Netflix Watch Instantly Recommendation Thread

What's the library like?

I don't have it myself, but Criterion has a deal with them so all their movies are streamed on there. That's as close to a film school library you can get, I think.

important to note that the Criterion movies on Hulu don't have commercials dropped into them

hmmmmm

mubi.com is pretty cool, don't use it now but they have 30 films at a time, add one daily and drop the oldest to keep the count

Kind Hearts and Coronets is a Criterion, and Badlands will be in a few months. I don't know if it'll be streaming (I don't know how their rights deals work) but because of those rights deals it's going to be impossible to get every film you want in one place (or anywhere at all).

I doubt Badlands will be available to stream. I've been semi-obsessed with Hulu's terrible website and slow-loading Criterion page -- you have to look at miles of thumbnails to browse titles, with no straight text list available, so I did something about it. Crossposted from one the Hulu thread and one of the Criterionn threads a month ago:

Finally got fed up with their crappy search function and having to look at pages and pages of slow-loading images instead of a text list.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Alm9ijj_zohtdEd2blozRllOSjlqSVpLd1MxbkNUTVE

All the "Criterion"s streaming on Hulu, 716 films. Doesn't include DVD/Blu-ray releases for which Hulu doesn't have streaming rights, and doesn't include Netflix streaming titles. A/An/The messes up sorting by title, and directors aren't last-name-first. Still, the file has some utility.

For all your Bulldog Drummond and Zatoichi streaming needs.

Really shame on Netflix for not having "Emmet Otter's Jugband Christmas" this week.

Dammit, why is Kind Hearts & Coronets or Badlands not streaming?

Is there some service I can pay for that's effectively just "Streaming Film School"?

― "It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Drunk!" (kingfish), Wednesday, December 26, 2012 12:51 AM (10 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

badlands is coming out on criterion in the spring, might be the reez

i watched emmet otter last year for christmas and uh idk it might be better to leave your childhood memories of it intact

no way man, emmett otter rules. I watch it at least every other year. NB I actually never saw it when I was kid...

like lots of movies i saw as a child, i think i built up a large imaginary tapestry of stuff that had happened in the movie and was super cool over the years, so yeah, that might be a contributing factor

now YOU have to make that superenhanced jugband christmas movie.

Never saw Emmett Otter as a kid, just discovered it a few years ago. The tunes are top-notch. Sweet at honeysuckle on the vine!

We did watch "Polar Express", which i thoroughly enjoyed for the first time. Not a bad movie, some really great 3D rollercoaster scenes, plot stays simple and more-or-less true to the book. I was scared at some point it would be revealed that the lead kid is THE CHOSEN ONE to save Christmas or something. Only issues i had were the elves were a bit creepy looking and the whole Santa Claus naught/nice giant batcave full of TVs watching every kid in the world sleeping. But then again Santa Claus is a creepy mofo anyways so that's not the movie's fault.

On Xmas Eve me and my bros watched "Ernest Saves Christmas", which is on youtube at the moment, not sure about Netflix. That movie still cracks me up. Particularly the part where he's pretending to be a snake handler.

Plz Wes Anderson stay away from an Emmett Otter reboot.

We watched Emmet Otter this year like always. Paul Williams wrote all the songs. The weasel in the rock band is playing Bootsy Collins' star bass.

At least _Days of Heaven_ is available, but I've already seen that plenty.

kind hearts & coronets isn't one of the Criterion releases that is available online via Hulu Plus. sorry.

now YOU have to make that superenhanced jugband christmas movie.

― the clown's reflection is incorrect (Jon Lewis), Wednesday, December 26, 2012 4:51 PM (37 minutes ago)

never sure whther to start with this or the version of Phantasm with the heist caper, time travel, talking dog (?!), laser security grid, and 7 different shock reboot endings.

i think i watched like 12 episodes of parenthood yesterday. season three. such an amazing season! now one of my fave t.v. seasons ever. i already want to watch it again. i'll watch it with maria. and i noticed that regular free hulu has season four episodes and i might have to watch them now instead of waiting. (we got rid of cable when we moved so i'm behind on new shows) i'll have to watch the season 4 eps before i can go look at the parenthood thread.

xpost i think i'm on board for both projects, let us become the powell and pressburger of youtube

Can't think of many things that are cooler than the River Bottom Nightmare Band. Plus "Barbecue"!

Which phantasm is that? #4? All I know is also there's no Phantasm on NF streaming either...

I like how they put effort into detail; like having the dude put a smaller synth atop his jazz organ

http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20081215152919/muppet/images/0/05/RiverbottomNightmareBand.jpg

ha dude, that is phantasm #theinsideofmycrazy11yearoldhead

oh shit, I could have sworn one of them did have a talking dog--at least 2 of them had time travel tho'.

THE GRASS DOES NOT GROW
ON THE PLACES WHERE WE STOP AND STAAAAAND

All of The West Wing

How to Survive a Plague

west wing is up??!!

According to Instantwatcher it is.

then what are we doing here??

the forest for the trees expires in like a day but it's really good fyi

not sure of the last like 3 mins when it becomes an indie rock video? but that aside

i also watched the lee atwater doc which was ok/good i guess

alanbanana otm

Really poor placement of music in films

OK so I just read an in-depth description of Santa Claus: The Movie and it sounds completely batshit insane.

For the parallel story of Patch and B.Z., the Newmans looked to a lofty inspiration: John Milton's "Paradise Lost" and its tale of an ambitious angel, Lucifer, who is expelled from Heaven after leading an angelic rebellion against God. Like Lucifer, Dudley Moore's Patch believes he can run paradise (i.e. Santa's workshop) better than Santa, and after falling, he's expelled from the North Pole. David Newman even names the elf character "Scratch" (a common nickname for Satan), while Lithgow's character ("B.Z.") is short for Beelzebub, one of Satan's followers in "Paradise Lost". Of course, as a children's film, SANTA CLAUS couldn't present the operatic depiction of evil that a "Paradise Lost" could, and Dudley Moore's elf character is a benign figure prone to wordplat variations on "elf" ("He fills me with a sense of real elf confidence," Patch says of Santa). It was Moore's idea to dilute the "Paradise Lost" reference further by changing his character's name from Scratch to Patch (Moore's nickname for his own son). "We wanted to draw on 'Paradise Lost' mildly," Moore said in a Los Angeles Times interview. "But I'm not up to playing a character who is evil, being such a nice bloke myself. Patch became less a Beelzebub than a Till Eulenspiegel figure. The evil in the film is taken care of by B.Z."

that was my favorite Christmas movie when I was a kid!

it has not aged well: it's more like Eighties:The Movie now, lol.

i had no idea about the Paradise Lost thing though O_O

Theory: Any piece of crap movie ever: the ppl behind the scenes have thought things like this.

Yep. cf: The Big Picture

Bones Brigade documentary was outstanding.

Finally saw Bill Cunningham New York. I found it fascinating despite having about zero interest in fashion. But his dedication to his life's work is inspiring.

Also Lexx is tripping me out. I can't believe I had never heard of it...

I found it fascinating despite having about zero interest in fashion.

felt like this about the doc "The Tents" re: bryant park

the snowtown murders was incredible, if you're in need of an indie bleakathon ya can't go wrong with this one. only 2 pro actors in the whole cast but I never would've guessed. great soundtrack, cinematography, did I mention it was bleak? bleak with grim dressing.

really want to see that

Is there much in your face torture?

I watched Jeff Who Lives At Home last night. My recommendation: skip it.

yeah that movie sucked

portlandia s2 is up

snowtown murders contains only one scene of torture, everything else is implied or takes place offscreen - that's some false advertising in the title. it *is* a pretty hairy scene, but the rest of the movie is character study / sociological observation. ever read a newsstory and wonder how everyday people get pulled into enabling some psychopath's crimes? it's one of the better explorations of the phenomena. the less you know going in, the better, if you don't know the (true) backstory, you can spend some guessing who the killer is. his emergence is gradual and naturalistic - like the movie itself, I guess.

I'm sold.

closest analog is prolly clarke's bully, minus the grody prurience

helpful hint: turn on subtitles, some of the aussie accents are as brutal as that torture scene