By John ThomasonStagecoach (Criterion)Release date: May 25Standard list price: $30.99As the legend goes, John Ford’s Stagecoach established the Western as an A picture, reviving it from its creatively moribund inception as disposable, one-dimensional nickelodeon fare and elevating it to the lofty standards of Whitmanesque poetry and pre-Wellesian compositional … [Read more...]
The View From Home 6: New releases on DVDs
By John ThomasonTokyo Sonata (E1)Release date: May 4Standard list price: $21.49Tokyo Sonata, the latest from Japanese auteur Kiyoshi Kurosawa, is seemingly a departure from the director’s preferred forte of cerebral horror and science fiction. At least that’s how it begins, with a focus on the lives of a middle-class Japanese family of four that echoes … [Read more...]
The View From Home 5: New releases on DVD
By John ThomasonSurviving Desire, Possible Films: Vol. 2 (Microcinema)Release date: April 27Standard list price: $22.49 eachIt’s not hyperbole to suggest that my cinephilia in general and my specific interest in writing about films are the result of one director’s work: Hal Hartley.Known for his insightful, quirky movies about hyper-literate drifters … [Read more...]
The View From Home 3: New releases on DVD
By John ThomasonMystery Science Theater 3000: Vol. XVII (Shout! Factory)Release date: March 16Standard list price: $32.99Aside from, perhaps, the wheel, the cotton gin and the printing press, Mystery Science Theater 3000 is one of man’s greatest creations. OK, well, at least it should be the top 100.Such hyperbole is not uncommon among Mystery Science Theater 3000 fanatics, or … [Read more...]
The View From Home 2: New releases on DVD
By John ThomasonCastle in the Sky, My Neighbor Totoro and Kiki’s Delivery Service (Disney’s Studio Ghibli)Release date: March 2Standard list price: $19.99 eachGirls always rule in the films of Hayao Miyazaki, Japan’s top animator and one of international cinema’s most empowering feminist voices. In his four most prominent Western exports – Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, … [Read more...]