As the coronavirus pandemic still rages on, precious few remain skeptical about going to the movies. But while your AMCs and others claim some godlike safety from COVID, there remains a chunk of people still uncomfortable hitting up theaters. To them, we bring you the September 2020 Criterion Channel lineup.
It starts off with quite the swath of content too. Béla Tarr’s Sátántangó hits the service on September 1, and its seven-plus hours should take up a large chunk of your day. Coming soon after is a collection of more than a dozen Joan Blondell starrers from the pre-Code era, including Howard Hawks’ The Crowd Roars, three collaborations with Mervyn LeRoy, and Ray Enright & Busby Berkeley’s Dames.
For some stuff released almost a century later, the service also sees the addition of documentary bender Robert Greene. His Actress, Kate Plays Christine, and Bisbee ’17 join soon after. Janicza Bravo, director of Lemon, is also on the list with four short films to watch before Zola reaches the masses—whenever that may be.
Other choices include five Albert Brooks features, the Criterion Collection edition of Richard Linklater’s Boyhood, and, come September 20, The Films of Agnès Varda. The latter includes a whopping 17 shorts and 21 features, as well as supplementary content from Criterion’s newly released box set of the same name. On September 23, Jan Oxenberg’s Thank You and Good Night gets a 4K restoration from IndieCollect, almost three decades after it premiered only to go widely unseen. So yes, there is some stuff to do at home.
See the full list below.
Les 3 boutons, Agnès Varda, 2015
7 p., cuis., s. de b. . . . (à saisir), Agnès Varda, 1984
Actress, Robert Greene, 2014
Agnès de ci de là Varda, Agnes Varda, 2011
Art and Craft, Sam Cullman, Jennifer Grausman, and Mark Becker, 2014**
The Beaches of Agnès, Agnès Varda, 2008
Big City Blues, Mervyn LeRoy, 1932
Bisbee ’17, Robert Greene, 2018
Blonde Crazy, Roy Del Ruth, 1931
Blondie Johnson, Ray Enright, 1933
Boyhood, Richard Linklater, 2014
Charlotte’s Web, Iwao Takamoto and Charles A. Nichols, 1973**
Circle of Deceit, Volker Schlöndorff, 1981
A Comedy in Six Unnatural Acts, Jan Oxenberg, 1975*
Corpus Christi, Jan Komasa, 2019*
Les créatures, Agnès Varda, 1966
The Crowd Roars, Howard Hawks, 1932
Daguerréotypes, Agnès Varda, 1975
Dames, Ray Enright, 1934
Death of a Salesman, Volker Schlöndorff, 1985
Defending Your Life, Albert Brooks, 1991
Diplomacy, Volker Schlöndorff, 2014
Les dites cariatides, Agnès Varda, 1984
Duck Soup, Leo McCarey, 1933
Elsa la rose, Agnès Varda, 1966
Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, Peter Kosminsky, 1992
A Fistful of Dollars, Sergio Leone, 1964
Footlight Parade, Lloyd Bacon, 1933
The Gates, Antonio Ferrera, David Maysles, Matthew Prinzing, and Albert Maysles, 2007
The Gleaners and I, Agnès Varda, 2000
The Gleaners and I: Two Years Later, Agnès Varda, 2002
Gold Diggers of 1933, Mervyn LeRoy, 1933
Gregory Go Boom, Janicza Bravo, 2013
A Guide to Breathing Underwater, Raven Jackson, 2018
He Was Her Man, Lloyd Bacon, 1934
The Headless Woman, Lucrecia Martel, 2008
The Heiress, William Wyler, 1949
Home Movie, Jan Oxenberg, 1972*
The Hours, Stephen Daldry, 2002
Jacquot de Nantes, Agnès Varda, 1991
Jane B. par Agnès V., Agnès Varda, 1988
Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life is Calling, Richard Pryor, 1986
Kate Plays Christine, Robert Greene, 2016
Kung-Fu Master!, Agnès Varda, 1988
Lawyer Man, William Dieterle, 1932
Le lion volatil, Agnès Varda, 2003
The Legend of Rita, Volker Schlöndorff, 2000
Lenny, Bob Fosse, 1974
Lost in America, Albert Brooks, 1985
The Loveless, Kathryn Bigelow and Monty Montgomery, 1981
Man Rots from the Head, Janicza Bravo, 2016
Merrily We Go to Hell, Dorothy Arzner, 1932
Millie, John Francis Dillon, 1931
Modern Romance, Albert Brooks, 1981
Mother, Albert Brooks, 1996
Nettles, Raven Jackson, 2018
Night Nurse, William A. Wellman, 1931
Nocturama, Bertrand Bonello, 2016
The Ogre, Volker Schlöndorff, 1996
Ô saisons, ô châteaux, Agnès Varda, 1958
One Hundred and One Nights, Agnès Varda, 1995
Pauline Alone, Janicza Bravo, 2014
The Phantom Tollbooth, Chuck Jones, Abe Levitow, and Dave Monahan, 1970
Plaisir d’amour en Iran, Agnès Varda, 1976
The Prison in Twelve Landscapes, Brett Story, 2016
Real Life, Albert Brooks, 1979
Réponse de femmes, Agnès Varda, 1975
Salut les Cubains, Agnès Varda, 1963
Sátántangó, Béla Tarr, 1994
Streetwise, Martin Bell, 1984
T’as de beaux escaliers, tu sais, Agnès Varda, 1986
Tabu, Miguel Gomes, 2012
Tabu: A Story of the South Seas, F. W. Murnau, 1931
Thank You and Good Night, Jan Oxenberg, 1991*
Three on a Match, Mervyn LeRoy, 1932
Tiny: The Life of Erin Blackwell, Martin Bell, 2016
Town Bloody Hall, Chris Hegedus, D. A. Pennebaker, 1979
Ulysse, Agnès Varda, 1982
Union Depot, Alfred E. Green, 1932
Varda by Agnès, Agnès Varda, 2019
The Virgin Suicides, Sofia Coppola, 1999
Voyager, Volker Schlöndorff, 1991
Walking on Water, Andrey Paounov, 2018
Western, Bill Ross IV and Turner Ross, 2015
Woman in Deep, Janicza Bravo, 2016
Working Girls, Dorothy Arzner, 1931
Ydessa, les ours et etc. . . ., Agnès Varda, 2004
Zama, Lucrecia Martel, 2017
*Available September 23
**Available in the U.S. only, September 24
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