Sundance Channel has teamed up with The Criterion Collection to present landmark works of world cinema in Sundance Channel Presents Classic World Cinema from The Criterion Collection. The thirteen-week series begins [ Thursday, June 7th at 9:00 PM ] with a different title airing every Thursday night. Included in the series are films by renowned directors Jean Renoir, Roman Polanski, Ingmar Bergman, Akira Kurosawa and Federico Fellini.
The first film shown will be L’Avventura (Italy, 1960), Michelangelo Antonioni’s “meditation on spiritual and moral emptiness set in motion by the mysterious disappearance of a wealthy woman during a yachting trip.” Here is the somplete Sundance Channel line-up:
[ L’Avventura (The Adventure) ] (Michelangelo Antonioni, Italy, 1960)Antonioni’s ravishing meditation on spiritual and moral emptiness is set in motion by the mysterious disappearance of a wealthy woman during a yachting trip. 6/7, 9pm
[ High and Low (Tengoku To Jigoku) ] (Akira Kurosawa, Japan, 1963) The legendary Toshiro Mifune stars as a wealthy industrialist whose family becomes the target of a ruthless kidnapper in Kurosawa’s exemplary film noir, adapted from Ed McBain’s detective novel King’s Ransom. 6/14, 9pm
[ Mr. Hulot’s Holiday (Les Vacances de Monsieur Hulot) ] (Jacques Tati, France, 1953) Director, co-writer and star Tati created one of cinema’s most beloved characters with this magical comedy about a hapless bachelor’s seaside vacation. 6/21, 9pm
[ Andrei Rublev (Andrei Tarkovsky, Russia, 1966) ] Tarkovsky’s epic masterpiece is a sweeping medireview tale about Russia’s greatest icon painter. 6/28, 9pm
[ Wages of Fear (Le Salaire de la Peur) ] (Henri-Georges Clouzot, France, 1953) An American oil company enlists four tough drifters for a high-paying suicide mission: transporting explosives across the rough terrain of Central America. 7/5, 9pm
[ Wild Strawberries (Smultronstallet) ] (Ingmar Bergman, Sweden, 1957) An elderly physician, about to receive an honorary degree, is prompted by a dream and by circumstance to revisit key moments in his life. 7/12,9pm
[ Knife in the Water (Noz w Wodzie) ] (Roman Polanski, Poland, 1962) Polanski’s brilliant, blackly comic first feature follows a couple whose boating weekend becomes an exercise in tension after they pick up an enigmatic young hitchhiker. 7/19, 9pm
[ Blood of a Poet (Le Sang d’un Poete) ] (Jean Cocteau, France, 1930) Cocteau’s dreamlike first film stretches the medium to its limits in an effort to evoke the creative process. 7/26, 9pm
[ The Seventh Seal (Det Sjunde Inseglet) ] (Ingmar Bergman, Sweden, 1957) A knight returning from the Crusades tries to outwit Death in Bergman’s stunning allegory of man’s apocalyptic search for meaning. 8/2, 9pm
[ Cleo from 5 to 7 (Cleo de 5 a 7) ] (Agnès Varda, France, 1961) Visionary of the French New Wave, Varda captures the atmosphere of Paris in the 60s with this portrait of a singer searching for answers as she awaits the results of a biopsy for cancer. 8/9, 9pm
[ Nights of Cabiria (Le Notti de Cabiria) ] (Federico Fellini, Italy, 1957) – Oscar® winner for Best Foreign Language Film, this haunting masterpiece stars the great Giulietta Masina as a naive prostitute searching for true love in the seediest sections of Rome. 8/16, 9pm
[ Grand Illusion (La Grande Illusion) ] (Jean Renoir, France, 1938) – A moving drama about a group of World War I POW’s trying to escape from a German prison camp, many consider this the greatest antiwar film ever made. 8/23, 9pm
[ Seven Samurai (Shichi-Nin No Samurai) ] (Akira Kurosawa, Japan, 1954) A desperate village hires a group of mercenary samurai to protect it from marauders in this crown jewel of Japanese cinema. 8/30, 9pm
For more on the Classic World Cinema roster, see the Sundance Channel site
