October 7th -9th: Guerrillas, Ghosts, and One-Eyed Jacks! Read on!
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I'm back, Stockahz! After a week's backoff due to the concocting of this month's rep circuit calendar and its accompanying Overview, I've returned to provide you with my newly-chosen Weekend Update format, which not only pares down the work for yours truly but also allows for the crank e-mail responses to sorta bundle up in one big bunch for me to address. With the trash icon. It's just better this way all around, trust me kids.
Notable events and series include Modern Matinees: B is for Bogart and the trib to dissident Russian auteur Marlen Khutsiev at MoMA, Krzysztof Kieslowski: A Complete Retrospective at Museum of the Moving Image, The Associates and Aldrich and Welcome to Metrograph: A to Z at the Metrograph, and of course the second and last week of the NYFF54 , specifically its Revivals and Retrospective series. The all-nite Rock 'n Roll and everyday party be thus;
Friday October 7th
Film Forum
THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS (1966) Dir; Gillo Pontecorvo
MoMA
Modern Matinees: B is for Bogart
THE TREASURE OF THE SIERRA MADRE (1948) Dir; John Huston
IT AS THE MONTH OF MAY (1970) Dir; Marlen Khutsiev
JULY RAIN (1967) Dir; Marlen Khutsiev
BAM Cinématek
MIDNIGHT COWBOY (1969) Dir; John Schlesinger
SON OF DRACULA (1975) Dir; Freddie Francis
Museum of the Moving Image
Krzysztof Kieslowski: A Complete Retrospective
THE DOUBLE LIFE OF VERONIQUE (1991) Dir; Krzysztof Kieslowski
New York Historical Society
THE BEST MAN (1964) Dir; Franklin J. Schaffner
Metrograph
ALL THE MARBLES (1981) Dir; Robert Aldrich
Rubin Museum
MEETINGS WITH REMARKABLE MEN (1979) Dir; Peter Brook
Nitehawk Cinema
THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS (1991) Dir; Jonathan Demme
TENEBRE (1982) Dir; Dario Argento
Today's Pick? There's simply no question. Not only is Gillo Pontecorvo's seminal political/military/resistance procedural, 1966's THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS, screening in a new 4K DCP spitshine, one I've recently witnessed at its unveiling at the currently underway New York Film Festival, it's accompanied this evening by producer and star Saadi Yacef, actual participant in the Algerian uprising of the late 50's and the man who authored the film's source material. Said screening occurs this evening, the 7:30pm slot at Film Forum, where it runs all week. There's simply no way to overstate the importance of this in-person event. Do yer damndest to attend.
Saturday October 8th
Nitehawk Cinema
BEETEJUICE (1988) Dir; Tim Burton
CAPE FEAR (1962) Dir; J. Lee Thompson
THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS (1991) Dir; Jonathan Demme
TENEBRE (1982) Dir; Dario Argento
Film Forum
THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS (1966) Dir; Gillo Pontecorvo
Film Society of Lincoln Center
UGETSU (1953) Dir; Kenji Mizoguchi
NIAGARA (1953) Dir; Henry Hathaway
Metrograph
THE MALTESE FALCON (1940) Dir; John Huston
Mid-Manhattan Library
CHRISTINE (1983) Dir; John Carpenter
MoMA
ILYCH'S GATE (1962) Dir; Marlen Khutsiev
Museum of the Moving Image
Krzysztof Kieslowski: A Complete Retrospective
THE SCAR (1976) Dir; Krzysztof Kieslowski
Metrograph
THE CHOIRBOYS (1977) Dir; Robert Aldrich
BAM Cinématek
SKIDOO (1968) Dir; Otto Preminger
Today's Pick? Part of me wants to just go nuts, as did director Otto Preminger when he committed to this project, and pick his 60's psychedelic freakout SKIDOO. Groucho Marx made his last onscreen appearance as a fully tattooed gangster named God. Yeah, it's that level batcrap. But no. Today a film from the immediate postwar Japanese studio era, perhaps the most haunting ghost story from a culture that found itself immediately surrounded by such, is screened in its new digitized cleanup, courtesy of Scorsese's Film Foundation and KADOKAWA Corporation. It combines elements of Jidaigeki, or period piece cinema, of horror cinema, of Odysseian journey home through the wake of war. Mostly though, it conveyed the pain, bewilderment and longing of a people who'd been beaten both by their leaders and their leaders' opponents. Kurosawa, the man most responsible for bringing Japanese cinema to the world stage, searched for his nation's soul from the outside in. Mizoguchi chose the opposite course. And may have been the more successful of the two. UGETSU screens at the Bruno Walter Auditorium as part of the NYFF's Revivals program. Unmissable.
Sunday October 9th
Nitehawk Cinema
BEETEJUICE (1988) Dir; Tim Burton
CAPE FEAR (1962) Dir; J. Lee Thompson
Film Forum
THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS (1966) Dir; Gillo Pontecorvo
Film Society of Lincoln Center
ONE-EYED JACKS (1961) Dir; Marlon Brando
LA MARSEILLAISE (1938) Dir; Jean Renoir
Metrograph
THE LEGEND OF LYLAH CLAIRE (1968) Dir; Robert Aldrich
Mid-Manhattan Library
OUT OF THE FOG (1941) Dir; Anatole Litvak
BAM Cinématek
POPEYE (1980) Dir: Robert Altman
MoMA
SPRINGTIME ON ZARECHNAIA STREET (1956) Dir; Marlen Khutsiev
THE TWO FEDORS (1959) Dir; Marlen Khutsiev
Museum of the Moving Image
Krzysztof Kieslowski: A Complete Retrospective
THE CALM (1976) Dir; Krzysztof Kieslowski
CAMERA BUFF (1979) Dir; Krzysztof Kieslowski
Metrograph
THE MALTESE FALCON (1940) Dir; John Huston
Today's Pick? Tempted by the Kieslowski program, but I feel like the really good stuff is yet to come. POPEYE, yeh. POPEYE. Metrograph's print of Huston's directorial debut, 1941's THE MALTESE FALCON, is a hard offe to apss up, and in addition longtime viewers of this page know I abhor the double-dip, so that Hammet adap severely tempts. But another directorial debut just bests all this day, a singular helm that stands up with the best one-timer club members, like Charles Laughtons NIGHT OF THE HUNTER and Leonard Kastle's THE HONEYMOON KILLERS. It's finally gotten the critical re-evaluation it's long deserved, and a DCP scrub equally meritorious. Marlon Brando's ONE-EYED JACKS, what many consider the HEAVEN'S GATE of its day, pings the screen at the newly-renovated Walter Reade Theater as part of this year's NYFF.
Oher notable Picks this week include a seasonal screening of one of the few, FEW worthwhile Brian de Palma films, 1976's CARRIE, Monday the 10th at Syndicated; a special evening AV projection of Jim Henson's LABYRINTH this Tuesday the 11th at the Mid-Manhattan Library (Yeh, I'm choosing a library screening over MoMa and the Film Society! Ya wanna take this outside?!?!); John Huston's THE AFRICAN QUEEN, presented, I'm assuming, in its recent DCP resto this Wednesday the 12th as part of MoMA's continuing B is for Bogart series; and finally Alfred Sole's ALICE, SWEET ALICE, unspooling in all its glorious stepped-on 35mm glory at the Nitehawk this Thursday the 13th as part of the venue's monthly trib to Times Square's grindhouse posterity, The Deuce!
For more info on these and all NYC's rep film screenings in October '16 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. Summer's canine dusk-til-dawn's have soundly parked themselves over our fair metropolis like the giant saucers from INDEPENDENCE DAY, but warmer weather notwithstanding 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!
