Somebody noticed that Paul Haggis's Crash has been Netflix's "No. 1 rented movie" for more than three and a half years, since it was released on DVD in September 2005. Needless to say, this is not the kind of factoid that speaks for itself and must be dealt with until a satisfactory explanation if forthcoming. God knows that Haggis, who write and directed the Academy-Award-winning message movie, has no earthly idea why anyone would want to rent the thing: "I have no idea why anyone went to the movie in the first place," he told the Chicago Tribune, "let alone rent it. It was a little independent film, and when people started to see it, I was amazed." (Haggis, to his credit, is also bewildered that the fruit of his loins won the Oscar. "I love the Oscars; I just think they are the best thing in the world, but if you asked me if it was the best film of the year, I'd say, 'Of course not.'" He adds, "I happened to like my second film [In the Valley of Elah] better than Crash, but no one went to see it." Incidentally, Elah was technically his third movie as a director, the first having been 1993's Red Hot, but apparently even he didn't see that one.) If it makes him feel better, Netflix spokesman Steve Swasey confirms that, based on his numbers, "More people have now seen Crash on Netflix than in the theater." He added that, because the movie is on so many people's queues, it's always out and people have to wait a long time to get to rent it, which in turn "adds to the demand for people wanting to see it."

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While doing my holiday shopping a few weeks back, I was startled to find that Waterloo Video – an adjunct of the venerable Waterloo Records here in God’s own Austin, Texas – had shuttered its doors. I shouldn’t have been too surprised, I guess; there’s that whole “economy going in the toilet” thing…and then there’s those little red envelopes that arrive in the mail, envelopes containing DVD rentals with no late charges, envelopes that threaten the very existence of those magical wonderlands known as video stores.

Of course, not all video stores are so magical, and I suspect I’m not alone in shedding no tears over the Netflix effect on Blockbuster Video’s bottom line. But while Waterloo Video was never my favorite, I did feel a twinge of guilt upon spotting those empty shelves gathering dust. For I, too, have sold my soul to the demon Netflix, and for all the conveniences I now enjoy, there is, alas, something missing.

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The third episode of our trip through some of the most beloved Christmas movies of all time isn't actually beloved.  Notorious would be a better word.  Infamous would be another.  It also isn't a movie; it's a television special.  What's more, it isn't even a television special you can go rent at your local Blockbuster, or queue up via Netflix.  In fact, unless you happen to have been watching CBS at 8PM Eastern Time, November 17, 1978, you've probably never seen it.  Or, unless you have one of the approximately one hundred billion bootlegged copies that have been floating around sci-fi conventions for the last 30 years.  Or unless you have Google video.  Anyway, you sure as hell are never going to see an official release:  George Lucas -- the man who willingly released Star Wars Episode III:  Revenge of the Sith into theaters -- has said that he is so ashamed of the Holiday Special that if he could, he would hunt down every copy of it in existence and smash them to pieces with a sledgehammer.

How bad is the Star Wars Holiday Special?  It's so bad that even Star Wars geeks, many of whom pretend that the second trilogy wasn't relentlessly awful and have paid real cash money for Star Wars novelizations, think that it's a bad joke.  It's so bad that Harrison Ford, during an appearance on the Conan O'Brien show, attempted to deny that he even remembered doing it.  It's so bad that it goes beyond so-bad-it's-good into so-bad-it's-actually-terribly-bad and back around into so-bad-it-in-fact-is-immune-to-such-meaningless-abstractions-as-bad-and-good.  It's so bad you feel sorry for Jefferson Starship for having had to be in it.  Unless you have spent two hours being savagely tortured by members of the Iraqi Republican Guard, it is the most excruciatingly long two hours you will ever spend.

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So, a few months ago, my wife rearranged our Netflix queue in chronological order, from the dawn of cinema (circa Intolerance) to the present. And, despite the regrettable consequence that it will now be many, many weeks before Bubba Ho-Tep arrives on our doorstep, the experiment has resulted in a fairly interesting history of filmmaking, from silents to the French New Wave and beyond.

We’ve only just reached Norman Jewison’s 1968 hipster heist flick The Thomas Crown Affair, setting the stage for a little mano-a-mano tag-team compare-and-contrast between the original (starring Steve McQueen as the titular playboy thief and Faye Dunaway as a sexy insurance investigator) and the 1999 John McTiernan remake starring Pierce Brosnan and Renee Russo.

So which version takes "the crown"? Let’s check the scorecard!

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Some time ago, the Screengrab reported on Apple's freshly announced streaming movie rental service. At the time, we noted that it was overpriced, clumsy, and a classic example of valuing the rapid dissemination of computer technology over the actual value of that technology to the consumer. We predicted that whoever was the winner in the upcoming war between Apple and Netflix for streaming video rental, the consumer would likely be the loser until the bullheadedness of the studios over digital rights management was overcome.

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The MacWorld Expo is the time when Steve Jobs and company traditionally roll out killer apps and whatever else every geek you know will want for Christmas next year.  This time around, one announcement is that the iTunes online store will be rolling out a digital 'rental' service for movies, allowing those who pay a fee -- reportedly a staggering four bucks a day -- to download streaming video of movies by a number of major studios direct to their computers.  Determined to fill the gap left by WalMart's largely unsuccessful attempt to do the same, Netflix, the revolutionary mail-order movie rental company, is likewise rolling out their Netflix Unlimited plan, allowing higher-tier subscribers (with PCs; the iTunes plan is platform-neutral) to 'rent' movies via download as often as they like.

In a way, it's a typically hardheaded and pointless duel of technologies: Apple's plan is ridiculously overpriced, even for their snob-factor demographic (a fact likely attributable to hardheaded licensing restrictions by the studios). Netflix's plan is platform-limited and, despite their 'unlimited' hype, not available to all subscribers.

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Those of us who long ago welcomed the now-entrenched DVD home delivery service Netflix into our lives, hailing it as another important step towards the ultimate goal of never leaving the house again, received quite a shock a few weeks ago. As much a part of Sunday morning as a hot cup of joe and a dose of our favorite hangover remedy, the trip to the computer to fire up the Netflix “Releasing This Week” page was suddenly thwarted. As this Computerworld post notes, the company’s redesign of its New Releases section included the removal of that page for no adequately explained reason. Even the site’s own Community Blog administrator admits that “the loss of this very efficient page would seem pretty moronic,” but apparently the company has decided that most of their customers are, in fact, morons who prefer not to have easy access to a list of all the new DVDs available.

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As anyone who's perused the American Film Institute's lists can tell you, consensus is boring. Unfortunately, it's hard to get around when you conduct a poll. The International Documentary Association has asked its members to select the twenty-five greatest documentaries ever made. (They voted from a list of 700 films, but that complete list doesn't seem to be available on the IDA's website.) It reveals that documentarians are just as prone to sticking with the "new release" shelves and shying away from subtitles as the rest of us. Despite the "international" in the IDA's name, only two foreign-language films made the top twenty-five — Buena Vista Social Club landed at #20 and Night and Fog at #22. Never fear, though: Michael Moore will come to save the day, with three films on the list. While including a number of landmarks (Titicut Follies, Don't Look Back, Grey Gardens), the list leans towards high-profile recent documentaries, including major films (Capturing the Friedmans, Grizzly Man) and mediocrities (Born into Brothels, Spellbound). Any films made before 1955 are missing — so much for Dziga Vertov (without whom Koyaanisqatsi, the #14 entry, would look much different) and Robert Flaherty. A strict definition of documentary seems to have kept F for Fake and Close Up at bay. All but two films are available on DVD — I wonder if this has anything to do with Netflix's sponsorship of the poll.  Still, this list isn't entirely without merit in the long run — like the AFI's, it begs to be countered and is bound to spur dialogue, as it already has in the blogosphere. — Steve Erickson