CRUCIAL VIEWING
The Films of Sidney Peterson (Avant-Garde)
Doc Films (University of Chicago) – Wednesday, 8pm
Surrealist cinema proper is something of a historical footnote, an of-its-time-ism that no longer feels vital or relevant. Often, it is what was inspired by it (DUCK SOUP or the great Joseph Cornell's ROSE HOBART) that still resonates rather than the stale works made under its auspices (we mean you, Luis Buñuel). Strip away the smug intellectualism and the emperor's-new-clothes "radicalism" and you are left with a dream-poetry and playful illogic which others made more eloquent use of. And here we mean the pioneering American experimental filmmaker Sidney Peterson. His seven films made in the 1940s were instrumental in the pulling away from European forms and the development of a uniquely American avant-garde cinema. This program features three: THE CAGE (1947), THE LEAD SHOES (1949), and MR. FRENHOFER AND THE MINOTAUR (1949), as well as his final film, MAN IN A BUBBLE (1981). In THE CAGE, the perfunctory narrative about an artist's lack of inspiration and the loss of an eyeball, which wanders about the countryside and city, is simply an excuse to pursue the real subject—the multiplicity of ways of seeing. The film is full of optical and other tricks, but, unlike most previous European films where these things are used to reveal third-person psychology, here Peterson is coming close to the first-person vision that would distinguish the American avant-garde. Strangely, even with its obvious debt to (and improvement on) Surrealism, THE CAGE is much closer in spirit, and in its use of technique to reach more fundamental questionings of the world around us and how we see it, to Vertov's THE MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA. (1947-1981, TRT 100 min, 16mm). PF
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More info at www.docfilms.uchicago.edu.
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The Films of Sergei Paradjanov: Week One (Retrospective)
Gene Siskel Film Center – Showtimes noted below
The Film Center's remarkable string of summertime director showcases continues with their welcome presentation of the films of Sergei Paradjanov, a Soviet-Armenian director whose flaring visual style has brought cinema some of its greatest poetry. Throughout his career, Paradjanov was repeatedly jailed and censored for his art and eccentricity, or, as the authorities put it: "homosexuality", "rape", "pornography", "bourgeois subjectivism and mysticism" and "ideological deviation." While beginning his career in earnest with SHADOWS OF OUR FORGOTTEN ANCESTORS (1964, 97 min, 35mm; Saturday, 3pm & Tuesday, 6:15pm) he committed a major no-no, breaking with the Soviet-approved Social Realist style, opting instead to create a movie more regional than national, imaginative than realistic, experimental than conventional—one might even say better rather than worse. Set in the Carpathian mountains of the Ukraine, the film tells the story of Ivan, a man driven to misery and madness by the loss of two wives. Though, as J. Hoberman notes, SHADOWS did have its precursors—including F.W. Murnau masterpiece TABU (playing this week at Doc; see coverage below)—the movie has a striking resemblance to another film "made at virtually the same time, half a world away in the Colorado Rockies": Stan Brakhage's avant-garde epic DOG STAR MAN. While the films vary in their degrees of otherworldliness (look for a plot synopsis for both films and see what you find), SHADOWS does share Brakhage's visual daringness, but perhaps not as much as it shares with the stylings of Paradjanov's successor, Martin Scorsese. Roger Ebert was dead-on when he wrote in his review of the film: "[Paradjanov] has the kind of heedless energy you glimpse in some of the early work of Martin Scorsese, pounding camerawork so filled with itself it can hardly contain the story." While these comparisons are wholly credible, the profound mystery and magic that surround Paradjanov's films lend the artist an unshakeable sui generis status. Also playing this week: ANDREISH (1954, 63 min, 35mm), the director's long-unavailable movie that he labeled "garbage" (along with everything else he made before SHADOWS), which screens along with PARADJANOV: A REQUIEM (1994, 57 min, 16mm; both Saturday, 5pm & Sunday, 3pm), a documentary available as a special feature on the DVD release of Paradjanov's best movie THE COLOR OF POMEGRANATES (which plays next week). KH
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More info at www.siskelfilmcenter.org.
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Edgar G. Ulmer's THE CAVERN (Classic Revival)
Doc Films (University of Chicago) – Thursday, 8pm
Edgar G. Ulmer is one of those filmmakers who test the limits of comfortable auteurism. It's "easy" to appreciate the visual style of a John Ford or Alfred Hitchcock or Vincent Minnelli, but throw one of Ulmer's B-grade films at a middle-of-the-road film lover and see what response you get. As Andrew Sarris wrote: "most of Ulmer's films are of interest only to unthinking audiences or specialists in mise-en-scène." Still, his best-known film, DETOUR, has gained a following for its dark nihilism. And his reputation is continually on the rise. So the opportunity to view his hard-to-see final film, THE CAVERN (1964), is especially welcome. Ulmer's formal qualities are often overlooked, but here is a film whose setting seems perfect for his frequent cramped and claustrophobic compositions, chiaroscuro-laden lighting, and spare, but telling, camera movement. The story is irrelevant (six men and a woman are trapped in an underground munitions dump for several months). What matters is the chance to see the stylistic machinations of Ulmer at play in what many consider his greatest film. (1964, 94 min, 35mm) PF
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More info at www.docfilms.uchicago.edu.
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ALSO RECOMMENDED
The 14th Annual Black Harvest Film & Video Festival
Gene Siskel Film Center – Showtimes noted below
Since its early years at the Art Institute in the late 1990s, the (now
Gene Siskel) Film Center's annual Black Harvest Festival has
emphasized programming a variety of local, domestic, and international
shorts and features that fall outside the increasingly homogeneous
film festival circuit, while often featuring a level of attendance by
directors, actors and producers worthy of far larger events. This
year's opening week features two Sundance pickups in Chicago
premieres, preceding their wide release elsewhere: NYC portrait photographer Timothy Greenfield-Sanders and Elvis Mitchell collaborate
on HBO's THE BLACK LIST, VOLUME ONE (2008, 65 min; Tuesday, 8:15pm),
featuring a variety of African-American celebrities (from Toni
Morrison to Lou Gossett, Jr. to Sean Combs) receiving the Interrotron
treatment by Mitchell (who will be present for an audience
discussion); extra-hyped Katrina doc TROUBLE THE WATER (2008, 90 min,
35mm; Wednesday, 6:15pm) won't open wide for another three weeks, and
it's probably worth picking up your tickets early. No one has yet
authoritatively surveyed the DVD-conomy of the August 2005's post-hurricane verité-gold rush—much of which was presumably restricted
by the quick release of Spike Lee's towering WHEN THE LEVEES BROKE—but former Michael Moore producers Carl Deal and Tina Lessin literally
struck it rich by meeting former Ninth Ward residents Kim and Scott
Roberts, who happened to have filmed the disaster and its aftermath
from the ground on a Hi-8 camcorder, and not without significant
measures of both charisma and heroism. Lessin was quoted in Variety as
saying, "We’re professional documentary filmmakers, they’re amateur
camera shooters. And yet they shot the most riveting material we’ve
ever seen": a phrase that is sadly
indistinguishable from the promotional logic of that other Sundance
summer blockbuster, THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT. Also showing: low-budget
local policier T.A.C.T.I.C.A.L. (2007, 110 min, DigiBeta; Saturday,
8:15pm & Wednesday 8:15pm); South Shore Cultural Center-exhibition-inspired SOUL OF A WOMAN (2006, 79 min; Sunday 5:15pm & Thursday
6:15pm); and from the director of last year's popular rock-doc AFRO-PUNK, a narrative feature set in New York hipster clubland, WHITE
LIES, BLACK SHEEP (2007, 78 min, DigiBeta; Monday 6:15pm & Thursday
8:30pm). Friday's opening night of shorts (70min; 7:30pm) features a
complimentary reception with guest directors. MC
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More info at www.siskelfilmcenter.org.
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Fred Camper's SN (Avant-Garde)
Caro d'Offay Gallery (2204 W North Ave) – Friday, 10pm
As a complement to his current show at Caro d'Offay Gallery (which has been extended a day to August 2), local film and art writer and artist Fred Camper screens his legendary (in some circles) nearly-unseen (this is only its second public screening ever) silent Super-8mm film SN (1976-84). Comprised of ten sections, one of which consists of three short reels randomly selected from a possible sixteen, Camper's film is an unsettling, hermetic work that continually pushes in on itself, a "closing down" of options (as Camper puts it) that force the viewer to consider the formal elements of the film: editing rhythm, camera movement, and, most importantly, the tension created by changing spatial configurations and the play between depth and shallowness in the image, both within each section and among the individual sections. A striking example comes late, in the longest reel: as Camper pans across the New York City skyline from different buildings the initial depth one sees collapses and flattens, becoming a near-blur and forcing attention away from the "subject" to the flatness of the screen itself. It is an encapsulation of the kind of re-focusing and re-seeing that Camper is attempting to engage his audience in throughout. In this respect, it shares a similar agenda as his current art making. SN is not an easy film and perhaps not one for the casual viewer but, even if one does not understand it completely, there are magical moments and rewards for those willing to really look. (1976-84, 105 min, Super-8mm). Camper will also be giving a just-scheduled gallery talk at 4pm on Saturday, the final day of his exhibition. PF
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More info at www.carodoffaygallery.com and www.fredcamper.com.
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John Ford’s JUDGE PRIEST (Classic Revival)
Bank of America Cinema – Saturday, 8pm
One of the surprises of the recent Ford at Fox box set is the revelation that John Ford made nearly as many comedies as he did Westerns and prestige films. Perhaps this strand of his career isn’t as renowned today because Ford’s great theme—the eternal resilience of human civilization—is too inherently optimistic to create the kind of tension film comedy usually thrives on. Instead, Ford’s comedies are closer in spirit to the short stories of Maupassant or Carson McCullers, taking more pleasure in the idiosyncrasies of human character and location than telling a story. Many consider JUDGE PRIEST to be the best of Ford’s comedies (In Ford’s opinion, it was his best film altogether), in part because of the inspired casting of Will Rogers in the title role. As a father figure to a small town in the post-Civil War South, Rogers’ wry, common-sensical persona makes a great match with Ford’s laid-back direction. The episodic plot involves the Judge helping his squarish nephew with his romantic woes, solving a mystery so he won’t have to send an innocent man to jail, and hanging out a lot with the locals—including the great Stepin Fetchit and Hattie McDaniel. Ford had a great time making this film, and it shows in the way every scene goes down like honey. (1934, 80 min, 35mm) BS
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More info at www.cine-file.info/venues/lasalle.html.
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Buster Keaton's OUR HOSPITALITY (Classic Revival)
Portage Theater – Friday, 8pm
Recommending Buster Keaton is only difficult because everyone does it. It is like recommending exercise. His movies are, simply put, good for your body and soul. Yet if you recommend Keaton too much you can sound chiding, even fanatical, and the task of seeing a Keaton can become a chore. Then again, perhaps it is the opposite. Perhaps it is like recommending sugar. His movies are light, graceful, and frenetic. You leave with more energy than you came in with. As you can see, any attempt to describe Keaton is flummoxed by Keaton himself. His body in motion shakes off any description. Since he began his vaudeville career at age three, repeatedly tossed by his father across the stage and into the scenery (that was the whole act and it was very, very good), he was built to suffer for our entertainment. OUR HOSPITALITY is Keaton's version of Romeo and Juliet. His oblivion is his recklessness. And the eloquence of his pining heart is expressed through his stony face and bruised body. (1924, 74 min, 35mm)
WS
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More info at www.portagetheater.org.
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CHRIS & DON. A LOVE STORY (New Documentary)
Landmark Century Center – Check Reader Movies for showtimes
It is 1953. A distinguished English novelist, already firmly middle-aged, meets a teenaged beachbum in Malibu. Despite a thirty-year age difference and a hostile cultural climate, the two fall in love and end up in a relationship that will endure more than three decades, until the older man is diagnosed with cancer. The beachbum, now middle-aged himself and an accomplished artist, becomes a full-time caregiver and sketches his dying partner incessantly right through the day he passes away. An unbelievable story; except, it really happened. This documentary does a fine, straightforward job of telling it, weaving new interviews with Don Bachardy (who, in his 70s, is still feisty and unapologetic) with some jawdropping home movie footage shot by Christopher Isherwood, which includes the couple's celebrity pals like Aldous Huxley, W.H. Auden, Tennessee Williams, Burt Lancaster, Igor Stravinsky (wearing sandals!) and a very lovely Leslie Caron. It's a love story all the more poignant for their bravery. Bachardy tells a rather ribald story about Anna Magnani filming THE ROSE TATTOO; it's crass, and Pasolini would have loved it. (2007, 90 min, 35mm) RC
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More info at www.zeitgeistfilms.com.
x Jean-Luc Godard’s CONTEMPT (Classic Revival)
Music Box – Check Reader Movies for showtimes
All the films that Jean-Luc Godard made in the 1960s are readily rewatchable for their infectious, trailblazing energy, but CONTEMPT also possesses a magisterial authority that anticipates the poetry of his awesome late period. The primary concern, as always, is Cinema: Taking place on the set of a big-budget film of The Odyssey improbably directed by Fritz Lang (who plays himself), CONTEMPT contains still-pertinent ideas about the ethics of making movies, with Lang representing artistic integrity and producer Jeremy Prokosch (Jack Palance) representing the crassest instincts of the medium. Torn between them is Paul, an ambitious writer coerced into penning the film’s script; not only must he play mediator on the troubled shoot, but his professional commitments are about to cost him his marriage. The way in which Godard sets these conflicts against the classical presence of Homer inspired Jonathan Rosenbaum to write that CONTEMPT is a look at modern man as he may appear to the Greek gods. (Godard, writing in 1963, put it more obliquely: “It is about characters from L’AVVENTURA who wish they were characters in RIO BRAVO.”) But the film is shot through with a sense of immediacy—especially during the 25-minute centerpiece depicting an argument between Paul and his wife (Brigitte Bardot). Playing out in real-time and jumping nervously from antagonism to reconciliation to sympathy, the scene is instantly recognizable to anyone who has experienced the death of a romance. Godard does little to hide the fact that his own marriage to Anna Karina was failing at the time (Bardot even dons a black wig at one point to resemble Karina), and his candor makes CONTEMPT perhaps the most confessional work of career. Raoul Coutard’s ‘Scope photography—with its bold emphasis on primary colors—creates some of the most stunning images in Godard’s canon as well, which makes this opportunity to see a new print of the film a real treat. (1963, 35mm widescreen, 103 min) BS
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More info at www.musicboxtheatre.com.
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F.W. Murnau's SUNRISE & TABU (Classic Revival)
Doc Films (University of Chicago) – Showtimes noted below
Realism is the opposite of reality. A black and white image, like a silent image, is not realistic. Yet, it has no choice but to be real. So when one says that F.W. Murnau's SUNRISE (1927, 95 min, 35mm; Friday, 7pm & 9pm) and TABU (1931, 84 min, 35mm; Saturday, 7pm & 9pm) feel more real, more alive than most other movies, it doesn't mean that they strive for "realism." TABU, co-scripted by Robert Flaherty and shot on location in Tahiti with a native cast, doesn't even strive for ethnography. They're fabulistic, fantastic; they're what supporters of realism call "stylized." But SUNRISE's foggy marshes and hazardous city streets—or TABU's spear-hunts—feel like living. There's isn't much to say or write about either film, but not because eighty years of film history have exhausted them. They just seem to interface directly with the act of being alive. TABU's island is wherever you may live. SUNRISE's titular dawn starts when the audience leaves the theater. IV
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More info at www.docfilms.uchicago.edu.
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Wong Kar-Wai's AS TEARS GO BY (Contemporary Revival)
Facets Cinémathèque – Check Reader Movies for showtimes
American audiences were generally dismissive of MY BLUEBERRY NIGHTS when it played here this spring, but those who missed its brief run can still see some Wong Kar-Wai on celluloid with this revival of his first feature, presented in a new print. Starring Andy Lau and Maggie Cheung in early lead roles, AS TEARS GO BY brings a sense of dark romanticism to a genre tale of a "debt enforcer" (Lau), his careless protégé, and his naive cousin (Cheung) whom he must look after. Wong would soon move on to arthouse fair with his subsequent DAYS OF BEING WILD, but fans of this major stylist should recognize his more ambitious qualities in nascence. J. Hoberman stated as much in a recent Village Voice review: "The director's trademark set pieces, based on mega close-ups of tiny details and a strategic form of step-printed, smeared, slow-motion violence, are already present. So too is his characteristically mournful atmosphere—a fusion of smoke, neon, and fetishized pop." (1988, 102 min, 35mm) BS
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Full details at www.facets.org.
X Orson Welles's TOUCH OF EVIL (Classic Revival)
Block Cinema (Outdoor Summer Series) – Wednesday, 8:30pm (FREE)
When a bomb goes off in a bordertown, sanctimonious Mexican cop Charlton Heston sizes up the situation and decides he doesn't like it. For CITIZEN KANE Orson Welles had Bernard Herrmann, and for TOUCH OF EVIL he had Henry Mancini. And it can be argued that he never made two finer films. Both composers knew exactly what Welles needed from them and were able to deliver the goods; their work immeasurably enriches everything onscreen. Mancini contributes his first major film score and it's a doozy: latin-rock cuts that swing the sleaze and crime jazz of the highest order. The music fuses with Russell Metty's deep focus depravity into an overripe stew that entirely puts over Welles' mood of frenetic paranoia. The technique extends to the acting too: you won't find any "good" acting on display, just great performances, especially Welles himself as a human gargoyle. Charlton Heston's gold-plated dignity has never been used more effectively, and then there's Janet Leigh's eccentric beauty. Her role is a training ground for perverse turns in PSYCHO and THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE. Other memorable parts include Dennis Weaver as a motel creep, and of course Marlene Dietrich, who pops in long enough to contribute some witty lines and a withering stare. (1958, 112 min, projected DVD, FREE!) RC
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More info at www.blockmuseum.northwestern.edu/block-cinema.
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THE JUDGE AND THE GENERAL (New Documentary)
Gene Siskel Film Center – Monday, 8:15pm
Juan Guzmán was a young judge during the height of Augusto Pinochet's brutal rule in Chile, and denied habeas corpus to several political prisoners. Decades later, in 1998, he was randomly assigned to lead the first criminal investigation against the leader he had steadfastly supported. This documentary, being rolled out at special screenings across the country before airing on PBS August 19, follows Guzmán as he travels the country and comes face-to-face with the many disappearances and killings sponsored by Pinochet (and supported and aided by the U.S.). In the process, Guzmán begins to grapple with his conscience and question his own complicity in the events.
The film runs the risk of overly romanticizing this story of personal redemption; of manufacturing some sort of happy ending that reduces these injustices to relics of a more imperfect past. But critics have generally agreed that it avoids that fate, showing that the same battle that destroyed Allende's government and brought Pinochet to power still rages (footage from Pinochet's 2006 funeral shows his supporters yelling at protesters: "Communist faggots! They killed your relatives because they were losers!"). Sorry Francis Fukuyama, but we haven't reached the end of history just yet. PBS News Hour correspondent Elizabeth Farnsworth and Chilean journalist Patricio Lanfranco produced and directed. (2008, 84 min, video). MS
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More info at www.siskelfilmcenter.org.
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THE TENANT (Classic Revival)
Music Box – Saturday & Sunday, 11:30am
Following REPULSION (1965) and ROSEMARY'S BABY (1968) in Roman Polanski's "Apartment Trilogy," THE TENANT (1976) is everything you'd want and expect from Polanski. Polanski plays Trelkovsky, who moves into an apartment where the previous tenant, a girl named Simone, committed suicide. Slowly Trelkovsky begins to turn into her. It's claustrophobic, unsettling, and downright eerie. Is Trelkovsky going insane? Do his neighbors have alterior motives? Is it all in his head? One thing's for sure, it's creepy as heck. (1976, 126 min, 35mm) CS
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More info at www.musicboxtheatre.com.
x NOTE: The following event (scheduled for Monday, August 4) was mistakenly added to last week's CINE-LIST. The editors sincerely apologize for any inconveniences this may have caused. Chris Hefner's PINK HOTEL Fundraiser & Cabaret (Special Event)
The Hideout – Monday, 8pm
Local cine-virtuoso Chris Hefner is putting on a cabaret of sorts to scrap together funds for his first feature-length film THE PINK HOTEL, which he's set to shoot later this year. Hefner's supporting acts include pianist-projectionist Daniel Knox (whose evocative organ vibrations accompanied David Lynch's opening remarks at last year's Music Box premiere of INLAND EMPIRE) and shadow-puppet master Jill Summers, but the centerpiece of the show is the program of short films he put together, featuring some of his own work along with pieces by Damon Bishop and local animator Lilli Carré, as well as (remarkably) a new short film graciously provided by one Mr. Guy Maddin (whose contrasty, analog aesthetics should be a perfect compliment to Hef's own old-timey, impressionistic output). The night will end on an ass-shaking note, with a raucous DJ set by Hefner and friends. Admission is $7, and $2 raffle tickets give you a shot at winning CDs by Knox, DVDs autographed by Maddin, and other artistic souvenirs. DW
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More info at www.theoperatedeye.com.
x MORE SCREENINGS & EVENTS:
Robert Wise's soon-to-be remade 1951 "ultimatum from outer space" THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL screens Tuesday at 8pm in Grant Park as park of the 2008 Chicago Outdoor Film Festival.
Also playing this week at the Portage: the world premiere of local feature THE UNINVITED on Saturday, 8pm, and a chance to watch Bette Davis as Judith Traherne, diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor, in DARK VICTORY on Wednesday, 1:30pm. Also playing at the Music Box: German drama YELLA, chosen by Reader critic J.R. Jones as "Critic's Choice" this week (review here; showtimes here); Midnight movies this week are David Lynch's ERASERHEAD (previous coverage here) and late-'80s classic ROADHOUSE, with Patrick Swayze.
The Film Center premieres indie death row drama TAKE, starring Minnie Driver. Check Reader Movies for showtimes.
Sunday at 1:30pm, Chicago History Museum screens 1968 WITH TOM BROKAW, the journalist's retrospective analysis of the pivotal cultural events that took place that year. |
CONTEMPT 
