5 Films to Start with in Barnes & Noble’s Criterion Sale

Ghost World
Comic-book adaptions don’t have to be superhero blockbusters to have an impact (though this one does co-star a future Avenger). Based on Daniel Clowes graphic novel of the same name, director Terry Zwigoff’s movie follows two teenager friends (played by Scarlett Johansson and Thora Birch) over the course of one summer. They begin making prank phone calls to a lonely middle-aged man played by Steve Buscemi, but ultimately befriend him. Over the course of the season, their relationships develop and change in surprising ways before it all begins to break down, but the film never loses its wry sense of humor, its offbeat style, nor its deep-rooted humanity.

Stalker
A writer, a scientist, and the titular Stalker set out through a desolate and ever-changing landscape in search of a room within a bunker that is set to grant any heart’s desire. Only the Stalker knows how to navigate the various traps and deceptions to be found on the path, and the time spent forces the two seekers to confront both each other, and the nature of their own desires. It’s heavy stuff, with a screenplay by Russain sci-fi writers Arkady and Boris Strugatsky, based on their novel Roadside Picnic, but Soviet director Andrei Tarkovsky’s eerie visual style and dreamlike pacing remain unique (though crossing Bergman with David Lynch might get you close). The film gained new currency a few years after its release when the Chernobyl disaster created a landscape not unlike that depicted in the film, and the film has provided inspiration for music, video games, and even the recent Westworld TV show.

Straw Dogs
Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs remains the most controversial film from a director who never, ever shied away from controversy. Starring Dustin Hoffman and Susan George, it depicts the descent into hell of a young couple who were just looking to escape the rat race by moving to the Cornish countryside. Hoffman’s nebbishy character, David, soon becomes a target for local toughs with designs on his wife. Acts of violence pile up until David turns the tables in still shocking ways. It’s been long debated whether Peckinpah was glorifying violence or just commenting upon it, but the film remains unforgettable.

Lost in America
It’s an appealing dream: sell the house, quit the dumb job, and set out in an RV to see the country. When David and Linda Howard do it in Albert Brooks’ 1985 road movie, it’s not for any better reason than a sense of boredom and stagnation (and, well, the fact that David was fired after insulting his boss). When they set off to see the country with a $100,000 “nest egg” to fund their way, David (Brooks himself) likes to imagine that they’re the two bikers in Easy Rider rather than a couple of yuppies with only a fantasy version of the “real” America in mind. Then Linda loses all of their savings playing roulette (“I’ve only gambled twice in my life. This was the second time.”) and one thing after another goes hilariously wrong, to the point that a few days after quitting high-paying white collars jobs, our idealistic wanderers are near destitue and working dead-end jobs. Laugh so you don’t cry at this deeply caustic comedy classic.

The Lodger
Finally, going way back: there’s classic, and then there’s silent-Hitchcock-classic. 1927’s The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog wasn’t the master’s first film, but, by his own description, it was the first “Hitchcock film,” having many of the hallmarks that would come to define his thrillers for the next half-century. Very roughly based on the Jack the Ripper murders, the film follows a mysterious young man who shows up looking for a room to rent just as a series of murders attributed to a killer calling himself “The Avenger” reaches fever pitch. Wronged man on the run? Icy blondes? Innovative camera work? All of Hitch’s trademarks started here. Criterion’s edition follows a recent and extensive restoration, so the tense and important thriller is finally getting its due.
What are you picking up in the Criterion sale?