Could just be a hoax, though. I fake some headaches, everyone gets used to poor helpless Spike. Then one day, no warning, I snap a spine, bend a head back, drain 'em dry. Brilliant.

Spike ,'Potential'


Buffista Movies Across the 8th Dimension!

A place to talk about movies--old and new, good and bad, high art and high cheese. It's the place to place your kittens on the award winners, gossip about upcoming fims and discuss DVD releases and extras. Spoiler policy: White font all plot-related discussion until a movie's been in wide release two weeks, and keep the major HSQ in white font until two weeks after the video/DVD release.


Beverly - Jul 31, 2020 7:25:53 pm PDT #2752 of 3424
Days shrink and grow cold, sunlight through leaves is my song. Winter is long.

Mark Hammill voiced the baddie in both Castle in the Sky and Naussica.

While I'm at it, Minnie Driver voiced both Jane in Disney's Tarzan, and Lady Eboshi. Gillian Anderson was the mother wolf.

Also, Porco Rosso sent me on a research journey about the WWI Mediterranean and the pilots--not something taught in history classes in the US. I want to live in Gina's garden.

I want to like Ponyo a whole lot more than I do--the fish-to-little-girl transformation somehow gives me the wig, though. I think it's her running on not-yet-feet that does it.


megan walker - Aug 01, 2020 10:36:02 am PDT #2753 of 3424
"What kind of magical sunshine and lollipop world do you live in? Because you need to be medicated."-SFist

A very short (~40) Criterion expiring list this month.

German Expressionism: The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, The Golem, Destiny, Nosferatu, Dr. Mabuse the Gambler, The Hands of Orlac, Varieté, Metropolis
Marriage Stories: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Kramer vs. Kramer, The Squid and the Whale, A Separation
Western Noir: Day of the Outlaw
Directed by Mike Leigh: All or Nothing, Vera Drake, Happy-Go-Lucky, Another Year
Directed by Kathleen Collins: Losing Ground, The Cruz Brothers and Miss Malloy
Masterclass: Kelly Reichardt: River of Grass, Wendy and Lucy, Meek's Cutoff
Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky: Nostalghia, The Sacrifice
Starring Catherine Deneuve: Vice and Virtue, The Girl on the Train, On My Way
Other films: Born Free, Husbands, Death in Venice, The Last House on the Left, The Skin, My Beautiful Laundrette, Into the West
Three Documentaries from the Sensory Ethnography Lab: Caniba, Leviathan, Sweetgrass
Other documentaries: Stop Making Sense, Of Time and the City, Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky

My personal August "Get Them Before They're Gone" list: Besides the German Expressionism collection (many of which are rewatches) and continuing through Western Noir (which I actually expected to be expiring as a whole this month), I'm prioritizing Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Kramer vs. Kramer, Stop Making Sense, My Beautiful Laundrette, Vera Drake, A Separation, On My Way. The first two are rewatches, the others are basically what seemed most interesting of those expiring. No real must-see films for me, except A Separation, which I haven't seen but feel I should consider for my Century+ Essential Films.

Now maybe I can get through some of the films I've been meaning to watch on Hulu and Netflix.


DavidS - Aug 01, 2020 12:01:29 pm PDT #2754 of 3424
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."

I'm prioritizing Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Kramer vs. Kramer, Stop Making Sense, My Beautiful Laundrette, Vera Drake, A Separation, On My Way. The first two are rewatches, the others are basically what seemed most interesting of those expiring.

I love My Beautiful Launderette. A movie which just about everybody in my generational cohort watched but seems culturally somewhat forgotten. That's even more true about the second collaboration by Stephen Frears, and Hanif Kureishi, Sammy and Rosie Get Laid (which is also a fantastic movie I'd like to revisit.)


megan walker - Aug 01, 2020 12:52:25 pm PDT #2755 of 3424
"What kind of magical sunshine and lollipop world do you live in? Because you need to be medicated."-SFist

I love My Beautiful Launderette. A movie which just about everybody in my generational cohort watched but seems culturally somewhat forgotten.

Yeah, it's weird I haven't seen it, or Stop Making Sense for that matter, but that's how it works out sometimes. I probably should consider both for my 1980s Century+ list, though it would be hard to dethrone anything currently on there.


Amy - Aug 01, 2020 12:58:33 pm PDT #2756 of 3424
Because books.

I'm doing a Criterion trial because of you good people. Turn two, the rest are food...

Question: can you search by actor name? I tried but it wasn't giving me love. That said it was also late and I was high. Like, do they have a permanent library or just the themed groups of films monthly?


megan walker - Aug 01, 2020 1:36:01 pm PDT #2757 of 3424
"What kind of magical sunshine and lollipop world do you live in? Because you need to be medicated."-SFist

Question: can you search by actor name? I tried but it wasn't giving me love. That said it was also late and I was high. Like, do they have a permanent library or just the themed groups of films monthly?

They do have a permanent library. And the themed groups stick around for as long as some of the films in that collection are there. It's just that often the themes revolve around something that needs to be contracted out (I assume) and so they all expire at the same time when the contract runs out.

On the web (where I tend to organize most of my streaming queues since apps/Roku tend to be shit for that), there is an "All Films" section where you can filter by country, decade, director, and genre. While this can be useful if you are looking in a general way for, say, westerns or films of the 1910s (where there aren't that many), I mostly just use the Search feature. Their permanent collection runs very art house so I think if you are looking for a particular Hollywood actor, they might not have anything right now, but it doesn't mean they won't ever.

They cycle things in and out rather often. I've already seen multiple films "expire" and then be back again for some other reason.

The way I've pretty much been using Criterion is I have a permanent queue of films I want to get around to eventually and then I add new collections/films/double features that look interesting at the front when I happen to notice them, and then every month I put the expiring ones at the front of that. So on the Roku we see the expiring ones first and if nothing seems appealing at that moment we go to the collections. The only ones we seem to get to in my more permanent queue are the female filmmakers since I prioritize those on Fridays.


Kate P. - Aug 04, 2020 1:14:11 pm PDT #2758 of 3424
That's the pain / That cuts a straight line down through the heart / We call it love

Rose and I just watched the third HP movie, and I was so surprised that nobody explains to Harry (or the audience) who Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs are! That seems really important both plot-wise and thematically.


EpicTangent - Aug 04, 2020 2:31:26 pm PDT #2759 of 3424
Why isn't everyone pelting me with JOY, dammit? - Zenkitty

My major problem with that movie! I took my mom, who had not read the books, and kinda lost patience when I tried to explain, so she just didn't understand a lot of that movie.

Not as egregious as The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy neglecting to explain towels, but still.


Kate P. - Aug 04, 2020 3:09:44 pm PDT #2760 of 3424
That's the pain / That cuts a straight line down through the heart / We call it love

Right?? I'm baffled as to why that was left out. I remembered that being my favorite of the HP movies (though I think I've only seen up through the fourth) but somehow had forgotten that major omission, and it really irked me this time around.


Scrappy - Aug 05, 2020 4:24:12 am PDT #2761 of 3424
Life moves pretty fast. You don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.

I'm rewatching the entire Potter series and I just saw the film yesterday and thought the same thing!