In March, Criterion again has a packed release with four new entrants and two re-editions, with nothing as recent as 1989. Charlie Chaplin has a new film, one that is underrated, while an independent rom-com and a sequel to the legendary story of Godzilla also come aboard. While a ‘70s noir with Gene Hackman is also introduced, two classics get the 4K re-edition, one a French white-knuckle thriller from seventy years ago, and another being the introduction of Michael Mann.
A Woman of Paris (1923)
A new entrant from Charlie Chaplin; this is one of his more dramatic films and only appears as a cameo, giving the lead role to Edna Purviance playing a village girl who moves to the city of lights. It is the Jazz Age and the girl becomes the mistress of a wealthy businessman and gets involved with a rivaling suitor. The movie wasn’t received well because of Chaplin’s turn to a more dramatic story, but retrospective critics have realized it to be one of his most underappreciated movies.
The Wages of Fear (1953)
The first of two re-editions is Henri-Georges Clouzot’s masterful suspenseful suicide mission of four men in Latin America looking to make money for a ticket to freedom. With a tank of explosive nitroglycerin heading to put out a fire at an American oil refinery (a critique of American exploitation of third-world countries), the perils along the way test each man against each other and the elements. With a new cover, this film continues to pack the same intensity as it did seventy years ago with Yves Montand in a star-making role.
Night Moves (1975)
Gene Hackman plays a private eye who is hired to find the missing daughter (Melanie Griffith) of an actress, traveling from Los Angeles to the Florida Keys. It becomes more than a family drama, however, when he finds out a much more disturbing plot is the center of it all. Director Arthur Penn delves for us into the crossing paths that lead to the many turns without an exit in the shadow of disillusionment from what is the truth post-Watergate. Susan Clark, Jennifer Warren, Edward Binns, and James Woods co-star.
Thief (1981)
The second re-edition is Michael Mann’s sensational debut feature about an ex-con and safecracker (James Caan) looking to leave that life. He and his long-term girlfriend (Tuesday Weld) have adopted a baby and will be away from the criminal underworld after one last job. However, his plans are threatened by a mob boss and corrupt cops who seek to hold him for indefinite break-ins and threaten his family. Set in the streets of Chicago, Mann makes a slick neo-noir Mann’s path to an incredible career with the same smarts in his filmography.
Choose Me (1984)
From writer-director Alan Randolph, an erotic rom-com at a bar lures in a group of people who soon get entangled in passionate affairs and one-night stands. A stranger begins conversing with a prostitute who is scared about being committed in a relationship while a sex expert who studies the actions of others gets too involved with the stranger and prostitute’s actions from their first encounter. Genevieve Bujold, Keith Carradine, and Lesley Ann Warren star in this analysis of sex in the decade mixes with the soundtrack of slow love jams by Teddy Pendergrass.
Godzilla vs. Biollante (1989)
In a new generation of Godzilla movies, this story takes a new turn in what would become a bigger threat than Godzilla itself. The new threat is a mutant plant made from rose cells, the dead daughter of a scientist, and Godzilla itself. This leads all of the corporations to fight for control of this, but it has become way too big for them. Now in a new age of special effects, the film released a new bold vision which later versions of the story could tell while remaining faithful to its origins up to recently with Godzilla Minus One.
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