Dennis Lim talks to one of my favorite actors, Elliott Gould, in today’s New York Times, and reading the article made me not-so-cranky for a few minutes. Then I remembered that Robert Altman and Ingmar Bergman are dead, that most teenagers couldn’t pick Elliott Gould out of a lineup, and that Little Murders and California Split are currently out-of-print on DVD.

Little Murders isn’t a movie you have to see before you die, but California Split is essential viewing for anyone who loves Gould, who loves Altman, who loves George Segal, who loves not being someone who hasn’t seen California Split, and so on. Just like that, the crankiness started to return. I might have to re-read J. Hoberman’s 2007 profile of Gould later to keep from feeling too despondent.