Watched on St. Patrick’s Day, March 17, 2025.
Sweet little film to watch on St. Paddy’s Day 2025—85 years after its release. I thought I’d seen all the Ford/Wayne St. Patrick’s Day movies with the glorious The Quiet Man, but lo and behold, there was another. And Criterion had it. What a glorious thing.
Watched as part of Criterion Challenge 2025: #45. Asian film
This was pretty fun. I didn't really get into it until the last 40 minutes or so. The action started to get a lot more fun and there was more of it. I didn't find the story that engaging. It was fun thinking about movies it likely influenced. The cinematography is brilliantly saturated - it feels a little exaggerated, but I still enjoyed looking at it. The music is pretty bad…
What an incredible amount of technical artistry in this Pinocchio. Not since 1940 has there been a better version of the story (though Garrone’s 2019 version is pretty great). The visuals are immediately striking and satisfying. The stop motion really brings the texture out in the wood, you can almost feel it. It also pairs so well with the puppetry aspect of the story. Stop motion is just the perfect medium for Pinocchio. The Christian theme and the use of…
It’s a Wonderful Life is truly one of the greatest movies ever made. It never seems to get old, year after year. I rotate the black and white with the color version every other year. The HD transfers and restorations look so beautiful. The colorization is done so well. There are plenty of imperfect moments (the big, terrible shock is that Mary would’ve been an “old maid” if George were never born?), but the film still hits the marks that really count the most.
