Author: Doug Cummings

A Grin Without a Cat (1977, 1993)

DVD review

Last week, Icarus Films released the latest DVD in their excellent Chris Marker series, A Grin Without a Cat (originally released in 1977 but shortened with an added coda in ’93). Not only is this one of his most acclaimed documentaries, summarizing the decade of the New Left worldwide as well as his own globetrotting SLON collective filmmaking period, the DVD also comes amid a flurry of new Marker events:

• Cannes Classics has announced it’s debuting a new and restored print of Far from Vietnam (1967), the protest film Marker organized and edited with contributions by Joris Ivens, Claude …

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Oshima: Death by Hanging (1968) and Boy (1969)

Film review


A cemetery mound initiates a conical motif in Oshima’s Boy.

The new retrospective of Nagisa Oshima–widely regarded among experts as the most important filmmaker of the Japanese New Wave–is currently poised between its Los Angeles hosts, the American Cinematheque and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; LACMA begins its half of the series tonight with two masterpieces: Death By Hanging (1968) and Boy (1969).  Both films showcase Oshima’s ferocious sociopolitical edge and preoccupation with the interplay of fantasy and reality, as well as his stylistic diversity: the former is a black-and-white melange of Bretchian techniques and mobile camerawork …

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Los Angeles Film Festival Line-up

Commentary, Film festival

The Los Angeles Film Festival announced its line-up today, and any fears that its new director might steer the festival–with its solid line-up several years running–in an untoward direction have been put to rest. Some of the highlights follow.

The latest edition of the always excellent “The Films That Got Away” series programmed by the Los Angeles Film Critics Association:

• Musica Nocturna, described by Robert Koehler as “the most realistic depiction of a married couple that I’ve seen on screen since Cassavetes.”

• The Silence Before Bach, which I’ve been dying to see ever since it earned …

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Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975)

Film review

Last weekend, LACMA screened the new print of Chantal Akerman’s riveting portrait of life as a series of imprisoning rituals, Jeanne Dielman: 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (1975), a film that charts the actions of a matronly widow (Delphine Seyrig)–and covert prostitute–as she performs house chores and errands over a three day period. Comprised of lingering, static shots of Dielman in her apartment and around town, and clocking in well over three hours, its uncompromising and provocative vision has long been an inspiration to those lucky enough to see it. It’s never been released on video in the US, …

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AFI Fest Taps Robert Koehler

Commentary, Film festival

Robert Koehler has been a longtime supporter of–and occasional contributor to–Film Journey, and I have written many times of my respect and admiration for Rose Kuo, who has transformed AFI FEST in Los Angeles the past couple of years into a major festival for world cinema, so I’m delighted to quote Variety‘s announcement yesterday:

“Robert Koehler, longtime film critic and freelance writer for Variety and other publications, has been tapped director of programming for this year’s edition of AFI Fest.

Due to assume his duties in May, Koehler will work as the fest’s No. 2 under artistic

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Sita Sings the Blues . . . online!

Uncategorized

My favorite animated feature last year, the undistributed Sita Sings the Blues, created almost entirely in Flash by Nina Paley, has become Thirteen.org‘s first feature to be streamed in its entirety on their website. The film has been idling in legal limbo for many months because of its use of 80-year-old pop songs Paley hasn’t had the resources to purchase, but PBS stations have special rules governing their broadcasts that allow the work to be shown.

However, note Paley’s new post at her blog:

“Many more formats will be online by March 7th, the day Sita Sings the

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