Movies in 2026 173

 

The Gates of the Night (Marcel Carne, 1946)

I've made the point before that Marcel Carne might be my favorite French director, but also softened my stance by saying I don't know how passionately I would make that argument. However, I can also say that I've liked every Marcel Carne film that I've ever seen, including this morning's re-watch, his 1946 film The Gates of the Night. Apparently it wasn't a popular film when it came out right after World War II, but history has been much kinder to it, and now it's rightly considered a classic. Everything takes place in one night, focusing on the new and tragic love affair between Jean Diego (Yves Montand in his breakout role) and Malou (Nathalie Nattier). Considering the year, it's not particularly surprising that the war casts its shadow over the entire film, including certain Frenchmen who had collaborated with the Germans. I recognized Julien Carette, who played Monsieur Quinquina, but is better known for his roles in Jean Renoir's The Grand Illusion, The Human Beast, and The Rules of the Game. Jean Vilar as Le chochard, essentially playing fate, was especially good (and I'm stealing one of his speeches for my chapter on dreams and visions in the epics). Highly recommended.

Movies in 2026 172

 

Islands (Yann Gonzalez, 2017)

Over the years I've heard various and sundry versions of this statement from my friends: "It was really weird, I think you would like it," or "That was way too strange for me, but you might like it," or "Ten minutes in I was thinking, 'WTAF,' I bet Scudder has seen this." There is a certain truth in that, although I don't think I go out of my way to watch strange movies, but rather I'm polymorphously addicted to film, and am quite willing to give just about anything a try. The artistic temperament takes many forms, and it's more than a shame to close yourself off from new experiences. This seems especially true to day, when the mathematical internet gods are quite happy to determine your interests and only give you material designed to keep you in that slot (thus making you an easily identifiable consumer). And, once again, this is one of the beautiful things about the Criterion Channel: you will always be introduced to new directors and actors and films that you would never imagine existed in the world. Last night I watched Yann Gonzalez's 2017 short film Islands, which is a classic example of this fact. It starts off a sort of slasher film parody, which then transitions into a threesome with the monster killer (the director is clearly commenting here on our expectations) with homoerotic aspects on a stage - and it just gets more interesting/weird from there, ending with a scene that feels like a David Lynch outtake. I don't know if I liked it, although explicit monster killer sex is a criminally ignored genre, but there were some scenes that will definitely stick with me. I'm certainly going to check out at least one more of Gonzalez's shorts featured in this month's Criterion Channel collection. Would I recommend it? I think it's definitely interesting and challenging, but my description above will probably tell you whether to give it a watch.

Movies in 2026 171

 

Bergman Island (Mia Hansen'Love, 2021)

Last night I re-watched Mia Hansen-Love's 2021 film Bergman Island, which is a film I like although not as much as I want to. It's centered around a couple, Chris (played by the wonderful Vicky Krieps) and Tony (Tim Roth) Sanders, who visit Faro Island, the home base of the legendary Ingmar Bergman. They're a couple at a crisis point in their relationship, typical Bergman fare). Tony is there to screen a copy of his latest movie at a film fest, and Chris is working on a screenplay for a film she hopes to direct.  At a certain point it segues into her screenplay and then her film, starring Mia Wasikowska (as Amy) and Anders Danielsen Lie (as Joseph). And then it goes truly meta, with the actors inside her film. More than anything else, it's a love letter to Ingmar Bergman (including his son in a walkthrough at the end) and it's hard to critique that. The component parts are interesting, and the acting is first rate, but I don't think any of the sections are given the room to breathe, and hence the viewer is left a tad emotionally disconnected. Like I said, I like it, I just don't know if it came together as cleanly or impactfully as it might have. I definitely will watch it again down the road, and you should check it out.

Movies in 2026 170

 

Out of the Past (Jacques Tourneur, 1947)

I've (obviously) seen a ton of film noir, including its Japanese and French and Scandinavian and Argentinian (it goes on and on) cousins, and I don't know if there is a better example of the genre than Jacques Tourneur's 1947 absolute classic Out of the Past. How many times have I seen this film - I'd hate to guess, but it's one that I never miss. It's been featured this past month on the Criterion Channel and so I had to re-watch it, even though I also own the DVD. Robert Mitchum is amazing as Jeff Bailey/Markham, a former detective, now gas station owner, who can't outrun his past. Once, in the antediluvian past, I was involved with a woman who proposed that I possessed Mitchum's "sleepy intensity," which I think I only partially understand, but which I like. Jane Greer is wonderfully wicked as Kathie Moffat, who gives Barbara Stanwyck a run for greatest film noir femme fatale of all-time. It also  features a very young Kirk Douglas, who is great as the venomous Whit Sterling. The very definition of Required Viewing.

There are so many great lines, almost more than you can count:

Jeff: "That's not the way to win." Kathie: "Is there a way to win?" Jeff: "There's a way to lose more slowly." It's spoken very early in the film, related to a scene when Kathie is gambling, but it essentially is the line that defines the entire movie.

Ann (Jeff's nice girlfriend): "She (Kathie) can't be all bad. No one is." Jeff: "Well, she comes the closest."

Kathie: "Don't you believe me?" Jeff: "Baby, I don't care."

Kathie: "I don't want to die." Jeff: "Neither do I, baby, but if I have to, I'm going to die last."

Kathie: "Don't you see? You've only me to make deals with now." Jeff: "Well, build my gallows high, baby."

Barnacles

 Janet is out of town again, which means that I am festooned by very needy cats (especially Cici, who is the more Janetcentric of the two). Still, there are worse ways to spend the morning when you're working on your Italian. 

Half of this scene never changes, in that Mollie (the Horizontal Cat), on the right, would always be here, but Cici (the Vertical Cat) would be in the other room attached to Janet.

Movies in 2026 169

 

It Came from Beneath the Sea (Robert Gordon, 1955)

It's rare that you can say that you went down a Kenneth Tobey rabbit hole, but I guess it can happen. The other night when we were watching The Thing from Another World I told Janet that Kenneth Tobey eventually did a series of monster movies (none as good as Nyby's classic). This led us, on a night when she was tired and didn't have the energy for longer film, to Robert Gordon's 1955 It Came from Beneath the Sea, which she had also never seen (apparently not everyone spent every Saturday night watching monster movies - such a wasted life, her, obviously, not me - she probably had a date or was reading classic literature or something). A giant octopus, generated by H bomb fallout (which happened a lot in the 1950s) causes mayhem, including destroying the Golden Gate Bridge. Today the film is mainly remembered as the beginning of the Ray Harryhausen era of stop motion model animation (Dynamation) era. I think it is required viewing, but only if you grew up in the middle of a cornfield in Indiana in the age before cable TV or the Internet.

Movies in 2026 168

 

Halloween (John Carpenter, 1978)

After watching John Carpenter's The Thing the other night, I guess it was inevitable that we'd end up watchin his 1978 classic Halloween a couple nights later. Somehow Janet (who I always accuse of growing up in a nunnery) had never seen Halloween. It is definitely on the short list for greatest independent films of all time (Carpenter made it for $300,000 and in its initial run it made $70,000,000).  It also inspired an entire genre of movies, most of which, sadly, were terrible (including his own Halloween II). I've always thought that it was much more like a Hitchcock film than a Romero gore fest, with most of the shocks being based on timing and suspense. Movie fans will love the kids watching the beginning of The Thing From Another World on TV, a film that Carpenter would himself remake four years later (and certainly could not have dreamt of the budget for that film when he was making Halloween. Required viewing.