Latest Posts

DVD RELEASES 2009/5/19

Some very fine cinema is being released on DVD this week, so be sure not to overlook these titles:

Intimidad (Carnivalesque Films) — I dare anyone to not fall head over heels in love with David Redmon and Ashley Sabin’s Intimidad, a heartbreakingly sweet portrait of familial love at its most untainted and pure. Over the course of several years, Redmon and Sabin followed a young Mexican couple (and their insanely cute daughter) in their quest to purchase a home of their very own. Intimidad is a tender, though never overly sentimental, lesson in humility. Read the Hammer to Nail review (which is included in the DVD booklet), then buy it at Amazon. (Michael Tully)

Mississippi Chicken (Watchmaker Films) — John Fiege’s documentary, which was nominated for a 2007 Best Film Not Playing At A Theater Near You Award, is actually a great companion piece to Intimidad. Shot predominantly on super-8, Mississippi Chicken has the aesthetic, not to mention socially conscious, vibe of a PBS documentary from the 1970s, as it shows the struggles of Hispanic immigrants in rural Mississippi over the course of a hot summer. Fiege and narrator/subject Anita Grabowski never get preachy with their material, keeping it humane even when situations arise that make one want to start marching in protest. Buy it at Amazon. (MT)

Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind (Watchmaker Films) — (Note: this is a repost from May 5th’s DVD update, as it turns out the film actually hits the streets this week.) John Gianvito’s Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind is a solemn and reverent tribute America’s history of political activists, but it’s also a film that pushes the boundaries of documentary cinema in exciting—and effective—ways. Poetic rather than didactic, Gianvito jettisons traditional modes of communication (such as narration) and instead films public monuments in their actual context (whether in the woods, a public square, or by an Exxon station), while the alternating sounds of nature and modernity whisper of a heritage that may be overrun by moss, but is more important now than ever. Buy it at Amazon. (Cullen Gallagher)

Pigs, Pimps & Prostitutes: 3 Films by Shohei Imamura (Criterion) — The freak-flag-flying giant of the Japanese New Wave gets the deluxe Criterion treatment with this set collecting three of his early films. Pigs and Battleships is a wild satire on the U.S. military occupiers and the Japanese gangsters who seek to exploit them. The Insect Woman is Imamura’s characteristically offbeat take on the Mizoguchian or Narusean “woman’s picture” melodrama, spanning fifty years in the life of a factory worker, union activist, religious convert, prostitute, madam, maid, mistress, mother, and more. Intentions of Murder is a downbeat drama about an unhappily married woman who turns the tables on her victimizers. The box set maintains Criterion’s usual high standards of picture and sound quality and elegant packaging, and comes with several useful and informative extras, including interviews with Imamura from Japanese television. Buy it at Amazon, and click here to read my longer review. (Nelson Kim)

Liked it? Take a second to support Hammer to Nail on Patreon!
Become a patron at Patreon!

Michael Tully is an award-winning writer/director whose films have garnered widespread critical acclaim, his projects having premiered at some of the most renowned film festivals across the globe. He is also the former (and founding) editor of this site. In 2006, Michael's first feature, COCAINE ANGEL, chronicling a tragic week in the life of a young drug addict, world premiered at the International Film Festival Rotterdam. The film immediately solidified the director as one of Filmmaker Magazine’s "25 New Faces of Independent Film,” a reputation that was reinforced a year later when his follow-up feature, SILVER JEW, a documentary capturing the late David Berman's rare musical performances in Tel Aviv, world-premiered at SXSW and landed distribution with cult indie-music label Drag City. In 2011, Michael wrote, directed, and starred in his third feature, SEPTIEN, which debuted at the 27th annual Sundance Film Festival before being acquired by IFC Films' Sundance Selects banner. A few years later, in 2014, Michael returned to Sundance with the world premiere of his fourth feature, PING PONG SUMMER, an ‘80s set coming-of-age tale that was quickly picked up for theatrical distribution by Gravitas Ventures. In 2018, Michael wrote and directed the dread-inducing genre film DON'T LEAVE HOME, which has been described as "Get Out with Catholic guilt in the Irish countryside" (IndieWire). The film premiered at SXSW and was subsequently acquired by Cranked Up Films and Shudder.

Post a Comment

Website branding logosWebsite branding logos