Modern Romance (1981, dir. Albert Brooks)

Modern Romance (1981, dir. Albert Brooks)

What Is It?: A romantic comedy about a neurotic film editor and the poor woman he tortures with his massive insecurities.

What About It?: The Lost Classic supposes that one either "gets" Albert Brooks or one doesn't. As he's more of an acquired taste than Woody can get stuck in folks' craw. We think he was pretty funny in his day, and Modern Romance is a fine example of a free-form comedy made in the wake of Annie Hall. Super Dave Osborne (aka Bob Einstein) and director James L. Brooks have very funny cameos as a shoe salesman and a hack film director respectively.

Why Should I See It?: It's very funny. The Super Dave scene wherein he's a pushy shoe salesman is worth the price of admission alone. Brooks taking a quaalude while in the throes of his self-imposed break-up is doubly so.

What Else Is It Like?: Annie Hall, Walking and Talking, Barcelona.

When Is It Showing Until ON DEMAND?: 09/07/06

Watch It ON DEMAND on Comcast cable.

--ddt/pdx

Darwin's Nightmare (2004, dir. Herbert Sauper) [Not Available on Video]

Darwin's Nightmare (2004, dir. Herbert Sauper)

What Is It?: A harrowing documentary about the effects the Nile perch -- an invasive fish species -- has had on the people who live and work on the shores of Lake Victoria, in Tanzania, the second largest lake in the world.

What About It?: It can be seen as a microcosm of what feels sometimes to a westerner as the hopeless situation in many African nations. The Nile perch are an omnivorous species, having at this point consumed all the other species in the lake. The fish are popular in Europe, so they are filleted and shipped out by the ton, and much of the film concerns what is left. And what is left? Fish heads and carcasses that sit in maggot-infested piles to be fried and sold to the locals; Styrofoam fish containers being melted down and huffed by local children as a free high; The weapons that the European pilots are bringing in on their way to pick up the fish.

Why Should I See It?: Though bleak, the film has, ultimately, a very ethical view to impart. Not particularly hopeful, but one is able to see the humanity and the beauty alongside the wrenching sorrow. An important film.

What Else Is It Like?: Life and Debt, Bus 174, These Hands.

When Is It Showing Until ON DEMAND?: 08/29/06

Watch It ON DEMAND on Comcast cable

--ddt/pdx

Shadow of a Doubt (1943, dir. Alfred Hitchcock)

Shadow of a Doubt (1943, dir. Alfred Hitchcock)

What Is It?: A thriller of the highest order about an Uncle who may not be what he seems to his loving neice.

What About It?: Maybe Hitchcock's greatest film, oddly and woefully overlooked among contemporary film lovers, this is truly a Lost Classic in every sense of the term. The primary pleasure in this is you may not have seen it, and now you get to. Shadow boasts what might be Hitch's best screenplay -- written, in part, by Thornton Wilder, and a sublime performance from Joseph Cotten as Uncle Charlie and an atypical Hitchcock heroine (not blonde, not evil, not doomed) in Teresa Wright. It's about family, identity and loss of innocence.

Why Should I See It?: Because you love movies and you want to see one of the best ever made. Duh.

What Else Is It Like?: The Fallen Idol, Suspicion, Blue Velvet.

When Is It Showing Until ON DEMAND?: 10/05/06

Watch It ON DEMAND on Comcast Cable

-- ddt/pdx