Documenteur (1981)

Documenteur (1981) was filmed by French director Agnes Varda in Los Angeles while she was separated from husband Jacques Demy and it is subtitled “An Emotion Picture”. Like some of Varda’s other work, it mixes together fiction and reality, employing a documentary approach towards constructed elements that are no doubt reflecting what she was going […]

All That Heaven Allows (1955)

Seeing the doco series, A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese through American Movies, on ABC when I was a teenager was the kind of uber-text that sets you up with a list of references, of movies to one day track down and understand why they meant so much to Marty and his enthusiastic testifying. In […]

Je Tu Il Elle (1974)

One haunting image from the film, Je Tu Il Elle (1974; I You He She), is when Julie, the young woman played by the director, Chantal Akerman, has shifted furniture out of her ground floor apartment, and has moved her bed against the wall. Sitting against an alcove in the corner of the room, near […]

The Hitch-Hiker (1953)

It’s all a matter of time. You hear about a film, you see it pop up (particularly if it’s in the public domain – so everywhere, public access TV, crappy DVDs, free on YouTube), and know that at some point you’ll eventually see it. The Hitch-Hiker (1953) was always beckoning on the side of the […]

Nenette And Boni (1996)

Tactile, melancholic, sensuous, elliptical. It’s hard to describe the effect that Nenette And Boni (1996) had on me. Directed by Claire Denis, and co-written by Denis and her collaborator Jean-Pol Fargeau, the story is about a brother and sister living in Marseilles. The experience of the movie is that it gives you pieces of the […]