Hard Eight (1996)
QFS No. 140 - This is our first QFS selection of a Paul Thomas Anderson film. You know him from all of his great work over the last 25 years but Hard Eight was his first feature. I’ve seen so many of his films but I’ve never seen the first one so this week’s selection attempts to remedy that.
High and Low (1963)
QFS No. 139 - It’s been entirely too long since we’ve selected a Kurosawa film here at Quarantine Film Society. It was way back in July 2020 when we were young and terrified but watched the masterpiece Yojimo (1961, QFS No. 13. The offending parties to this nearly four-year gap have been reassigned to new minor roles within The Society.
Wanda (1971)
QFS No. 138 - Woah, what’s that you say? You’ve never heard of Wanda? You uncivilized movie ignoramus. That’s outrageous, well I oughta…
Okay fine. Neither had I.
The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
QFS No. 137 - For our four-year anniversary of QFS, we decided to select an epic by the great David Lean. Yes, it took us four years to get to a David Lean film, and for the most part it’s because I’ve seen most of the epic classic ones. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) remains one of my favorite films of all time and we could easily have selected it to commemorate our four years of watching and talking about movies. But instead, I picked what is my second favorite Lean film, The Bridge on the River Kwai.
Ace in the Hole (1951)
QFS No. 136 - I’ve managed to see a great deal of Wilder’s films but he made so many that there are a lot left for me to watch. He’s another one, like John Ford, with a very high batting percentage of great hits. I went with Ace in the Hole because, well, don’t we all want to bask in the glow of Kirk Douglas’ chin for nearly two hours?
20 Days in Mariupol (2023)
QFS No. 135- Long time QFS members know that we rarely select documentary films due to a long-standing bias against them within the ranks of our QFS Council of Excellence. This is only our third documentary selection.
Past Lives (2023)
QFS No. 134 - What I know about this film approaches zero. I do know it’s from South Korea and that it’s Celine Song’s first film after being a staff writer on a major Amazon series. So, you know – pretty amazing, that!
The Holdovers (2023)
QFS No. 133 - This is our first selection of an Alexander Payne film, one of my favorite contemporary filmmakers. I’ve seen nearly all of his films, hence its exclusion from the QFS Priority Selection List since I’ve seen nearly all of them. Truly one of the great living screenwriters, a modern auteur.
A Night at the Opera (1935)
QFS No. 132 - Okay fine, so it’s not exactly a holiday classic, but doesn’t this time of year seem like a perfect opportunity to watch a Marx Brothers film? We haven’t yet selected a film by the comedy legends, and A Night at the Opera (1935) is widely known as one of their best films.
Black Narcissus (1947)
QFS No. 131 - Emeric Pressburger and Michael Powell are the powerhouse directing duo from England whose legendary work includes The Red Shoes (1948, QFS No. 52), The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), 49th Parallel (1941), The Tales of Hoffmann (1951), and of course this week’s selection The Black Narcissus. I’ve only scratched the surface myself with their career work but everything I’ve seen has been incredibly impressive.
The Color of Pomegranates (1969)
QFS No. 130 - Martin Scorsese compared The Color of Pomegranates (1969) to “opening a door and walking into another dimension, where time has stopped and beauty has been unleashed.” I am here and ready to walk into another dimension.
Planes, Trains and Automobies (1987)
QFS No. 129 - John Hughes is one of my all-time favorite filmmakers and, I dare say, one of the reasons I wanted to become one myself. The only reason we haven’t selected one of his movies yet is that I have seen basically all of them – especially the ones he directed. There are a few he wrote that I haven’t yet seen, but truly it’s hard to remember a time when I hadn’t seen a John Hughes film.
Klute (1971)
QFS No. 128 - Alan Pakula is one of the great workman filmmakers who seemingly gets overlooked in conversations about the best directors of an era. His films speak for themselves. All the President’s Men (1976) is just an utterly stellar film that really showcases an incredibly adept filmmaker at the top of his game. Throw in The Parallax View (1974), Sophie’s Choice (1982), Presumed Innocent (1990), The Pelican Brief (1993) along with Klute and that alone would be enough to call it a career.
The Seventh Seal (1957)
QFS No. 127 - Sweden’s legendary director Ingmar Bergman is one of those essential filmmakers whose work you’re required to familiarize yourself with if you go to film school and intend to be a director. And with good reason. His films are deeply empathetic and explore what it means to be human in a style that I would characterize as part of the Neorealist movement that swept through post-war Europe.
Killers of the Flower Moon (2023)
QFS No. 126 - As you all know, this is the most recent film directed by Martin Scorsese, Patron Saint of QFS. It’s his 26th feature film and our second Scorsese selection after After Hours (1985, QFS No. 85) last year. And, crucially, the first of his films made during the QFS Pandemic Era. Scorsese is about to turn 81-years old in a couple of weeks and it is entirely possible that this is his final movie.
Beetlejuice (1988)
QFS No. 125 - Well, it’s been 124 films in and we’re just now getting to see our first QFS selection of a Tim Burton film. I’m pretty surprised by that, but perhaps it’s because I’ve seen pretty much all of his films from his golden era of the mid 1980s until the 2000s.
This is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection (2019)
QFS No. 124 - I know this will come as a shock to many of you, but this will be our first Quarantine Film Society selection from Lesotho. The country has about 2 million people – which is, I believe, still smaller than what the population of Los Angeles would be if the San Fernando Valley succession happened in 2002.
The Player (1992)
QFS No. 123 from Oct 4, 2023. The Player (1992) will be our first selection from the works of master Robert Altman since way back in 2000 with one of our early QFS selections, McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971, QFS No. 11). Unlike the Western setting of that film, The Player storyline takes place and is set in Hollywood.
Rocco and His Brothers (1960)
QFS No. 122 from September 27, 2023 - Another Italian film, you say? Well, you longtime members of QFS will remember that Sharat is making his way through the film requirements he was supposed to be have finished before beginning as a grad student at the American Film Institute.
How Green Was My Valley (1941)
We return to legendary John Ford, last seen in 2020 for QFS No. 26 with his Young Mr. Lincoln (1939), a film he made two years earlier than this week’s selection. The great American filmmaker turns his gaze outside the US in a film that won five Academy Awards including Best Picture. But to me it has always been known as “the film that beat out Citizen Kane.”