RIP Andrezj Wajda, a voice for Poland in film

Yesterday, Polish director Andrezj Wajda died at age 90. He was among the most distinguished Polish filmmakers of his generation or in general: his accolades include a Palme d'Or for his labor rights film Man of Iron and a 1999 honorary Oscar for his lifetime body of work.

As with Man of Iron, many of Wajda's works were influenced by his lifetime in Poland during its occupation in World War II and rule over the Soviet Union. Many of his films were challenged or banned by Soviet authorities; he was not able to produce Katyń, a film about a 1940 massacre of the Polish, until after Poland's independence.

If you want to watch some of Wajda's impactful, distinctly Polish cinematic vision, we have a number of his films available in the library, including two through streaming.

Ashes and Diamonds – HU DVD 2583 
Danton – HU DVD 5758
Everything for Sale – HU DVD 2626 
A Generation – HU DVD 2581
Kanal – HU DVD 2582 and Streaming
Katyn – HU DVD 6135
Korczak – HU DVD 10546
Man of Iron – HU DVD 3145
Man of Marble – DVD 2014
Penderecki: Paths Through The Labyrinth – Streaming
Promised Land – HU DVD 2655

Gene Wilder and his triumphant Mel Brooks comedies

As with everyone else, we're saddened by the news of the death of Gene Wilder. He was Willy Wonka, of course, but he was also one of the greatest comedic actors of the 20th century. His collaborations with Mel Brooks and Richard Pryor are all-time classics, and hearing that someone with such a sharp mind died from complications from Alzheimer's is heartbreaking.

If you only know Gene Wilder as Roald Dahl's famous chocolatier, this is an opportunity to discover the comedic intensity and chemistry that made him a favorite. We have all of the movies he made though Mel Brooks (though sadly none of his roles alongside Richard Pryor). Wilder has other assorted performances through his career, including stage roles and a bit part in Bonnie and Clyde, and we've included them on this list as well.

Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex, but Were Afraid to Ask – HU DVD 123
Blazing Saddles – HU DVD 673
Young Frankenstein – HU DVD 865
The Producers – HU DVD 5169
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory – HU DVD 10240 
Eugene Ionesco's Rhinoceros – HU DVD 10815
Bonnie and Clyde – HU DVD 11487
Death of a Salesman – Streaming video
Scarecrow – Streaming video

The end of the VHS, and what it means for the library

Well, we've been dreading this moment for years now: the VHS is officially obsolete.

Funai, the last company that still manufactures VHS players, will end their production at the end of the month. This comes less than a year after Betamax tapes were also discontinued. As of August 1st, the VHS will be a format permanently in the past; outside of small artisanal efforts (the article we linked to mentions a collector community that might not go down so easily), there will never be any more VHS players than currently exist in the world. That's all we've got.

This won't have too much of a practical effect for most people who have already replaced their VHS collections, but we worry about what will come of all the VHSes that have never been re-released or preserved. Countless documentaries and ephemera will become unavailable, assuming the tapes last longer than the supply of players.

For a few years now, Media Services has been in the process of preserving our VHS collection to ensure that this problem won't impact the AU community. We've been conducting an extensive audit of our VHSes to see what isn't available on any other format and whether we're within the legal grounds to digitize and create our own DVD copy of it. As part of this, we're also collaborating with other groups on campus like ATV and Athletics to preserve other valuable VHS videos, including old commencement addresses.

We still have a supply of VHS players and staff who know how to fix them, so we'll be fine in the long run. Let's take a second to commemorate this inevitable but sad moment for physical media.

RIP Abbas Kiarostami, defining voice of Iranian cinema

Over the weekend, Iranian director Abbas Kiarostami died at age 76. Kiarostami was perhaps the greatest and most renowned Iranian filmmaker; he is the only to win a Palme d'Or, had an outsized influence on world cinema, and brought international attention to the Iranian film industry. His admirers include Martin Scorsese and Jean-Luc Godard, who once reportedly said "Film begins with D.W. Griffith and ends with Abbas Kiarostami."

Kiarostami's thematically powerful work often lands on lists of the greatest films ever made, not just for their historical significance but their artistic achievement. His 1997 Palme-winning Taste of Cherry is an milestone in minimalism, with long stretches of silence and inaction that divided audiences on its release.

Below, we've included a list of films by Kiarostami, including some shorts included in compilations. You might also consider watching Cinema Asia: Iran (streaming), a documentary about the history of Iranian cinema that mentions Kiarostami's work.

Segment in Lumière & Company – HU DVD 283
Crimson Gold (screenplay) – HU DVD 928
The Wind Will Carry Us – HU DVD 1334
Ten – HU DVD 1336
Close-Up – HU DVD 1344 and streaming
ABC Africa – DVD 1345
Where is My Romeo? – DVD 4320
Life and Nothing More – DVD 8247
Certified Copy – HU DVD 10031
Segment in Five: 5 Long Takes Dedicated to Yasujiro Ozu – HU DVD 10290
Taste of Cherry – HU DVD 10375
Where is the Friend's Home – HU DVD 11633 
Like Someone in Love – HU DVD 11684
Through the Olive Trees – HU DVD 12018

RIP Douglas Slocombe, prolific Indiana Jones cinematographer

Douglas Slocombe, one of the most adaptable cinematographers of the mid-20th century, died yesterday at 103.

Unlike many cinematographers with a distinctive or showy style, Slocombe filmed his projects so closely to the vision of the material that his work was often almost invisible. His far-flung credits are a testament to how smoothly he fit into whatever slot he needed to fill: he began as a photojournalist and director of photography for 1940s and 1950s British comedies; he ended his career filming the Indiana Jones trilogy.

Slocombe retired in 1989, leaving behind films ranging from Jesus Christ Superstar to James Bond movie Never Say Never Again. We never even knew he had a hand in much of his filmography, which, given his style, might have been the goal all along.

Slocombe accrued a whopping 80 cinematography credits in 50 years, so we of course have a few in our collection. You might not see a signature Douglas Slocombe stamp on these films, but you'll certainly see a well-shot movie.

The Man in the White Suit – HU DVD 583
The Great Gatsby (1974) – HU DVD 722
Raiders of the Lost Ark – HU DVD 3251
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom – HU DVD 3252
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade – HU DVD 3253
A Run For Your Money – HU DVD 3923
The Titfield Thunderbolt – HU DVD 3925
The Lion in Winter – HU DVD 5348
Jesus Chris Superstar – HU DVD 5769
The Fearless Vampire Killers – HU DVD 6513
The Italian Job (1969) – HU DVD 10373
The Maids – HU DVD 10823

A salute to Jacques Rivette, craftsman of the French New Wave

Last week, we quietly lost Jacques Rivette, one of the original filmmakers of the original French New Wave movement. As a filmmaker and a critic, Rivette advocated for a more natural, improvised cinema that the New Wave aspired to. Godard and Truffaut captured the spotlight, but Rivette's films are often considered some of the most involved and accomplished. His films are often only critical assessed long and complicated, but they offer more than that.

We'll leave the eulogizing to Glenn Kenny at Flavorwire, who wrote an excellent tribute to a man who never labeled himself a director and preferred a credit for mise en scène. Give it a read.

Rivette's films are often unusually difficult to find in the United States, but luckily, we have a few available to watch in the library.

Short film on Lumière et compagnie – HU DVD 283
Who Knows? – DVD 314
Gang of Four – HU DVD 318
Secret Defense – HU DVD 530
The Beautiful Troublemaker – HU DVD 10599
The Nun – DVD 11306

Remembering Bowie on film

Like everyone, we're shocked and saddened by the death of David Bowie, rock god extraordinaire and cultural icon. Bowie was a true renaissance man who dabbled in music, performance, games, and yes, film. Attempting to quantify all his contributions to the arts is a fool's errand, but we want to at least acknowledge some of the excellent work on film by a man described by Vice as "fascinated with the moving image."

Everyone probably knows David Bowie best on the screen in the iconic role of Jareth the Goblin King in Jim Henson's Labyrinth. If that's any indication, his film choices were eclectic. He also played the starring role in the Japanese World War II movie Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence (HU DVD 10689) and was the centerpiece of the ethereal, influential The Man Who Fell to Earth (HU DVD 2658). And you might not recognized his brief appearance as inventor Nikola Tesla in Christopher Nolan's The Prestige (HU DVD 3831).

Don't forget the countless times other actors and filmmakers have paid tribute to Bowie's work, most notably the David Bowie-themed episode of the HBO series Flight of the Conchords (HU DVD 4831). There's also Velvet Goldmine (HU DVD 687), a film based so closely on David Bowie that the rock star nearly sued the production.

And of course, see Bowie's self-effacing cameo in Ricky Gervais's Extras (embedded above, also HU DVD 2992).

We're glad Bowie brought his enormous talents to film. It's a shame that he never got behind the camera apart from his music videos.

RIP William Becker, the unsung hero of world cinema

A week and a half ago, film distributor William Becker died. His name is not a recognizable one, and his quiet work at Janus Films and the Criterion Collection left a massive imprint on how we consume visual media.

As the co-owner of Janus Films starting in 1965, Becker oversaw the importation of many influential works of world cinema to American shores. He deserves partial credit for the success and influence of directors including Bergman, Kurosawa, and Fellini, filmmakers who might not have come to the United States for some time otherwise. He also co-founded the Criterion Collection, which worked closely with Janus Films to release of hundreds of classic works of cinema and popularized the letterbox film display standard. If you've watched The 400 Blows on a television, you can thank William Becker for that.

One person alone is of course not responsible for reshaping the arthouse and international film market in America, but Becker's transformation of Janus Films significantly helped. Criterion and Janus their exceptional work in distributing high-quality transfers of world cinema, and William Becker silently carved out a spot on the film world for that to happen.

RIP Wes Craven, master of horror

We wanted to start this semester off with a list of all the exciting titles we added recently, but we first need to acknowledge the very sad death of Wes Craven, horror director and producer extraordinaire whose slasher films defined and later deconstructed the genre.

Wes Craven is best known, of course, for his creation of A Nightmare on Elm Street and indelible horror movie icon Freddy Krueger. That alone would cement him as one of the most beloved figures in a genre full of cult personalities, but he also directed The Last House on the Left and The Hills Have Eyes and served as producer on their remakes. And in a terrific act of self-reflection, Craven also created Scream a series dedicated to dismantling the tropes and structure of the genre he helped popularize.

(He also directed a segment in Paris, je t'aime... which is weird.)

To honor Craven, we want to recommend not just his biggest movies but the love he put into his craft. So in addition to watching Elm Street and Scream, we suggest you watch three documentaries in which he offers a behind-the-scenes peek as his work and offers advice to upcoming filmmakers. Craven treated violent horror with artfulness and skill, and we'll miss his presence in the genre.

Scream – HU DVD 6
Scream 2 – HU DVD 7
A Nightmare on Elm Street – HU DVD 864
Paris, je t'aime – HU DVD 3378

The American Nightmare – HU DVD 998
Getting Started in Tinseltown – Streaming video
Successful Teamwork in Filmmaking – Streaming video

In honor of Rowdy Roddy Piper, a look back on They Live from Slavoj Zizek

Rowdy Roddy Piper's death last Friday leaves a very unusual hole in the film world. Though he made occasional guest appearances in TV shows and movies – usually either playing himself or a similarly hard-knuckled character – Piper is best known even beyond his wrestling career as the star of They Live (HU DVD 9020), John Carpenter's cult 1988 sci-fi thriller. Piper plays a construction worker who finds mysterious glasses that allow him to see the hidden mind-controlling messages throughout society. It's a bizarre but deeply loved film, and Piper's death has prompted plenty of media retrospectives about it.

Our favorite comes from Slavoj Zizek's documentary A Pervert's Guide to Ideology (available in the collection, HU DVD 11194). Zizek uses the film as a critique of the concept of moving outside ideology. It's complicated, and we'll let him explain it; the video is embedded above. He even discusses the over-extended fist-fight midway into the movie, calling it "the extreme violence of liberation."

They Live's second life in the cult film canon isn't surprising given its total weirdness, and we like that critics are revisiting its ideas with a little more acceptance. And even though Zizek's analysis is a few years old, it speaks to what a special movie Piper contributed to.

RIP James Horner

We're shocked and saddened by news of the untimely death of James Horner, Academy Award-winning composer of classic soundtracks for films including Apollo 13, Titanic, Braveheart, The New World, and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Horner was a world-class composer whose works are among the best in film; he was still an active composer and enhanced every movie he scored. His death is a significant loss to the medium.

Listen to his contributions to any of his films below for a reminder of the enormous talent we've lost.

Apollo 13 – HU DVD 529
Aliens – HU DVD 886
Glory – HU DVD 1171
Testament – HU DVD 1665
The New World – HU DVD 1963
The Name of the Rose – HU DVD 2106
Titanic – HU DVD 2290 
Apocalypto – HU DVD 4052
Braveheart – HU DVD 4787
Troy – HU DVD 6200 
Avatar – HU DVD 7045
An American Tail – HU DVD 7796
Hocus Pocus – HU DVD 7852
The Pelican Brief – HU DVD 7936

All the King's Men – HU DVD 3662
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan – HU DVD 9732
Star Trek III: The Search for Spock – HU DVD 9733
The Mask of Zorro – HU DVD 10750 

Who was Marion Barry? This HBO documentary is a good primer

Today marked the passing of Marion Barry, DC political legend and one of the country's most controversial mayors. To describe his decades of public involvement as tumultuous would be an understatement; Barry weathered multiple scandals and a high-profile arrest yet remained enormously popular among his constituents, serving four non-consecutive terms and continuing to serve as a councilman afterwards. His supporters said he fought hard for marginalized people in DC; detractors accused him of corruption and incompetence.

Suffice to say, Barry has a very interesting and complicated career, one that probably doesn't make much sense to anyone new to the DC area. If you're looking for a primer on Barry's history and legacy, we recommend watching The Nine Lives of Marion Barry (DVD 9730), an HBO-distributed documentary about the former mayor's highly elastic career. Barry was, for better or for worse, an irreplaceable politician, and we're glad that there's a comprehensive and even-handed documentary about his life.

The many works of Mike Nichols, EGOTer and prolific director

Mike Nichols, EGOT-winning director of The Graduate, died yesterday at age 83. For an acclaimed and decorated filmmaker, Nichols kept a comparatively low profile in the entertainment world, but he leaves behind an impressive lineup of truly great films and television productions, including Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Primary Colors, Working Girl, Angels in America, The Birdcage, and Charlie Wilson's War. The director got his start in entertainment as an improv comedian, but in future years, he will be remembered best for his consistent and varied filmography. It's quite an accomplishment that in his 40 years directing films, every single one was a winner.

Chances are that you've watched and enjoyed something by Mike Nichols, so in recognition of his career, we took the opportunity to look up the rest his directorial work. If you've ever been curious about his work or simply wanted a new director to get into, now is the right time to watch his films.

The Graduate – HU DVD 29
Wit – HU DVD 353
Postcards from the Edge – HU DVD 613
The Birdcage – HU DVD 667
Angels in America – HU DVD 760
Silkwood – HU DVD 1647
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? – HU DVD 3017
Primary Colors – HU DVD 3606
Closer – HU DVD 4080
Working Girl – HU DVD 4159
Charlie Wilson's War – HU DVD 4309
Carnal Knowledge – HU DVD 5728
Catch-22 – HU DVD 5844

A eulogy for the Saturday morning cartoon

Yesterday marked the largely unheralded end of a television tradition: the Saturday morning cartoon. For nearly fifty years, network channels devoted a significant portion of their Saturday programming to children's animated programs, but with the end of The CW's "Vortexx" block, no major broadcast networks is airing cartoons on Saturday anymore. After years of criticism for selling kids sugary cereal and toys, it's not surprising (and perhaps for the better) that educational and family-friendly programs have largely replaced cartoons as the go-to weekend staple. Child-friendly animation is still alive and well on channels like Cartoon Network and Disney XD, but the tradition that birthed Scooby-Doo, Yogi Bear, GI Joe, and the likes is now finished.

Certainly in the pantheon of all television shows, Saturday morning cartoons were among the most disposable. But they were a culturally significant niche, one that influenced generations of children and, if the success of Transformers and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles this summer is any indication, will continue to inform our media preferences for years to come.

Although our collection has a great selection of cartoons (including classics like Woody Woodpecker the recent The Amazing World of Gumball), we frankly don't have very many that began as part of the Saturday morning tradition. This might be for the best, given the quality of some of them. We do however, have both Captain Planet and the Planeteers (HU DVD 8841) and Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures! (HU DVD 10285). If you're looking for Saturday morning cartoons, you could certainly do worse than these too. But we don't provide cereal and action figures.

Robin Williams: a funnyman and performer of unparalleled range

We couldn't let this week pass without acknowledging the unfortunate and far too early death of comedian Robin Williams. We can only add to the immense outpouring of grief over Williams's death. Many retrospectives have focused on his terrific stand-up comedy and his ability to make us laugh – rightly so – but he was a performer of immense range who appeared in manic comedies as well as memorable dramatic roles. Consider that Williams starred in both Death to Smoochy and Insomnia in the same year, and you'll have some idea of this man's versatility. He will be greatly missed, but the breadth of his work on film and talent will speak for itself for years.

Befitting an actor who worked with such a terrific range for decades, the Media Services collection contains dozens of starring Robin Williams, encompassing everything from the silliest comedies to the most serious thrillers. A perusal of our collection brings up 21 DVDs starring Williams, from Hook to The Birdcage. We encourage you to check one out over the weekend to remember the work of a truly flexible and talented performer we lost far too soon.

Remembering Lauren Bacall, icon of classic Hollywood

Lauren Bacall, one of the last stars of the Golden Age of Hollywood, died yesterday at age 89. Bacall ranks among the greatest screen icons of the 30s and 40s, starring alongside legends including Spencer Tracy, Katherine Hepburn, John Wayne, Rock Hudson, and – most famously – her husband Humphrey Bogart. She was an enduring symbol of old Hollywood and one of our last connections to an era of elegance and grace to which the film world still aspires.

Luaren Bacall continued her career well into this decade, and her career runs the gamut from noir classics to animated voice-overs. In honor of Bacall's legacy, consider watching her films from our collection.

Written on the Wind – HU DVD 518
The Big Sleep – HU DVD 1062
To Have and Have Not – HU DVD 1440
How to Marry a Millionaire – HU DVD 2108
Howl's Moving Castle – HU DVD 2979
Manderlay – HU DVD 4147
Key Largo – HU DVD 4679
Dark Passage – HU DVD 5359
The Shootist – HU DVD 7645
Dogville – HU DVD 9013

Remembering Dick Smith, acclaimed makeup artist

On this blog, we usually memorialize the deaths of notable directors and actors. But today, we pay tribute to the life of Oscar-winning makeup artist Dick Smith, whose work ranks among the most memorable and iconic in film history.

You probably don't know Dick Smith and couldn't pick him out of a lineup, but his work with facial transformation is immediately recognizable. Smith was the man behind Marlon Brando's jowls in The Godfather, Travis Bickle's beat-up look in Taxi Driver, Regan's demonic turn in The Exorcist, the dramatic aging effects in Little Big Man and Amadeus, and the face-melting goodness of Scanners. Before CGI and motion capture became the dominant way to transform actors on screen, Smith had pioneered and perfected physical effects that, to this day, are haunting and powerful.

Dick Smith retired 15 years prior to this death, but there is no doubt that even his work will stand the test of time. He was an artist for the ages and undeniable proof that the crew of a film can be as important to movie magic as the stars.

RIP Eli Wallach, supporting actor legend

Audiences might remember him best as Tuco (The Ugly) from The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, but Eli Wallach was an actor of enormous range. Working on film and television well into his 90s, Wallach was the ultimate supporting actor, a man whose prolific appearances who brought life to every film in which he appeared. He charmed in the days of old Hollywood in The Magnificent Seven and The Misfits, and he brought humanity to recent hits including Mystic River, The Holiday, and Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps. Though he won BAFTA, Tony, and Emmy awards, Wallach was never nominated for an Oscar; the Academy realized their error in 2010 when they awarded him an honorary statuette for his lifetime accomplishments.

We're very saddened to hear news of Eli Wallach's death, but we'll never lose his numerous and iconic contributions to film. Media Services's collection contains a startling number of films starring Wallach, a testament to his prolific body of work.

Baby Doll – HU DVD 7752
Brand Upon the Brain! – HU DVD 4638
The Ghost Writer – HU DVD 8010
The Godfather, Part III – HU DVD 2543
The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly – HU DVD 1001
The Holiday – HU DVD 5407
The Lineup – HU DVD 7294
Lord Jim – HU DVD 10385
The Magnificent Seven – HU DVD 7640
The Executioner's Song – HU DVD 8857
The Misfits – HU DVD 8886
The Moon and the Son – HU DVD 1328
Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps – HU DVD 8018

(Wallach also hosted a series of stage play character studies for A Raisin in the Sun, The Glass Menagerie, and Our Town. Follow the links to view these programs online via the library.)

H. R. Giger, artist of the Alien, dies at 74

Swedish surrealistic H. R. Giger died today at 74. Though he worked primarily in painting and sculpting, Giger is best remembered as the designer of the terrifying and highly Freudian architecture and creatures from Ridley Scott's Alien franchise. Giger designed much of the iconic, dark, and twisted art of that world – from infested hallways in Aliens to the xenomorphs themselves. His style of quasi-organic and arguably erotic machinery indelibly changed the face of futuristic design, affecting everything from Predator to Man of Steel to a Giger-themed bar in Switzerland.

In honor of Giger's legacy, we recommend watching the Alien series (including Prometheus) that remain his most beloved creations. Though they are among his only contributions to movies, they are perhaps some of the most influential images captured on film.

Alien – HU DVD 885
Aliens – HU DVD 886
Alien 3 – HU DVD 887
Prometheus – HU DVD 10496

Director Michael Glawogger dies unexpectedly, leaves behind great works on globalization

In a bizarre turn of events, renowned Austrian documentarian Michael Glawogger suddenly died today of malaria while filming on location in Liberia. He died far too young and early into his career, but he leaves us with a number of quality films exploring hazardous products of globalization, from slum living to prostitution.

It's difficult to mourn properly a filmmaker whose career had only yet begun, but Glawogger's untimely death should not overshadow the significance of his completed works. We have two of the director's films in our collection – Whores' Glory and Workingman's Death – and we highly recommend watching them.

It is unclear if Glawogger's final project will see the light of day, but we have no doubt that he leaves a body of work that will enter, as the chief of the Austrian Film Institute puts it, "the canon of world cinema."