AUGUST 2012 WEEK THREE. GAUMONT STUDIOS AND THE FRENCH OLD WAVE. NOW GO AWAY BEFORE I TAUNT YOU A SECOND TIME.

So far, so good. The interactive calendar's been up for two weeks now and early reports indicate no one's been seriously hurt. Yet. Instead I've received mostly good response to the new thingamajigger that allows you to click on the day of your choice and check out all the classic film doings on that day, and even scroll further to check out the whole month of goodies. It's just to the right of this blog. Yep, that's it. On yer way. Yer welcome.

Today though we can also report that our ability to keep up with the constantly changing schedules and last minute announcements of the various venues screening our fave classics is well met by our fledgling calendar's capabilities. In other words we can get you the new news before said newly minted new news becomes older and not so new news. This is Damon Runyan reporting.

Simply put, this site can update as fast as the announcements are made, so you'll never be in the dark about a screening you'll want to be informed about. We've got more to come, but the site's working pretty good so far already. Tell your friends, whydonch'ya?

So let's get to it. Apparently the French have invaded. But in a friendly way. Like the French do. I'll explain.

Two of NYC's most celebrated retro film venues have decided to unspool a monumental selection of classic French cinema in their respective venues. Why this would happen now, simultaneously, as August winds down it's last me knows not. But the real question is, who cares? Between the retrospective screenings at Film Forum and MOMA this city may never have seen a more comprehensive overview of French cinema leading up to the Nouvelle Vague and just beyond, and Hallelloo I say to those involved, obviously independent of each other. I wouldn't want to label them collaborators. It's a thing.

The Gold goes to Film Forum, as it usually does, for it's overview of all classic French cinema of the sound era that defined that country's cultural identity, through both peacetime and occupation, and culminated in the explosively influential New Wave, which like any good child would revolt against its parents. There are very few films NOT included in this series, a Clouzot or Renoir or Vigo come to mind, but there is little left out of the Forum's THE FRENCH OLD WAVE fest. Jean Cocteau is repped by both his grand fairy tale masterpiece LA BELLE ET LA BETTE and the apex of his Orphic Trilogy ORPHEE. Max Ophuls gets to burn some style along with some cigarettes with his masterworks LE PLAISIR, THE EARRINGS OF MADAME DE..., and what many consider his greatest work, and possibly the finest film of all time, the gorgeous LOLA MONTES. Jean Gabin bullies the lens in PEPE LE MOKO and TOUCHEZ PAS AU GRISBI, as well as joining with Renior for LA BETE HUMAINE and GRAND ILLUSION. Renior himself dominates the proceedings with these offerings as well as screenings of THE RULES OF THE GAME, BOUDU SAVED FROM DROWNING, TONI and A DAY IN THE COUNTRY. He da man. Pardon. Il et homme.

Marcel Carne's beloved CHILDREN OF PARADISE, another popular vote for greatest film ever made, is screened in its newly minted 4K DCP print. Pristine heartbreak.

Mah boy Fritz Lang made a stopover in Pahree whilst fleeing Goebbels. The stay resulted in a single effort before fleeing once more to the welcoming yet musty arms of Louis B. Mayer. LILIOM shook off none of the UFA style which he had defined and vice versa. An excellent and interesting "lost" film from one of the medium's most fucking awesome. Yep, I said it.

Lastly, I champion as always one Henri-Georges Clouzot, the most cynical but also most modern of the Pre-New-Wave, and I'm not sure what that says about our modern world exactly. While THE WAGES OF FEAR may be oddly absent the bulk of his best screens during the fest. L'ASSASSIN HABITE AU 21, QUAI DES ORFEVRES and the all-time motherfuck DIABOLIQUE, constantly copied in acts of utter futility. If no one's ever spoiled the twist ending to this flick for you, GOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Further uptown MOMA takes the same Francophiliac lens and focuses with more scrutiny on the country's oldest studio, indeed the WORLD'S oldest continuously operated studio, Gaumont, and the suspense genre imbedded in it's DNA. The FANTOMAS series, Gaumont's earliest bread and butter and perhaps the cinema's oldest serial, is represented in several screenings spread out across the next two months. Godard's only other tolerable flick, BANDE A PART, gets a mercy screening. Cronenberg's fave rom-com EYES WITHOUT A FACE is on display as well, and it will give ya the boogah-boogahs. The indispensable pick I argue is by one Jules Dassin, and his wildly influential rewrite of the heist film RIFIFI. Never miss a chance to catch a screening of this highly stylistic blueprint that is often copied with the rarest of success.

Twixt these twin houses of towering cinematic excellence, any gaps in your knowledge of classic French film find their closure. You have weeks to catch as many of these works of art as you can. That's more than the Maginot Line afforded. Too soon?

Back to the Film Forum, they apparently just can't ever get enough of the Spaghetti Western, and there's not a goddam thing wrong with that. The specific Spag/West they seemingly can't get enough of this month is arguably the best Spag/West of all time, Leone's finest, Eastwood's finest, maybe the greatest Western of all time. THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY gets a week long salud n the palace on West Houston. This film currently resides at #6 on my list of greatest films all time, so don't bother to argue unless you've seen it projected. Otherwise you're nothing but a filthy YA-YA-YA-YA-YA....

Lastly, I can't sign off without a word about the loss of director/producer Tony Scott, the news of which just hit mere hours ago. An apparent suicide, which makes the loss even harder to discuss. But I'll say this; Lord knows the man was never, to put it lightly, my fave film maker, and I did and do afford a weighty portion of blame over the course Hollywod popcorn film making has taken over the last three decades due to his appropriation of high gloss military recruitment and auto ads as cinematic experience exploited by himself as well as the entire Bruck/Simps stable. In short; because of him and Lyne and Mulchahy we have Simon West and Stephen Sommers and, God help us, Michael Bay. But today let's remember the good, and there was plenty to admire in a career that spanned thirty years. My select Tony Scott filmography follows, and we the film loving of the world thank ye, Sir.

THE HUNGER

THE LAST BOY SCOUT

TRUE ROMANCE

CRIMSON TIDE

BEAT THE DEVIL

R.I.P. TONY SCOTT

-Joseph Walsh