We didn’t get to do Suggests this week, but if I could have, I would have passionately urged you to see both Ugetsu and Sansho the Bailiff at Northwest Film Forum this week.

Here’s the famous un-carnal embrace from Ugetsu. He’s a potter, she’s a ghost:

My review of the Mizoguchi series has already attracted one very angry Japanese film fan. If you care to debate: Is it wrong of me to identify a “classic triumvirate” of Ozu, Mizoguchi, and Kurosawa since critics who originally selected the trio I mentioned (see here, for example) often hadn’t seen anything by Mikio Naruse, whose work was relatively unknown in the U.S. prior to a recent revival? I’ve seen some Naruse, thanks to NWFF, and his interest in melodrama and preoccupation with the oppression of women places him much closer to Mizoguchi than either Ozu or Kurosawa. Degree of Western inflection could slice the group in different halves: Ozu and Naruse on one side, and Kurosawa and Mizoguchi on the other.

Sansho the Bailiff, a moving tragedy that’s perhaps more typical of Mizoguchi’s oeuvre, is only playing for two days: Monday and Tuesday.

Since you should be seeing Asphalt on Monday, that leaves Tuesday. Make a note of it.

Here’s a still from Asphalt:

Andrew Wright reviews Venus, in which Peter O’Toole hits on a pubescent girl:

Mostly, it’s about building a shrine to the greatness of Peter O’Toole, assembling a loose, shambling framework for the icon to caper, rage, charm, and otherwise do whatever pops into his head at the moment. This is hardly a bad thing.

And in On Screen this week: reviews of Smokin’ Aces (yay, mostly, to trillions of simultaneous assassination attempts!), Catch and Release (boo, sort of, to bizarre fishing metaphors!), and Seraphim Falls (will “sate all but the most ardent oater fan”).

I’d like to devote a whole Slog post to China Blue, at Grand Illusion starting tonight at 7 and 9 pm (review here). For now, I’ll just say that I immediately got up and checked every single tag on every single pair of jeans I own to see if any were made by diligent, overworked, underage factory girls in China. It’s a straightforward documentary, not agit-flavored in the least, and that’s good, because there are no easy solutions. See it.

Also in Limited Runs: Opal Dream (a web exclusive review), Family Law, and more. Fans of Jon Moritsugu should note that the director of Mod Fuck Explosion and other delectable, nonsensical examples of trash-art cinema now lives on Vashon Island and will attend the Northwest Asian American Film Festival screening of Scumrock.

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Movie Times are completely integrated with Film Shorts in Get Out. Get thee to the cinematheque.