Streaming Suggestions, February 2016: Lior Shamriz, Gabriel Abrantes, Benjamin Crotty

For the next few weeks, you can stream some incredible works by a handful of visionary young filmmakers on Vimeo and MUBI. For a limited amount of time, director Lior Shamriz has made several of his features available to stream for free on Vimeo, including his wonderful Saturn Returns from 2008. Saturn Returns stars Chloe Griffin, author of the excellent Cookie Mueller memoir Edgewise, as an American ex pat living in the queer art scene of Berlin. It's a hypnotic blend of improvisation, melodrama, and panache and comes highly recommended. In addition to Saturn Returns, Shamriz has also made his 2007 feature Japan Japan, about a gay Israeli teenager with a fetish for Japanese culture, and his 2012 feature A Low Life Mythology available on Vimeo for a limited amount of time.

In a similar vein, carrying on the themes of internationally displaced youth and their fluid sexuality, MUBI is now streaming a collection of works by directors Gabriel Abrantes, Benjamin Crotty, Daniel Schmidt, and Alexander Carver in collaboration with The Film Society of Lincoln in New York City. The "Friends with Benefits" series includes Abrantes and Schmidt's medium-length films Palaces of Pity (Palácios de Pena) and A History of Mutual Respect, two exquisitely photographed and exceptionally lush fables filmed in Portugal. Benjamin Crotty's feature Fort Buchanan, a "queer soap opera" about an army husband (Andy Gillet of Eric Rohmer's Les amours d'Astrée et de Céladon) in France and his wild adopted daughter (Iliana Zabeth from Bertrand Bonello's House of Tolerance), is also a part of the series; filmmaker and actress Mati Diop (35 Shots of Rum) also stars. Not all of the films are available in all territories, and these films will only be streaming for a limited time.

If you’re signing up for a subscription to MUBI, you might also want to check out one of the final masterworks from director Andrzej Żuławski, who died last week just days before his final feature Cosmos made its U.S. premiere in New York City: Fidelity (La fidélité). Starring his then-wife Sophie Marceau, Pascal Greggory, Guillaume Canet, Michel Subor, and Édith Scob (as a hilarious loud-mouthed, fall-down-drunk fashion magazine editor), La fidélité carried on Żuławski’s signature style and operatic tone in a loose adaptation of Madame de La Fayette’s La princesse de Clèves (which also served as the inspiration for Manoel de Oliveira’s La lettre and Christophe Honoré’s La belle personne). In carrying on the unofficial theme of expatriate filmmakers (Shamriz is an Israeli living in Berlin, Abrantes and Crotty are Americans working in Portugal and France, and  Żuławski left communist Poland for France in the 1970s), La fidélité is currently streaming on MUBI in the U.S.

Żuławski's L'amour braque from Mondo Vision, Almodóvar and Other DVD Updates

Mondo Vision has announced the third of their nine Andrzej Żuławski releases, L'amour braque, for 15 October. Like La femme publique and L'important c'est d'aimer before it, there will be two versions to choose from: a standard edition and a limited Premium Signature edition. The film marked Żuławski's first collaboration with his then-muse Sophie Marceau, who would star in all of the rest of his French productions before they separated in 2001 after La fidélité. Francis Huster and Tchéky Karyo also star.

I've been told that Sony will be releasing all, or most, of the films from their ¡Viva Pedro! box set, released at the beginning of 2007. Law of Desire and Matador will become available individually for the first time in the US, and the remastered versions of both All About My Mother and Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown will be back in circulation. I would imagine the same for Bad Education, Talk to Her and The Flower of My Secret, but unlike the other two, they were just repackaged into the set. All will/might(?) be out 3 November, just in time for Broken Embraces.

Some date changes: Water Bearer has moved the release of OMG/HaHaHa to 12 October and announced Philippe Vallois' We Were One Man [Nous étions un seul homme] for the same day. TLA has pushed their release of Shank from October to 8 December. And finally, Cinema Guild moved Jerichow's release date to 27 October.

The only Blu-ray release I came across that was of any interest was Kathryn Bigelow's Near Dark from Lionsgate on 10 November. Expect that awful Twilight-looking cover art as well. The rest of the DVD announcements are below, in descending order of release.

- A Lady of Chance, 1928, d. Robert Z. Leonard, Warner Archive, 18 August, w. Norma Shearer
- Speedway, 1929, d. Harry Beaymont, Warner Archive, 18 August
- Shopping for Fangs, 1997, d. Quentin Lee, Justin Lin, Pathfinder, 6 October, w. John Cho
- West 32nd, 2007, d. Michael Kang, Pathfinder, 13 October, w. John Cho
- Carnal Uptopia [Sonhos e Desejos/O Balé da Utopia], 2006, d. Marcelo Santiago, Pathfinder, 20 October
- The Heartbreak Yakuza, 1987, d. Masato Harada, Cinema Epoch, 10 November
- Holes in My Shoes, 2006, d. David Wachs, Alive Mind, 10 November
- Hurt, 2009, d. Barbara Stepansky, Monterey, 10 November, w. Melora Walters, William Mapother
- The Merry Gentlemen, 2008, d. Michael Keaton, The Weinstein Company, 10 November, w. Michael Keaton, Kelly Macdonald
- Tora-San, Volume 1: Films 1-4, d. Yoji Yamada, Azuma Morisaki, Shun-ichi Kobayashi, AnimEigo, 10 November
- Rome, The Complete Series, 2005-2007, HBO, also on Blu-ray, 17 November
- Toi et moi, 2006, d. Julie Lopes-Curval, Koch Lorber, 24 November, w. Marion Cotillard, Julie Depardieu, Jonathan Zaccaï

L'important c'est d'aimer in June

Mondo Vision announced L'important c'est d'aimer as the next of their Andrzej Żuławski titles to be released on DVD in the US. Like La femme publique, it will be available in standard and limited signature editions on 16 June. The film stars Romy Schneider (in what she considered her best role), Klaus Kinski and Jacques Dutronc, and it comes highly recommended.

Good news for Żuławski fans

The studio Mondo Vision looks to follow up their release of Andrzej Żuławski's La femme publique, which they released in limited and standard releases last November, with a number of the director's other films. They had already acquired L'important c'est d'aimer, with Romy Schneider, and L'amour braque, with Sophie Marceau, but they've added six more of Żuławski's films to their roster (unfortunately his last film La fidélité is not one of them). They are La note bleue [The Blue Note], Diabeł [The Devil], Possession, Trzecia część nocy [The Third Part of the Night], Szamanka [Shaman Woman] and Na srebrnym globie [The Silver Globe]. Facets previously released disappointing editions of The Devil and The Silve Globe (with the title Under the Silver Globe), so pristine transfers are something to definitely look forward to. This would also explain why Blue Underground canceled their re-release of Possession last year. As soon as any of these are announced for purchase, I'll be sure to let you know.

2009 Notebook: Vol 9

I have to write a piece on the local gay & lesbian film festival... things aren't looking good.

The New Favorites

La fidélité - dir. Andrzej Żuławski - 2000 - France - with Sophie Marceau, Pascal Greggory, Guillaume Canet, Michel Subor, Edith Scob, Magali Noël, Manuel Le Lièvre, Marc François, Aurélien Recoing, Marina Hands, Guy Tréjan, Jean-Charles Dumay

Middle of the Road

Away with Words - dir. Christopher Doyle - 1999 - Hong Kong/Japan/Singapore - N/A - with Tadanobu Asano, Kevin Sherlock, Georgina Hobson, Christa Hughes, Mavis Xu

Between Something & Nothing - dir. Todd Verow - 2008 - USA - Water Bearer Films - with Tim Swain, Julia Frey, Gil Bar-Sela, Philly, Todd Verow, Brad Hallowell, Francisco Solorzano

Finding Me - dir. Roger Omeus - 2007 - USA - TLA Releasing - with RayMartell Moore, Eugene Turner, J'Nara Corbin, Derrick L. Briggs, Maurice Murrell, Ronald DeSuze

Wrangler: Anatomy of an Icon - dir. Jeffrey Schwarz - 2008 - USA - TLA Releasing

The Bad

On ne devrait pas exister [We Should Not Exist] - dir. Hervé P. Gustave - 2006 - USA - N/A - with Hervé P. Gustave, LZA, Bertrand Bonello, Benoît Fournier

Shitfests

Between Love & Goodbye - dir. Casper Andreas - 2008 - USA - TLA Releasing - with Simon Miller, Justin Tensen, Rob Harmon, Jane Elliott, Aaron Michael Davies

Schoolboy Crush - dir. Kohtaro Terauchi - 2007 - Japan - TLA Releasing - with Atsumi Kanno, Kazunori Tani, Yoshikazu Kotani, Yuuki Kawakubo

Watercolors - dir. David Oliveras - 2008 - USA - N/A - with Tye Olson, Kyle Clare, Ellie Araiza, Casey Kramer, Jeffrey Lee Woods, Karen Black, Greg Louganis

Revisited: Les Autres

9 to 5 - dir. Colin Higgins - 1980 - USA - 20th Century Fox - with Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin, Dolly Parton, Dabney Coleman, Sterling Hayden

Questionable Amounts of Flesh, Growing Older (Wiser?) and Hysteria

I've been asked by a few people to resume writing analysis of the particular films I've seen, so here's a few. Sorry if they weren't the ones you wanted to hear more of...

Too Much Flesh - dir. Pascal Arnold, Jean-Marc Barr - 2000 - France - N/A - Jean-Marc Barr, Élodie Bouchez, Rosanna Arquette, Ian Brennan, Ian Vogt

The fact that Pascal Arnold and Jean-Marc Barr's Too Much Flesh was released with said title, the temptation to discuss at length the film's fleshiness and sexual content is unavoidable, and perhaps the only thing worth spending time on in the first place. Conceived as the second part of a trilogy dealing with the heart, the body and the soul, Too Much Flesh deals with, yes, the carnal desires of man, specifically one named Lyle (Barr) who's still a virgin at 35. He seems to be driving his wife (Rosanna Arquette) mad with this, and things don't get any better when he decides to lose his V-card to another woman, played by Élodie Bouchez, who not only starred with Barr in J'aimerais pas crever un dimanche but is the only actor to be in all three of Arnold and Barr's trilogy (Lovers and Being Light are the other two). Once the deed is done, we're given a series of lusty, dreamy sexual encounters between the two, one even involving Bouchez wanting Barr to seduce a young farmboy. There's plenty of issue to be taken about the fact Too Much Flesh isn't half the film Dogville is (which Barr co-starred in), but the film's display of sexuality is considerably more provoking than its notion of small-town, small-minded America. For the abundance of flesh on display, it's hard not to notice the way in which the camera or the body is always cropped in order to avoid Barr's penis. There's a suggestion in the film that there might be something "wrong" with it, but when Bouchez's body, which is not given the same treatment, becomes the concealer of choice (placing her hands and legs, among other things, strategically in front of Barr's member), any attempts at a European elitism over prudish American views of sex become futile. Too Much Flesh begins to perpetrate taboos it so snobbishly opposes in regards to full-frontal male nudity (Bouchez's hand also hides the farmboy's dick), which I'm sure most people would attribute to American cinema. The sex itself, while certainly more erotic than most films about blossoming sexuality, also stops short of penetration, and I'm referring to the simulated act. Ultimately, Too Much Flesh seems satisfied with not-really-enough flesh and becomes about as prudish as it thinks us Americans are.

Party Girl - dir. Daisy von Scherler Mayer - 1995 - USA - First Look - with Parker Posey, Guillermo Díaz, Sasha von Scherler, Omar Townsend, Anthony DeSando, Donna Mitchell, Liev Schreiber

God, I'm getting old. More than ten years ago, Party Girl was one of my touchstones of hipness. Yeah, it probably always was a shitty movie, but what I'm realizing now is that, outside of the multi-character Gen-X films she co-starred in (Dazed and Confused, Kicking and Screaming, Sleep with Me), Parker Posey was probably the only actress who constantly rose above her shitty films. I rewatched The House of Yes a few weeks ago and could barely get through it. It's probably the greatest compliment one can give an actress to be so wonderful as to distract the viewer from recognizing the lousiness of the film at hand. While I'll always admire Mary's ice-cold hauteur (which was the exact phrase a critic used to describe her while condemning the film), I don't know that I'll be taking many more trips down memory lane with Party Girl. Talk to me when you get a last name, honey.

L'important c'est d'aimer [The Main Thing Is to Love] - dir. Andrzej Żuławski - 1975 - Mondo Vision - France/Italy/West Germany - with Romy Schneider, Fabio Testi, Jacques Dutronc, Claude Dauphin, Klaus Kinski, Roger Blin, Gabrielle Doulcet

It's rather fitting that I'm watching Andrzej Żuławski's films around the same time Jeremiah Kipp's been interviewing Daniel Bird about Central New Wave Cinema at The House Next Door. I should confess that although I included Żuławski's Possession in the revisited section of my 2009 Notebook, I'm not 100% certain that I saw the full film prior to this year, after renting a crappy VHS of it from an independent video store years ago which, more than likely, was the US edit. In the interview, Kipp states that "[Żuławski's highly emotional and aggressive films] are frequently criticized for their 'hysteria.'" These are similar criticisms that have been given to Ken Russell's films with "mania" as the substitute for "hysteria." However, in looking back at both directors' films, there's something terribly admirable about this "hysteria/mania." When you're hard-pressed to come up with a contemporary filmmaker to match either (Baz Luhrmann be damned!), there's a sad sense that perhaps such cinematic mannerisms have become relics. L'important c'est d'aimer (which is a difficult title to translate into English) was Żuławski's first big success, in France of course as it was his first to be made in the country and starred two cultural icons, Romy Schneider and Jacques Dutronc. Though it lacks the alarming-ness of his later Possession, L'important c'est d'aimer is wonderful still, particularly for Schneider, who considered this to be her best work and whose performance here was one of the dedications at the end of Almodóvar's Todo sobre mi madre. As Nadine Chevalier, an actress specializing in films de cul, Schneider devastates within her first moments onscreen, unable to find it within her to fuck the dying body of her onscreen lover. Żuławski has a flair with actors, eliciting the frightening best of out of both Schneider and Isabelle Adjani in Possession and wonderful turns from Dutronc and Klaus Kinski as well. Was I wrong in absolutely hating Mes nuits sont plus belles que vos jours, particularly Dutronc's performance? I'll have to give it another go. Best line in the film: when asked if he's crazy after planting a kiss on the film's dull protagonist Servais (Fabio Testi), Kinski responds, "no, just rich."

2009 Notebook: Vol 8

Vicky Cristina Barcelona is the second film I've watched twice this year, and though I know I'm not alone in my love for it, I just can't seem to get enough of it. It made sense to watch it again to, sort of, get the best of both worlds, as Almodóvar and Allen have been my go-tos when nothing new looks remotely appealing. I'm still having problems with the labeling of the films (On the Bus, for example, should fall somewhere between "Good" and "Middle-of-the-Road"), but hopefully that'll work itself out. I'm going to try to do a fair amount of writing today, so check back.

The New Favorites

Les corps ouverts - dir. Sébastien Lifshitz - 1998 - France - N/A - with Yasmine Belmadi, Pierre-Loup Rajot, Margot Abascal, Mohamed Damraoui, Malik Zidi, Dora Dhouib, Sébastien Lifshitz

The Good

L'important c'est d'aimer [The Main Thing Is to Love] - dir. Andrzej Żuławski - 1975 - Mondo Vision - France/Italy/West Germany - with Romy Schneider, Fabio Testi, Jacques Dutronc, Claude Dauphin, Klaus Kinski, Roger Blin, Gabrielle Doulcet

Martyrs - dir. Pascal Laugier - 2008 - France - The Weinstein Company - with Morjana Alaoui, Mylène Jampanoï, Catherine Bégin, Robert Toupin, Patricia Tulasne, Isabelle Chasse, Juliette Gosselin, Xavier Dolan-Tadros

On the Bus - dir. Dustin Lance Black - 2001 - USA - 10% Productions

The Bad

Too Much Flesh - dir. Pascal Arnold, Jean-Marc Barr - 2000 - France - N/A - Jean-Marc Barr, Élodie Bouchez, Rosanna Arquette, Ian Brennan, Ian Vogt

Revisited: The Old Favorites

Bugcrush - dir. Carter Smith - 2006 - USA - Strand Releasing - with Josh Barclay Caras, Donald Eric Cumming, David Tennent, Eleonore Hendricks, Alex Toumayan, Billy Price

Old Joy - dir. Kelly Reichardt - 2006 - USA - Kino - with Daniel London, Will Oldham, Tanya Smith

Vicky Cristina Barcelona - dir. Woody Allen - Spain/USA - 2008 - MGM/Weinstein Company - with Javier Bardem, Rebecca Hall, Scarlett Johansson, Penélope Cruz, Patricia Clarkson, Chris Messina, Kevin Dunn, Pablo Schreiber

Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown [Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios] - dir. Pedro Almodóvar - 1988 - Spain - MGM/Sony Pictures - with Carmen Maura, Julieta Serrano, María Barranco, Antonio Banderas, Rossy de Palma, Kiti Manver, Fernando Guillén

Revisited: Les Autres

Party Girl - dir. Daisy von Scherler Mayer - 1995 - USA - First Look - with Parker Posey, Guillermo Díaz, Sasha von Scherler, Omar Townsend, Anthony DeSando, Donna Mitchell, Liev Schreiber

2009 Notebook: Vol 7

I promise a full round-up tomorrow night! I'm on a Woody Allen/Pedro Almodóvar kick at the moment, and it's treating me well. I couldn't resist watching Isabelle Adjani in all her carnal glory in Possession, which is the first film I've viewed twice in 2009. I didn't count Zack and Miri Make a Porno as it was the most inspid ten minutes I've endured in a long time before ejecting it from my DVD player. I know plenty of people whose opinions I respect that "didn't mind it," so perhaps it improves, but I can no longer tolerate the nauseating mix of fourth-grade boy potty humor and earnest romance.

The New Favorites

In the City of Sylvia [En la ciudad de Sylvia] - dir. José Luis Guerín - 2007 - Spain - N/A - with Xavier Lafitte, Pilar López de Ayala

Revisited: The Old Favorites

All About My Mother [Todo sobre mi madre] - dir. Pedro Almodóvar - 1999 - Spain - Sony Pictures Classics - with Cecilia Roth, Marisa Paredes, Penélope Cruz, Antonia San Juan, Rosa María Sardá, Candela Peña, Toni Cantó, Eloy Azorín

Deconstructing Harry - dir. Woody Allen - 1997 - USA - Fine Line Features - with Woody Allen, Hazelle Goodman, Judy Davis, Bob Balaban, Elisabeth Shue, Billy Crystal, Kirstie Alley, Eric Lloyd, Robin Williams, Demi Moore, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Stanley Tucci, Richard Benjamin, Mariel Hemingway, Caroline Aaron, Amy Irving, Julie Kavner, Tobey Maguire, Stephanie Roth

Fat Girl [À ma soeur!] - dir. Catherine Breillat - 2001 - France/Italy - Criterion - with Anaïs Reboux, Roxane Mesquida, Libero De Rienzo, Arsinée Khanjian, Romain Goupil, Laura Betti

Possession - dir. Andrzej Żuławski - France/West Germany - 1981 - Blue Underground - with Isabelle Adjani, Sam Neill, Heinz Bennett, Margit Carstensen, Michael Hogben, Johanna Hofer

Talk to Her [Hable con ella] - dir. Pedro Almodóvar - 2002 - Spain - Sony Pictures Classics - with Darío Grandinetti, Javier Cámara, Lenor Watling, Rosario Flores, Mariola Fuentes, Gerladine Chaplin, Lola Dueñas, Chus Lampreave, Paz Vega, Fele Martínez, Elena Anaya

Revisited: Les Autres

Basic Instinct - dir. Paul Verhoeven - 1992 - USA/France - Tri-Star - with Michael Douglas, Sharon Stone, George Dzundza, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Dennis Arndt, Leilani Sarelle

The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things - dir. Asia Argento - 2004 - USA/UK/France/Japan - with Asia Argento, Dylan Sprouse, Cole Sprouse, Jimmy Bennett, Jeremy Renner, Marilyn Manson, Peter Fonda, Ornella Muti, Kip Pardue, John Robinson, Ben Foster, Lydia Lunch, Jeremy Sisto, Michael Pitt

Mighty Aphrodite - dir. Woody Allen - 1995 - USA - Miramax - with Woody Allen, Mira Sorvino, Helena Bonham Carter, F. Murray Abraham, Peter Weller, Michael Rapaport, Olympia Dukakis

Wild at Heart - dir. David Lynch - 1990 - USA - MGM - with Laura Dern, Nicolas Cage, Diane Ladd, Willem Dafoe, J.E. Freeman, Harry Dean Stanton, Isabella Rossellini, Grace Zabriskie, Calvin Lockhart, David Patrick Kelly, Sherilyn Fenn, Crispin Glover, Freddie Jones, John Lurie, Jack Nance, Sheryl Lee

2009 Notebook: Vol 3

I'm thinking that I may create a database somewhere online to keep track of my 2009 viewings, but as it stands now, my nose is like Niagara Falls, my ear like a fucking church bell and I'm still waiting for the antibiotics to kick in. Here's the last 10 films I've seen, all of which will be spoken about in more depth at a later date. All I'll say now is that Żuławski's Possession officially placed itself onto that list of my all-time favorites. January is a good month to resort to some of your old faithfuls (Muriel's Wedding, ha!), especially when your December was not only jam-packed with film watching, but jam-packed with films like Revolutionary Road, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Gran Torino. All of us deserve a month off (at least).

Brilliant! (?)

La vie nouvelle [A New Life] - dir. Philippe Grandrieux - France - 2002 - N/A - with Zachary Knighton, Anna Mouglalis, Marc Barbé, Zsolt Nagy, Raoul Dantec, Vladimir Zintov

Not Brilliant!

Via Appia - dir. Jochen Hick - Germany - 1990 - Strand Releasing - with Peter Senner, Guilherme de Pádua, Yves Jansen

Revisited

The Dead Girl - dir. Karen Moncrieff - USA - 2006 - First Look - with Brittany Murphy, Toni Collette, Rose Byrne, Mary Beth Hurt, Marcia Gay Harden, Kerry Washington, Nick Searcy, Giovanni Ribisi, Mary Steenburgen, James Franco, Piper Laurie, Josh Brolin, Bruce Davison

Happiness - dir. Todd Solondz - USA - 1998 - Lionsgate - with Jane Adams, Dylan Baker, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Lara Flynn Boyle, Cynthia Stevenson, Ben Gazzara, Louise Lasser, Rufus Read, Camryn Manheim, Jon Lovitz, Jared Harris, Marla Maples, Evan Silverberg, Dan Moran, Molly Shannon

Muriel's Wedding - dir. P.J. Hogan - Australia/France - 1994 - Miramax - with Toni Collette, Rachel Griffiths, Bill Hunter, Jeanie Drynan, Gennie Nevinson, Matt Day, Daniel Lapaine, Sophie Lee, Roz Hammond, Belinda Jarrett, Pippa Grandison, Gabby Millgate, Daniel Wyllie

Palindromes - dir. Todd Solondz - USA - 2004 - Wellspring (R.I.P.) - with Emani Sledge, Valerie Shusterov, Hannah Freiman, Rachel Corr, Will Denton, Sharon Wilkins, Shayna Levine, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Ellen Barkin, Stephen Adly Guirgis, Matthew Faber, Debra Monk, Alexander Brickel, Richard Masur, Robert Agri, Richard Riehle, John Gemberling

Possession - dir. Andrzej Żuławski - France/West Germany - 1981 - Blue Underground - with Isabelle Adjani, Sam Neill, Heinz Bennett, Margit Carstensen, Michael Hogben, Johanna Hofer

Red Road - dir. Andrea Arnold - UK/Denmark - 2006 - Tartan Films (R.I.P.) - with Kate Dickie, Tony Curran, Martin Compston, Nathalie Press, Paul Higgins

Storytelling - dir. Todd Solondz - USA - 2001 - Fine Line Features (R.I.P.) - with Mark Webber, Selma Blair, Paul Giamatti, John Goodman, Robert Wisdom, Leo Fitzpatrick, Julie Hagerty, Jonathan Osser, Lupe Ontiveros, Noah Fleiss, Aleksa Palladino, Franka Potente, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Xander Berkeley

Welcome to the Dollhouse - dir. Todd Solondz - USA - 1995 - Sony Pictures Classics - with Heather Matarazoo, Angela Pietropinto, Brendan Sexton III, Matthew Faber, Eric Mabius, Daria Kalinina, Bill Buell, Dimitri DeFresco