March 14th 2014. Pick of the Day.
New York City's premiere resource for classic film screenings in the metropolitan area. Offering reviews, recommendations, venues and a host of links keeping classic film and the silver screens alive.
To all my fellow NY'ers who share a spiritual (and gravely physical) connection with Capt. Steve Rogers today, I'm happy to report that as we collectively thaw, rep circuit activity transforms from options potential to increasingly kinetic! Today's ongoing series include The Complete Hitchcock at Film Forum, Vienna Unveiled and An Auterist History of Film at MoMA, Under the Influence: Scorsese/Walsh at BAM Cinematek, Richie's Electric Eight: The Bold & the Daring at the Japan Society, Overdue: Richard Fleischer at Anthology Film Archives, and the swank Cabaret Cinema at the Rubin Museum. The movie-mad meshuggaas be thus;
Film Forum
VERTIGO (1958) Dir; Alfred Hitchcock
THE 39 STEPS (1935) Dir; Alfred Hitchcock
MoMA
NOTHNG BUT A MAN (1964) Dir; Michael Roemer
STOLEN IDENTITY (1952) Dir; Emil A. Reinhart
THE THIRD MAN (1949) Dir; Carol Reed
BAM Cinematek
RAGING BULL (1980) Dir; Martin Scorsese
GENTLEMAN JIM (1942) Dir; Raoul Walsh
Japan Society
CHASE (1957) Dir; Yoshitaro Nomura
Anthology Film Archives
TRAPPED (1949) Dir; Richard Fleischer
CONAN THE DESTROYER (1984) Dir; Richard Fleischer
Rubin Museum
DAYS OF HEAVEN (1978) Dir; Terrence Malick
IFC Center
DRESSED TO KILL (1980) Dir; Brian De Palma
Nitehawk Cinema
MAD MAX (1979) Dir; George Miller
Today's Pick? I'm only holding off on choosing the greatest movie ever made (if you need to ask you don't know me very well) because I'm making it my selection whence I attend on St. Pat's, as I can think of no better way to avoid the sophmoric tomfoolery of every amateur drunk and faux-Irishman than a couple of hours spent in the company of Harry Lime. So I'm going with Film Forum's awesome, exhaustive Complete Hitchcock, and your last chance to catch what Big Al would surely consider the most perfectly contructed example of Hitchcockian cinema, 1935's THE 39 STEPS. Everything he'd been working toward from his beginnings in the silent era through his early successes in Brit sound cinema came to crystallization with this tale of mistaken identity, surreptitious flight from both the law and more sinister conspiratorial forces, murder, betrayal, a cool curvy blonde and a set of handcuffs. Sound familiar? Hitch would repeat this forumla in the slightly superior (bring it!) SABOTEUR and the wholly, ingeniously preposterous NORTH BY NORTHWEST, but the germination of this popular formula remains one of the most thrilling examples of early sound cinema informed by the craft of the silent era. It's probably star Robert Donat's finest 90 minutes, though he'd win the Oscar for 1939's GOODBYE MR. CHIPS, and it showed how a Brit film industry unfettered by Hollywood's then-recently installed Hays Code could subversively best their American competition. All of his pre-Hollywood work shows some degree of genius slowly unfolding, but this is the film I argue where he first truly became Tha Mahstah.
For more info on these and all NYC's classic film screenings in March '14 click on the interactive calendar on the upper right hand side of the page. And be sure to follow me on both Facebook, where I provide further info and esoterica on the rep film circuit and star birthdays, and Twitter, where I provide a daily feed for the day's screenings and other blathery. Back tomorrow with a brand new Pick, til then Bridgegate Smidgegate; anybody looking into the intersection of Bleecker and Bowery? Ya wana talk about a carjam?
-Joe Walsh
P. S. Should you be feeling charitable during this harsh weather period please remember to check in with the good folks over at Occupy Sandy. Some of our NY neighbors are still feeling the effects of last year's hurricane. Be a mensch.
