f i l m j o u r n e y . o r g

The eye-candy movie of the year has arrived, which is fitting since the film has virtually no dialogue whatsoever. Directed by Silvain Chomet with animators in Paris, Belgium, and Quebec, The Triplets of Belleville (2003) is an eccentric and sprawling adventure that begins in a nostalgic, mid-century Paris and progresses to a mythical metropolis, [...]

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In addition to filmjourney, one of my side projects includes co-administrating robert-bresson.com, a tribute site to Robert Bresson (1901-1999), perhaps my favorite of all filmmakers.
Two years ago, Peter Becker of the Criterion Collection mentioned their acquisition of Bresson’s quiet masterpiece, Diary of a Country Priest (1950), and I’ve been filled with anticipation ever since. [...]

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Continuing my bout of screenings with filmmakers in attendance, I wrapped up last week with the UCLA Film & Television Archives’ showing of acclaimed documentarian Errol Morris‘ new film, The Fog of War. But unlike Charles Burnett’s and AgnËs Varda’s down-to-earth interactions, Morris proved to be a showman at heart. When the sound [...]

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Why expanding kids’ cinematic knowledge isn’t always a good thing:
(My nephew, Sheldon, is seven years old now, and my brother just sent me these comments on their recent Lord of the Rings viewing.)

Sheldon has really enjoyed the background features. I think it is opening a new world to him, in that movies are [...]

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This past week, AgnËs Varda made the rounds to various Los Angeles sites as part of this year’s On Set with French Cinema series, picking up USC’s first Eisenstein Award along the way for her “visionary and distinguished contributions to the cinema.”
I’ve blogged about Varda before, the “grande dame of the French New Wave,” but [...]

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Just a note this morning to comment on the lack of graphics on filmjourney today. We’re experiencing some technical difficulty with our graphics server, but things should be up and running again in a day or two.
Incidentally, we’ve heard from a few people over the months that they’ve experienced difficulty logging-in to the discussion [...]

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I usually don’t do this sort of thing, but this deal is too good to pass by without mention. Rbcmp3.com, a US e-tailer of Russian media, is apparently offering a buy-one, get-one free deal for two of my favorite films, Andrei Tarkovsky’s Stalker (1979) and Mirror (1975).

“The first 10 orders for the film [...]

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Tuesday night, filmmaker Charles Burnett was invited to screen his new documentary, Nat Turner: A Troublesome Property, for a class here at Caltech and facilitate a Q&A afterward. A graduate of UCLA, Burnett is one of the most highly-esteemed filmmakers currently working in the US and he continues to be active in independent and [...]

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As a corollary to yesterday’s post, reader John Davies (a critic for MovieMail in the UK), has submitted lists of Great Films, which I’ve added to the Lists section of filmjourney.
In general, the best lists are those which cast the widest possible historical and geographical net. Movies are a global art [...]

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Due to the Los Angeles subway workers’ strike currently underway, I managed to ride my bike about 80 miles in two days and caught six feature films over the weekend: Long Gone, Condor: Axis of Evil, Bright Leaves, Dolls, What the Eye Doesn’t See, and The Runner. And I loved five out of six. [...]

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