December, New Titles, 'The Campaign' 'Dark Knight Rises'

CAMPAIGN, THE (2012)
The timing of this political comedy couldn’t be better. Ferrell is Cam Brady, a politician whose mane of commanding, election-winning hair is suspiciously Romney-like. And, like Romney, he’s busted saying something he shouldn’t on tape – here, it’s a filthy, X-rated sex message. That’s a goof-up too far for his shady billionaire backers, who pick a rival to challenge his re-election campaign. And they pick a doozy: oddball lovable loser Marty Huggins.

More New Titles
DARK KNIGHT RISES, THE (2012) DVD/BLU-RAY
SHE MONKEYS (2011)
SLEEPING BEAUTY, THE (2010) R1
GIRLS (2012) SEASON 1
HERE (2011)
PAUL KELLY: STORIES OF ME (2012)
REDFERN NOW (2012)
THIS IS ENGLAND '88 (2011)
LOOK AROUND YOU (2003) SEASON 1 R2/4
FEAR OF A BLACK HAT (2003) R1
HOLLOW CROWN, THE: RICHARD II (2012) R2/4
HOLLOW CROWN, THE: HENRY IV PARTS 1&2 (2012) R2/4
HOLLOW CROWN, THE: HENRY V (2012) R2/4
A NEW LEAF (1971) R1
JACK IRISH: BLACK TIDE (2012) R4
KILLING TIME (2010) COMPLETE SERIES R4
PAGE ONE: INSIDE THE NEW YORK TIMES (2011) R4
SAPPHIRES, THE (2012) R4
VAMPS (2012) R4
FORGIVENESS OF BLOOD, THE (2011) CRITERION
REVENGE OF THE ELECTRIC CAR (2011)
LE CIEL EST A VOUS (1944)
BLACK PANTHER, THE (1977)
LIFE AND DEATH OF COLONEL BLIMP, THE (1943)
LIFE AND DEATH OF COLONEL BLIMP (1943) BLU-RAY
CHERNOBYL DIARIES (2012)
ICE AGE 4: CONTINENTAL DRIFT (2012)
MAGIC MIKE (2012)

November, New Titles, '2 Days In Paris', 'Prometheus'

No, you’ve not got déjà vu. The title might look familiar. But this is French actress and filmmaker  Julie Delpy taking to heart the line that directors make the same film over and over. In 2007, Delpy wrote and directed the spiky romcom ‘2 Days in Paris’, starring as a photographer, Marion, who takes her uptight New Yorker boyfriend back to Paris to meet the parents. Five years later, and Delpy has reversed the roles: la famille is in New York to meet the boyfriend (a new one, Mingus, played by Chris Rock). And it’s more of the same, with diminishing returns: less bite and more screwballish, madcap farce.

Other New Titles

2 DAYS IN NEW YORK (2012)
DARK HORSE (2011)
SNOW WHITE AND THE HUNTSMAN (2012)
UNDERGROUND: THE JULIAN ASSANGE STORY (2012)
A ROYAL AFFAIR (2012)
ELENA (2011)
INTO THE ABYSS (2011) | ON DEATH ROW (2012)
A FANTASTIC FEAR OF EVERYTHING (2012)
REMORQUES (1941)
MAYOR OF THE SUNSET STRIP (2003)
LONESOME (1928)
CIRCUMSTANCE (2011)
INTRUDERS (2011)
TAKE THIS WALTZ (2011)
THREE STOOGES, THE (2012)
WHERE DO WE GO NOW? (2011)
A HAPPY EVENT (2011)
LES VISITEURS DU SOIR (1942) CRITERION
QUADROPHENIA (1979) CRITERION
LUMIERE D'ETE (1943)
CIRCUMSTANCE (2011)
INTRUDERS (2011)
TAKE THIS WALTZ (2011)
THREE STOOGES, THE (2012)
WHERE DO WE GO NOW? (2011)
FOOTNOTE (2011)
TOMBOY (2011)
KABOOM (2010)
CABIN IN THE WOODS, THE (2011)
CHAINED (2012)
JACK IRISH: BAD DEBTS (2012)
MARLEY (2012)
DOLLHOUSE (2009) SEASON 1 DISCS 1-2
DOLLHOUSE (2009) SEASON 1 DISCS 3-4
KEYHOLE (2011)
BLACK PANTHER, THE (1977) BLU-RAY
PROMETHEUS (2012)
PROMETHEUS (2012) BLU-RAY
ROCK OF AGES (2012)
WE WERE HERE (2011)
OBSCURE JAPANESE PORN
DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS (1971)
ONCE UPON A TIME IN ANATOLIA (2011) REGION 4
SEPARATION (1968)
GET THE GRINGO (2012)
MOONRISE KINGDOM (2012)
NOSTALGIA FOR THE LIGHT (2010)
PRIVATE ROMEO (2011)
REC: GENESIS (2012)
TURIN HORSE, THE (2011)
WHITE VENGEANCE (2011)
WOMAN IN THE FIFTH, THE (2011)
CALL THE MIDWIFE (2012)
PUBERTY BLUES (2012)
INNOCENT SORCERERS (1960)
PRIMROSE PATH (1940)
TAKING FATHER HOME (2006)
STORY OF A CHEAT, THE (1936)
QUADRILLE (1938)
PEARLS OF THE CROWN, THE (1937)
DESIRE (1937)

Wes Anderson's new film is utterly absorbing and a sheer delight. With nothing to dislike about it, its only fault is that it ends at all. A flippant facile soupcon perhaps, but warm blooded, cuddly, rather pink and fluffy, a variety of canapés with no main course, and very saucy for a teenage love story. Filled with too many characters,  some that are hardly drawn, it leaves major actors with almost nothing to do, but who's quibbling.
Its diametrical opposite in contemporary cinema is surely Bela Tarr's latest and final film, the lugubrious 'The Turin Horse' in which a rural farmer is forced to confront the mortality of his faithful beast of burden, which appears to be the same animal the philosopher Nietzsche went mad over.
It was with passionate relief that cinemagoers worldwide greeted the news of Bela Tarr's retirement, and this his last film reminds us all why. One of the great bores of contemporary cinema, Mr Tarr has proved a leading light in the post-modernist movement that aims to drive audiences out of picturehouses by occupying the austere high ground with minimalist scriptless plotless one-eyed studies of inactivity.
 Unlike the cine-revolutionaries of the early Seventies, he has no interest in the erotic, the stylish, the witty or the political. In its place, we endure a morose contemplation of utter banality and non-event. This is what awards committees reward in our time, but Bela has finally wearied of wearying everybody. Perhaps he was supported like Tarkovsky, Sokorov and Tsai Ming Liang by generous state subsidy. Perhaps that support has waned. Without it, work like this could never have got made, and there will be those in the West who admire this staunch dreariness simply because it could never get funded in our ruthless free-markets.

(PS The allusion to Nietzsche's horse in the title is purely tendentious, a meretricious attempt to secure funding.)

More Titles For October
ONCE UPON A TIME IN ANATOLIA (2011) REGION 4
SEPARATION (1968)
GET THE GRINGO (2012)
MOONRISE KINGDOM (2012)
NOSTALGIA FOR THE LIGHT (2010)
PRIVATE ROMEO (2011)
REC: GENESIS (2012)
TURIN HORSE, THE (2011)
WHITE VENGEANCE (2011)
WOMAN IN THE FIFTH, THE (2011)
CALL THE MIDWIFE (2012)
PUBERTY BLUES (2012)
INNOCENT SORCERERS (1960)
PRIMROSE PATH (1940)
TAKING FATHER HOME (2006)
STORY OF A CHEAT, THE (1936)
QUADRILLE (1938)
PEARLS OF THE CROWN, THE (1937)
DESIRE (1937)

September, New Titles, 'Damsels In Distress', 'The Avengers'

'Damsels In Distress'
After directing a trio of highbrow preppy comedies in the ’90s (Metropolitan, Barcelona), Whit Stillman disappeared. Now he’s back with this delightfully deadpan, elegantly anachronistic campus movie. What took him so long? Maybe he’s been waiting for a girl like Greta Gerwig to come along.

In the 28-year-old, the director has found his soulmate: here’s an actress who delivers his hyper-literate dialogue with aplomb, who has an air of having spent her teens listening to Jacques Brel and watching ‘Annie Hall’ on repeat. She stars as Violet, the ringleader of a gang of girls at an East Coast American university whose mission is to make college life more fragrant: they’re not so much mean girls as girls who mean well.

Other New September Titles

ART OF LOVE, THE (2011)
BIRDSONG (2012)
ECSTASY (2011)
LADY, THE (2011)
WAY, THE (2010)
W.E. (2011)
AVENGERS, THE (2012)
AVENGERS, THE (2012) BLU-RAY
JESS + MOSS (2011)
PINA (2011)
SONS OF ANARCHY (2010) SEASON 3
WISH YOU WERE HERE (2012)
DAMSELS IN DISTRESS (2011)
GOLD RUSH, THE (1925)
TUESDAY, AFTER CHRISTMAS (2010)
LIFEBOAT (1944)
DAVID HOLZMAN'S DIARY (1967)
SUCH GOOD FRIENDS (1971)
LONDON TALES (1958 | 1966 | 1976)
WONDERFUL LONDON (1924)
GAME OF THRONES SEASON 1 (2011) DISCS 3-5
SOURCE, THE (2011)
GRAY'S ANATOMY (1996) CRITERION
BULLHEAD (2011)
39 STEPS, THE (1935) CRITERION
RETURN OF THE PRODIGAL SON (1967)
PITFALL (1948)
BREAKING POINT, THE (1950)
CONFLICT (1945)
TOMORROW IS ANOTHER DAY (1951)
INNKEEPERS, THE (2011)
WELCOME TO THE RILEYS (2010)
NOEL FIELDING'S LUXURY COMEDY (2012)
HUNGER GAMES, THE (2012)
HUNGER GAMES, THE (2012) BLU-RAY
PEARLS OF THE DEEP (1966)
AND EVERYTHING IS GOING FINE (2010) CRITERION
INTO THE ABYSS (2011)
SURVIVING LIFE (THEORY AND PRACTICE) (2010)
BEING ELMO: A PUPPETEER'S JOURNEY (2011)
GOODBYE, FIRST LOVE (2011)
HIDDEN FACE, THE (2011)
LE HAVRE (2011)
RAID, THE (2011)
DARD DIVORCE (2007)
AN AMERICAN ROMANCE (1944)

August, New Titles, 'Margaret', 'Salmon Fishing'

MARGARET (2011)

Kenneth Lonergan's long-awaited follow-up to the much-loved 'You Can Count On Me' fails to deliver that film's intelligent study of tenderness between quarrelling brother and sister, but this car-crash moral-maze melodrama has moments of insight and dramatic tension. Warner Brothers dithered over releasing the picture, then delayed the DVD, after difficulties between the studio and the maverick director threatened to shelve the movie. All of which suggests Lonergan should probably have trialled the script as a play off-Broadway, as with his earlier effort, before making a low-budget independent pic. Still, worth a look, but struggles with its portentous moral crux, over-long and for contemporary New York through eyes of morally conflicted twenty-something woman  not a patch on 'Girls'.

SALMON FISHING IN THE YEMEN (2011)
SLAP, THE (2011)
A LITTLE BIT OF HEAVEN (2011)
BATTLESHIP (2012)
LEDGE, THE (2011)
IN DARKNESS (2011)
SPUD (2010)
THIS MUST BE THE PLACE (2011)
CONFIDENCE (1979)
LARKS ON A STRING (1969)
CAPRICIOUS SUMMER (1968)
JOKE, THE (1969)
DAISIES / A REPORT ON THE PARTY AND GUESTS (1966)
RUGGLES OF RED GAP (1935)
LORAX, THE (2012)
NOTHING TO DECLARE
DOWNTON ABBEY SEASON 2 (2011)
PORTLANDIA (2011) SEASON 1
BREAKING UPWARDS (2009)
DEAR LEMON LIMA (2009)
AFRICA UNITED (2010)
BIG YEAR, THE (2011)
FORGIVENESS OF BLOOD, THE (2011)
HAYWIRE (2011)
SOLARIS (1972) BLU-RAY
BHOWANI JUNCTION (1956)
LIFEBOAT (1944) BLU-RAY
RUGGLES OF RED GAP (1935) BLU-RAY
SUMMER INTERLUDE (1951) CRITERION
SUMMER WITH MONIKA (1953) CRITERION
SANAM (2000)
A DANGEROUS METHOD (2011)
BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL, THE (2011)
CORIOLANUS (2011)
50/50 (2011)
HEADHUNTERS (2011)
LIKE CRAZY (2011)
SING YOUR SONG: HARRY BELAFONTE (2011)
CHINATOWN (1974) BLU-RAY

Greatest Films Of All Time, Sight & Sound poll, 2012

Once every ten years, Sight & Sound magazine publishes its critics' poll of the greatest 50 movies of all time. The big shock this year (apart from the inclusion of the wildly over-rated 'In The Mood For Love') is that the total number of critics in the world has swollen in the last decade from 150 to a massive 853. We can only hope that swingeing austerity cuts bring about a reduction in this number before the next poll in 2022.

As usual, Video Dogs is the only place in this wide brown land where you can find all of these titles on DVD, with many now on Blu-ray.
 

1. Vertigo Alfred Hitchcock, 1958 (191 votes)

 2. Citizen Kane Orson Welles, 1941 (157 votes)

 3. Tokyo Story Ozu Yasujiro, 1953 (107 votes)

 4. La Règle du jeu Jean Renoir, 1939 (100 votes)

 5. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans FW Murnau, 1927 (93 votes)

 6. 2001: A Space Odyssey Stanley Kubrick, 1968 (90 votes)

 7. The Searchers John Ford, 1956 (78 votes)

 8. Man with a Movie Camera Dziga Vertov, 1939 (68 votes)

 9. The Passion of Joan of Arc Carl Dreyer, 1927 (65 votes)

 10. 8½, Federico Fellini, 1960 (64 votes)

 11. Battleship Potemkin Sergei Eisenstein, 1925 (63 votes)

 12. L’Atalante Jean Vigo, 1934 (58 votes)

 13. Breathless Jean-Luc Godard, 1960 (57 votes)

 14. Apocalypse Now Francis Ford Coppola, 1979 (53 votes)

 15. Late Spring, Ozu Yasujiro, 1949 (50 votes)

 16. Au hasard Balthazar Robert Bresson, 1966 (49 votes)

 17= Seven Samurai Kurosawa Akira, 1954 (48 votes)

 17= Persona Ingmar Bergman, 1966 (48 votes)

 19. Mirror Andrei Tarkovsky, 1974 (47 votes)

 20. Singin’ in the Rain Stanley Donen & Gene Kelly, 1951 (46 votes)

 21= L’avventura Michelangelo Antonioni, 1960 (43 votes)

 21= Le Mépris Jean-Luc Godard, 1963 (43 votes)

 21= The Godfather Francis Ford Coppola, 1972 (43 votes)

 24= Ordet Carl Dreyer, 1955 (42 votes)

 24= In the Mood for Love Wong Kar-Wai, 2000 (42 votes)

 26= Rashomon Kurosawa Akira, 1950 (41 votes)

 26= Andrei Rublev Andrei Tarkovsky, 1966 (41 votes)

 28. Mulholland Dr. David Lynch, 2001 (40 votes)

 29= Stalker Andrei Tarkovsky, 1979 (39 votes)

 29= Shoah Claude Lanzmann, 1985 (39 votes)

 31= The Godfather Part II Francis Ford Coppola, 1974 (38 votes)

 31= Taxi Driver Martin Scorsese, 1976 (38 votes)

 33. Bicycle Thieves Vittoria De Sica, 1948 (37 votes)

 34. The General Buster Keaton & Clyde Bruckman, 1926 (35 votes)

 35= Metropolis Fritz Lang, 1927 (34 votes)

 35= Psycho Alfred Hitchcock, 1960 (34 votes)

 35= Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce 1080 Bruxelles Chantal Akerman, 1975 (34 votes)

 35= Sátántangó Béla Tarr, 1994 (34 votes)

 39= The 400 Blows François Truffaut, 1959 (33 votes)

 39= La dolce vita Federico Fellini, 1960 (33 votes)

 41. Journey to Italy Roberto Rossellini, 1954 (32 votes)

 42= Pather Panchali Satyajit Ray, 1955 (31 votes)

 42= Some Like It Hot Billy Wilder, 1959 (31 votes)

 42= Gertrud Carl Dreyer, 1964 (31 votes)

 42= Pierrot le fou Jean-Luc Godard, 1965 (31 votes)

 42= Play Time Jacques Tati, 1967 (31 votes)

 42= Close-Up Abbas Kiarostami, 1990 (31 votes)

 48= The Battle of Algiers Gillo Pontecorvo, 1966 (30 votes)

 48= Histoire(s) du cinéma Jean-Luc Godard, 1998 (30 votes)

 50= City Lights Charlie Chaplin, 1931 (29 votes)

 50= Ugetsu monogatari Mizoguchi Kenji, 1953 (29 votes)

 50= La Jetée Chris Marker, 1962 (29 votes)

Chris Marker, 1921-2012

Chris Marker was a French writer, photographer, documentary film director, multimedia artist and film essayist. His best known films are La jetée, A Grin Without a Cat, Sans Soleil and AK, an essay film on the Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa.
An enigmatic writer, photographer, filmmaker and multimedia artist who pioneered the flexible hybrid form known as the essay film, he died on Sunday in Paris. He was 91.

Chris Marker, left, with Alain Resnais in 1954

Helene Chatelain in 'La Jetee'

Made entirely of still images, save for one brief moving sequence of a woman closing her eyes, La Jetee is Marker's best-known film: set in Paris after World War III it was to become the basis for Terry Gilliam's 'Twelve Monkeys'.

A transmedia artist long before the term was coined, Mr. Marker resisted categorization throughout his career; he once referred to “career” as “that despicable word.”

 In Sans Soleil (Sunless, 1983), a fictional cameraman (a Marker surrogate) tries to make sense of the cultural dislocation he feels in Japan, West Africa and Iceland.

More than 20 years after his first film on the subject, and after the fall of Soviet communism, Marker returned to Medvedkin in Le Tombeau d'Alexandre (The Last Bolshevik, 1992). The film is a series of video letters to Medvedkin (who died in 1989) and provides a broader, incisive meditation on the nature of reality, fiction, art, ideology and history.

At VIDEODOGS you can find all these Marke films, as well as 'A Grin Without A Cat' and  'A Day In The Life Of Arseny Arsenivitch' on Tarkovsky. See all titles here.

July, New Titles, 'Portuguese Nun', 'House of Tolerance'

A witty, luminous, reflective and extremely wise travelogue of the soul, it follows Franco-Portuguese actress Julie (Leonor Baldaque) as she travels to Lisbon to perform in a film based on the anonymous letters of the title's 17th century nun. Drawn into the mysteries of the city (indeed, this could have taken the title of the late Raul Ruiz's final magnum opus) and of a passionately held faith, Julie finds herself questioning the basis of her life and its meaning. Through a series of pivotal encounters, not least with the white city itself, she is subtly transformed. Green channels Bresson and Ozu in his immaculately understated but deeply humane making, but the imaginative world he crafts is entirely his own - warm, beautiful and profound. Great soundtrack too, featuring Fado singers.

HOUSE OF TOLERANCE (2011)
BLUEBEARD (2009)
IN A BETTER WORLD (2010)
JOHN CARTER (2012)
KLITSCHKO (2011)
MABO (2012)
STRANGE AFFAIR OF UNCLE HARRY, THE (1945)
ELUSIVE PIMPERNEL, THE (1950)
IMMORTAL STORY, THE (1968)
LA CHIENNE (1931)
FILM SOCIALISME (2010)
NO SUBTITLES NECESSARY: LASZLO & VILMOS (2008)
EATING OUT: THE OPEN WEEKEND (2011)
HARDWARE WARS (1978)
EXTREMELY LOUD & INCREDIBLY CLOSE (2011)
GREY, THE (2011)
SWELL SEASON, THE (2011)
WOODY ALLEN: A DOCUMENTARY (2012)
ARTIST, THE (2011) BLU-RAY
STRANGER, THE (1946)

New titles, June, 'The Artist', 'Contraband', 'Woman in the Fifth'

1920s California for a loving – and silent – recreation of Hollywood on the verge of sound. ‘The Artist’ is shot in exactly the same speechless, monochrome style as the movies in which our tragic hero, actor George Valentin (Dujardin), employs a canny arched eyebrow or breaks out into a rip-roaring tap-dancing routine to woo his adoring audience.

It’s 1927, Valentin is a star, but, oh no, is that the sound of… sound, on the horizon? Valentin is an insufferable ham. He laps up the adoration at a premiere, ignoring his co-stars and hogging the stage with a trusty performing dog (a constant, cute presence in the film). His domestic life is shaky, and his wife isn’t impressed when he’s snapped outside the premiere with an unknown woman and they both appear on the cover of Variety. The woman is young, beautiful Peppy Miller (Bérénice Bejo), who turns up as an extra on George’s next picture, ‘The German Affair’.
 

Other New Titles

BEING JOHN MALKOVICH (1999) CRITERION

BUCK (2011)

CONTRABAND (2012)

LATE BLOOMERS (2011)

WOMAN IN THE FIFTH, THE (2011)

BORGIAS, THE (2012) SEASON ONE

WALKING DEAD, THE (2012) SEASON 2

MY NIGHT WITH MARILYN (2011)

NIGHTBIRDS (1970)
LAUREL & HARDY: SWISS MISS, ETC. (1938)
CHRONICLE (2012)
FASTEST (2011)
SUNSET LIMITED, THE (2011)
MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE (2011)
MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE (2011) BLU-RAY
CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM (2011) SEASON 8

UTAMARO AND HIS FIVE WOMEN (1946)
DESIRE (1936)
WOMAN OF THE LAKE (1966)
MACHETE MAIDENS UNLEASHED! (2010)
SAFE HOUSE (2012)
SHAME (2011)
WEEKEND (2011)
WOMAN, THE (2011)
YOU DON'T KNOW JACK (2010)

Top 10 films featuring Queens

As one wealthy unelected dictator celebrates avoiding being deposed for more than half a century, we look back at some of the other queens in cinema history.

The African Queen

In Africa during WW1, a gin-swilling riverboat owner/captain is persuaded by a strait-laced missionary to use his boat to attack an enemy warship. Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn star in John Huston's Technicolour comedy about an odd couple aboard a boat in times of war. Rent $4.40

The Bandit Queen

Phoolan Devi, the Goddess of Flowers, India's Bandit Queen, surrendered with her gang on her own terms, negotiating with a police force that was unable to capture her. Shekhar Kapur's film captures the cheering crowds of ten thousand, who considered her an avenging angel, the scourge of the high castes and the rich, and protector of the low caste and poor. Rent $4.40

Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen

A teenage girl is convinced that her home city revolves around her until her family packs up and moves to the suburbs, where she finds herself competing for attention. Rent $4.40

Kings And Queen

Nora is in her thirties and has loved four men - her son Elias, Elias's deceased father, her own father, and Ismael, a musician given to odd behavior with whom she lived seven years. Faced with her father's death, Nora seeks out Ismael to ask that he reconnect with Elias. Rent $4.40

Queen Of Spades

An elderly countess strikes a bargain with the devil and exchanges her soul for the ability to always win at cards... Thorold Dickinson's horror comedy with Edith Evans just pre-dates our glorious Queen's reign, but she might have watched it on her honeymoon. Rent $4.40

Nine Queens

Marcos observes Juan successfully pulling off a bill-changing scam on a cashier, and then getting caught as he attempts to pull the same trick on the next shift. Marcos steps in, claiming to be a policeman, and drags Juan out of the store. Once they are back on the street, Marcos reveals himself to be a fellow swindler with a game of much higher stakes in mind, and he invites Juan to be his partner in crime. Rent $4.40

Priscilla Queen Of The Desert

Australia's triumphant riposte to the accusation that it is a land without high culture. Homophobia is solved by ambitious actors dressing in provocative frocks and touring the set of 'Wake In Fright', meeting the extras and being attacked with table-tennis balls. Painful, unfunny but impossible to delete from the national psyche. Rent $4.40

Queen Margot

Young Queen Margot finds herself trapped in an arranged marriage amidst a religious war between Catholics and Protestants. She hopes to escape with a new lover, but finds herself imprisoned by her powerful and ruthless family. Rent $4.40

Virgin Queen

Sir Walter Raleigh overcomes court intrigue to win favor with Queen Bette Davis in order to get financing for a proposed voyage to the New World in Henry Koster's magnificent treatment made in Year Three of our supreme commander's glorious reign.

Queen Christina

Young Christina ascends to the Swedish throne at age 5. While she is queen, Sweden becomes a dominant European power at the end of the Thirty Years War. Like England's Elizabeth I, Christina (Greta Garbo) is pressured into a politically correct marriage (her cousin) but she falls in love with an emissary from Spain (John Gilbert). Rent $4.40

New Titles, June, 'Hugo', 'The Skin I Live In'

STORY OF FILM, THE: AN ODYSSEY (2011)

Mark Cousins' enormously comprehensive history of cinema was a great book and now he's turned it into a highly enjoyable series, with interviews and linking segments shot by himself on DV that visit the locations of some of cinema's greatest moments and turns a still, melancholy eye on them as they are today. His global approach gives fair space to Iranian, Indian and Japanese cinema, as much as to American and British approaches of storytelling, though his low-key, worldweary Irish accented narration may irk with some. All ten one-hour episodes are included on 5 disks.

Other new stuff this week

HUGO (2011)

SKIN I LIVE IN, THE (2011)

DEVILS, THE (1971)

ALBERT NOBBS (2011)

DARKEST HOUR, THE (2011)

FLYING SWORDS OF DRAGON GATE, THE (2011)

Q (2011)

UNDERWORLD: AWAKENING (2012)

KILLING, THE: SERIES 2 (2009)

STORY OF THE LAST CHRYSANTHEMUMS, THE (1939)

ALAMBRISTA! (1977) CRITERION

ANATOMY OF A MURDER (1959) CRITERION

ORGANIZER, THE (1963) CRITERION

EDWARD SAID: TWO FILMS (2004/2005)

STROMBOLI (1950)

UNE SI JOLIE PETITE PLAGE (1949)

TOOMELAH (2011)

WELL-DIGGER'S DAUGHTER, THE (2011)

X (2011)

GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO, THE (2011)

GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO, THE (2011) BLU-RAY

BIG LOVE SEASON 5 (2011) DISCS 1-2

BIG LOVE SEASON 5 (2011) DISCS 3-4

TRUE BLOOD SEASON 4 (2011) DISCS 1-3

TRUE BLOOD SEASON 4 (2011) DISCS 4-6

New Titles, May, 'Young Adult' 'Tinker Tailor...' 'Muppets'

Here’s a new comedy from Jason Reitman and Diablo Cody, the writer/director duo behind ‘Juno’. But don’t go expecting another happy, warm hug of a movie: YOUNG ADULT is much less of a charmer, trailing a juicy waft of sourness behind it. Charlize Theron gives her best performance in years; she’s properly funny (who knew?) as Mavis Gary, a train-wreck who crashes into her hometown to reclaim her high-school sweetheart, Buddy. What, Buddy’s happily married? Devoted to his new baby? Like Mavis gives a damn. She’s angry, self-obsessed, immature, stalkerish, possibly alcoholic… and we’re kinda gunning for her.


Other new stuff this week


TINKER TAILOR SOLDIER SPY (2011)
MUPPETS, THE (2011)
FORBIDDEN LEGEND, THE: SEX & CHOPSTICKS 1&2 (2008)
WOMEN ON THE 6TH FLOOR, THE (2010)

ON THE ECSTASY OF SKI-FLYING (2008)

SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER (2003)

A SEPARATION (2011)

FRY'S PLANET WORD (2011)
COLORADO TERRITORY (1949)
GREED (1924)
WAYS OF SEEING (1972)

New Titles, May, 'We Bought A Zoo' 'War Horse' 'Iron Lady'

It’s not often we get to see Matt Damon in civvy emotions – these days he’s more likely to wear the dead-eyed stare of a man with too many deaths on his conscience. Here he is, though, with a soulful, tender performance as recently widowed dad-of-two Benjamin, anchoring another happy-sad feelgood drama from Cameron Crowe.

The film is based on British journalist Benjamin Mee’s account of buying Dartmoor Zoo, transplanted by Crowe to California, where even grief is dappled in warm sunlight and mellowed by Cat Stevens. Benjamin buys the tumbledown menagerie on a whim, to the delight of his seven-year-old daughter (Maggie Elizabeth Jones, the cutest kid actor since Drew Barrymore) and the horror of his teenage son. Among its quirky residents, on two legs and four, is zoo keeper Kelly (Scarlett Johansson, too smouldering by half). Crowe, to his credit, is more concerned with insights about family than romance – and some of these are heart-on-sleeve touching if you’ve got a sweet tooth for the stickier stuff.

Other new stuff

LIFE AT THE TOP (1965)

A BIGGER SPLASH (1973)

A BIGGER SPLASH (1973) BLU-RAY

PEEP SHOW (2010) SEASON 7

HER PRIVATE HELL (1968)

HER PRIVATE HELL (1968) BLU-RAY

MARWENCOL (2010)

CLOSE TO EDEN (1991)

WE HAVE A POPE (2011)

LETTER NEVER SENT (1959) CRITERION

WAR ROOM, THE (1993)

PATIENCE (AFTER SEBALD) (2012)

EL BULLI: COOKING IN PROGRESS (2011)

FACE TO FACE (2011)

TITANIC (2012) TV SERIES

WAR HORSE (2011)

WE BOUGHT A ZOO (2011)

THIS IS NOT A FILM (2011)

LUNACY (2005)

ADVENTURES OF TINTIN, THE (2011)

EYE OF THE STORM, THE (2011)

HAPPY FEET 2 (2011)

IRON LADY, THE (2011)

TOWER HEIST (2011)

MARTYRS (2008)

RESTLESS (2011)

DEEP BLUE SEA, THE (2011)

AGES OF LOVE, THE (2011)

BURNING MAN (2011)

MACHINE GUN PREACHER (2011)

MISSION IMPOSSIBLE: GHOST PROTOCOL (2011)

MELANCHOLIA (2011) BLU-RAY

New Titles, April, 'Once Upon A Time In Anatolia'

The new film from Nuri Bilge Ceylan follows a group of men driving across the Turkish steppe, hunting for the body of a murder victim. The murderer is in the car. The men are cops, escorting him to the site where he has buried the remains. The film is a cop procedural, with a difference. For the director is Turkey's answer to Andrei Tarkovsky, Bela Tarr, Angelopoulos and Sokurov. The great bores of modern cinema. This is Tarantino for film studies PhD's.

Murder mysteries rarely run as deep as this long, dark night of the soul from Turkish filmmaker Nuri Bilge Ceylan, director of ‘Uzak’ and ‘Three Monkeys’. Ceylan is a master of brooding stories defined by their wry questioning of human nature and often focused on men in crisis. He has an unflinching eye for the worst in all of us and for the black comedy and absurd banalities of everyday life.

For his sixth film, Ceylan has chosen his bleakest canvas yet: a murder investigation that begins in the dark wilds of the great Anatolian outdoors and ends in the cold light of an autopsy room. In tone, it’s Ceylan’s most epic and talky film yet. But don’t be fooled – it’s also his most mysterious and meditative.

Other New Stuff This Week

DON'T BE AFRAID OF THE DARK (2010)

DREAM HOUSE (2011)

PUSS IN BOOTS (2011)

SNOW FLOWER AND THE SECRET FAN (2011)

SHAMELESS (US) SEASON 1 (2011)

FIRST GRADER, THE (2010)

JUDY MOODY AND THE NOT BUMMER SUMMER (2011)

SOLITUDE OF PRIME NUMBERS, THE (2010)

IDES OF MARCH, THE (2011)

IDES OF MARCH, THE (2011) BLU-RAY

TREME SEASON 2 (2011) DISC 1-2

TREME SEASON 2 (2011) DISC 3-4

BURNT BY THE SUN (1994)

ANNA: FROM 6 TILL 18 (1994)

DARK EYES (1987)

New Titles, March, 'Vanya On 42nd St', 'Moneyball', 'My Week With Marilyn'

A great list of titles for the month of March. Best of all, it's good to see 'Vanya On 42nd Street' from Criterion. If you want to see other versions of Chekhov's play, check out the 'Anton Chekhov' set for the Olivier, Ian Holm & Anthony Hopkins versions.

We also changed our Rent By Mail policy. Now you can rent one title at a time for only $7.70 a time, and keep it for up to one month. (4 titles still costs $19.95). We also repeated our popular special so members can pay $20 and get $50 of rental credits on their account.

ATTENBERG (2010)

MONEYBALL (2011)

MYSTERIES OF LISBON (2010)

RED STATE (2011)

TRANSIT (2012)

IMMORTALS (2011)

PROJECT NIM (2011)

MY WEEK WITH MARILYN (2011)

THE DESCENDANTS (2011)

HIGHER GROUND (2011)

MARGIN CALL (2011)

GILIAP (1975)

AMARCORD (1973) BLU-RAY CRITERION

RECONSTRUCTION, THE (1970)

DAYS OF '36 (1972)

TRAVELLING PLAYERS, THE (1975)

HUNTERS, THE (1977)

DEBT, THE (2010)

GUILTY OF ROMANCE (2011)

KNUCKLE (2011)

REAL STEEL (2011)

SHOCK DOCTRINE, THE (2009)

WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN (2011)

BREAKING BAD SEASON 4

DESK SET (1957)

STATE OF THE UNION (1948)

RUM DIARY, THE (2011)

VANYA ON 42ND STREET (1994) CRITERION

PORTRAIT D'UNE ENFANT DECHUE (1970)

PROVIDENCE (1977)

STRUCTURE OF CRYSTAL, THE (1969)

WALKING DEAD, THE SEASON 1 (2010)

J. EDGAR (2011)

DAYS OF THE ECLIPSE (1988)

IL DONO (2003)

ILLUMINATION (1973)

ILLUSION TRAVELS BY STREETCAR (1954)

L'AMOUR FOU (1969)

THE MIRROR (1997)

THE MOTHER AND THE WHORE (1973)

OUT 1 (1971)

THE QUINCE TREE SUN (1992)

SUMMER IN THE CITY (1970)

SUPERSTAR: THE KAREN CARPENTER STORY (1988)

VISITOR OF A MUSEUM (1989)

TWILIGHT: BREAKING DAWN PART 1 (2011)

OUR IDIOT BROTHER (2011)

PERFECT SENSE (2011)

TAKE SHELTER (2011)

DRIVE (2011) REGION 4

TT: CLOSER TO THE EDGE (2011)

HUGO (2011)

TINY FURNITURE (2010) CRITERION

THREE OUTLAW SAMURAI (1964) CRITERION

LES GIRLS (1957)

GODZILLA (1954) CRITERION

POTO AND CABENGO (1980) CRITERION

ROUTINE PLEASURES (1986)

MY CRASY LIFE (1992)

WARP VISION: THE VIDEOS 1989-2004

BELLE DE JOUR (1967) Criterion

XALA (1974)

A MOMENT OF INNOCENCE (1996)

MOMENT OF TRUTH, THE (1965) CRITERION

3 BY THEO (1994, 1996, 2003) 3 X DVD SET

BEST MAN, THE (1964)

DROLE DE DRAME (1937)

TAKEN (2008)

MIDNIGHT IN PARIS (2011)

BILL CUNNINGHAM NEW YORK (2010)

GAME OF THRONES SEASON 1 (2011)

GAME OF THRONES SEASON 1 (2011) BLU-RAY

MILDRED PIERCE (2011)

THE WHISTLEBLOWER (2010)

CITY OF LIFE AND DEATH (2009)

ANOTHER EARTH

ANONYMOUS (2011)

THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE 2: FULL SEQUENCE (2011)

IN TIME (2011)

BELLFLOWER (2011)

PINA (2011) BLU-RAY

ANOTHER EARTH (2011) BLU-RAY

February, New Titles, 'Dust Of Time' 'Melancholia'

Theo Angelopoulos (1936-2012)

The Greek film director Theo Angelopoulos, who has died aged 76 in a road accident, was an epic poet of the cinema, creating allegories of 20th-century Greek history and politics. He redefined the slow pan, the long take and tracking shots, of which he was a master. His stately, magisterial style and languidly unfolding narratives require some (ultimately rewarding) effort on the part of the spectator. "The sequence shot offers, as far as I'm concerned, much more freedom," Angelopoulos explained. "By refusing to cut in the middle, I invite the spectator to better analyse the image I show him, and to focus, time and again, on the elements that he feels are the most significant in it."

Angelopoulos was born in Athens, where he studied law. After military service, he went to Paris to attend the Sorbonne but soon dropped out to study at the IDHEC film school (now known as La Fémis). Back in Greece, he worked as a film critic for the leftist daily Allagi, which was closed down by the military junta that came to power in 1967. The seven-year regime of "the colonels" was seared into his consciousness and remained a subject – overtly or subliminally – throughout his oeuvre. (Guardian)

Other New Titles

ACROSS THE LINE (2010)

LOPE (2010)

KILLING, THE VOL.2 (2007)

INBETWEENERS MOVIE, THE (2011)

OUR BELOVED MONTH OF AUGUST (2008)

CONTAGION (2011)

DRIVE (2011)

TINKER TAILOR SOLDIER SPY (2011)

MELANCHOLIA (2011)

THE DUST OF TIME (2008)

SALT OF LIFE (2011)

A PATCH OF BLUE (1965)

BOYFRIEND, THE (1971)

IDENTIFICATION OF A WOMAN (1982) CRITERION

FUTURE, THE (2011)

GETTING STRAIGHT (1970)

AUTOLUMINESCENT (2011)

THING, THE (2011)

THING, THE (2011) BLU-RAY

HUNTER, THE (2011)

FOOTLOOSE (2011)

TALL MAN, THE (2011)

HELP, THE (2011)

DESIGN FOR LIVING (1933) 2 DISC CRITERION EDITION

NICHOLAS NICKLEBY (1947)

SOMETHING OF VALUE (1957)

TAWNY PIPIT (1944)

KEEP YOUR RIGHT UP!

MONTE CARLO (2011)

HOSTEL PART 3 (2011)

ZOOKEEPER (2011)

TEMPEST, THE (2010)

A WARM DECEMBER (1972)

MOON AND SIXPENCE, THE (1943)

VANINA VANINI (1961)

REV - SERIES 1 (2011)

RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD PART 2 (1987)

THE SKIN I LIVE IN (2011)

PARIS: THE LUMINOUS YEARS (2010)

ARRIETY (2010)

SPY KIDS: ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD (2011)

LET THE BULLETS FLY (2010)

DOORS MR. MOJO RISIN' THE STORY OF LA WOMAN (2011)

CRAZY, STUPID, LOVE. (2011)

FRIGHT NIGHT (2011)

APOLLO 18 (2011)

BUNRAKU (2010)

LEAP YEAR (2010)

February, New Titles, 'The Skin I Live In', 'Crazy Stupid Love', 'Hostel 3'

Pedro Almodóvar again reveals his genius for turning the ridiculous into the sublime with this creepy skin flick – THE SKIN I LIVE IN (2011) - a melodramatic thriller that is sombre but never sober and that moves through time and space with much of the boldness and style we’ve come to expect from Spain’s leading director. Antonio Banderas puts in a charismatic turn as a tragic figure touched by evil. The last time Banderas worked with Almodóvar was for ‘Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!’ in 1990. Twenty-one years later, they’re back together for an adaptation of Thierry Jonquet’s French novel ‘Mygale’ (‘Tarantula’ in English translation), the story of a plastic surgeon, Dr Robert Ledgard (Banderas), whose skills with the knife allow him to take control of a messy personal life in ways unimaginable to anyone but him. Banderas puts in a commanding performance in a film whose thriller tendencies are made doubly interesting by also being an artful study of masks and identities, sex and flesh, bodies and power.

Other New Stuff

PARIS: THE LUMINOUS YEARS (2010)

ARRIETY (2010)

SPY KIDS: ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD (2011)

LET THE BULLETS FLY (2010)

DOORS MR. MOJO RISIN' THE STORY OF LA WOMAN (2011)

CRAZY, STUPID, LOVE. (2011)

MONTE CARLO (2011)

HOSTEL PART 3 (2011)

ZOOKEEPER (2011)

TEMPEST, THE (2010)

FRIGHT NIGHT (2011)

APOLLO 18 (2011)

BUNRAKU (2010)

LEAP YEAR (2010)

DESIGN FOR LIVING (1933) 2 DISC CRITERION EDITION

NICHOLAS NICKLEBY (1947)

SOMETHING OF VALUE (1957)

TAWNY PIPIT (1944)

KEEP YOUR RIGHT UP! (Godard)

A WARM DECEMBER (1972)

MOON AND SIXPENCE, THE (1943)

VANINA VANINI (1961)

REV - SERIES 1 (2011)

RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD PART 2 (1987)

January, New Titles, 'One Day', 'Beginners', 'Priest', 'Vigo'

The worries about this adaptation of David Nicholls’ much-loved and likeable 2009 novel were obvious when it was first announced. Could Anne Hathaway pull off the character of a Northern lass (‘We spent all our summers in a caravan in Whitby’), first as an Edinburgh student and later a graduate working in a Taco joint? Would Danish director Lone Scherfig be sensitive to the book’s subtle but playful period stylings? Would the film’s makers resist the temptation to tip what was already a slightly gimmicky and cloying story into the territory of full-on romantic sap? And how could one film do justice to 23 eventful years in the lives of confident public-school boy Dexter and earthy, less assured Emma (Hathaway) – two opposites whom the novel visits once a year on the same date they first have a romantic encounter in 1988 as students?

The result is a compromise – but not a disastrous one. Nicholls’ script follows his novel closely as a ‘greatest hits’ spin on the book, rather than taking it anywhere new. Dexter follows a path of success, hubris and self-destruction, followed by rehabilitation, while Emma takes equally as long to discover what she wants from life and a friendship with Dexter, but without the accompanying obnoxiousness.


Other new stuff this week
SMURFS, THE (2011)
PRIEST (2011)
ONE DAY (2011) BLU-RAY
WEEDS SEASON 6 (2010)
COMPLETE JEAN VIGO, THE (1930-1934) CRITERION
LANDMARKS OF EARLY SOVIET FILM
RIVER MURDERS, THE (2011)
BEGINNERS (2010)
CHANGE-UP, THE (2011)
FROZEN PLANET
INTO THE UNIVERSE with Stephen Hawking