A couple of lonely hearts (played by Shirley Stoler and Tony Lo Bianco) find true love in this affecting documentary-style romanctic drama directed by Leonard Kastle.  Oh, and they con then kill a bunch of women across the United States, because these is actually a shockingly brutal ripped-from-the-headlines true crime film.  But I guess it's also that first thing too.

If you'd like to watch ahead for next week's film, we will be discussing and reviewing Paul Thomas Anderson's Punch Drunk Love (2002).

The back room boys are at it again!  That’s right, we’re jumping back into the endlessly charming (so far) films of Powell and Pressburger.  Sammy Rice (played by David Farrah) is a scientist working for an ill-defined problem-solving crew that the British government relies on for technical advice during the Second World War.  Will his ever-suffering girl Susan (Kathleen Byron) give him the support he needs to battle his addictions, his injuries, Byzantine office politics, and a series of nefarious unexplored bombs dropped by German planes across the English countryside?  

If you’d like to watch ahead for next week’s film, we will be discussing and reviewing Leonard Kastle’s The Honeymoon Killers (1970).

Julliette Binoche deadpans.  Sudden fade to black! Dum dum da dummmmm..!  Repeat that about four more times and you have one of the most iconic pieces of 1990s European cinema.  Does this formula hold up for two jaded cinephiles at the end of 2020?  The first installment of Krzysztof Kieslowski's ambitious Three Colours Trilogy doesn't pull any punches with his breathless character study of a woman rediscovering human connection after an unthinkable tragedy.

If you'd like to watch ahead for next week's film, we will be discussing and reviewing Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's The Small Back Room (1949).

If you are celebrated auteur Jean-Luc Godard, it’s the 1960s, and your cranking out about 7 movies a year, the odds are strong that there’s going to be some winners and losers in the mix.  And the question today is whether or not this picaresque travel film about a  married couple (played by Jean Yanne and Mireille Darc) braving the traffic jam, car crash, and cannibal-strewn French countryside to murder a family member in get their inheritance early is a good one or a bad one.  It’s even more to the point of the film that the central premise is actually whether or not the film itself is good or bad.  And then it comes down to the point of whether or not the premise about whether or not the film is good is a good premise or not.  Merry Christmas!

If you’d like to watch ahead for next week’s film, we will be discussing and reviewing Krzysztof Kieślowski’s Three Colours: Blue (1993).

When you imagine the lead character in the Talented Mr. Ripley, do you picture a wild-eyed Dennis Hopper in coveralls and a cowboy hat wandering around 1977 Hamburg?  No?  Well apparently Wim Wenders was the only director bold enough to take Patricia Highsmith’s legendary anti-hero in that...uh...specific direction.  But if that has scared you off, don’t worry: the movie is mostly about Bruno Ganz rocking a real sexy 1970s dad look while he clumsily tries his hand as a mob hitman.  And it’s beautiful.

If you’d like to join us for next week’s film, we will be discussing and reviewing Jean-Luc Godard’s Weekend (1967).

Who is up for a largely improvised drama set in poverty-stricken Thatcher-era London?  Anyone?  Ok, we get it, but what if we told you it was directed by Mike Leigh and it features early virtuoso performances by Tim Roth and Gary Oldman?  And that they aren’t even the best part?  Hint: it’s a acerbic but tender characterization by Phil Daniels as a wise-ass brother navigating the dole, neighborhood skinheads, nagging parents, patronizing relatives, unemployment, and a society and government that has all but given up him.  

If you’d like to watch ahead for next week’s film, we will be discussing and reviewing Wim Wender’s The American Friend (1977).

Come join us as we discuss director G. W. Pabst's adaptation of Bertholt Brecht and Kurt Weill's legendary musical set in the London underwold.  Gang boss Mackie Messer (aka Mack the Knife played by Rudolf Forster) plots to marry Polly Peachum (Carola Neher) daughter of the beggar king, while his scorned lover Jenny (Lotte Lenya) seeks to have him arrested by police chief Tiger Brown (Reinhold Schunzel).  With a few jaunty tunes and innumerable betrayals and getaways, this German language exploration of class , power, and poverty paints a compelling portrait of pre-War politics.  And we totally don't spend too much time talking about Bobby Darin.

If you'd like to watch ahead for next week's film, we will be reviewing and discussing Mike Leigh's Meantime (1984).

[Insert eye-rolling pun about dipping our toes back into familiar Waters here]... That's right, we're once more spending the day with the Dreamland Players, reveling in the trash and the wigs of Jon Waters' decades-long seedy send-up of American culture.  Divine smirks, whines, and stomps his way into our hearts as Dawn Davenport, following her sordid decline from dissatisfied youth to art experiment/serial killer.

If you'd like to watch ahead for next week's film, we will be discussing and reviewing G. W. Pabst's The Threepenny Opera (1931).

Francois Truffaut (clearly famous mostly because he's mentioned in our theme song) crafts an oddly gentle love-triangle period piece, full of joy, friendship, understanding, frustration, and tragedy.  A kind of bohemian fusion of Edith Wharton and Henry James. Jules (Oskar Werner) and Jim (Henri Sarre) play two fast friends living in France on the precipice of World War I.  A chance encounter with anarchist Catherine (preposterously absent from the title, and brilliantly played by Jeanne Moreau) brings joy and turmoil as the three navigate the early 20th century in this masterpiece of the French New Wave.  

It looks like Randy finally decided to pick for us a good, old-fashioned, big-budget, mid-century, historical war epic.  Michael Caine plays Peter O’Toole playing David Bowie as Michael Caine in the Role of Lieutenant Gonville Bromhead alongside Stanley Baker as Lieutenant John Chard: both men of hesitant bravery competing with one another for the command of a small regiment of British soldiers defending against a massive Zulu army in 1870s Natal.  As you might imagine, there’s quite a lot to unpack here.

If you’d like to watch ahead for next week’s film, we will be discussing and reviewing Francois Truffaut’s Jules et Jim (1962).