Last Year at Marienbad (Alain Resnais, 1961)

9.5/10
I watched the first 30 minutes or so so many times before writing this review I think I lost count. An impenetrable Rubik's cube of dreamlogic (or maybe just pseudo-philosophical arty nonsense), I was completely under its spell - from the beautiful dialogue to the unbelievable hotel itself, and everything in between, particularly Alain Resnais' other-worldly mise-en-scenes. I will say that I enjoyed exploring the hotel, the guests, the conversations, the games, the courtyard, etc more than the actual meat of the movie (a man trying to convince a woman that they had met exactly one year ago), so I'll ding it half a point there, but this is a movie I'll be watching over and over again until I die.

Viridiana (Luis Bunuel, 1961)

7/10
I liked it well enough but there wasn't any single thing that really blew me away. Bunuel's depiction of class differences almost seemed a little facile, and kind of predictable. I don't know, I enjoyed it, but it didn't really leave any kind of impression or impact on me, so I guess I was left wanting more.

Yojimbo (Akira Kurosawa, 1961)

8/10
I'm a big fan of A Fistful of Dollars, so of course I'd like the movie it was based on. I didn't really realize just how closely based on it it was until I saw Yojimbo...only the second Kurosawa movie I've seen (after Seven Samurai) and I liked both a good deal. Ran is up next on my long list of Kurosawa flicks to watch.