Here are the highlights (and the deep cuts) from the Criterion Collection’s "B" section. Spine #209: Beauty and the Beast (1946) Before Disney, there was Cocteau. This is not a children’s film; it’s a surrealist poem about loneliness. The living candelabras are creepy, the beast is heartbreaking, and the final shot of Jean Marais flying through the starry sky is pure magic. If you own only one French fantasy film, make it this one.
Antonioni leaves Italy for Swinging London. A fashion photographer (David Hemmings) thinks he’s photographed a murder. Or did he? This is the film that invented the "blow-up-the-photo" trope, but it’s less a thriller than a meditation on the impossibility of truth. Plus: The Yardbirds with a young Jimmy Page smashing his guitar. The Criterion Collection - B
Yes, the John Hughes teen drama is in the Collection. And yes, it deserves to be there. Don’t let the "Brat Pack" label fool you. This is a tight, five-act stage play set in a library. The Criterion 4K transfer makes the grain of the film stock sing, and the supplement where Molly Ringwald reconsiders the film’s sexual politics is a must-listen. The Forgotten Gem (Blind Buy Alert) Spine #417: Brand Upon the Brain! (2006) Guy Maddin is an acquired taste, but this silent, expressionist, quasi-autobiographical fever dream is his best work. Shot in black-and-white with a live narration track (you can choose between Isabella Rossellini, Laurie Anderson, or John Ashbery), it tells the story of a boy detective on an island of orphans. It is 95 minutes of beautiful, unsettling insanity. If you like David Lynch but wish he were faster , buy this. The Verdict on "B" The letter B proves that Criterion is not just about stuffy foreign films. It is about cinema . You go from the moral simplicity of a neorealist bike thief to the moral ambiguity of a swinging London photographer to the moral panic of a 1980s detention room. Here are the highlights (and the deep cuts)
Vittorio De Sica’s neorealist gut-punch. The plot is so simple (man needs bike to work; bike gets stolen; man looks for bike) that its emotional devastation feels almost accidental. You will watch Antonio and his son Bruno walk through Rome, and you will feel the weight of every broken promise of the post-war era. Essential. The living candelabras are creepy, the beast is
There is a specific, nerdy joy in organizing a movie collection by spine number. It’s a ritual. And as I slide past the A ’s ( 8½ , 12 Angry Men , 400 Blows ), we land in the sprawling, complicated territory of the letter B .