Peter Labuza

Jean-Pierre Melville and Jean Renoir Films Hit Criterion: The Search for Humanity

While there was a certain tendency in French cinema, two of the great directors of this era that would be exalted by Cahiers Du Cinema designed two very different yet complimentary systems to tell stories. On one side, the young blood of Jean-Pierre Melville, a so-called American in Paris, but more accurately, a geometrician of human calculations. On the other: the old master, Jean Renoir, who makes every moment of cinema feel accidentally captured, and thus indelibly human....

‘A Day in the Country’ Hits Criterion: Jean Renoir’s Universe of Emotions

A Day in the Country, Jean Renoir's 1936 impressionist image of past frivolities drowning in time, is drenched in the myths of its production: a sudden rainstorm halted the production and had to be integrated in the story; Renoir could never return to it because of a "creative block"; the mid-sized length was conceived by its producer while having a creative breakthrough as he hid from the Nazis. And thus the film that developed, which is now out on Criterion Blu-ray, is its own miracle....

[Review] Something, Anything

Don’t let the generic title fool you. Paul Harrill’s Something, Anything gently tells its story through detailed specificity. One might not be able to place the...

Peter Labuza’s Top 10 Films of 2014

The one thing I'll state about the year overall: I found it notable that, despite being in the "digital" era, over half of my list was shot on 35mm or 16mm. W...