Every Tuesday, discriminating viewers are confronted with a flurry of choices: new releases on disc and on-demand, vintage and original movies on any number of streaming platforms, catalog titles making a splash on Blu-ray or 4K. This weekly column sifts through all of those choices to pluck out the movies most worth your time, no matter how you’re watching.
This week, we’ve got one of last year’s finest films, two marvelous indie documentaries, a Blu-ray bump for a ‘60s classic, and a double feature that feels just right for this apocalyptic moment.
ON THE CRITERION CHANNEL:
“Fail Safe” and “Dr. Strangelove”: Kinda starting to feel like the end of the world out there, isn’t it? Well, that was the aura of the era circa 1964, when (respectively) Sidney Lumet and Stanley Kubrick released these dramatizations of a hypothetical nuclear apocalypse; both films are in the Criterion Collection, so their channel has packaged them as a “Going Nuclear” double feature. And though the tones are different – “Fail Safe” is a solemn drama, “Dr. Strangelove” a pitch-black comedy – the films have more in common than merely the subject matter. Both were conceived in the wake of the Cuban Missile, shot in stark black-and-white, and released by Columbia Pictures in the same year; in fact, the resemblance was close enough that Kubrick sued. But it’s fascinating to watch such similar stories approached so differently, and Criterion definitely got the order right; “Strangelove” is by no means a pick-me-up, but by the bleak conclusion of “Fail Safe,” you’ll be ready for a laugh.
ON BLU-RAY / DVD / VOD:
“Uncut Gems”: Josh and Benny Safdie scored their biggest commercial and critical success to date – and deservedly so – with this adrenaline-fueled embed into New York City’s diamond district, as seen through the eyes of a perennial hustler and inveterate gambler (Adam Sandler), who spends his life perpetually in pursuit of the next big score. Sandler has never been better, harnessing his considerable nervous energy and offhand charisma, and the entire supporting cast wows (though Julia Fox’s put-upon girlfriend and Lakeith Stanfield’s seemingly laid-back accomplice are the stand-outs). The Safdies have been building to a movie this great for a decade; it’s hard to imagine where they’re headed next.
“Recorder: The Marion Stokes Project”: Marion Stokes popped a VHS tape into the deck during the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis, pressed record… and never stopped. Matt Wolf’s ace documentary runs a scant 87 minutes, yet somehow packs in enough material for three different movies: a bio-doc of the eccentric woman who kept pressing that button, a survey of the decades of history she preserved on those tapes, and a commentary on the shifts in media they captured. Maybe this one requires an interest in media studies (or a compulsion or two), but if you do (guilty, on both counts) it’s a must-see.
ON DVD / VOD:
“Stuffed”: The subject matter may be dark – a deep-dive into the world and history of taxidermy – but there’s something strangely soothing about Erin Derham’s documentary, which travels the world to profile taxidermists, professional and amateur, of different backgrounds, motivations, and aesthetics. There’s much to learn here, from the history of the art (and science) to exactly how it’s done. But the picture’s primary value is as a portrait of, in the words of one participant, “this really closely-knit community of eccentric weirdos,” and the bond that ties them together.
ON BLU-RAY:
“Salesman”: An early Criterion Collection DVD making a welcome jump to Blu-ray, this documentary classic follows the busted out, cigarette-pounding hard cases who sell door-to-door for the Mid-American Bible Co. as they talk shop, tell war stories, and bemoan their fates. Directors Al Maysles, David Maysles, and Charlotte Zwerin recognized the dramatic possibilities of these men; in spots, it plays like a non-fiction “Death of a Salesman” (or a pre-“Glengarry Glen Ross”), with recognizable types and familiar conflicts. But the knowledge that this is not staged, that these salesmen (and their marks – I mean, customers) have to keep living these lives beyond the frame, gives the film a sense of overwhelming despair and sorrow. Put simply, it’s one of the great American documentary films.