December 6th 2013. Pick of the Day.
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AAAAND...the December rep calendar properly begins! Last year our cheery programming elves brought us retrospectives dedicated to Max Von Sydow, Pier Paolo Pasolini and Jean-Louis Trintignant. Because nothing sez warm holiday fuzzies like that trio. Proceedings are significantly lighter this spin 'round the sun, and new and continuing series today include Film Forum's excellent month-long Barbara Stanwyck trib, IFC Center's Robert Redford huggery, MoMA's ongoing Auteurist History of Film, the Film Society's Yasujiro Ozu hot stone massage, Moving Image's See It Big! Great Cinematographers, and the Rubin Museum's Cabaret Cinema. The full day's shebang as follows;
IFC Center
THEY LIVE (1988) Dir; John Carpenter
JEREMIAH JOHNSON (1972) Dir; Sydney Pollack
THE SHINING (1980) Dir; Stanley Kubrick
TAXI DRIVER (1976) Dir; Martin Scorsese
Film Forum
THE BITTER TEA OF GENERAL YEN (1933) Dir; Frank Capra
THE MIRACLE WOMAN (1931) Dir; Frank Capra
MoMA
BILLY LIAR (1963) Dir; John Schlesinger
Film Society of Lincoln Center
EQUINOX FLOWER (1958) Dir; Yasujiro Ozu
AN AUTUMN AFTERNOON (1962) Dir; Yasujiro Ozu
New York Historical Society
IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE (1946) Dir; Frank Capra
Museum of the Moving Image
SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS (1957) Dir; Alexander MacKendrick
Rubin Museum of Art
HANNAH AND HER SISTERS (1986) Dir; Woody Allen
Nitehawk Cinema
BLACK CHRISTMAS (1974) Dir; Bob Clark
Today's Pick? Hard to choose against the Capra holiday classic once December rolls around, but a superior screening, also accompanied by an intro from none other than Donna Reed's daughter Mary Owen, is just around the corner. So I'll gladly choose the other, meaner ode to the Yuletide, Bob Clark's BLACK CHRISTMAS, screening at midnight at the Nitehawk Cinema in equally scary Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Clark almost never gets credit for kicking off the holiday-themed slasher flick that dominated the 80's horror circuit (that honor or dishonor is usually reserved for John Carpenter's HALLOWEEN), but that's exactly what he did with his tale of a killer stalking the residents of a female sorority house during the Xmas break. Mildly received by critics when released, it quickly earned its budget back from fans of the popular fright craze of the 70's and went on to become a cult classic. As I deem it essential to mix a little naughty with the season's nice, I'm happy to hang this flick over my fireplace this winter's eve. Just don't tell me the call's coming from inside the house. I'm not falling for tha
For more info on this and all NYC's classic screenings in December '13 click on the interactive calendar on the upper right hand side of the page. And be sure to follow me on Facebook and Twitter! Back tomorrow with a brand new Pick, til then be safe and sound and look out a little for the next knucklehead too!
-Joe Walsh
