Erotic Thrillers: Part 1 – The Dawn of the Eighties

by Cláudio Alves

Mainstream cinema feels more sexless than ever. Even at the height of the Hays Code's second coming, sex had a place of pride in Hollywood, often sublimated into insinuation to avoid censorship. There's art to horniness, to making the camera a conduit of erotic reverie or a purveyor of desire, want itself synthesized as form. Sexual films can also be rich texts, telling us much about the times when they were made, the culture that created them, and the audiences that either embraced or repudiated the movie. Whether prurient or intellectual, there are many ways to engage with erotic cinema, especially when carnal craving collides with violence, and annihilation that goes beyond the ecstasy of an orgasm.

Erotic Thrillers is the theme of one of the Criterion Channel's latest collections, released right in time for the You Must Remember This podcast's new season - "Erotic 90s". After tackling the 80s last year, Karina Longworth is heading into a new decade, and we're going along for the ride. For the next few weeks, we'll explore all films in the Criterion program, taking a journey from 1980 to 1996. Let's begin the adventure with a Hitchcockian riff full of fucked-up notions of gender, a postmodern neo-noir, and an unlikely message picture… 

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Weekend Box Office: Actual New Movies!

By Ben Miller

Studios are finally starting to get with the program.  For the sixth straight week, a new release was tops at the box office with Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves comfortably winning the weekend behind very positive critical (91% on Rotten Tomatoes) and audience (A- CinemaScore) notices.  D&D was the first of the six films not to be a sequel, but you can only expect so much of the 2023 film landscape.  Regardless, it's nice to have more films being regularly released on the schedule.

Weekend Box Office (actuals) March 31st-April 2nd 🔺 = new or expanding /  ★ = Recommended
WIDE (Over 800 Screens)	LIMITED / PLATFORM
DUNGEONS & DRAGONS	A GOOD PERSON
1 ★🔺 DUNGEONS & DRAGONS: HONOR AMONG THIEVES $37.2 *NEW* 3,855 screeens	1 🔺 A GOOD PERSON $537k (cum. $1.7) 687 screens

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Drag Race RuCap: “Blame It On the Edit”

CLÁUDIO ALVES: I knew they were bluffing! Apologies for starting this RuCap at the end of the episode, but there was no other way this episode could end but with the whole top four moving to the finale. All that talk of a final elimination was always a baldfaced lie, a mere attempt at adding stakes to an episode with none. Whatever faint redundancy this chapter might exemplify, it’s inconsequential in the face of these bitches’ collective serve. But maybe I’m exaggerating, too drunk in affection to think straight. 

NICK TAYLOR: As the one of us who dared to believe that RuPaul would actually send a queen home this episode, I’m really happy I was wrong...

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Reader's Choice: Don't let 'Dick' run your life!

Each weekend Nathaniel is looking at a movie that you, the readers, chose the previous week.

Arlene: What's the deal with that Watergate thing. Do you know anything about it?
President Nixon: No, no. No no no. Absolutely nothing. I don't know a thing. No way, Jose.

Dear readers, I struggled with finding time for Dick this week. I recall mostly loving Dick in the late 90s/early 00s even though the quality of it definitely varies. But you demanded I spend some time with Dick so I finally did this weekend. It turns out it's especially delightful in the morning.

Everything you've just read is jokey but true (literally and figuratively) and if you found it annoying, then Andrew Fleming's Dick (1999) is probably not the movie for you...

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Chaplin vs. Keaton vs. Lloyd

by Cláudio Alves

Today marks a century since Harold Lloyd delivered his most legendary work to movie theaters. Safety Last! is a silent comedy classic, featuring such riveting stunts as the famous climax that finds our hero hanging from a clock. Though no other Lloyd picture has a comparable legacy, the man's filmography is a treasure trove for slapstick lovers with an inclination for bespectacled hunks. If you have any doubts, jump over to the Criterion Channel, where a new 42-title collection showcases the man's work from the late 1910s to the advent of sound and 1936's Milky Way. If you're not entertained, see a doctor, stat.

But of course, maybe Lloyd's not your preferred flavor of silent comedy. Amid the classic loving community, it seems everyone has a favorite from the three big names that defined Hollywood slapstick and continue to live in the public imagination. So, because this is a day for foolishness, why not indulge in pot-stirring drama and futile competition? Between Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Harold Lloyd, who's your pick? Maybe it's…

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