Criterion by the Numbers: A Special Edition list

OBSESSIVE DVD NERDS, I BESEECH YOU!

The Chewer Nation has been having fun with the little monthly challenges I've thrown down. I've got a new one that just might take us through the end of 2009. What I want us all to do is to review The Criterion Collection. But, there's a catch. The number of words you can use will be determined by the spine number. I'll start.

1. Grand Illusion - Classic.
2. The Seven Samurai - Chambara Epic.

and so on and so on.


Post your Criterion reviews on the CHUD message board.

Yes. It has to be in order.

6) Beauty and the Beast - The French mix Grimm shadows well.

7) A Night to Remember - Better than Cameron, much less detail abound.

8) The Killer - John Woo riffs on Douglas Sirk very well.

9) Hard Boiled - Tequila does his best against the Triads, doves fly.

12) This is Spinal Tap - Getting lost under the stage, hoping to find a properly scaled Stonehenge.

15) Samurai II: Duel at Ichijoji Temple - A chain and sickle is handy against eighty enemies. But, where does one go next?

16) Samurai III: Duel at Ganryu Island - An old enemy keeps Miyamoto from the people that love him. What excitement awaits him now?

19) Shock Corridor - In pursuit of a Pulitzer, a young writer learns the limits of sanity. Larry Tucker really steals the show.

22) Summertime - Katharine Hepburn looks for love in Venice. The man she meets tries to change her spinster ways. Darren McGavin watches from afar.

23) Robocop - Old Detroit gets a new kind of cop. Bitches Leave. Miguel Ferrer hits his career high note, while Kurtwood Smith watches him beg.

24) High and Low - Kingo Gondo gets to experience what Frank Sinatra and Mel Gibson experienced before. A loved one is kidnapped as tensions run high and low.

26) The Long Good Friday - Bob Hoskins makes a name for himself playing a British gangster. Helen Mirren appears along with her lovely breasts. John Mackenzie directs from Barrie Keeffe's script.

27) Flesh for Frankenstein - Baron Frankenstein goes to Greece to dissect a gay athlete. He hopes to create a new master race of monsters. The Baron's wife really fucks a lot.

28) Blood for Dracula - Udo Kier needs virgin blood to stay alive. Renfield packs up his master, as they head to Italy looking for virgins. They find four ladies with ample arteries.

29) Picnic at Hanging Rock - Mrs. Appleyard's school is going on a field trip. It's Valentine's Day and the girls want to play in the beautiful Australian wilderness. Suddenly, a few girls go missing.

30) M - Hans Beckert loves kids. Whistling some Grieg, Hans makes his way down the German streets. Stalking the little girls one by one, Hans attracts the attention of the German populace.

35) Diabolique - A schoolmaster gets whacked by his wife and mistress. They drown his ass and dump him where no one can find the corpse. Days go by and the corpse has gone missing. Subtitled for Americans.

37) Time Bandits - Time-traveling dwarves make their way across history with a young British boy in tow. Sean Connery shows up as an Ancient Greek, while David Warner plays a perfect Satan. Jim Broadbent plays a game show host.

39) Tokyo Drifter - Tetsu just wants to cut and run. He recently left the Tokyo Underworld and he wants to spend some time in the country. Sure, he left his girlfriend and other worldly troubles behind. Boss Kurata is going to shit himself.

40) Armageddon - Animal crackers are the ambrosia of the retarded. The U.S. Government is officially out of ideas regarding the planet's well-being. Naturally, they let a cripple hire Bruce Willis and his friends. Mainstream America gets to meet Owen Wilson's nose.

41) Henry V - Olivier takes the classic play from the stage and into the broad English countryside. Created as a rallying call to the British people during the World War II, this film has come to define what it is to be incredibly courageous.

42) Fishing with John - John Lurie doesn't know a damn thing about fishing. That doesn't keep him from taking Tom Waits, Jim Jarmusch and Dennis Hopper out on a boat. Coming across as a semi-reality show, the show brings a lighter side to the Collection.

43) Lord of the Flies - Peter Brook takes on this classic tale of young boys being left alone on an island. Ralph and Jack form sides, as they parallel the Apollonian and Dionysian natures of mankind and civlization. Plus, Piggy gets treated like a British Milhouse Van Houten.

44) The Red Shoes - The Archers' finest film showcases some of the finest cinematography in British cinema. Boris is envious of Victoria Page's talent. When Victoria falls in love with the composer of The Red Shoes, Boris snaps. His demands eventually force Victoria out of the ballet company.

45) A Taste of Cherry - Mr. Badii wants someone to bury him in Tehran. Badii asks soldiers, old friends and various citizens to help him in his final day of life. Eventually, Badii finds an old taxidermist who previously tried to kill himself. The taxidermist agrees, but only for some sort of compensation.

47) Insomnia - Jonas Engstrom goes to the farthest reaches of Norway to hunt down a killer. Heads and tails above the Nolan remake, yet it lacks any emotional connection to the audience. Does all cinema have to resonate with its audience? Do you even care? I don't know.

48) Black Orpheus - Orpheus and Eurydice trade Ancient Greece for Rio during Carnival. The Macumba ceremony made foreigners scarier to me than any Delta Force movie. Yet, there's something to be said for Camus's use of music. He made us believe in the power of a lone guitar player. Pick it up.

49) Nights of Cabiria - Cabiria is a young prostitute who dreams of something bigger. We follow her through Rome's ghettos, as she tries her best to keep it all together. Her boyfriend steals from her, random men take her home and she's left with nothing but dreams. This leads back to the Madonna.

50) And The Ship Sails On - The Opera Singer Tetua's ashes rest aboard an Italian luxury liner. The ship stops for a day to let several Serbian refugees board the ship. The upper crust Italians have to rub elbows with these who people who talk of the Great War. It's the year 1914, World War I beckons.

51) Brazil - Sam Lowry just wanted to fix a small error. But, that's when he met Harry Tuttle. Finding himself on the wrong side of the law, Sam tries his best to find love and purpose in an Orwellian society. Katherine Helmond gets her face stretched by Jim Broadbent. One of Gilliam's finest.

52) Yojimbo - Sanjuro is a Ronin who has come to town to stir up shit. He doesn't have a Fistful of Dollars, but he has a steady hand and a sharp katana. What follows is a beautiful ballet of wholesale murder. Mifune achieve cinematic Sainthood around the hour marker. Watch the man's shoulder twitch.

55) The Unbearable Lightness of Being - Who should Daniel Day-Lewis rail first? Juliet Binoche or Lena Olin? Philip Kaufman asks this question and more in his 1988 adaptation of what was once thought an unfilmable novel. The Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia puts a damper on the fucking, as the real world comes crashing in. Kaufman uses stock footage to blend truth.

56) The 39 Steps - Robert Donat is a Hitchcockian Canadian who witnessed a murder. Donat proceeds to follow the usual Hitchcock trappings, as he seeks out Mr. Memory. Mr. Memory being the murderer from before that stalks Donat across most of Europe. Throw in some trains, Depression era set pieces and a Pavlovian desire to answer a ringing phone.

57) Charade - Government agent steals his fortune from the US Government. Audrey Hepburn doesn't know, but she sure loves to spend it. Walter Matthau shows up to reclaim the cash. Stanley Donen directs this bitch in his sleep. James Coburn and George Kennedy play Matthau's support team while Cary Grant takes a shower fully clothed. Madcap antics are had.

58) Peeping Tom - Slightly predating Psycho, the Archers one-up Hitchcock. Taking the third leg of a tripod to new levels allows a British cameraman to stick it to the ladies. Condemned upon initial release, Peeping Tom has found a new respect among lovers of crime fiction. Check out the nude model with the super freaky Joaquin Phoenix style hair-lip.

59) The Night Porter - This film does for S&M what Schindler's List did for keeping notation. Dirk Bogarde is such an underrated actor, as he treads this line that echoes Peter Lorre and Klaus Kinski. Yet, he doesn't become this weird creature. He sulks and sits watching his prey in the form of Charlotte Rampling. If you're watching for cheap thrills, go somewhere else.

60) Autumn Sonata - Bergman wants to show you how your parents can screw you up. Bergman wants to show you that she can toe to toe with Liv Ullmann. These are two different Bergmans. Bergman was a common surname in Sweden. No, I don't think that's odd. Americans can't begin to discuss interpersonal relationships, we tread on the trivial. That's an even sixty.