faith in a cynical era, may prove more controversial than his efforts to portray biblical truths in a contemporary setting.

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

THE MAGUS, 1968, 117 min., Color

Genre: Documentary
Release Data: October, 2006 (US Only)
Director(s): Guy Green

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Michael Caine is Nicholas Urfe, an English teacher, who arrives on a sleepy Greek island to take up a position which has become available through his predecessor’s suicide. He soon falls under the spell of Maurice Conchis (Anthony Quinn), the local doctor, who has pretensions to being a “magus” – and seems to hold considerable influence over locals and ex-pats alike. Intellectual and sexy – the hallmarks of its time – the film deals in ambiguities until the moment when Urfe finds himself entering into a bargain with Conchis that brings him face-to-face with the problem of whether a man even has the right to enter into a contract that entails sacrificing some lives in order to spare others. Described by Fowles, through the medium of Conchis, as "meta-theater—for the actors", the plot is by turns bewildering and moving. Back in the heady days of the 1960s, mainstream material about magicians was more unusual and held great appeal for the audience of the day, and the New York Times called the film “a fine adaptation of a strong, difficult novel….” Today, however, the material seems pretentious and boring, something that not even Michael Caine and a script by author John Fowles (The Collector, The French Lieutenant’s Woman) can rescue. If you remember it fondly, see it again, otherwise you might find yourself less than enthusiastic about this film.

Notes: DVD available in the US Only

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

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Worth a Mention

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THE DAY OF THE DEAD, 2006, 91 min., Color

Genre: Documentary
Release Data: October, 2006
Director(s): Robert D. Kline

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With All Souls’ Day, October 31st – “Hallowe’en to most of us in North America – fast approaching, this is a timely documentary about one of the most important dates for Latino communities around the world. Known as “The Day of the Dead”, or” El dia de los muertos”, this autumn holiday is celebrated throughout Spanish-speaking countries with extravagant street markets offering candies resembling coffins, skulls and the newly risen. People have picnics on the tombs of their loved ones while cleaning the site, refreshing the flowers and, hiring musicians to play the dearly departed’s favourite songs. In this particular film, the director follows the tradition’s migration to Southern California, where the Latino communities continue to celebrate with colourful customs and artistic verve. Set to the music of Quetzal, a talented cross-border group of musicians, the film explores the cultural significance of this holiday and the tradition of expressing one’s love and respect for the dead through a celebration of life. An interesting film with a fine sound-track.

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

LA MOUSTACHE, 2005, 86 min., Subtitles, Color

Genre: Drama
Release Data: October 2006, (Canada Only)
Director(s): Emmanuel Carrière

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One night, on a whim, Marc Thiriez, a successful, happily married architect, shaves off his moustache – and suddenly, we’re in the “twilight zone”. When his wife, Agnes, and his friends all fail to notice the change - and, indeed, begin to claim that he never had a moustache - Marc's self-identity begins to slowly unravel in the wake of his clean-shaven condition. At first, he assumes that everyone has conspired in a practical joke, but even when they are alone, a baffled Agnes continues to insist that he never had a moustache. Dismayed and frustrated by the whole situation, and afraid that his wife will commit him to a mental institution, Marc flees to Hong Kong, a city that, like his life, is suspended between two realities: east and west. As the predictable begins to break down, we are subverted from the storyline we initially thought we were getting into an exploration of the illusion of oneness, which as lovers we insist on, despite the reality that we all inhabit separate worlds, not matter how intimately we may be connected. Set to Philip Glass's "Concerto pour violon et orchestre, 1987", this highly cinematic film is a brilliant exploration of that inevitable moment when our relationships begin to transform from impassioned singularity into emotional partnerships. And, after all, what’s in a moustache?

Notes: DVD available in Canada Only

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

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Overlooked Comedy

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OYSTER FARMER, 2004, 91 min., Color

Genre: Drama
Release Data: October, 2006
Director(s): Anna Reeves

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A funky, idiosyncratic story about the mayhem that ensues when city-boy Jack Flange leaves Sydney to work on an oyster farm – and indulge in petty thievery – as a way to cut his own expenses and help pay his sister’s steep medical bills for rehabilitation resulting from a car accident. You will learn a lot of things about the fascinating world of oyster farming, even as you laugh at Jack knocking out the opposition with a frozen lobster as he robs an armoured van outside a fish market, and makes off with the cash. Adventure arrives when he decides that the way to cover his trail is to mail the cash to himself and the postman has a heart-attack, drops the precious parcel, and it ends up at the bottom of the bay. The majority of the film is taken up with all of us guessing who may have recovered the cash. The most likely suspect is Pearl, a sexy young woman with a serious passion for mail-order designer shoes, and a knack for Jack. The director seems to have an affinity fo the eccentric characters that work on oyster farms which is born out by a great supporting cast of oddballs, played by a combination of real-life Aussie farmers and seasoned actors. Hearts open, love blooms, and there are some genuinely funny scenes, but the real star of the show is the setting of abundant green forests and winding waterways of the wild country around New South Wales’s Hawkesbury River. This is not a “great” film, but it’s charming and fun in a very down-to-earth way, and like many Australian films, it has a terrific atmosphere. We think you’ll find it quite enjoyable.

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

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Better Mainstream

Mentioned but not reviewed – these popular titles don’t really need us to publicize them, but we want you to know they’re now available on DVD.

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A PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION, 2006, 105 min., Color

Genre: Drama
Release Data: October, 2006
Director(s): Robert Altman

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Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

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Our Boxed Set Pick(s)

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HUMPHREY BOGART: THE SIGNATURE COLLECTION, Vol. 2, Color

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7 Discs (The Maltese Falcon – three-disc Special Edition; Across the Pacific; Action in the North Atlantic; All Through the Night; and Passage to Marseille) All are also available as separate DVDs

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

MOTION PICTURE MASTERPIECES, Various, Color

Genre: Drama
Release Data: October, 2006
Director(s): Various

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Notes: 5 disc set
Marie Antoinette (1939), David Copperfield (1935), Pride and Prejudice (1940), A Tale of Two Cities (1935), and Treasure Island (1934)

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources

NORMAN MCLAREN: MASTERS EDITION, 2006, Color

Genre: Documentary
Release Data: October, 2006
Director(s): Norman McLaren

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Notes: 7 disc set
58 films from this ground-breaking visionary in the field of documentary, beginning with his early experimental days in the Scotland of the 1930s, to his inspiring leadership and support for the genre at the National Film Board of Canada until his death in 1983.

Available on DVD through our listed on-line sources