Great movie alert! (Patreon)

But first let me quickly note that Paper Moon walked away with this week's request poll, beating Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar by a nearly 2:1 margin. (For the record, I'm planning to watch at least the first 10 minutes of the latter at some point, regardless.) I recall watching it when I worked at Scott's Super Video (not a chain) and was making the rounds of our inventory armed with the Maltin Guide; that would've been in either 1990 or 1991, if memory serves. It's been a while. Currently sits at #4 on my '73 list, but that was assembled from distant memory for the most part. Available on Kanopy (at least via my library).

A higher priority for many of you, however, should be Dariush Mehrjui's Leila, which I just saw has been added to MUBI's collection, at least here in the U.S. (though it's not one of their Films Of The Day, which is why I'm flagging it). Not only is this a near-masterpiece—rated it 85 upon a revisit two years ago—but it's been impossible to see in any kind of decent quality for the past 20+ years. I own the DVD that was released at the time and still had to dig up a (marginally) better source online, because that disc is borderline unwatchable. But I checked MUBI's stream and while it's sourced from a slightly beat-up print, it otherwise looks great. I realize that Mehrjui's not a familiar name à la Kiarostami or Makhmalbaf or Farhadi, but trust me, you will not regret watching this. Stars Leila Hatami (who went on to play A Separation's female lead) and Ali Mosaffa (future star of The Past). "Still one of the most formally sophisticated, dramatically complex, and flat-out heartbreaking Iranian movies I've ever seen, like a cross between Private Life and The Handmaid's Tale (plus a weird, invigorating dollop of Humpday's mutual-dare dynamic)," I wrote on Letterboxd. If you subscribe to MUBI and have never seen Leila and don't take this opportunity to do so, I will be very cross indeed.