Spirits of the Dead (1968) | May 26, 12:00 am

Three directors each adapt a Poe short story to the screen: “Toby Dammit” features a disheveled drugged and drunk English movie star who nods acceptance in the Italian press and his producers fawn over him. “Metzengerstein” features a Mediveal countess who has a love-hate relationship with a black stallion – who it turns out is really her dead lover. “William Wilson” tells the story of a sadistic Austrian student with an exact double whom he later kills. – Telescope Film

Director: Federico Fellini , Roger Vadim , Louis Malle

Cast: Brigitte Bardot, Alain Delon, Jane Fonda, Terence Stamp

Country: France, Italy

Distributor: Janus Films

Rating: R

Runtime: 2 hours, 2 minutes

Platform: The Criterion Channel

Special Programming: Classic Cinema, Midnight Movies

Searching for Ingmar Bergman (2018) | May 25, 10:00 pm

A meaningful account of the personal and professional life of the great Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman (1918-2007) that explores his film legacy, with interviews with his closest collaborators and a new generation of filmmakers. – JustWatch

Director: Margarethe von Trotta

Cast: Margarethe von Trotta, Olivier Assayas, Daniel Bergman, Ingmar Bergman Jr.

Country: Germany, France

Distributor: Oscilloscope

Rating: Not Rated

Runtime: 1 hour, 35 minutes

Platform: Kanopy

Special Programming: Classic Cinema, Documentary Cinema

The Koker Trilogy: Through the Olive Trees (1994) | May 25, 7:15 pm

Abbas Kiarostami takes metanarrative gamesmanship to masterful new heights in the final installment of The Koker Trilogy. Unfolding “behind the scenes” of And Life Goes On, this film traces the complications that arise when the romantic misfortune of one of the actors—a young man who pines for the woman cast as his wife, even though, in real life, she will have nothing to do with him—creates turmoil on set and leaves the hapless director caught in the middle. An ineffably lovely, gentle human comedy steeped in the folkways of Iranian village life, Through the Olive Trees peels away layer after layer of artifice as it investigates the elusive, alchemical relationship between cinema and reality. – The Criterion Channel

Director: Abbas Kiarostami

Cast: Mohammad Ali Keshavarz, Farhad Kheradmand, Zarifeh Shiva

Country: Iran

Distributor: Janus Films

Rating: Not Rated

Runtime: 1 hour, 44 minutes

Platform: The Criterion Channel

Special Programming: Classic Cinema

Special Events: Filmmaker Conversations

Filmmaker Conversations

This conversation between Abbas Kiarostami and programmer Peter Scarlet is available to watch on The Criterion Channel.

The Koker Trilogy: And Life Goes On (1992) | May 25, 5:00 pm

In the aftermath of the 1990 earthquake in Iran that left fifty thousand dead, Abbas Kiarostami returned to Koker, where his camera surveys not only devastation but also the teeming life in its wake. Blending fiction and reality into a playful, poignant road movie, And Life Goes On follows a film director who, along with his son, makes the trek to the region in hopes of finding out if the young boys who acted in Where is the Friend’s House? are among the survivors, and discovers a resilient community pressing on in the face of tragedy. – The Criterion Channel

Director: Abbas Kiarostami

Cast: Farhad Kheradmand, Pouya Payvar, Hossein Rezai

Country: Iran

Distributor: Janus Films

Rating: Not Rated

Runtime: 1 hour, 36 minutes

Platform: The Criterion Channel

Special Programming: Classic Cinema

The Koker Trilogy: Where is the Friend’s House? (1987) | May 25, 3:00 pm

The first film in Abbas Kiarostami’s sublime, interlacing Koker Trilogy takes a simple premise—a boy searches for the home of his classmate, whose school notebook he has accidentally taken—and transforms it into a miraculous, child’s-eye adventure of the everyday. As our young hero zigzags determinedly across two towns, aided (and sometimes misdirected) by those he encounters, his quest becomes both a revealing portrait of rural Iranian society in all its richness and complexity and a touching parable about the meaning of personal responsibility. – The Criterion Channel

Director: Abbas Kiarostami

Cast: Babek Ahmed Poor, Ahmed Ahmed Poor, Kheda Barech Defai, Iran Outari, Ait Ansari

Country: Iran

Distributor: Janus Films

Rating: Not Rated

Runtime: 1 hour, 24 minutes

Platform: The Criterion Channel

Special Programming: Classic Cinema

Blind Alley (1939) | May 25, 1:15 pm

One of the very first Hollywood films that could be described as a noir, this brisk psychological thriller stars Chester Morris as an inmate who escapes from prison and hides out in the home of a famed psychiatrist (Ralph Bellamy). As the hostage doctor begins analyzing his captor and dredges up the secrets of his troubled past, the tables gradually turn. – The Criterion Channel

Director: Charles Vidor

Cast: Chester Morris, Ralph Bellamy, Ann Dvorak

Country: United States

Distributor: Columbia Pictures

Rating: Not Rated

Runtime: 1 hour, 10 minutes

Platform: The Criterion Channel (Not currently available)

Special Programming: Classic Cinema

Destiny (1921) | May 25, 11:00 am

In Fritz Lang’s spellbinding romantic fantasy, inspired by the Indian folktale of Savitri, a young woman (Lil Dagover) confronts the personification of Death (Bernhard Goetzke) in an effort to save the life of her fiancé (Walter Janssen). In response, Death weaves three romantic tragedies and strikes a deal to unite the girl with her paramour – provided she can prevent the death of the lovers in at least one of the episodes. Thus begin three exotic scenarios of ill-fated love – set in Persia, Quattrocento Venice, and a fancifully rendered ancient China – in which the woman must somehow reverse the course of destiny. – The Criterion Channel

Director: Fritz Lang

Cast: Rudolf Klein-Rogge, Wilhelm Diegelmann, Lil Dagover

Country: Germany

Distributor: Kino Lorber

Rating: Not Rated

Runtime: 1 hour, 39 minutes

Platform: The Criterion Channel (No longer on the service)

Special Programming: Classic Cinema