Nick Efter

Leo’s Carax’s wonderfully delirious, hypnotic and daftly screwball “Mauvais Sang” is a film of a major auteur coming into his own. It’s the outright pivotal film of the second French New Wave of the 80s.

The other adaptation of Hemingway’s To Have And Have Not is Michael Curtiz’s woefully underrated noir masterpiece The Breaking Point. It was one of John Garfield’s final film roles and arguably his best. Curtiz rarely gets the recognition he deserves in the canon of classic Hollywood auteurs.

The Insider is Michael Mann’s masterpiece. It’s a shame that Hollywood rarely makes these kind of political thrillers anymore. Especially considering the current times we live in.

50 years later. Altman’s Nashville is still stupendous, still prescient, still groundbreaking as ever.

It’s impossible to watch Eustache’s tour de force without thinking it must’ve had a major influence on the American indie cycle of slacker romance films of the 80s and 90s, as well as their descendants of the mumblecore movement a decade later.

Orson Welles was at the threshold of realizing a whole new cinematic language with F For Fake. It was the last film he completed in his lifetime. He started his career with another little groundbreaking film called Citizen Kane.

That opening speech was actually adapted from actual speeches by the Greek right wing junta when they took power, especially the “scientific/medical” metaphors

I think Paddy Chayevsky’s “Network” - directed by Sidney Lumet at the height of his powers - states its case for greatest American screenplay ever produced. It’s about as strong a case for the “screenwriter as auteur” as you’ll find.

Kudos to Criterion Channel for releasing Nico Papatakis’ The Shepherds Of Calamity (1967) aka Thanos And Despina. It makes a strong case for greatest Greek language film ever made. A wonderfully batshit romp that’s a biting indictment of class warfare in Greece at the onset of the Junta.

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Next up…
Punishment Park. 1971. Dir: Peter Watkins

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Next up…
Foreign Correspondent. 1940. Dir: Alfred Hitchcock

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Next up…
Fail Safe. 1964. Dir: Sidney Lumet

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Next up…
All The President’s Men. 1976. Dir: Alan J Pakula

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Next up…
Missing. 1982. Dir: Costa Gavras

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Next up…
Investigation Of A Citizen Above Suspicion. 1970
Dir: Elio Petri

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Next up…
Seven Days In May, 1964. Dir: John Frankenheimer

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Next up
The Conformist. 1970. Dir: Bernardo Bertolucci

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Next up…
The Manchurian Candidate. 1962. Dir: John Frankenheimer

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Next up…
The Battle Of Algiers 1966 dir: Gillo Pontecorvo

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Next up…
“Z” 1969 dir. Costa-Gavras

The greatest political dramas/thrillers. No particular order. Let’s start with:
The Grand Illusion. 1937 Dir: Jean Renoir