Snobbin: Beautiful Trash in the Pop Culture Gutter

Akira Kurosawa's No Regrets For Our Youth (1946) stars Ozu's favorite lead, Setsuko Hara, in a prescient antifascist political vehicle. Kurosawa includes lots of dramatic action without a "pillow shot" in sight.

Rene Laloux's Fantastic Planet is a masterful Franco-Czech animated science fiction film that uses stop motion and cut out animation to tell the story of humans that are controlled by large humanoid aliens on a distant planet. The aliens known as Draags consider them animals, and some are treated as barely suitable pets for their children. Others live in the wilderness and are subject to periodical purgings. When his mother is teased to death by children, a Draag leader finds Terr. He grows up the pet of the leader's daughter, Tiva, and learns from her education headphones. Later, when he escapes he takes them with him and joins a tribe. When they discover that the Draag plan to exterminate them, they make plans to leave the planet. The bizarre animation, which recalls 60s underground comix, Vaughn Bode for instance, is coupled with a jazzy psychedelic soundtrack by Alain Goraguer (I have been long familiar with the soundtrack but never watched the film). The film is heavily ...

Jean Rollin is my current director of choice. I've been enamored with his beautifully shot, dreamy movies about vampires and existential death. The lovely and horrific images that flit with little apparent reason through his films with zero regard for consequence have me hooked. Of course, I need to watch more of his films to develop an appreciation for the breadth of his work. Most of his films fall into the French genre, Fantastique, which combines elements of horror, science fiction, and fantasy, and can easily hook any horror fan with an addiction to Foreign films. As an avid horror movie buff, with a deep appreciation for foreign horror, I'm surprised that I have never seriously considered Rollin. His bizarre plots are reminiscent of Michelle Soavi's Cemetery Man (a long time favorite) or more straightforward Luis Buñuel. The cinematography is beautiful, and the landscapes are easily as remarkable as early Argento, or the Gothic forest scenes of the best Paul Nasc...