November 27th 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.
New, returning and ongoing series this day include Film School 101: Canon Fodder and Wes Craven's Nightmares at IFC Center, a tribute to filmmaker and innovative production designer William Cameron Menzies at Film Forum, Modern Matinees: The Film Library at Ten at MoMA, Turkeys for Thanksgiving at BAM Cinématek, Jack Smith Selects (From the Grave) and Essential Cinema at Anthology Film Archives, The Hollywood Classics Behind Walkers at Museum of the Moving Image, Justice in Film at the New York Historical Society, and SciFighters at the Nitehawk Cinema. And you thought yesterday's plate was full. The lenticular leftovers be thus;
IFC Center
TOKYO STORY (1953) Dir; Yasujiro Ozu
A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET (1984) Dir; Wes Craven
Film Forum
THINGS TO COME (1936) Dir; Alexander Korda
TEMPEST (1928) Dir; Samuel Taylor
MoMA
Modern Matinees: The Film Library at Ten
HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY (1941) Dir; John Ford
BAM Cinématek
HEAVEN'S GATE (1980) Dir; Michael Cimino
CLEOPATRA (1963) Dir; Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Anthology Film Archives
Jack Smith Selects (From the Grave)
DARK PASSAGE (1947) Dir; Delmer Daves
LES DAMES DU BOIS DE BOLONGE (1945) Dir; Robert Bresson
I WAS BORN, BUT... (1932) Dir; Yasujiro Ozu
THERE WAS A FATHER (1942) Dir; Yasujiro Ozu
Museum of the Moving Image
The Hollywood Classics Behind Walkers
DR. STRANGELOVE, OR HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE BOMB (1964) Dir; Stanley Kubrick
New York Historical Society
Justice in Film
IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE (1946) Dir; Frank Capra
Nitehawk Cinema
THE RUNNING MAN (1987) Dir; Paul Michael Glaser
Today's Pick? Short and sweet. Which also defines the career that I celebrate this day. The magnificent, luminous soul of some of Japanese cinema's most haunting works, a soul that helped to channel the focus of postwar world cinema on some masters from foreign film industries both old and new, threw off her mortal coil recently, and it was only this past Wednesday that the word became official; Setsuko Hara, who served as muse for some of master filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu's best films and greatest themes, left us.
I'd like to say I'm some sort of expert on the actress, and of the impact her work had on her native film industry as well as the world's. Can't. there are still so many titles I need to cross of my list, and Ozu is a huge sub-category unto himself. What I can offer is this; I've seen Hara in Kurosawa's NO REGRETS FOR OUR YOUTH and Ozu's TOKYO STORY, and I suspect the two offer some evidence of her range. The former offers a well-to-do female youth testing her boundaries, the latter a daughter seeking newer an better freedoms that her parents might jeopardize. In both instances a chance for a new freedom, a chance to assert, even to develop a unique identity, is theme that connects her performances. She left the film industry pretty much once Ozu died, walking away at the height of her fame and popularity and box office power. How in keeping with a woman whose only true concern was her own will. Arigato.
Setsuko Hara stars in what many consider Yasujiro Ozu's crowning achievement: 1953's TOKYO STORY, screening at IFC Center as part of their fab series Film School 101: Canon Fodder. Let's bid the artist farewell with class, shall we?
For more info on these and all NYC's rep film screenings in November '15 click on the interactive calendar on the upper right hand side of the page. 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. The warmer, fiercer cuddle of the sun's sunnier disposition has begun its annual wane, but 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!
