I’ve added the ten movies Elle Fanning picked in her Criterion Closet appearance.
The Red Shoes
The Virgin Suicides
Daisies
Bringing Up Baby
To Die For
The Power of the Dog
The Worst Person in the World
Parasite
The Princess Bride (rando pick)
I Knew Her Well (rando pick)
Ella Fanning had one original pick: The Power of the Dog. No one in the history of Closet Picks has chosen this movie. This is why my Master List of Closet Picks in the Criterion Closet is so valuable.
125 minute running time so a bit on the long side, but this was an interesting movie I’d never heard about before four people picked it in their Criterion closet picks videos. (Look at the master list to see who those four people are.) I should add that the reliable John Farr also recommended it too.
Budd Schulberg and Elia Kazan “cooperated” with the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in the early 1950s and probably felt pretty awful about it, so they made a political movie like this one to make amends maybe? It’s about the rise of a “demagogue in denim” and how TV’s invention has shaped American politics.
This movie reminded me of Nightmare Alley (1947) in a way (another movie I love and recommend) … sort of stripping away and laying bare the mythology of America. Andy Griffith’s breakout role and young Walter Matthau also appears. This is a green-go recommended movie.
… outcasts, hobos, nobodies, gentlemen loafers... one time or all time losers, call us what you want to...
I’ve added the seven movies Claire Danes picked in her Criterion Closet appearance.
A Woman Under the Influence
Defending Your Life
Dogfight
Some Like It Hot
Streetwise
The Breakfast Club
The Grifters
Claire Danes didn’t have any original picks, although to date only one other person has selected Streetwise and one other person selected The Breakfast Club. This is why my Master List of Closet Picks in the Criterion Closet is so valuable.
91 minute running time … rated R for “disturbing sexual content involving children” which made me go hmmm? The is a W.D. By movie … the young woman who made it, named Miranda July (not sure if that’s a real name … no, her real name is Grossinger, so her dad is Jewish), also stars in it. John Hawkes is in it, he looks like David Thewlis and plays the father of two beautiful mulatto boys.
This is a weird movie, unconventional … Miranda July is goofy and pretty and has shockingly blue eyes … the movie is funny and quirky and different, but not good enough to recommend. July is interested in sexuality, especially teenage sexuality, and human relationships in general.
I did watch it from start to finish, which means that it’s not terrible.
I have a lot of time on my hands so I made a sortable master list of all the closet picks ever made by those invited by the Criterion Collection to raid their closet. The movie selections made by every guest, from Agnes Varda to Zoe Kravitz, is included in the list. There are over 2,500 rows in the list (and counting).
It’s interesting to see what are the most common picks, but I find it more interesting to see which movies have only been picked once despite there having been over 300 closet videos posted to date. For instance, I never would have watched The Cremator, which I enjoyed, if Carrie Coon hadn’t recommended it, and she is the only person who did so.
Enjoy! If you find any mistakes or omissions, please email me and I’ll correct it.
106 minute running time … this is a W.D. By movie, written and directed by Celine Song … not sure how autobiographical it is … girl leaves Korea for Canada at age 12, moves to New York at age 22 or 24, final age in movie is 32 or 34? She’s attractive, she’s smart. Her English name is Nora. She had a childhood sweetheart in Korea that she later briefly connects with at age 22? via a number of Zoom calls (very romantic). Finally he comes to visit her in New York when she is in her early 30s and married. The movie jumps back and forth among these 12 year periods. A story of lost love or what could have been, I guess.
Lots of musical cues in this movie, lots of piano and heartstring stuff. Nora went to an artists’ colony in Montauk at age 22 or 24 where they left the doors open and there were nicely arranged flowers and other still life tableaux mysteriously scattered about. In one scene you see the various artists in attendance which include one gay black man, one lesbian, two bearded guys, and Nora (the token Asian woman). At this equal opportunity artists' colony she met a short, nerdy Jewish guy named Arthur and "seduced” him. She really had to encourage him to make a move because he’s a real nebbish. He also plays video games at age 33 so you know he’s a total loser, despite writing a best seller which is inexplicably titled “Boner.” (Some kind of inside joke?)
[Insert some Manhattan skyline and Brooklyn Bridge and Statue of Liberty shots, all of which are required to qualify for movie industry tax credits. The streets are clean and the subway is well lit and sparkling and not filled with crazy homeless people.]
The Korean boy has grown into a strong handsome young man, very sweet and sensitive … when he visits her in New York, Nora and her husband have dinner with him and her little dork of a husband decides to wear a brown Mr. Rogers button-up cardigan over a cowboy shirt to the meal. Nora and the muscular Korean man in fashionably tight shirt have a nice heart-to-heart talk and Nora wonders to herself, what the hell am I doing milquetoasty Arthur whom I haven’t looked at even once tonight?!? She doesn’t say this, but we know she’s thinking it. The Korean guy is more blunt: he asks her to imagine if she had stayed in Korea and they had a mess of pure little Korean children together.
Later she sees the Korean guy off to his Uber to the airport and gives him the chance to sweep her off her feet and bundle her back to Korea (which she really wants), but he wimps out and blows it, so she goes back to Arthur in his brown cardigan and their crummy East Village apartment that costs $4,300 a month and weeps. The End.
Sweep her off her feet, dummy!
If you survived these outlier moves in October 2025, congratulations! It’s a good practice to go back and study all the outlier moves from the prior month at the start of a new month.
Click on any chart to enlarge it.
October 6: SPRB, SOPA
October 7: GLTO, ZNB
October 8: XBIO
October 9: TTRX
October 10: QNRX
October 13: ELBM, STI
Ocotber 15: COOT, GNPX
October 16: RYOJ
October 17: RANI
October 21: NERV
October 22: ARMP, BENF
October 23: SCNX
October 24: GNTA
October 27: CODX
October 28: VSEE
October 29: CMBM
October 30: BQ, INTS
My wife was recently paid off for a drug debt with a Beemer X3 (this is an inside joke). I didn’t like the car at first, but it’s growing on me.
2004 E83
2005 E83
2006 E83
2007 E83 Facelift
2008 E83 Facelift
2009 E83 Facelift
2010 E83 Facelift
2011 F25
2012 F25
2013 F25
2014 F25 Facelift
2016 F25 Facelift
2017 F25 Facelift
2018 G01
2021 G01
2022 G01 Facelift
In Czech and German … 67 minute running … a Holocaust movie so not something you should voluntarily watch… very promising beginning, I’m sure the guy who made Son of Saul (which is great) was inspired by it … but this movie, despite its short length, could have been tightened up considerably … the flashbacks and fantasies became repetitive, the scene with the ridiculous old German men, with their beer steins and sausages, holding them hostage could have been shortened a great deal… in short, the director needed a firm editor but didn’t have one … still, this is not a bad movie, it could have been a very good movie, and possibly a great movie, if I had edited it. It’s worth seeing, no matter what.
Essay by Michael Atkinson (that I haven’t read yet) … OK, I read it, it’s good.
Intelligent, articulate, informed, civilized … shed a tear for what Murka has become.
