Calendar: Week 8

May 18 - May 24

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Julian Schnabel, 2007 - 112 min.

Based on the true story of Elle France editor Jean-Dominique Bauby, who was completely paralyzed by a stroke at 43, save his left eye. Bauby is trapped in his body, with his mental faculties completely intact but unable to express as much to the outside world. Initially frustrated, he overcomes his inability to communicate with others by traditional means by developing a blinking alphabet. Through this system, he then dictates his memoirs for publication, and shares his dreams and fantasies, which reveal a vibrant and complex inner life. In French with English subtitles. 35mm.

Planet of the Apes
Franklin J. Schaffner, 1968 - 106 min.

You had a crush on Dr. Zira, or maybe on Nova. You could recite all the dialogue, especially Heston’s coarse final monologue. Maybe you even discussed the caste system of the movie (orangutan: judicial; chimpanzee: scientific; gorilla: military) in relation to Austen in your freshman English class. Admit it: you have a soft spot for Planet of the Apes that age, pretense, and sour memories of the Tim Burton version will never, ever wipe away. So come see the original Apes in a brand new print and learn anew that “no human can remain human on the Planet of the Apes.” 35mm.

Green Hell
James Whale, 1940 - 87 min.

Whale hoped to resurrect his career with this jungle adventure, but budget cuts and an old-fashioned script by intertitle scribe Frances Marion assured his ultimate defeat. Constrained by cheap sets, Whale developed a suspenseful style that anticipated Val Lewton’s work. The story is nothing more than a yarn about buried treasure and the like, but Karl Freund contributed some sleek cinematography and the cast includes Joan Bennett, Vincent Price, George Bancroft, and Alan Hale. Called ‘the best worst picture of the year’ by the Times, Green Hell flopped with audiences who guffawed at its overripe dialogue. Archival 35mm.

Quick Billy
Bruce Baillie, 1967-70 - 56 & 16 min.

Baillie described this as a ‘horse opera in four reels,’ adding that it is ‘a kind of interior documentary’ formulated as a rendering of The Tibetan Book of the Dead. A record of Baillie’s near-death from hepatitis and its aftermath, filmed over the course of three full years, in the course of which the viewer metaphorically enters into the underworld, is transformed, and finally released back into the world through the power of light itself.16mm.
Following the feature, six short reels of film shot for, but unused in, Quick Billy will be shown

Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne
Robert Bresson, 1945 - 84 min.

This modernized version of Diderot’s Jacques le Fataliste is one of Bresson’s earliest and most accessible works. A society woman (Maria Casares) betrayed by her lover (Paul Bernard) wreaks vengeance on him by conniving to have him marry a prostitute (Elina Labourdette). It’s more conventional than Bresson’s later works – unlike many of the films to come, it includes professional actors, a musical score, stylized interiors, and dramatic, highcontrast visuals. But one can also glimpse the austerity and minimalism that later became his hallmarks. Screenplay co-written by Bresson and Jean Cocteau.In French; subtitled. Archival 35mm.

These Are the Damned
Joseph Losey, 1963 - 96 min.

After being corrupted by distributors and television, Losey’s bizarre science fiction thriller was finally restored to its original and superior state. While vacationing on the South coast of England, Simon Wells (Macdonald Carey) is lured into a mugging by the attractive Joan (Shirley Ann Field). After her incestuous brother (Oliver Reed) and his gang beat up Wells, Joan attempts to escape with Wells on his boat. Fleeing, the two stumble upon a military base, where radioactive children who think they’re in a space ship are kept isolated in caves and bunkers. A unique and rare creation, this is not to be missed. 35mm.

***Schedule Change***La Virgen que forjó una patria
Julio Brancho, 1942 - 110 min.

From the New York Times: "La Virgen que Forjó una patria (Saint That Forged a Country) is one of several Mexican films inspired by the 16th-century sighting of the Virgin Mary -- a phenomenon that abruptly ended hostilities between the Spanish Conquistadors and the Aztec Indians and spearheaded the spread of Catholicism throughout Latin America. Former romantic lead Ramon Novarro delivers a sincere, thoughtful performance as Juan Diego, the humble peasant who built the church on the hill where first he saw the Blessed Virgin. The film expansively covers the years 1531 to 1810, and features such prominent Mexican clerics as Brother Martin (played by Domingo Solar) and Father Hidalgo (Julio Villareal). Gloria Marin also appears as the Aztec slave girl who figured so importantly in the proceedings. Somewhat long and drawn out, the film nonetheless held Mexican audiences in thrall back in 1944." In Spanish with English Subtitles. Archival 35 mm.

The Land Unknown
Virgil W. Vogel, 1957 - 78 min.

Hal and Jack (Jock Mahoney and William Reynolds) lead a Navy expedition to the Antarctic, along with their helicopter pilot (Phil Harvey) and Maggie, a reporter they all not-so-secretly desire (Shawn Smith). Beneath the ice, they discover, naturally, a tropical jungle filled with dinosaurs and man-eating plants. In addition to fending off the beasts, they must also deal with a mysterious man (Henry Brandon), who also lusts after Maggie. Despite the film’s obvious low budget, the special effects are somewhat credible. The Land Unknown is one of the more fast-paced and exciting of the ’50s sci-fi flicks. 35mm.

Southland Tales
Richard Kelly, 2007 - 144 min.

An impossibly ambitious simulacrum of contemporary America, its cult of the personality and its Iraq War trauma, Kelly’s second feature after Donnie Darko has proved even more divisive than its predecessor. There’s little use giving a rundown of the plot, but: Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson is an amnesiac movie star who at the film’s start finds himself lying on Venice Beach in a police state Los Angeles populated variously by schizophrenic war veterans, philanthropist pornstars, neo-Marxist terrorists, and an addict narrator, whose collective star power manages to keep this pop culture phantasmagoria afloat. 35mm.

The Band’s Visit
Eran Kolirin, 2007 - 87 min.

Not allowed as Israel’s submission to the Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language film, as less than half the dialogue is in Hebrew and Arabic, Kolirin’s directorial debut certainly deserved the honor. An Egyptian brass band travels to Israel to play at the opening of an Arab cultural center, but somehow gets lost along the way. Rather than building on the expected political and cultural tensions, the film develops as an emotionally varied, understated comedy, defined both by its quirky and effective visual humor and moments of lonely melancholy. In Arabic, Hebrew and English with English subtitles. 35mm.