I’m going to introduce my first quick review with a cautionary tale. Back in the dark ages when I was at university, a fellow English major asked me to go to an art movie with him. But—here comes the cautionary bit—I neglected to find out in advance that he was also studying German epic poetry. The art movie, which was in German with those English subtitles that don’t really show up against black and white film, seemed to be some kind of allegorical poem involving King Arthur’s knights and their search for the Holy Grail.

I’m not really sure about the plot of the film because A) it went on for untold hours of torture in which people wearing gauzy clothes over tights talked a lot and floated around but didn’t seem to accomplish much, and B) German art poetry. My date was very excited about all this and did…