The Best DVDs You've Never Seen, Just Missed or Almost Forgotten: A Guide for the Curious Film Lover

A self-described ""source of information about films that might have been neglected or overlooked or, conversely, well known at one time and now worth a reminder,"" this hodgepodge guide may most appeal to readers who value a New York Times recommendation above all else. The collection includes ""art films,"" small-scale indies and foreign-language films, as well as coming-of-age comedies and thrillers that ""flourish on the far side of respectability,"" according to critic A.O. Scott's introduction. ""The editors try to ease the anxious quandary you may face wandering up the video-store aisles in search of something to watch,"" he says. They succeed in that mission; the films, organized alphabetically and described in approximately one page each, range from Joseph H. Lewis's 1949 Gun Crazy, which Pauline Kael called ""a tawdry version of the Bonnie and Clyde story,"" to Ridley Scott's 1977 The Duellists, adapted from a Joseph Conrad story, to Laurent Cantet's 2001 Time Out, which chronicles workers' woes at the management level. Most (though not all) of the films listed were produced within the past 30 years, and though they vary widely in terms of genre and commercial value, all are, as Scott says, ""worth seeking out.""