Brick and mortar retail chains keep going bankrupt, so much so that there’s nowhere to buy DVDs near my cozy home or slightly less cozy workplace. That twitchy urge to buy movies on the day of their release will have to be repressed, and Lord only knows how this will effect my already questionably sane psyche. Tower Records buckled in 2006, Circuit City tanked last year, and now the Virgin Megastores are liquidating their inventory before disappearing into the great big box store in the sky. There’s still a few scattered Best Buys, with their limited Hollywood selection, and some Barnes and Nobles, with their inflated prices, but none near me, not that they’d salve my pain anyway. Kim’s Video, that venerable NYC outlet, is attempting to survive as a retail-only store after selling their rental archive to Sicily, but it’s only at one location, far from my prying eyes. READ MORE

My job at Facets Multi-Media in Chicago offers great access to some of the latest foreign films, documentaries, and other alternative movies. Between our theater, rent-by-mail service, and DVD label, I have seen hundreds of films most people don’t even know exist. Some of them are terrific; some enhance my understanding of the possibilities of film as an art form;  while others belong to the “watching-paint-dry” school of filmmaking. But, at least none of them are directed by Michael Bay, or include geeky male characters in suspended states of adolescence, or feature major stars wasting their talents jumping around in superhero costumes.

 Recently, I have been working with a documentary series from the Czech Republic called Private Century that has become one of my favorite titles. It is not only a moving viewing experience but it really stretches the boundaries of what many think a documentary should be. Private Century is an eight-episode series consisting entirely of home-movie footage from the 1920s through the 1960s.  READ MORE

I’ll follow up Jeff’s post on faces with one that says “let’s bandage ‘em up!” (It certainly sounds better to say that than “in your face!” – Especially if the face in question just got melted or has otherwise disappeared.) READ MORE

For most people the films of Andy Warhol were more fun to read about then to actually watch. And in the case of films such as the 485 minute Empire (1964) or Sleep (1963), at 321 minutes, it’s hard to imagine someone watching these in their entirety in one sitting. Even at revivals of the most popular and infamous titles such as The Chelsea Girls (1966) and Lonesome Cowboys (1968), you can bet on numerous walkouts during the screenings, not from outrage but sheer boredom and disinterest. At the other end of the scale, however, are the short, silent black and white films he made when he was first experimenting with the medium and his Screen Test series shows a brilliance of concept and execution that could easily turn naysayers into converts.     READ MORE

Am I the only person in the world who’s ever said that? READ MORE

Have you a favorite cab driver from classic movies?

Is he (or she) loud, pushy and aggressively seeking a faster route and big tip–maybe a Alan Hale, Sr. or Nat Pendleton type, quick with his mouth and his fists when needed? Or is the celluloid cabbie you cherish a comical “hail fellow well met” type, eager for conversation and filled with an inexplicable sense of bonhomie–perhaps played by a George Tobias, Red Skelton or Frank McHugh? Might another compelling favorite be those Charon-like figures behind the wheel, ferrying passengers across the dark city, musing philosophically about the pulse of the lifeblood of the city while guiding those in the back seat to a physical and spiritual destination–weightier characters captured by such diverse actors as Tom D’Andrea and Paul Lukas?

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Four faces of Jean-Luc Godard,  (L-R from 1968, 1970, 1979, and 1980) taken from the tantalizing DVD artifact “JLG in USA”, which accompanies the March/April edition of The Believer (Full Disclosure: Don’t hold it against it the magazine, but my wife and I wrote a brief article in the issue). Compiled by BAM programmer and Film Desk founder Jacob Perlin, it contains four short films of interviews, lectures, and home movies recorded at the cusp of Godard’s experimental video work in the early 70s with the Dziga Vertov Group and beyond, through his return to more personal art films with Every Man for Himself in 1980. This period is still the least understood in his career, and the few films I’ve seen from his seventies work, Ici et Ailleurs (1976) and Numero Deux (1975), are both extraordinary and demanding. For those like myself eager for further info into this part of his career, it’s a fascinating and surprisingly moving look at a man going through artistic and (one assumes) personal upheaval.

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Earlier this month, one of our faithful readers expressed interest in learning more about character actors, which prompted Morlock Moirafinnie to write an excellent post on Hank Worden, who appeared in secondary roles during the Golden Age.

 In the tightly run studio system of the Golden Age, the lines were drawn between types of screen actors. Movie stars were groomed to play the main roles, and their presence in a film was used to lure people into the theaters; “legitimate” actors were imported from other countries or the stage to star in serious literary or historical dramas, and their names added prestige to a film; character actors were under contract to play secondary roles.  These talented but unsung actors played archetypes — villains, kindly fathers, wise loving mothers, buffoons, best friends, spinsters — with such skill that they often turned simple parts into memorable three-dimensional characters. The old line about “remembering the face but not recognizing the name” is the best definition of a good character actor. Back in the day, few character actors crossed over into starring or leading roles and vice versa.

 The attention on character actors reminded me that the distinction between types of actors has become blurred. And, a result of that is today’s Hollywood films feature far fewer character actors compared to movies in the Golden Age. Fewer films are made these days, and that is the obvious reason for the decrease in character actors, but I have also noticed that in contemporary films, aging movie stars or leading actors often take on secondary roles or character roles, replacing (or, perhaps displacing) the real thing. In independent films, the opposite is sometimes true. Character actors sometimes get a shot at a starring role. In Goodbye Solo, character actor Red West takes on one of the two leading roles, and his years as a secondary player as well as his unique life experiences helped him make the most of this opportunity.

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As my fellow Morlocks help celebrate 15 years of TCM programming since its April 14, 1994 channel launch, I’d like to tip my hat to TCM for helping another organization whose name is also synonymous with quality film programming: the Telluride Film Festival. I’ve been attending the TFF since 1995, and in just a few months it will be holding its 36th festival. For most of the time that I can remember, TCM has been a TFF sponsor.  TCM was also instrumental in the making of key films that premiered at Telluride, such as the 1999 four-hour “virtual” restoration of Erich Von Stroheim’s Greed (1924) and the documentary of Lon Chaney: A Thousand Faces (Kevin Brownlow, 2000). But that’s only the tip of the iceberg. READ MORE