December 20th 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.
New and continuing series today include the Film Forum's nearing-the-finish-line trib to Barbara Stanwyck, the Film Society's equally awesome retrospective dedicated to studio-era ace George Cukor, IFC Center's The Way He Was: Early Redford, MoMA's ongoing Auteurist History of Film, and the Rubin Museum's Cabaret Cinema. The hooliganism be thus;
IFC Center
IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE (1946) Dir; Frank Capra
DOWNHILL RACER (1969) Dir; Michael Ritchie
ALIEN (1979) Dir; Ridley Scott
Film Forum
THE VIOLENT MEN (1955) Dir; Rudolph Mate
FORTY GUNS (1957) Dir; Sam Fuller
Film Society of Lincoln Center
SUSAN AND GOD (1940) Dir; George Cukor
A BILL OF DIVORCEMENT (1932) Dir; George Cukor
ZAZA (1938) Dir; George Cukor
SYLVIA SCARLETT (1935) Dir; George Cukor
MoMA
GERTRUD (1964) Dir; Carl Theodore Dreyer
Rubin Museum
THE LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS (1960) Dir; Roger Corman
Nitehawk Cinema
FEMAKE TROUBLE (1974) Dir; John Waters
Today's Pick? I gotta swing the pendulum in the other, more uptown direction, to show some love for the Film Society's George Cukor trib, an exhaustive retro of his work from the early sound era to the last practicioning of his craft in the 80's. Not his 80's, THE 80's. No other helmer from that first decade of sound in the cinema, not Ford or Lang or Hawks, nor slightly later star directors like Wilder or Zinnemann who saw their careers last into the 70's, can boast such longevity, where at the end of so long and esteemed a career they were producing at least passable and interesting work (take that, Wilder's 1982 BUDDY, BUDDY!). Today you can plunk yourself down for not just a double-bill of the man's work, not merely a three-fer, but an honest-to-God quadruple course bill of fare, as the Walter Reade Theater unspools SUSAN AND GOD, A BILL OF DIVORCEMENT, ZAZA, and the centerpiece of today's doings, Cukor's 1935 classic SYLVIA SCARLETT, which not only finally redeemed his faith in the star power of gifted but difficult Katherine Hepburn, but established for good the onscreen persona (redundant, because he had no offscreen iteration) of the mighty Cary Grant.
Cukor made his name in the industry as a director sympathetic to actresses, a go-to guy for "women's pictures", and this tale of identity confusion, a not uncommon example of gender swap in early cinema, nevertheless fully wrought the tomboy from the strong-willed, New England-raised Hepburn, and perhaps first placed the fire firmly under her ass to conquer the meduim on terms solidly her own. It was lost on no one that 5 years later, after a few years on the box-office no-fly list, she personally requested Cukor direct the film of the hit Broadway play she'd purchased to re-ignite her star power, a little something called THE PHILADELPHIA STORY. Labelling Cukor a master of "women's pictures" and leaving it at that is a true injustice, as the director, while perhaps never attaining the auteur heights reached by the Cahiers du Cinema round table, excelled in multiple genres, including the suspenser (GASLIGHT, A DOUBLE LIFE), the musical (MY FAIR LADY, A STAR IS BORN), and literary and stage adaps (DAVID COPPERFIELD, ROMEO AND JULIET). Today's a great chance, should you have the whole afternoon and evening to burn, to take in a generous sampling of the man's efforts. That'll do Film Society. That'll do.
For more info on these and all NYC's classic screenings in the final month of 2013 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 pay no attention to them six maids-a-milkin' and promote the similarly appropriate amount of shame amongst the fellow children. And NO, having just seen BLUE IS THE WARMEST COLOR has nothing to do my comment on the 6th Day of Xmas! Mind outta the gutter, kids!
-Joe Walsh
