It's my birthday, which I share not because I want you to leave me some mushy comment (that's what Facebook is for), but because it's my way of saying this post is going to be written in the spirit of this special day. That is, I could write about the Seventies gem Five Easy Pieces (1970), which I saw last night at Atlanta's historic movie palace, the Plaza Theatre, in a restored print celebrating the film's 40th anniversary; or some marvelous presents I received today, Criterion's Blu-rays of 8 1/2 (1963) and Red Desert (1964), as well as the Blu-ray of Hitchcock's classic, North by Northwest (1959); all beautiful films which deserve deeper thoughts than I'm willing to bring forth today. Instead, I'll save those for the near future because today, I'm just kicking back, dashing off some quick notes on some of the other gifts I got today which, though excellent in every way, don't really deserve something epic in the way of critical consideration.
