When I was a teenager and first beginning to truly love movies I sent off for a movie catalog. I saw an ad in the back of Rolling Stone or Spin or some such thing and I wanted to see what type of films were available outside of my little small town. What I got was a Xeroxed copy of a copy of a copy of some typed-out list of films. I think there were occasionally pictures and there were definitely some synopses of the films.
I didn’t buy any of the movies, or rent them, but I was endlessly fascinated by that catalog. Here were all sorts of films, hundreds of them, that I’d never heard of. I think they were mostly cult films, foreign films, low-budget B-movies, the type of films that I now love, but it opened up this idea that there was a cinematic world out there, just out of reach that maybe someday I could explore.
I mention this because I think of young cinephiles now. How literally nearly every film ever made is available to them if they know how to look. How sites like IMDB and Letterboxed and countless others give them information and recommendations for all sorts of films in every genre imaginable. What an amazing time it must be for them. I mean it is an amazing time for me, but I can’t imagine how awesome it must be for kids just now discovering movies.
I am, of course, a huge proponent of physical media. While I certainly stream my fair share of movies, nothing quite beats sliding in a disc and pressing Play. One of the things I love about all these boutique Blu-ray companies is that they regularly supply me with great films I never knew existed.
Goodbye & Amen is one such film. It is an Italian thriller about a C.I.A. agent living in Rome with plans to start a coup in some African country. But his plans are thwarted when one of his agents starts shooting random people and holds a couple of people hostage in a hotel room.
It is well-shot, and directed, and is an utterly enjoyable watch. You can read my full review over at Cinema Sentries.
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