Turkey Day, my parents don't love me, THE LONG GOOD FRIDAY (26) and NIGHTS OF CABIRIA (49)

Hope you all had a lovely Thanksgiving. In traditional American fashion I ate exactly one giant pile that contained turkey, mashed 'taters, wild rice, gravy, three glasses of wine, a beer, a glass of scotch, a shrimp cocktail, one piece of bland pumpkin pie, and an assortment of other you know food. I gained a layer of chub around my mid-section that not only makes me look like a forty-four year old from my double-chin down but riddles with self-doubt (hey, this single thing is harder and less lady-filled than expected). I colluded with family and friends and watched football on a television that may have been taller than me. In the end it was as T-Day always is in The Sanders' Family, a reminder that no matter what might be ailing you in the real world, the family is always there to make you laugh and put everything in perspective.

That said, I'm pretty sure this whole "Mama and Papa Sanders love Noah" thing is a sham. I've been harassing my slightly-addled folks for a while now to get on the Criterion Quest bandwagon, and sure, they talk about it, they assure me that they've written it down and they'll start reading just as soon as they get home. But, after 30 blog posts, they've yet to even glance at it.

So, my brother, Dimwit Sanders, recently started his own blog (paradeofdelusion.blogspot.com) about his upcoming move to Los Angeles, and guess who signed up as followers before the, er, "ink" dried on the digital "page"? Mama and Papa Sanders. If it wasn't for the vast Sanders' fortune I'm sure to accrue when the old codgers kick the bucket I'd disown the shit out of them. Maybe I'll emancipate myself from them and hire some new parents that will read my blogs and shower me with guilt-ridden presents when they forget my birthday.

I've spoke at length about Fellini in this blog before, and as I've gotten older, and further along in my Criterion Quest I've come to eagerly anticipate his next film in the collection. I was blown away by Amarcord (4), so when a customer (and Criterion Quest follower) mentioned that Nights of Cabiria (49) was his favorite Fellini film I couldn't wait to get home and throw it in my broken ass computer. To say the least, Customer Matthew's high praise was entirely deserved. This tale of mouthy Italian prostitute Cabiria (played by Fellini's wife Giulietta Masina) is as heart-warming and hopeful as any movie I've ever seen. The gist of the story is that Cabiria is a tough-living lady of the night that is just continuously getting shat on by the world and those who live within it. Men take advantage of her (hell the film starts with her getting pushed into a roaring river by her boyfriend for a few hundred lire), her prostitute friends betray her and mock her, hell, even the good Lord won't throw her a break. But, and this is the heartwarming part, Cabiria just continues to see the good that this world possesses. It's beautiful, it's funny (Masina was referred to by the French as a female Chaplin), and the final shot of the movie is so goddamn optimistic that only those without blood-pumpers will be without a smile.

It's funny that The Long Good Friday (26) is the second film I'm talking about because it's such an exact opposite. The story of a man, Bob Hoskins (playing Cockney like no one else can) is a big-time gangster on the verge of a huge property deal who suddenly realizes that someone very smart and very dangerous is out to snuff his wicked little life. It's pretty much a film about a bad person who can't help but see the bad in the world, and the untimely fate that befalls him and his seedy friends. I don't want to give anything away, but I'll say this: this is a lean, mean piece of filmmaking that doth not pull a punch. If you like crime flicks this is a classic.

Hope everyone either found some place warm and friendly for the holidays or drank enough that it seemed that way.

Tuesday: And The Ship Sails On (50) and Flesh for Frankenstein (27)

A few nerd-related things, ALPHAVILLE (25) and BLACK ORPHEUS (48)

If the idea that I'm writing a blog about watching every film in the Criterion Collection doesn't paint me as enough of a dork (and it certainly does, at least that's what the ladies tell me) I'm currently writing said blog, whilst wearing my brand new asphalt gray Criterion shirt and drinking a steaming cup of joe from my brand new Criterion mug. You may remember me drunkenly purchasing these items a few weeks back and I've literally been checking every entrance of my house each afternoon to see where our wily mail man may have hidden them. Well they arrived and aside from a strange bubble in my Criterion mug, I couldn't be happier.

Oh wait, I actually can be happier, because Criterion just completely changed their website. A website? Who cares about a website? I care about website you cynical cockwanks. I've spent probably more time sleepily cruising the catalog of Criterion on their old, beautiful website than anything else. Their new website steps up the dork-related game a bit, indulging in the more internet saavy opportunities currently offered to a giant film company like this. You can buy films directly from them, indulge in free online "film festivals" and join forums to surround your (my)self with those of your/my ilk. It's said to say that I literally posted myself in front of the computer Monday night and just geeeeeeeeeeeeked out over the whole damn thing. If you're interested whatsoever in the films I'm talking about here, you should really check this site out, it'll get you even more excited, or at least get you more ammunition at which to smear my good name with:

THE BRAND NEW CRITERION COLLECTION WEBSITE

Alphaville (25) is my first exposure to an absolute staple of both The Criterion Collection and film in general, Jean-Luc Godard. He's a Frenchie that helped to create the French New Wave and is an absolute legend across the pond. I'd bet you a handful of pennies that one out of a thousand Americans have even heard his name. Alphaville (25) is a science-fiction movie but unlike what we know today. There's no Keanu Reeves, or giant monsters, or sweaty-bosomed girls fighting giant robots. Nope sir, this is a bizarre take on the world of consumerism as funnelled through film-noir and the early kernels of pop art. The main character Lemmy Caution (Eddie Constantine) is sort of bedraggled noir detective who arrives in the Ford Galaxy to solve, well, a mystery? It eventually turns in to a strange battle between man, shark-toothed women, a computer with seemingly a pack-a-day habit, and to be very honest, though I don't remember the plot lines or conclusions, I remember the mood, the strangeness, the occasional interaction between man and idea and in my beliefs, that's what this film was asking from me.

Black Orpheus (48) is a beautiful, and times poignant movie that, well, bored the shit out of me. I tried to watch it on both airplane rides from NY and had to stop and start the damn thing twenty times or more as I kept slipping off in to the sweet abyss of sleep. The story is that of Eurydice and Orpheus (Greek tragedy, they fall in love, death takes Eurydice, Orpheus goes to the Underworld to try and find her, stuff happens, he dies, everyone cries) but set in Brazil's Carnival. What struck me the most about this movie is the music, the constant beat that permeates the entire film, and when Orpheus realizes that something has happened to his beloved Eurydice (in a train car station) that music stops, and it brings an almost reckoning weight on to the film. It's interesting to see how Marcel Camus translates the myth to the setting and I especially enjoyed the hellish Bureau of Missing Persons, a place not populated by the dead, but by stacks of paper, each seemingly bearing the name and soul of the dead. The film ends, as does the myth, tragically, but a group of small children, the rising sun, and the continued rhythm of Carnival make it seem almost alright. A complete and total classic, just one that I was that endeared to.

Have a Happy T-Day! Drink a lot! Eat a lot! And fight with your family! That's the best thing ever!

No posts from me until Monday, don't cry, it's the holiday season! Just immerse yourself in guilt!

Few thoughts on the East Coast, and HIGH & LOW (24)

I'm baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack. Did you miss me?

Got in last night after a whirlwind tour of DC and New York, and I'm already sick after completely abusing my body over the course of the last four days. A few thoughts that I may expand on in the weeks to come:

1. Airplane travel is as hellish as ever. Ugly, old, unfriendly stewardesses, "lunches" of peanuts and Diet Coke and a the realization that not only are small dogs allowed on planes, but they can fit, kennel and all under the seat in front of you. The airlines keep wondering about why there businesses are sloughing towards the shitter, well, Mr. Delta CEO maybe you should put down your diamond encrusted cigar and take a peek in to the coach class.

2. DC is a great city, but New York is undoubtedly the greatest city in America. Huge, bustling, completely and amazingly overwhelming - it is everything that everyone has ever written or said about it, and more. It's dirty and loud and smelly and all the more beautiful because of it. I managed to see as much as I could in two and a half days, and was completely impressed by its every facet.

3. Don't let people tell you that New Yorker's are rude or unfriendly. My every experience as a absent minded tourist in the city was bettered by interactions with random, extremely helpful folk. They're not rude, they're just involved in whatever they're doing. I bet folk in Seattle, Washington are more obnoxious than the majority of folk currently crowding the streets of Manhattan.

4. I'm sick. Yup the combination of NY germs, airplane cabins, and just under 11 hours of sleep in four days left me sore-throated and bitter at 20,000 feet. To say the least, arriving in a rainy, cold, grey Seattle, Washington with a runny nose and the prospect of seven days of work ahead of me has left me a little down. I'll try to pep up over the course of the week.

5. Man, I had so many good observations over the course of my time in NY and now as I sit down to write them, I can't remember a damn thing. Well, I'll pick my brain over the next few weeks and make sure you guys have access to all of my absolutely exciting observations. Wow, now who's excited.

High and Low (24) is my favorite Criterion film I've seen so far. Akira Kurosawa directed this film from a screenplay based on a pulp novel written by noir-god Ed McBain. The film, broken in to three acts (the high, the middle, the low) revolves around a the kidnapping of a child and the very difficult decisions an extremely rich shoe-magnate (Toshiro Mifune) has to make. What's brilliant about this film is the structure - the way we're exposed to the glossy, castle like living of Toshiro Mifune's Kingo Gondo, then pulled in to the day-to-day work load of the everyday police force, before being thrust in to the seedy underworld of Japan's smoky, steamy underworld. Each section is wholly different than that which came before, and each digs deeper in to the morality tale Kurosawa so masterfully creates. So much is going on in this film, so many decisions, so many ways of picking apart the classist issues that plague Japanese society, so many symbols of the ways we view this life and the center of it all lies a rich man with a very difficult decision to be made. If you've ever questioned or wondered why anyone would think of Kurosawa as the master of film, this should put you in your place.

I was going to write about Black Orpheus (48), but I want to leave you thinking about High and Low (24) because it's a movie you need to see. So, get your hands out of your pants and put this on your Netflix.

Wednesday: Alphaville (25) and Black Orpheus (48)

Noah's Big East Coast Trip! ... and ROBOCOP (23)!

Oh boy oh boy, I'm writing this palms sweaty with anticipation because in less than seven hours I'll be getting up, heading to the airport and boarding a plane to the East Coast. Honestly, I was informing customers all day at the coffee shop that I was heading out to D.C. and New York ('cause that's what a barista does, forces people to listen to the minute details of his boring ass life ... sort of like what I make you lovely people do) and pretty much every person said something along the lines of, "Why are you going?" Uh ... 'cause I want to? Is that a good enough reason anymore? I know, I'm past the youthful 25-mark but do I need to go anywhere in the continental U.S. of A without some sort of professional reason. I want to go to D.C. to see the sites, eat some of the best Ethiopian food around and maybe peruse a few free museums. I want to go to New York because, hell, it's NEW YORK. It's the biggest city in the United States of America and I want to go there for three short days and experience just about anything I can get my unwashed hands on. I don't have any meetings or lunch dates or projects to pitch to well-dressed corporate types, nope, I'm just hitting the East Coast 'cause I've been on the West Coast for too long. There's a slim, slight, tiny chance of me moving there in the months/years to come, but I'm going pretty much because, well, it sounds like fun. Haters, step back.

Here's just another reason why I love the Criterion Collection: yesterday I talked about a little known classic directed by David Lean and starring the almighty Kathy Hepburn, and today, well today I'm talking about Robocop (23). Yup, the Paul Verhoeven directed sci-fi flick about a wounded man who's turned in to a cyborg police officer. When I was little I was so scared of this film because my brother's chubby friend Bobby Conover told me that a half melted man was exploded by a car AND that Robocop shot a criminal in the junk. To a gore-frightened eight year old this was pretty much like saying the movie involved Santa Clause getting murdered by the Easter Bunny.

Thus, I came in to Robocop (23) with only the scantest rumors of what it was and what it was about. Turns out what I thought was going to be a fairly dated 80s action flick, was actually a fairly dated 80s action flick with a mean disposition towards corporations. I mean, the film is pretty much about the interweaving of criminals and corporations and Robocop's role as there enforcer. It's got a lot of neon in it, the dad from That 70's Show, and a monster tank robot that falls down the stairs after exploding a guy with machine gun fire. That sounds pretty good right?

Alright, and you might want to sit down for this, I'm not going to post tomorrow. I'll be traveling and vakaying, and maybe I don't want to expose my intimate life details for just one brief moment. Jesus, you goddamn vultures stay the hell away from me and my life. I kid I kid ...

Monday: Who knows ... who knows ...

I still love the movie theatre and SUMMERTIME (22)

With the advent of the high end, ultra-huge, plasma/LCD/HD televisions, more and more people are complaining about going out to the theaters to see a movie. The prices are too high, there are too many godawful mouth-breathers polluting the sanctity of the theater with their ill-mannered comments and shameless cell-phone abuse - yes, these are very, very good reasons why watching a movie in the peace and quiet of your home is better than braving the shit show that the "theater experience" has become. I don't want to pay ten dollars to sit next to a 700 hundred pound man who squeezes me in to parts of the seat I didn't know existed and in front of a brainless stooge who tries impress his girlfriend by making comments like, "Whoa, that's a cool car" or "Oh man, that is so funny." I understand. But there is still something absolutely beautiful about a good theater experience.

And I had that tonight with the front-runner for my favorite film so far Let The Right One In. If you're at all film-interested, you've probably heard about this Swedish vampire flick that's garnering absolutely well-earned rave reviews from, well, everyone. I, being a gigantic loser, have spent a good deal of my time over the last eh, two months trying to get people syked about a foreign film about two kids (one a vampire) who fall in love by watching the trailer repeated times and quoting obscure reviews from even dorkier-than-I websites. Seemingly, someone out there is doing a better job than I because when I arrived at, may I say the shittiest theater in Sea-town to see it there was already a steady line of excited filmgoers. This worried me, big crowds create a better chance for dim-witted assholes, and when the sound flickered in and out in the beginning of the film, I started to worry more. Even more so, when the couple behind me started loudly translating the film, I almost snapped, but this lasted only briefly and by the time the film ended I was so happy with the audience and this brilliant movie that I could've hugged each and every one of them. I don't want to give away a damn thing about this film, but please get past all of your genre stereotypes of "horror" movies because this is beautiful, poignant, well-written, absolutely original film and you, being the film-lover that I know you are, need to get out there and see it. It's playing in limited runs in most big cities and is well worth a little travel. Sigh, this one is going to stay with me for a while.

I'd say Let The Right One In is about loneliness more than anything, finding someone, no matter what their past or their occupation or their moral code that you mesh with and being with them. It's what life, in a sense, is all about. And it's nice that Summertime (22) coincidentally is the Criterion film I get to talk about today because it addresses similar points in a totally different way. The film, an under-the-radar pic by David Lean (he of Lawrence of Arabia fame), features the always amazing Katherine Hepburn as a single woman on a vacation in Venice who falls for a strange man and begins a bit of a love affair. Sounds trite right? Wrong. Hepburn brings a certain panic to the film, a certain frantic loneliness that only an getting-on-in-age, single adult can truly know and it makes the film a sad and heartbreaking look at what loneliness can do to us. She's nervous around people, unsure of herself in this foreign country, and it makes us the viewer share in her uncomfortable sadness. Her romance with Renato (Rossano Brazzi), a married Italian, clicks but she overlooks his faults because she only wants someone to be with. I've always thought of Hepburn in her screwball comedy persona, the sort of fast-talking high society broad, but here she brings a real vulnerability that I loved. This was the film that most surprised me in how much I ended up liking it.

What a great evening of film. And here I was thinking that I'd just eat thirteen buffalo wings, feel slightly nauseous, and go to bed feeling emotional beaten. Take that life!

Thursday: Black Orpheus (48) and Robocop (23). Yes, that Robocop (23)

Late night writing, morning running, DEAD RINGERS (21) and INSOMNIA (47)

I'm switching up my schedule. Where in the past (read: last week) I'd wake up "early" and attempt to pound through my trifecta of blogging, then slog through another five and a half hours at the coffee shop, and then come home fairly spent and try to motivate myself to run, now I'm flip-flopping. I'm going to write at night. I'm going to eschew a little bit of my all-to-frequent boozing, so I can pound out three separate posts for three separate blogs (sometimes more) and have them nascent, glistening and ready for your perusal by the crack of dawn. This allows me more time in the morning to get up, dick around my room, and then badger myself/guilt-trip myself in to throwing on my running shorts and heading out in to the frosty cold morning. There's a few reasons for this:

1. I enjoy writing and nearly despise running. Thus, motivating myself to come home and write (basically sitting in a chair near a television) compared to motivating myself to run (the sweating, the cold, the shortness of breath) is, well, no comparison at all. Hopefully, HOPEFULLY, the change will increase the amount of times I run over the course of the week, bettering my actual running ability, thus, making my morning runs a pleasure, rather than the grueling shit shows they currently are.

2. There's far less people running at 9 in the morning and this is great for two other reasons. First, people are stupid and when there's lot of them together, they manage to clog the roads like brain-damaged sheep, this infuriates me and I hate running mad. Secondly, I think I run funny. The ex-girlfriend always said I was being vain, but every once in a while she'd let a comment slip about my "floppy bird arms" or my "fruity prance run" and the self-conscious running thoughts would crop up again. I always assume that every person I run past is checking me out, mocking my labored breathing, scoffing at my wobbly knees and bright red face. In the morning there's less of these pestering ooglers and the majority of them are equally odd in running style. I'm a strange man, you don't have to tell me this.

3. Hell, it's kind of nice to get up and get exercising. To get that blood pumping, the adrenaline flowing, so I can be awake, alert, and enthusiastic for a day of mind-numbingly steaming milk for a bunch of mouth-breathing soccer moms. Seriously, it helps.

So, hopefully, whatever time you wake in the morning, there will be a Criterion Quest entry waiting for your eager little eyes. Again, I say hopefully.

With Salo (17) out of the way, all of these Criterion films are shining like beautiful gems in a dirt strewn alleyway. I mean Dead Ringers (21) is a crazy, gory, at times disturbing film, but it's like sipping tea with your favorite stuffed animals compared to the shit-chomping horrors of Salo (17). The film, by one of my favorite directors David Cronenberg (you probably know him from more recent mainstream successes like A History of Violence and Eastern Promises), follows the slow, strange degradation of two very successful plastic surgeon twins who share, well, waaaaaaay too much. Seriously Jeremy Irons, playing both twins, is swapping ladies and lives like it's the norm, but sadly, one of them kind of becomes a wedge in the twins special bond and everything goes to shit. A lot of strange surgical utensils are purchased, a lot of drugs are done, and everything ends up extremely messy. It's a great film for those who like their flicks a little weirder than normal.

Insomnia (47) is a Norwegian film that was actually remade by the Batman himself, Christopher Nolan. While both films are extremely well made films, I enjoyed the Norwegian Insomnia (47) a little bit more. The film stars "that guy" Stellen Skarsgaard as a cop with a shady past who has to travel to Northern Sweden (where the sun never goes down) to solve a murder. Turns out Skaarsgard's cop is a bit amoral, to say the least, and the glaring white light of The Great North prevents him entirely from sleeping. This of course begins to push him closer and closer to the edge and an unfortunate shooting, everything starts to unravel. I love this film because I love the way the unyielding light seems to never give Skarsgaards character a chance to hide from his many many sins. The sun is always there, always pushing him to hide his tracks, to dig himself deeper in to the shit, 'cause everything is exposed. Skarsgaard is remarkably creepy in the film, and I can't really remember where I ever started thinking of him as a "likeable" actor. A great, stylistic modern piece of filmmaking.

Wednesday: Summertime (22) & Black Orpheus (48)

SALO (17) - was it worth it?

Salo (17) was, and probably always will be, one of the most painful, disturbing, stomach-turning movie watching experiences I've ever had. For those of you who haven't been following over the course of the last three days, the film revolves around a small town in 1940s Fascist Italy, where a group of sadistic politicos and their wives take a group of 18 youth and subject them to well, horrible, horrible tortures. I came in to this film expecting a certain amount of grossness, but Jesus almighty, it transcended my expectations. I stopped the film last week right before the segment entitled "Circles of Feces" and yes, there was a lot of poop involved. Poop stories, poop-filled bathtubs, crying girls eating poop, a gigantic dinner platter piled high with, yup you guessed, it human poop. In my entire life as a film watcher I've never been so disgusted that I honestly thought about turning a film off, but during this section of the film, I had to look away it was so viscerally disturbing. From here the film continues with a torture and further degradation and a nipple-burning moment that once again had me reaching for the stop button. This movie was not enjoyable in any way to watch.

Which begs the question: what's the point of making a movie so difficult to watch? Is their merit in makign a film this shockingly gross? Or is this just a sadistic son-of-a-bitch screwing with the minds of his audience?

I honestly don't know. You can see the symbolism inherent in the film, the bursts of life that seem to flutter even in the harshest of conditions but to me director Pier Paolo Pasolini (shot to death before the film was ever released) paints these flashes of life with such strange cruelty that I couldn't find much meaning in them. I like shock cinema, I like films that viscerally affect you, that leave an image on your brain that you just can't shake, but this might've been too much. Maybe it's because I've a lack of experience with Fascist Italy or that I couldn't get behind the extreme beliefs held by Pasolini, but this film made me feel dirty and that's about it. I challenge any of you to sit through this, but I can't recommend the viewing for any reason but that you'll forever be able to say that yes, you've seen Salo and survived. During my research of the film there were writers that said they'd seen it multiple times. These people are called morons.

Thank god, this film is finally out of my life. Tomorrow we'll get back to a regular viewing schedule.

Tuesday: Dead Ringers (21) & Insomnia (47)