Oh, to live in Gotham...

Those lucky devotees of Film Forum's excellent programming have a real treat: Max Ophuls' magnificent The Earrings of Madame De.... Although still unavailable on DVD (Criterion is supposed to give it the deluxe treatment this summer; if the inferior Ophuls product Lola Montes can get it...), I've protected my New Yorker Home Video copy purchased in the mid-nineties as zealously as I used to my copy of The Conformist (until I left it under a movie theater seat during an Adaptation screening, after Andy had borrowed it). The reliable Dave Kehr published an enlightening essay in today's New York Times. "Proustian" is a disgracefully abused adjective, but surely it applies to The Earrings of Madamde De..., in which Ophuls' irony and bemusement fuse in the film's last third into something approaching despair.

In other news an American remake of Eric Rohmer's Chloe in the Afternoon is scheduled for release....starring Chris Rock.