November 9th 2013. Pick Of The Day.
New York City's premiere resource for classic film screenings in the metropolitan area. Offering reviews, recommendations, venues and a host of links keeping classic film and the silver screens alive.
Rep cinema goodies on the menu today include Hal Ashby's directorial debut, the restoration of a Harold Lloyd classic at Film Forum, and Milos Forman's Oscar-slayer from 1984. Among the new and continuing series today are Anthology Film Archives' Golden Age of Spanish Horror, BAM's trib to Czech New Wave filmmaker Jan Nemec, and the final weekend of the Museum of the Moving Image's massive retrospective The Complete Howard Hawks. The whole megillah;
Nitehawk Cinema
THE LANDLORD (1970) Dir; Hal Ashby
Film Forum
SIDEWALK STORIES (1988) Dir; Charles Lane
THE FRESHMAN (1925) Dirs; Fred C. Newmeyer, Sam Taylor
Museum of the Moving Image
RIO LOBO (1970) Dir; Howard Hawks
Anthology Film Archives
THE HOUSE THAT SCREAMED (1969) Dir; Narciso Ibanez Serrador
THE DEMONS (1972) Dir; Jess Franco
VENUS IN FURS (1969) Dir; Jess Franco
BAM Cinematek
A REPORT ON THE PARTY AND GUESTS (1966) Dir; Jan Nemec
DIAMONDS OF THE NIGHT (1964) Dir; Jan Nemec
Symphony Space
AMADEUS (1984) Dir; Milos Forman
MoMA
MANILA IN THE CLAWS OF LIGHT (1975) Dir; Lino Brocka
Today's Pick? We all love second chances in this life, even if it comes in posterity, and just as playwright Peter Shaffer ressurrected the profile of obscure 18th century Italian composer Antonio Salieri in his hit play AMADEUS, so did the scribe and director Milos Forman give the opportunity of a lifetime to stalwart character actor F. Murray Abraham when casting this lead role for their screen adap. Their faith in this great actor's talents were rewarded with near unanimous critical praise and excellent box office returns, and he himself was allowed to walk away with the little gold guy at the Academy Awards ceremony the following March. Mediocrity, p'shaw!
F. Murray Abraham was born in Pittsburgh in 1939, the child of Syrian and Italian parents, and was raised in El Paso, Texas, where his predilection for teenage hoodlum life might've taken him down a completely different road had he not discovered acting. Interest flourished into enthusiasm in college, where he won a best actor award at Texas Western. He moved to NYC to study with legendary acting coach Uta Hagen, and next followed a prolific stage and screen career that saw him turning up in small but memorable roles in gritty 70's classics like SERPICO and ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN, as well as lighter fare like THE PRISONER OF SECOND AVENUE and THE SUNSHINE BOYS. His highest profile gig was as a bunch of grapes in the Froot of the Loom ads of the late 70's, until he snagged a key part in Brian De Palma's remake of SCARFACE, playing right hand man to Robert Loggia's druglord and getting tossed from a helicopter for the effort. When the casting call went out in 1983 for Saul Zaentz's big screen adap of AMADEUS, Abraham was summoned, along with hundreds of other character actors of the stage and screen, for what initially was an opportunity to fill out the memorable supporting cast. Needing a voice box to run lines with a higher profile actor up for a lead part Milos Forman asked Abraham to read Salieri. The next day he asked him to come back and read again. And the next day. Forman became enamored of the paycheck actor's comfort with the lines, with the role. As he later explained, he suspected that after a lifetime of being promised his due and losing out to other actors time and time again, that Abraham "was Salieri offstage as well as on." A stunned Abraham recieved a call just before filming was set to begin to let him know he had the lead, beating out just about every actor in the English language for the plum gig. The man who routinely worried about acting work to pay the Con Ed bill was now at the center of perhaps the most eagerly awaited prestige production of 1984. Needless to say, he delivered in spades, and a new career was upon him, as well as the Oscar for Best Actor. Even better than the statuette is the performance itself, set against some of the most beautiful music the world has ever known, and I argue equally as timeless.
Those lucky enough to attend tonight's screening of AMADEUS at Symphony Space will be treated to an appearance by none other than Antonio Salieri himself, as Mr. Abraham will engage in a post-screening discussion of the film, and opportunities like these are rare for film lovers even in our movie-mad Mecca. Here's hoping you can make it. As the emperor said, there it is.
For more info regarding these and all NYC's classic film screenings in November '13 click any day on the interactive calendar on the upper right hand side of the screen. And be sure to follow me on Facebook and Twitter! Back tomorrow with more of the goods, til then don't buy any bridges for sale and advise the rest to do likewise!
-Joe Walsh
