February 14th 2015. 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.
St. Valentine, what'd you ever do, exactly, to earn the enmity of boyfriends/husbands historically and worldwide? Invent chocolates boxed in a heart-shape? Accelerate the advent of the greeting card? Posit the cuddly notion of plush leave-behinds? Whatever it might be, your name is both curse and song, dependent on gender. Not too many folk may boast of the similar status.
New and continuing series this day include Screwball Romance at IFC Center, the Laughton and Boorman smoochery at Film Forum, Tell It Like It Is!: Black Independents in New York, 1968-86 at Lincoln Center, and the Valentine's Day Massacre at Anthology film Archives. The celluloid love lettery be thus;
IFC Center
MY MAN GODFREY (1936) Dir; Gregory La Cava
BLUE VELVET (1986) Dir; David Lynch
Nitehawk Cinema
LA BELLE ET LA BETTE (1946) Dir; Jean Cocteau
SID & NANCY (1986) Dir; Alex Cox
Film Forum
THE BIG CLOCK (1948) Dir; John Farrow
THE SUSPECT (1944) Dir; Robert Siodmak
EXCALIBUR (1981) Dir; John Boorman
ZARDOZ (1974) Dir; John Boorman
Film Society of Lincoln Center
Tell It Like It Is!: Black Independents in New York, 1968-86
I REMEMBER HARLEM (1981) Dir; William Miles
Anthology Film Archives
WE WON'T GROW OLD TOGETHER (1972) Dir; Maurice Piliat
MODERN ROMANCE (1981) Dir; Albert Brooks
POSSESSION (1981) Dir; Andrzej Zulawski
BAM Cinématek
THE PHILADELPHIA STORY (1940) Dir; George Cukor
Today's Pick? I'd love to go with La Cava's masterpiece of screwballery, a template for the form, yet its pre-noon status frightens me. AFA's ironic scheduling entices, but it needs to refresh; offering the same three titles 3 years running, well Andrew Wyke would object. Cukor's STORY has never convinced, and perhaps Hepburn's grate is most responsible for that. All that out of the way, I'd love to catch Lynch's perverse American dream at midnight, Miles' documentation of a world long lost, and either of the Laughton tribs unspooling this day. However, in the same house that Laughton lodges this day, a work most prized by myself and, if the attendance at MoMA's recent screening is any evidence, a great number of the populace indeed, digitally unspools its 1's and 0's today on West Houston street. It is a work most romantic, one of the great romantic works of the cinema bar none, were you to seek out my two cents. It is about chivalry, and thankfully it is chivalric in style. It concerns kings and countries, and reinforces the nobility both may strive toward. It features wizardry, dragons, dreamworlds, and yet offers sound and grounded moral lessons we may still draw from to this day. Finally, it features what I deem the most beautiful, poetic, heartbreaking, and ultimately optimistic farewell speech a warrior has ever humbly offered to the love of his life in the history of film. Spar with that detail, medares ye!
John Boorman's EXCALIBUR screens all day today as part of Film Forum's trib to the filmmaker's CV, cleverly entitled Boorman. Python aside, it is the finest transcription of the Arthurian Legend to the big screen ever. Largely because those who were responsible for the sacking of those who were initially in charge of sacking those responsible, had by that time, finally, been sacked.
For more info on these and all NYC's classic film screenings in February '15 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 (currently suspended) 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 soon with new Picks 'n perks, til then safe, sound, make sure the next knucklehead is too!
P. S. We're fully entwined in winter's embrace, and believe it or not some of our fellow NY'ers have still yet to be made whole in the wake of the 2012 storm. Should you be feeling charitable please visit the folks at OccupySandy.net, follow their hammer-in-hand efforts to restore people's lives, and donate/volunteer if you have the inclination and availability. Be a collective mensch, Stockahz!
