Greetings from a cooler-than-you'd-think Los Angeles. It has to be a darn sight more pleasant than my folks in Lake Havasu City, which I'm told is topping the mercury right now at 122 Fahrenheit. Yikes. I think my car would melt if I tried to drive in that kind of heat.
I've got two older Criterions in review today, in conjunction with the Sundance Channel's Classic Cinema show that plays every weekend this summer at 9PM. These two play next Saturday and Sunday Night.
Jean-Luc Godard's Alphaville is a personal favorite and a good example of an abstract Art film that for Savant plays like gangbusters. It shows on Sunday, whereas the Saturday night spot is filled with the bizarre Japanese yakuza hitman epic Branded to Kill. Director Seijun Suzuki assembles his genre thrillfest of sex and violence with a totally original style.
Back to more normal Hollywood fare, George Cukor's The Women is a two-hour catfight where loyal wife Norma Shearer defends her turf against interloper Joan Crawford. Most of the flying fur is the verbal kind, but Paulette Goddard and Rosalind Russell get their licks in with tooth and claw. Not the best endorsement for the female sex, or more accurately, it's own self-appraisal in 1939.
Savant promises to get to MODESTY BLAISE in due course. They aren't all blockbusters, but I'm enjoying the misc of dix, or make that the mix of discs, this summer. GE
Posted by DVD Savant at July 07, 2002 02:33 PM