Alfred Hitchcock’s frothiest entertainment delivers glamor and romance with Cary Grant and Grace Kelly on the French Riviera where a cat burglar is stealing the jewels of rich tourists.
Tag: 1955
Satyajit Ray’s ‘The Apu Trilogy’ on The Criterion Channel
The Apu Trilogy: Pather Panchali / Aparajito / Apur Sansar – In 1955 Satyajit Ray, a young graphic artist in the advertising industry, released his debut feature, a labor of love made independently over the course of two and a half years. Pather Panchali (aka Song of the Little Road, 1955), a portrait of life […]
A ‘Picnic’ with William Holden and Kim Novak on Criterion Channel
The repressed desires and suppressed dreams of small town citizens bubble out of their confines in the late summer days of Picnic (1955). William Holden is the hunky drifter who rides the rails into a small Midwest town with dreams of landing a “respectable” job with his rich college buddy (Cliff Robertson). Kim Novak is […]
The original ‘Diabolique’ on Amazon Prime and Criterion Channel
Henri-Georges Clouzot was called the Hitchcock of France for his shadowy thrillers and the atmosphere of distrust and suspicion that ran through so many of his films. Diabolique (France, 1955, not rated, with subtitles), his 1955 thriller about a plot to commit a perfect murder and the wrenching tension when the corpse disappears, plays like […]
‘All that Heaven Allows’ – Love as suburban opera on VOD and Blu-ray/DVD
Rock Hudson and Jane Wyman were so successful in Douglas Sirk’s Magnificent Obsession that they all reteamed for All that Heaven Allows (1955) as Sirk became Universal’s house melodramatist. He turned improbable plots into social commentary and pulling back the covers of middle class hypocrisy with an ironic visual style and an almost operatic emotional […]
Ingmar Bergman’s ‘Smiles of a Summer Night’ on The Criterion Channel
Ingmar Bergman’s reputation is built on a foundation of introspective human dramas and personal crises steeped in philosophical discussions, conversations that scrape tender emotions and troubled relationships laid bare. And yes, his career is filled with such cinema, much of it dark, most of it very serious and all of it (to a greater or […]