Â
FILM SOCIETY OF LINCOLN CENTER hosts two iconoclastic directors and announces a Labor Day weekend celebrating movie trilogies
Film Comment Selects: AN EVENING WITH LARRY COHEN
Tuesday, August 30
THE PRIVATE FILES OF J. EDGAR HOOVER (1977) 112min
SPECIAL EFFECTS (1984) 93min
Legendary write/director/producer Larry Cohen presents a double feature of his typically entertaining and thought-provoking films.
First, Cohen’s decades-spanning chronicle THE PRIVATE FILES OF J. EDGAR HOOVER dishes the dirt on the secret machinations of the notorious FBI director, mixing archival footage with fictionalized reenactments. From Hoover’s first days as the head of the agency through his work in front of and behind the scenes with several administrations (with special emphasis on his contentious relationship with Robert F Kennedy) to his final days prior to Watergate, the film features Broderick Crawford and a host of 70s character actors at the top of their game.
In Cohen’s pitch-black satire SPECIAL EFFECTS, a sleazy, washed-up director (Eric Bogosian) shoots a picture about a killing he himself committed – and caught on film. Zoë Lund (best known for her collaborations with Abel Ferrara) pulls off a memorable double role, as the airheaded murder victim and a mousy city girl turned actress.
Both films are prime example of Cohen’s not frequently celebrated non-horror or non-genre work and he will be on hand to take part in a Q&A afterward with Film Comment editor Gavin Smith.
AN EVENING WITH PAUL MORRISSEY featuring the U.S. Premiere of NEWS FROM NOWHERE
Tuesday, September 6
NEWS FROM NOWHERE (U.S. Premiere) 94min
TRASH (1970) 110min
The always provocative Paul Morrissey (HEAT, TRASH, FLESH) comes to the Walter Reade for the U.S. Premiere of his latest, NEWS FROM NOWHERE as well as an encore screening of his classic cult favorite, TRASH (1970). In between screenings, Morrissey will be joined on stage a conversation moderated by Oscar-nominated writer-director James Toback (FINGERS, BUGSY) to discuss Morrissey’s latest and his career.
Shot on location in Montauk, NEWS FROM NOWHERE is a visceral and topical drama following the encounters of an enigmatic Argentinian stranger with the residents of an Atlantic seaport town. The film is intentionally meant to return to the style not just of the director's earlier work, but to the type of films made in Europe in the 1960s and 70s. In the film, the main character’s nature and appearance set him apart from the natives who attempt to connect with him and he has no intention of explaining or dramatizing himself, retaining only his surface identity. Whatever reason he has, he keeps to himself.
THIRD TIME’S THE CHARM: A WEEKEND OF MOVIE TRILOGIES
September 2 – 5
From Sophocles to THE LORD OF THE RINGS, as long as there have been stories, there have been those that cannot stay contained to a single part. Come see five classic movie trilogies, including Hollywood blockbusters, art-house prizewinners, and the BACK TO THE FUTURE films presented in stunning 2K digital projection!
FILMS, DESCRIPTIONS AND SCHEDULES
BACK TO THE FUTURE
Robert Zemeckis’s time-hopping misadventures remain a clever, funny, and resoundingly entertaining stand-out from a formative era of the blockbuster. Scrappy McFly (Michael J. Fox) gets catapulted back to 1955 (thanks to mad scientist Christopher Lloyd) only to endanger his existence upon meeting his parents (Crispin Glover and Lea Thompson). In the delightful sequels, Zemeckis reprises the trick, with some spiffy futuristic design in BTF2, and then a warped ode to Westerns in BTF3’s 19th-century jump.
Sunday, September 4
Back to the Future (1985) 116min
Director: Robert Zemeckis
BACK TO THE FUTURE PART II (1989) 108min
Director: Robert Zemeckis
BACK TO THE FUTURE PART III (1990) 118min
Director: Robert Zemeckis
THE GODFATHER TRILOGY
The collective winner of nine Academy Awards (and 29 nominations), including the first-ever Best Picture Oscar awarded to a sequel, Francis Coppola’s epic chronicle of the Corleone family remains the gold standard by which all chronicles of Mafia life shall forever be judged. Presented here in the stunning digital restoration supervised in 2009 by Coppola, cinematographer Gordon Willis and film preservationist Robert A. Harris.
Monday, September 5
THE GODFATHER (1972) 175min
Director: Francis Ford Coppola
THE GODFATHER PART II (1974) 200min
Director: Francis Ford Coppola
THE GODFATHER PART III (1990) 162min
Director: Francis Ford Coppola
KIAROSTAMI’S KOKER TRILOGY
Routinely counted among the greatest living filmmakers, Abbas Kiarostami first rose to international prominence with this rich, humane trio of films set in and around the Iranian village of Koker. Reflecting the director’s multilayered engagement with cinema—and the audience—the trilogy begins with the lyrical tale of a schoolboy’s journey to deliver a book, then revisits the region after the 1990 earthquake in a semiautobiographical story about a director and his son, and concludes with a comedy about filmmaking. Together they reveal Kiarostami as an artist whose self-awareness only increases the humanity of his work.
Friday, September 2 and Sunday, September 4
WHERE IS THE FRIEND’S HOUSE? (1987) 87min
Director: Abbas Kiarostami
AND LIFE GOES ON (1992) 91min
Director: Abbas Kiarostami
THROUGH THE OLIVE TREES (1994) 103min
Director: Abbas Kiarostami
MAD MAX
George Miller’s hell-on-wheels vision of the future notched a novel international action hit for the burgeoning Australian cinema, giving a new meaning to the notion of a “road movie.” The battle-ready cars, ravaged landscapes, and punkish road warriors make for one of the defining dystopias visualized in cinema. Rising star Mel Gibson plays the ex-police officer who takes the law into his own hands, facing down sadistic gangs, gas shortages, and, in the final installment, Tina Turner.
Saturday, September 3
MAD MAX (1979) 88min
Director: George Miller
MAD MAX 2: THE ROAD WARRIOR (1981) 91min
Director: George Miller
MAD MAX BEYOND THUNDERDOME (1985) 107min
Directors: George Miller & George Ogilvie
THREE COLORS
The late Krzystof Kieslowski achieved international auteur superstardom with this remarkable trilogy inspired by the three colors of the French flag and their symbolic meanings: liberty, equality, and fraternity. Set, respectively, in Paris, Warsaw and Geneva, BLUE, WHITE and RED are not obviously connected in matters of plot or characters, but they are dominated by Kieslowski’s career-spanning themes of chance, coincidence and the mysteries of fate.
Friday, September 2 and Saturday, September 3
BLUE (1993) 98min
Director: Krzysztof Kieslowski
WHITE (1994) 91min
Director: Krzysztof Kieslowski
RED (1994) 99min
Director: Krzysztof Kieslowski
Â
SCREENING SCHEDULE for Third Time’s the Charm: A Weekend of Movie Trilogies
Screening Venue:
The Film Society of Lincoln Center – Walter Reade Theater
165 West 65 Street, between Broadway & Amsterdam (upper level)
Friday, September 2
12:00PM WHERE IS THE FRIEND’S HOUSE? (87min)
1:50PM AND LIFE GOES ON (91min)
3:45PM THROUGH THE OLIVE TREES (103min)
6:00PM BLUE (98min)
8:00PM WHITE (91min)
9:50PM RED (99min)
Saturday, September 3
12:00PM BLUE (98min)
2:00PM WHITE (91min)
3:50PM RED (99min)
5:50PM MAD MAX (88min)
7:45PM THE ROAD WARRIOR (91min)
9:45PM MAD MAX BEYOND THUNDERDOME (107min)
Saturday, Sunday 4
12:00PM WHERE IS THE FRIEND’S HOUSE? (87min)
1:50PM AND LIFE GOES ON (91min)
3:40PM THROUGH THE OLIVE TREES (103min)
5:50PM BACK TO THE FUTURE (116min)
8:10PM BACK TO THE FUTURE PART II (108min)
10:20PM BACK TO THE FUTURE PART III (118min)
Monday, September 5
12:30PM THE GODFATHER (175min)
4:00PM THE GODFATHER PART II (200min)
8:00PM THE GODFATHER PART III (162min)
Film Society of Lincoln Center
Under the leadership of Rose Kuo, Executive Director, and Richard Peña, Program Director, the Film Society of Lincoln Center offers the best in international, classic and cutting-edge independent cinema. The Film Society presents two film festivals that attract global attention: the New York Film Festival, currently planning its 49th edition, and New Directors/New Films which, since its founding in 1972, has been produced in collaboration with MoMA. The Film Society also publishes the award-winning Film Comment Magazine, and for over three decades has given an annual award—now named “The Chaplin Award”—to a major figure in world cinema. Past recipients of this award include Charlie Chaplin, Alfred Hitchcock, Martin Scorsese, Meryl Streep, and Tom Hanks. The Film Society presents a year-round calendar of programming, panels, lectures, educational programs and specialty film releases at its Walter Reade Theater and the new state-of-the-art Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center.
The Film Society receives generous, year-round support from Royal Bank of Canada, 42BELOW, American Airlines, The New York Times, Stella Artois, the National Endowment for the Arts, WNET New York Public Media, the National Endowment for the Arts and New York State Council on the Arts.For more information, visit www.filmlinc.com
