“Tales from The New Yorker”, 30-Film Series Opens February 21 at Film Forum

Robert-Benchley

Robert Benchley

Tales from The New Yorker, a two-week series celebrating the iconic magazine’s first century, will run from Friday, February 21 to Thursday, March 6 at Film Forum, with a slate of over 30 films inspired by fiction and reporting from its pages, and by the legendary writers who helped define it.

The series opens on the 100th anniversary of the magazine’s very first issue (dated February 21, 1925, featuring the magazine’s top-hatted dandy, Eustace Tilley, on the cover), with Richard Brooks’ faithful adaptation of Truman Capote’s IN COLD BLOOD (1967), which first appeared in serial form in The New Yorker in 1965. The opening night screening will be introduced by New Yorker editor David Remnick.

Other films in the series adapted from New Yorker stories include Alexander Hall’s MY SISTER EILEEN (1942), based on stories by Ruth McKenney; Vincente Minnelli’s MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS (1944), based on stories by Sally Benson, Norman Z. McLeod’s THE SECRET LIFE OF WALTER MITTY (1947), based on the story by James Thurber; Nicholas Ray’s BIGGER THAN LIFE (1956), based on the Annals of Medicine story “Ten Feet Tall” by Berton Roueché; Frank Perry’s THE SWIMMER (1968), based on the short story by John Cheever; Ang Lee’s BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN (2005), based on the short story by Annie Proulx; Lee Chang-dong’s BURNING (2018), based on the short story “Barn Burning,” by Haruki Murakami; and many more.
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Jean-Luc Godard’s “A Woman Is A Woman” At Film Forum

a-woman-is-a-womanA WOMAN IS A WOMAN, writer/director Jean-Luc Godard’s “subversive” color and Scope tribute to the Hollywood musical comedy, starring Jean-Paul Belmondo, Jean-Claude Brialy, and the director’s then-wife and muse Anna Karina, will run at Film Forum from Friday, February 7 to Thursday, February 20, in a new 4K restoration being shown for the first time in the United States.

“I want to be in a musical with Cyd Charisse and Gene Kelly… choreographed by Bob Fosse!” declares Karina, and she almost gets her wish in this first color, Scope, and partly studio-shot film by her then-husband, the second (following LE PETIT SOLDAT) of their seven and a half collaborations. Karina’s Angela — an afternoon dancer in the sleazy Zodiac Club – yearns for motherhood, but live-in boyfriend Brialy “isn’t ready yet,” while hanger-on Belmondo is more than happy to oblige.
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Trailblazing Italian Filmmaker Lina Wertmüller’s Dark Comedy “Swept Away”

swept-awayTrailblazing Italian filmmaker Lina Wertmüller’s dark comedy SWEPT AWAY… BY AN UNUSUAL DESTINY IN THE BLUE SEA OF AUGUST, starring Mariangela Melato and Giancarlo Giannini, will run in a new 4K restoration from Friday, January 31 to Thursday, February 6 at Film Forum.

Set against the backdrop of the beautiful Mediterranean, SWEPT AWAY is Lina Wertmüller’s most famous and controversial film about sex, love and politics. On an elegant yacht cruising off the coast of Sardinia, Raffaella (Melato), a beautiful, haughty bourgeoise, enjoys tormenting Gennarino (Giannini), a Communist sailor. Fate weaves a different scenario and roles become reversed when the two find themselves stranded together on a deserted island.

Raffaella must submit to Gennarino in order to survive, which culminates in a dramatic climax when they are rescued. “A parable in which people’s sexual attitudes are governed by economics and class.” — New York Women in Film and Television`
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A.I. from METROPOLIS to EX MACHINA | 30+ Film Festival Runs January 3-23 at Film Forum

AI-from-Metropolis-to-Ex-Machina-film-forumA.I. FROM METROPOLIS TO EX MACHINA…, a three-week festival of movies that helped introduce the world to the concept of “artificial intelligence” (a term not coined until the 1950s), will run at Film Forum from Friday, January 3 to Thursday, January 23. The series includes more than 30 films, most of them offering a dystopian view of a society run by A.I., along with profound ethical and existential questions.

Fritz Lang’s 1927 silent masterpiece METROPOLIS (written by his wife Thea von Harbou, who adapted it from her own 1925 novel), broke new ground in science fiction storytelling, with the creation of Maria, a robot designed to look human and control the workers in an underground city. Gort, a massive robot that serves as enforcer for an alien peace mission in Robert Wise’s THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL (1951), provided an early example of a machine with a higher purpose.

Five years later, Robby the Robot of FORBIDDEN PLANET (based on Shakespeare’s The Tempest!) both defined what a “robot” looked like for generations and offered a more benign depiction of what would later be called “artificial intelligence.” Later lovable movie robots include Johnny 5 in SHORT CIRCUIT, R2D2 in the Star Wars movies, and Wall-E in the Pixar movie of that name. The “Emerac” computer in the Tracy-Hepburn comedy DESK SET is also less malevolent, merely threatening to take jobs away from humans – probably the first film to raise that possibility.
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Frank Capra’s “Mr. Deeds Goes To Town” In 35mm at Film Forum

Mr.-Deeds-Goes-To-TownFrank Capra’s comedy-drama masterpiece “Mr. Deeds Goes To Town” (1936), starring Gary Cooper and Jean Arthur, will be screened in 35mm at Film Forum from Friday, December 27 through Thursday, January 2.

Nominated for five Academy Awards – winning Best Director for Capra – MR. DEEDS is one of eight collaborations between Capra and screenwriter Robert Riskin, who together are often credited with creating both the classic screwball and romantic comedy genres.

Cooper’s “pixilated” tuba-playing, greeting card versifying Vermonter Longfellow Deeds inherits $20 million — and then he’s whisked from Mandrake Falls to Park Avenue, as wisecracking reporter Jean Arthur dubs him the “Cinderella Man.” “Capra and Riskin’s crowning achievement… If I were to choose one film to be both the best and most representative of the decade, this would be it.” – David Shipman

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BRANDO 100, Commemorating the Iconic Actor’s Centennial Year

marlon-brando-100BRANDO 100, a two-week festival of classics starring Marlon Brando, with many films screening in 35mm, will run at Film Forum from Friday, December 13 to Thursday, December 26, in commemoration of the actor’s centennial year in 2024.

The series features performances by Brando (1924-2004), the rebellious iconoclast in his most iconic and lesser seen roles. From his rarely-screened feature debut as a paralyzed, depressed ex-GI in Fred Zinnemann’s THE MEN (1950); to his definitive Stanley Kowalski in Tennessee Williams’ A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE (adapted to film in 1951 by Elia Kazan); to his Oscar-winning performance as dockworker Terry Malloy in Kazan’s ON THE WATERFRONT (1954), and his turn as the suave, wisecracking Sky Masterson in the 1955 musical GUYS AND DOLLS. Brando’s return to form as Mafia patriarch Don Vito Corleone in Francis Ford Coppola’s THE GODFATHER (1972) reminded Hollywood of his brilliance and earned Brando his second Oscar (which he refused in protest of Hollywood’s treatment of Native Americans). The following triumph, Bernardo Bertolucci’s X-rated sensation LAST TANGO IN PARIS (1972) would go on to spark debate about the ethics of consent in filmmaking, and APOCALYPSE NOW (1979), his second collaboration with Coppola, in which he plays a rogue Army officer who descends into madness, is remembered as one of Brando’s most enigmatic performances.
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Werner Herzog’s THEATER OF THOUGHT, A Bracing Exploration of the Brain | Opens December 13 at Film Forum

Herzog-THEATER-OF-THOUGHTFilm Forum is set to present the US theatrical premiere of Werner Herzog’s THEATER OF THOUGHT opening Friday, December 13.

After 50+ years exploring the far corners of the world, Werner Herzog focuses inward — on the human brain, via the cutting-edge field of neuroscience, with its attendant ethical quandaries. Joined by Columbia professor Rafael Yuste (the film’s science advisor), the two cross the country querying innovators in cerebral research and bioethics: Can computers help people communicate telepathically? How can the brain be stimulated to curb depression, pain, or the effects of Parkinson’s? Is thought control possible? Can fear be located in the brain? And — as only the beguiling Herzog could inquire — will a scientist be able to read his mind and see his film before he’s made it? Herzog’s curiosity is at its peak in this romp through technological advances once only the stuff of science fiction.

The film had its world premiere at the 2022 Telluride Film Festival and went on to screen at the Toronto International Film Festival, as well as DOC NYC, where Herzog was awarded the festival’s Lifetime Achievement Award.

THEATER OF THOUGHT will be the 17th of Herzog’s films to debut at Film Forum, making him the second most-premiered filmmaker in the theater’s 54-year history.

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Michelangelo Antonioni’s First Masterpiece, IL GRIDO

IL-GRIDOIL GRIDO (1957), the widely underseen early masterwork by Italian auteur Michelangelo Antonioni, will run at Film Forum in a new 4K restoration from Friday, November 8 through Thursday, November 14.

Deserted by the mother of his child, Aldo, a factory worker (played by Hollywood tough guy Steve Cochran) wanders through the Po Valley in search of solace and connection. His romantic prospects—including a gas-station owner (Dorian Gray), a sex worker (Lyn Shaw), and an old girlfriend (Betsy Blair, Oscar nominee for the prior year’s Marty and Mrs. Gene Kelly)—fizzle out into alienation and despair.

Made three years before his international breakthrough L’avventura, this rare departure from exploring affluent society is among Antonioni’s most politically trenchant films and a raw expression of anguish that remains one of Italian cinema’s great underappreciated gems. Strikingly composed with atmospheric photography by the great Gianni Di Venanzo, IL GRIDO reveals a director in the process of discovering his artistic signature.

Directed by Michelangelo Antonioni, from the screenplay by Michelangelo Antonioni, Elio Bartolini and Ennio De Concini, the film stars Steve Cochran, Alida Valli, Betsy Blair, and Dorian Gray.

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“Lets Get Lost”, Documentary Portrait of Jazz Legend Chet Baker, Opens November 1 at Film Forum

Photo by William Claxton

“Lets Get Lost” (1988), Bruce Weber’s Academy Award-nominated documentary portrait of the elusive jazz icon Chet Baker, will run at Film Forum in a new 4K restoration from Friday, November 1 through Thursday, November 7.

A James Dean look alike pretty boy whose jazz trumpeting and melancholy epitomized 50s cool, Chet Baker had become, when famed photographer Bruce Weber finally caught up with him after three decades of fandom, an alcoholic and a junkie, whose petulantly angelic looks peeping out from behind a gaunt, valleyed and crevassed face could have starred for Sam Peckinpah.

Two visually stunning and musically moving hours with the iconic jazz trumpeter in the most romantically erotic jazz documentary ever made, shot by D.P. Jeff Preiss in stark, brooding film noir black & white.

Shifting back and forth from past to present, from Baker’s breakout performance and his controversial “doomed youth” years, to his poignant late-career decline and struggles with addiction, LET’S GET LOST forms a dreamy, improvisational quality offering a rare, behind-the-scenes glimpse into the decadent life of jazz music’s original bad-boy.

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Andrei Tarkovsky’s “The Sacrifice”, New 4K Restoration Opens October 25 at Film Forum

Andrei-Tarkovsky-THE-SACRIFICETHE SACRIFICE (1986), Russian expat master Andrei Tarkovsky’s final film, will run at Film Forum in a new 4K restoration from Friday, October 25 through Thursday, October 31.

Opening with a small group of familiar players in a tense isolated situation, THE SACRIFICE unfolds to encompass the director’s cosmic view as, faced with nuclear holocaust, a mystic sacrifice must be offered to restore the world — with unforeseen results.

Produced in Sweden with a cast headed by Bergman star Erland Josephson (Scenes from a Marriage, Cries and Whispers) the film was shot by Bergman’s longtime cinematographer, two-time Oscar winner Sven Nykvist. The director’s last work – made as he was dying of cancer – THE SACRIFICE is Tarkovsky’s personal statement, a profoundly moving, redemptive tragedy steeped in unforgettable imagery, including an astounding long take at the film’s finale.

The film was awarded the Grand Prix and a prize for artistic contribution (in recognition of Nykvist’s cinematography) at the 1986 Cannes Film Festival, and won the 1988 BAFTA for Best Foreign Language Film.

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