Reviews: January 2008 Archives
4 by Agnes Varda (Criterion)
Among the most important female directors* in film history, Agnes Varda may best be remembered for crashing the boys' club that was the Nouvelle Vague with Cleo from 5 to 7, her 1962 study in real-time anxiousness — the title character hangs around in Paris, awaiting the results of a cancer biopsy. But she was already on the scene in 1956, when she made La Pointe Courte, a film-school standby and an important precursor to the French New Wave. This boxed set collects both of those high-water marks along with Le Bonheur (1965), the well-regarded Vagabond (1985) and a full load of extras. I haven't seen it myself, but it's on my list.
* No, there aren't many of them. Another good reason to investigate the great ones.
Buy it from Amazon.com: 4 by Agnès Varda (La Pointe Courte, Cléo from 5 to 7, Le bonheur, Vagabond) - Criterion Collection
Monty Python's Life of Brian (Sony)
How many times do you have to buy Life of Brian, anyway? If you already own a DVD version, this latest iteration — the "Immaculate Edition" — may be missable. But if you're like me, you haven't watched this since the Criterion laserdisc came out and need an upgrade. (You could also ask why you spent big money on a Criterion laserdisc that you would only play once, and why you would compound that fiscal error by sinking even more money into a DVD that you're likely to only play once — but then you wouldn't be like me.) My copy (Blu-ray) hasn't arrived from Amazon.com yet, but it looks like this one contains the same five deleted scenes and the same twin commentary tracks as the Criterion version, which means I can thrill again to the sound of distinguished Python Terry Gilliam griping about how much better this film would have been if the group had let him direct. (He's probably right, of course.) As Python goes, I honestly prefer the more madcap Holy Grail — but this one has the distinction of being perhaps the least offensive film ever to get a worldwide reputation for blasphemy. Here's a recent interview with John Cleese on the subject.
Buy it from Amazon.com: Monty Python's Life Of Brian - The Immaculate Edition
or Monty Python's Life Of Brian - Collector's Edition [Blu-ray] (Note: Amazon.com says the Blu-ray version is two discs, but apparently it's just one.)
Formally precise, thematically incisive, and altogether unnerving, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days is a bravura piece. With this tense dramatization of the events surrounding an illegal Romanian abortion (circa 1987), director Cristian Mungiu shows how the Communist regime's intrusive, overweening laws created an environment of not only paternalism, sexism, and physical danger but also outright exploitation. (Abortions themselves were no picnic either, as he’s keen to demonstrate.) Talk about body horror — combining social melodrama, character study, and hair-raising thriller, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days is a riveting ordeal in three parts. You can’t watch, but you don’t dare look away.
You could make a case for U2 as the most overdocumented rock group in recent history. Not only does ample concert footage exist from each period in the band's evolution (starting with 1983's Red Rocks video, Under a Blood Red Sky, which established the band as a premier arena act), but the band even had its own theatrically released rockumentary, Rattle and Hum, back in 1988. Some two decades later, the band has a somewhat longer-toothed demeanor -- there's nothing in U23D that's as fiery as Bono's famous "Fuck the revolution!" declaration (directed at the IRA during a performance of "Sunday Bloody Sunday") from Rattle and Hum, and the band slides easily into a formidable but ultimately comfortable groove. If you're looking for moments of real excitement or spontaneity in performance, well, you'll certainly have to look to a band with a less rigorously choreographed sound-and-light show.
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