DVD review – Page 2 – Film Journey

Robert Koehler’s Best of 2008

January 15, 2009 Robert Koehler Commentary, DVD review, Film review

The Golden Age Continued: The Films That Matter in 2008

By ROBERT KOEHLER

It’s always dangerous to assume anything, but I figured that by now I would have been teased—somewhere, by someone—for having argued more than once over the past couple of years that we are living in a new golden age of film. This position runs so counter to the prevailing mood and sentiment (dour may be one word to describe it) that I know more than ever that I’m right, just as I know that such a contrarian position opens one up for attack. Hasn’t happened. Yet. Maybe …

Tops Tens of 2008

January 8, 2009 Doug Cummings Commentary, DVD review, Film review

Birdsong

This past year was a difficult one for me, schedule-wise, but I still managed to squeeze in a good number of films at the Palm Springs, COLCOA, Los Angeles, DocuWeek, and AFI festivals, UCLA, the American Cinematheques, AMPAS, Cinefamily, LACMA (check out Bernardo Rondeau’s top ten list here), REDCAT, and the Filmforum, not to mention the commercial Landmark and Laemmle theatres. Los Angeles remains a vibrant setting for cinephiles even if its dispersion and middling public transport often require a tolerance for long commutes and a commitment to keeping a close eye on screening calendars, limited runs, and …

Sita Sings the Blues and Azur and Asmar

October 16, 2008 Doug Cummings DVD review, Film review

Sita Sings the Blues

Azur and Asmar

As a fan of animation, I’ve embraced the digital era, but my enthusiasm for mainstream three-dimensional CGI has been waning for some time. It seems like computer animated films (shorts as well as features) can increasingly be divided into two groups: those that explore the potential of the medium, and those that settle for a more commercially established, “photorealistic” (but artificially pristine) synthetic verisimilitude, offering one toy story after another. Given this trend, it’s exciting to see digital animators returning to the roots of visual design–graphic art, illustration, and painting–to create films that …

Touch of Evil (1958)

October 7, 2008 Doug Cummings DVD review

I have long championed the critical recording by James Naremore and Jonathan Rosenbaum on Criterion’s The Complete Mr. Arkadin as being one of the most pleasurable and informative DVD commentaries of recent years, and their new tag team recording on Universal’s 50th anniversary edition of Touch of Evil (released today) is a worthy followup. By and large, Naremore follows the content of his Touch of Evil chapter in his excellent book, The Magic World of Orson Welles, broaching such topics as the Civil Rights era, Welles’ formalism, moral ambiguity, and the use of fair lady/dark lady stereotypes, while Rosenbaum …

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner x 3

September 18, 2008 Doug Cummings DVD review

Proteus, one of my favorite documentaries from 2004, is being released on DVD this week by First Run Features. It’s a fascinating look at the work of 19th century artist-naturalist Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919) that is experimental film, historical summary, and philosophical meditation all rolled into one. Laboriously assembled by David Lebrun over the course of 22 years, it’s a montage of etchings, sketches, and paintings (rephotographed and animated with narration, music, and sound effects) that positions Haeckel as the meeting point between the dominant worldviews of his day: scientific rationalism and Romanticism.

To represent the latter, Lebrun makes extended …

Heinz Emigholz’s “Architecture as Autobiography”

April 3, 2008 Doug Cummings DVD review

The industrious Adam Hyman of the Los Angeles Filmforum has organized an exciting collaborative event between various local film institutions (Filmforum, LACMA, REDCAT, UCLA) and the MAK Center: a week-long retrospective of German filmmaker Heinz Emigholz from April 6-13. Emigholz’s Schindler’s Houses was one of my highlights of last year’s Toronto film festival, so I’ve been eager to explore previous entries in his thirty-film “Photography and Beyond” series (begun in 1983) showcasing architecture, sculpture, writing, and drawing. Unfortunately, however, I’ll be in New York City next week, so I was delighted to discover that Facets Video has already released a …