August 31st 2014. Pick of the Day.
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Last day of August '14. As fast as the season seems to have whizzed by it also gifts us with a fully stocked memory locker. SORCERER and A HARD DAY'S NIGHT at Film Forum. NETWORK and THE GREEN BERETS at the Nitehawk. 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY in 70mm at Museum of the Moving Image. And, although it doesn't quite fit within the site's timeline parameters, the specialty flavored ice cream at Brooklyn Bridge Park's unspooling of FANTASTIC MR. FOX. I believe it was bespokenly monickered Cuss-Yeah custard. Ah Brooklyn, twee capital of the globe.
Before it passes into that good calendar-shred let's give the final 24 hours of August's rep calendar its due. Ongoing series today include 1939 - Hollywood's Golden Year at IFC Center, Classics in HD at Symphony Space, The Great War: A Cinematic Legacy at MoMA, Screenwriters and the Blacklist: Before, During and After at Anthology Film Archives, and See It Big!: Hollywood Melodrama at Museum of the Moving Image. Here be the shenanigans;
IFC Center
1939 - Hollywood's Golden Year
STAGECOACH (1939) Dir; John Ford
Nitehawk Cinema
DETOUR (1945) Dir; Edgar G. Ulmer
Film Forum
THAT MAN FROM RIO! (1964) Dir; Philippe de Broca
THE CONFORMIST (1971) Dir; Bernardo Bertolucci
AMC Kips Bay15, AMC Empire 25
THE NUTTY PROFESSOR (1963) Dir; Jerry Lewis
Symphony Space
REAR WINDOW (1954) Dir; Alfred Hitchcock
MoMA
The Great War: A Cinematic Legacy
THE PATENT LEATHER KID (1927) Dir; Alfred Santell
THE BIG PARADE (1925) Dir; King Vidor
Anthology Film Archives
Screenwriters and the Blacklist: Before, During and After
FIVE CAME BACK (1939) Dir; John Farrow
THE LAWLESS BREED (1953) Dir; Raoul Walsh
Museum of the Moving Image
See It Big!: Hollywood Melodrama
THE COLOR PURPLE (1985) Dir; Steven Spielberg
REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE (1955) Dir; Nicholas Ray
Today's Pick? There's opportune fare of great import today, honoring the centennial of the first War to End All Wars (The Great War: A Cinematic Legacy) and HUAC's terrible legacy (Screenwriters and the Blacklist: Before, During and After), and a pair of screenings I'm putting off for selection at a later date (PROFESSOR, REBEL). However, being as we're gearing up for a particularly American holiday mañana, tilde intentional, I'm going with a particularly American icon of Hollywood cinema, one who may not represent the ideals of the labor movement, particularly, but who does rep friend and family gatherings, BBQ and beer, and reverence for older movie stalwarts. I'm talking about the still-controversial saddle occupant known as John Wayne, who spent ten years working as a B-western familiar before mentor and drinking buddy John Ford literally dragged him by the scruff onto the A-list with one of the most glorious, and blatant, star-making spotlights ever afforded a pal. The resulting film not only birthed the persona of one of the five-to-ten most recognizable actor CV's in film history, but re-injected life and stamina into a foundering genre. Should you retain any stamina of your own, I heartily recommend you wake up at the unGODly hour of anytime-before-11am to bear big-screen witness to an out-and-out classic. However rough it might be dragging your narcoleptic posterior to the theater, just remind yourself Yakima Canutt had it worse.
John Ford's STAGECOACH screens today at IFC Center as part of the series 1939 - Hollywood's Golden Year. C'mon. You'd do it for Randolph Scott.
For more info on these and all NYC's classic film screenings in August '14 click on the interactive calendar on the upper right hand side of the page. For the monthly overview and other audio tomfoolery check out the podcast, and follow me on SoundCloud! For reviews of contemporary cinema and my streaming habits (keep it clean!) check out my Letterboxd 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 safe, sound, make sure the next knucklehead is too Pilgrim.
-Joe Walsh
