THE DARJEELING LIMITED (2007)



I still haven't seen "The Hotel Chevalier," a (by all accounts great) short companion film that preceded The Darjeeling Limited at some (but not all venues) during its theatrical run, and I'm still a little ticked off at Wes Anderson for that...but considering how much I hated The Life Aquatic (after loving The Royal Tennenbaums and Rushmore), I was just happy to see one of my favorite directors back in fine, peculiar form with this dreamy, visually gorgeous tale of three newly fatherless brothers grieving their way across India in search of the inscrutable mother who abandoned them. Lighter and funnier than its synopsis would indicate, the film is nevertheless steeped in quiet melancholy (personified by the mournful, meta presence of Owen Wilson, pre-suicide attempt) and a timely sense of hopeful fatalism. Like any number of strangers in strange lands before them, the brothers find relief from alienation in the alien landscapes of their journey as those simultaneously indifferent and transcendent surroundings help draw their collective gaze from their own navels. (Great soundtrack, too.)

THE MAGGIE (1954)



A slightly bitterer precursor to Local Hero, The Maggie has American businessman Calvin B. Marshall (Paul Douglas) hiring a grossly incompetent boat to carry his furniture to a prospective summer house in Kiltarra. Led by one Mactaggert (Alec Mackenzie), it's not so much a fair fight between wealthy American and wily Scots as an absolute walkover. The crew are fun, but they're actively incompetent and opportunistic; what they do to a Marshall willing to pay them more than reasonably is hilarious but also kind of unconscionable. And he likes it!  Phoning home at one point, he announces "I'm developing a very strange sense of humor."  There are no clips on YouTube, so the one above features the wonderfully character-actor-ish Douglas on What's My Line?, adopting a Cockney accent for no justifiable reason.

WOMAN IN THE DUNES (1964)



"If they're afraid of the sand, have them tackle it scientifically" announces exasperated entomologist Niji Jumpei (Eiji Okada) after he's forced — for seemingly the rest of his life — to live in a pit of sand with the titular woman. Jumpei isn't so much a stranger in a strange land as a stranger in no man's land, surrounded by blatantly allegorical, hostilely indifferent locals and no explanations. Much of Woman is disorienting to watch as well: in a square frame, sand piles up, slips and slides in kinetic, snaky ways at least as interesting to watch as the people. (It might quite possibly be an even better movie about sand than Lawrence of Arabia, though that film otherwise wins.) For a film about being trapped — Niji's pinned down like the insects he studies — there's an amazing abortive escape across the sand, an action release across strange territory before being trapped again.

THE BIRD WITH THE CRYSTAL PLUMAGE (1970)



Tony Musante was one of those actors who flourished in the late '60s/'70s, when actors willing to travel and work in cheapie international co-productions in ludicrous scenarios would be compensated for their troubles. Here, the truly Italian-American Musante is the oddly named American Sam Dalmas (!) — although, depending on which dub you see, everything happens in either equally fluid Italian or English. Sam sees a murder in an art gallery and spends a lot of time trying not to get shot and traveling around the country he's supposed to be leaving in a few days. Though Dalmas has been in Italy for a while (working on a book about birds), he seems to have no familiarity with the city's layout, which makes it hard for him to elude killers effectively. Dalmas gets the job done but, in truth, Musante is never once convincing as an American abroad: he just looks too at home, matching all the real Italian players physically. (Just two years before, he'd been playing Mexican mercenary bandit "Paco Roman" in The Mercenary. Go figure.)

THE OUTSIDE MAN (1972)



One of the films highlighted by Thom Anderson in 2003's undervalued Los Angeles Plays Itself as an example of a French director bringing a better eye to LA location shooting than Angelenos themselves (Jacques Demy's equally obscure 1969 Model Shop is also cited), The Outside Man is a textbook gritty '70s guilty pleasure that deserves to be better known. The plot's pretty rote — Jean-Louis Trintignant comes to town to knock someone off, double-crosses and hits on his life ensue — but it's just an excuse to gawk at a metropolis growing into urban crappiness way too fast. Director Jacques Deray (an action specialist who really should be better known in the US) gawks at all the right mundane things (new supermarkets, Venice Beach) his protagonist ignores, which now look totally alien. Best of all are Trintignant's assassin freres, who arrive in town to help him out. "Why are we wearing all black?" one whinges. "How will we meet women this way?"

Click Here For Part One, Two, Four, Five & Six 

Contributors: Andrew Osborne, Vadim Rizov