How had I never seen... "Z" (1969)

by Mark Brinkerhoff

After finally having gotten around to seeing 1931’s M, it seemed only fitting to round it out with 1969’s Z, co-record-holder of the shortest movie title ever. Who knew that these two would have more in common than their one-word titles? 

Bracingly directed by Greek-born Costa-Gavras, the Algeria-set, French-language Z is a thinly veiled version of the circumstances around the 1963 assassination of a reformist Greek politician by right-wing zealots. Both the fictional and actual events stoked social upheaval and prompted a political crisis. Factor in a shady government coverup, eventually exposed by a dogged team of investigators and journalists, and you have the makings of a thriller that is as timeless as it is unnerving...

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How had I never seen...“Enter the Dragon”?

by Cláudio Alves

I often find myself bristling at the idea that cinema is, essentially, a form of storytelling. Many a great filmmaker has said those words and many passionate cinephiles have done so too. Far from me to begrudge anyone that thus defines the seventh art. To each his own, but it’s difficult not to think that storytelling is simultaneously too broad and too narrow a description. After all, what of experimental cinema or aesthetic marvels that have little to no story?

Narrative isn’t the only type of cinema there is and even if we account for the narrative value of documentaries, many fact-based projects circumvent that too. Not to sound facetious, but, to me, cinema is moving image and time, it’s editing and it’s audiovisual stimuli. Such words may smell like pretention and taste like academic nonsense, but through them, one can understand the appeal of certain films in a way that’s impossible when thinking of them as storytelling.

Enter the Dragon is garbage as storytelling. As a spectacle of color and rhythm, however, it’s pure delight…

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How had I never seen... "Cabaret"?

In this new series, members of Team Film Experience watch and share their reactions to classic films they’ve never seen. 

By Ben Miller

Cabaret is Bob Fosse’s “musical” into the world of bohemian performer Sally Bowles and uptight Brit Brian Roberts.  Both try to navigate the world of love along with the struggle to reach a level of extravagance, all the while experiencing the adapting political climate of 1930’s Berlin.

Shamefully, I had never seen it.

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How had I never seen... "Three Days of the Condor" or "The Parallax View"?

In this new series, members of Team Film Experience watch and share their reactions to classic films they’ve never seen. 

by Lynn Lee

The 1970s may have been a great era for cinema, but they were a pretty lousy time for faith in the great American experiment.  Between the Vietnam War, the Pentagon Papers, the Church Committee reports, and of course Watergate, there were seemingly endless reasons to suspect the U.S. government and other institutions meant to serve and protect the public were instead covering up all manner of malfeasance—and that they might be watching you if they thought you were a threat.  This generalized paranoia found fertile ground in Hollywood, leading to a spate of conspiracy thrillers of varying quality and goofiness.

Until last month, the only one of these films I’d seen was All the President’s Men (unless you count Chinatown and Network, which I’d argue you could).  But something about the social and political tensions of today made these movies seem especially current again.  So it seemed like a good occasion to watch two of the most famous examples of the genre: Three Days of the Condor (1975) and A Parallax View (1974)...

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How had I never seen... "M" (1931)?

Series Debut! As a kind of dark mirror to our "Over & Over" column, we've invited  Team Experience to fill in some of their most shameful film history gaps and tell us about their experience. We all have gaps in our viewing with over a century of film history behind us! To kick things off here's a 'Lang-delayed' encounter for Mark. - Editor

by Mark Brinkerhoff

I first became aware of M, Fritz Lang’s seminal 1931 German thriller, while flipping through Vanity Fair’s Hollywood, a weighty, sumptuous 2000 coffee table book. Therein, opposite a cuckoo photo of Doris Day with half a dozen dyed poodles, is a haunting photo of actor Peter Lorre with the following caption...

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