In Which Your Faithful Narrator Discusses Battle for Algiers

I watched the movie Battle for Algiers last night. It is a French film, so I had to read it, but that's actually alright. Sometimes reading a film makes me pay attention to it even closer, because I don't understand French (aside from the occasional "oui," "messeur") I am forced to really watch the images on the screen, I can't flip through a magazine or close my eyes and get the movie through my ears.

The Battle for Algiers is about the Algerian revolution in the late 50's against French colonial rule. It is actually a brutal movie. The situation quickly degenerates into guerrilla warfare on both sides. The French blow up an apartment building, the Algerian fighters blow up two cafes and a discotheque. The French torture captives for information, the Algerians shoot the French policemen patrolling the streets. It becomes a tit-for-tat kind of movie very quickly.

One cannot help but link our present situation in Iraq to the past situation in Algeria. I found myself asking the question "why" a lot. And I wasn't able to get any good answers from the film.

It is a dark film. It has to be, there is very little to celebrate in the film. Music is very important and certainly helps to move the story, but also set the tone. To the film. This is a film that requires more than one viewing in order to detach from the film, but on the other hand, it is important to work with the film.

I'm glad I bought the movie. It is an important addition to my collection.

How Far Down the Rabbit Hole I've Gone... Criterion Will Be My Death

What follows is the list of Crition Collection DVD's I have thus far. I don't have many vices, but it seems that purchasing expensive(but worth every penny)dvds is one cross I'll have to bear... could be worse, I suppose.

1-Grand Illusion
2-Seven Samurai (reissue)
3-Lady Vanishes (reissue)
4-Amarcord (reissue)
7-A Night to Remember
8-The Killer
9-Hard Boiled
11-Seventh Seal (Reissue)
24-High and Low (Reissue)
25-Alphaville
29-Picnic at Hanging Rock
30-M
35- Diabolique (Reissue)
37- Time Bandits
38-Branded to Kill
39-Tokyo Drifter
40-Armegeddon
41-Henry V
44- Red Shoes
51-Brazil
52-Yojimbo (reissue)
53-Sanjuro (reissue)
54-For All Mankind (reissue)
56-The 39 Steps
57-Charade
63-Carnival of Souls
64-The Third Man (reissue)
65-Rushmore
75-Chasing Amy
76- Brief Encounter
82-Hamlet
93-Black Narcissus (reissue)
97-Do the Right Thing
108-The Rock
110-M. Hulot's Holiday
111-Mon Oncle
112-Playtime (reissue)
115-Rififi
118- Sullivan's Travels
131-Closely Watched Trains
135-Rebecca
140-8 1/2
157-The Royal Tenenbaums
163-Hopscotch
174-Band of Outsiders
175-Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
176- The Killers

185-Five Films by Francois Truffaut
(5--400 blows)
186--Stolen Kisses
187--Bed and Board
188--Love on the Run)

196-Hiroshima Mon Amour (reissue)
197-Night and Fog
213-Richard III
The Rules of the Game
219-La Strada
221-Ikiru
230-3 Women
233-Stray Dog
234-Tin Drum (reissue)
247-Slacker
249-The Battle of Algiers

250-John Cassavetes: Five Films
(251-Shadows
252-Faces
253-A Woman Under the Influence
254-Killing of a Chinese Bookie
255-Opening Night
256-Constant Forge)

265-Short Cuts
268-Youth of the Beast
269-Fighting Elegy
281-Jules and Jim
286-Divorce, Italian Style
288-F for Fake
289- Hoop Dreams
293-The Flowers of St. Francis
298-Gate of Flesh
299-Story of a Prostitute
300-Life Aquatic
304-The Man Who Fell to Earth
306-Le Samourai
314- Pickpocket
315-Shoot the Piano Player
316-Ran
319-The Bad Sleep Well
322-Mr. Arkadin: AKA Confidential Report
333- Fists in the Pocket
334-Harlan County, USA
335-Elevator to the Gallows
336-Dazed and Confused
349-Kicking and Screaming
350-Seduced and Abandoned
351-The Spirit of the Beehive
374-Bicycle Thieves
376-49th Parallel
378-Fires on the Plain
379-The Burmese Harp
380-Naked City
382-Overlord
384-Vengance is Mine
396-Ace in the Hole
408-Breathless
409-Days of Heaven
413-Drunken Angel
414--Two Lane Blacktop
421- Pierrot Le Fou
437- Vampyr
439- Trafic
441- The Small Back Room
450- Bottle Rocket
452- The Spy Who Came in From the Cold
453-Chungking Express
454-Europa
470-Wise Blood
475-The Friends of Eddie Coyle
488-Howard's End
489-Monsoon Wedding
490-Wings of Desire

500- Roberto Rossellini's War Trilogy
(497- Rome Open City
498-Paisan
499-Germany Year Zero)

501-Paris, Texas
505-Make Way for Tomorrow
519-Stagecoach
521-Mystery Train
523-Night Train to Munich
533-Crumb
535-Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence
537-The Magician
539-House
540-The Darjeeling Limited
541-The Night of the Hunter
543- Modern Times

America Lost and Found: The BBS Story
544-Head
545-Easy Rider
546-Five Easy Pieces
547-Drive, He Said
548-A Safe Place
549-The Last Picture Show
550-THe King of Marvin Gardens

555- Sweet Smell of Success
562- Blow Out
565- The Great Dictator
591-12 Angry Men
594-Godzilla
599-Vanya on 42nd Street
600- Anatomy of a Murder
608- Harold and Maude
619- Le Havre
625- Eating Raoul
647- On the Waterfront
649- Ministry of Fear
651- Badlands
654- Repo Man
667- Seconds
670- To Be or Not to Be
671- La Cage Aux Folles
704- Riot in Cell Block 11
721- Love Streams
725- Eraserhead
733- La Dolce Vita
736- It Happened One Night
738- Tootsie
748- Watership Down
764- Fisher King
765- The Black Stallion

Janus Films

Paddle to the Sea
The Red Balloon
White Mane

Eclipse

Series 5-The First Films of Samuel Fuller
(I Shot Jessie James
The Baron of Arizona
The Steel Helmet)