Goings On: De Sica, Tavernier, and More

New York. “Among the most savage and surreal of Italian comedies, starring one of the country’s biggest stars”—Alberto Sordi—“and directed by one of its legendary filmmakers, Vittorio De Sica’s Il Boom barely made a ripple when first released, in 1963, then sank so deep that it’s only now getting a proper release in the United States,” writes Bilge Ebiri in the Village Voice. “Luckily for us, it has lost almost none of its bite.” Il Boom opens tomorrow at Film Forum and runs through June 27. Later in the summer, it rolls on to Madison, Wisconsin,Hartford, Connecticut, and Cleveland, Ohio.

More from Bilge Ebiri: “To Live and Die in L.A. [1985], which screens at midnight this Friday and Saturday in the IFC Center’s ongoing Road Rage series, returned Friedkin to the crime drama, but his approach was different. As he notes in his excellent memoir, The Friedkin Connection, he ‘would abandon the gritty macho look’ of The French Connection for ‘something more in the unisex style of Los Angeles in the 1980s.’ . . . Today, it’s rightfully acknowledged as a near-masterpiece.”

“With 2017 bringing the two latestentries in long-running film franchises featuring clashes between humans and apes, Anthology Film Archives’ upcoming exploration of this ongoing fascination, Simian Vérité, is perfectly timed,” writes Jon Hogan for Hyperallergic. “‘The series is predicated on something of a joke,’ Anthology guest programmer Steve Macfarlane explained via email. ‘The tension between primate and human can be taken in so many different directions that the hook is mostly just an excuse to watch movies about monkeys.’” The series opens tomorrow and runs through June 27. At Screen Slate, Caroline Golum recommends James Fargo’s Every Which Way But Loose (1978), screening on Father’s Day and again on Wednesday and the following Saturday: “If a movie date with your Old Man is in the stars, treat him to a tallboy of ‘Banquet’ and this classic caper.”

“Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s British melodrama Gone to Earth—at the Museum of Modern Art on Wednesday, June 21, as part of Modern Matinees: Becoming Jennifer Jones—has a reputation often eclipsed by the drama surrounding its production,” writes Andy Webster in the New York Times. “The executive producer, David O. Selznick, married Jones before filming and had the film re-edited for its American release, adding scenes directed by Rouben Mamoulian and retitling it The Wild Heart (1952). In the American version, at MoMA, the film’s merits survive.”

Robert Wise’s The Set-Up (1949) screens on Saturday at the Metrograph and, at Screen Slate, Caroline Golum notes that this boxing movie “has that familiar scent—stale tobacco and Greek dramatic irony—but Wise never reduces this to another tired yarn about an ‘underdog’ with ‘one last fight.’”

“In 1984, coal miners in the north of England began what would become a year-long nationwide strike and one of the largest mass actions in British labor history.” On Tuesday, Light Industry presents The Miners’ Campaign Tapes, which were widely distributed and “were watched in working-class homes as a form of alternative television.”

Los Angeles. Tonight, Bertrand Tavernier will be at the Aero Theatre for the west coast premiere of My Journey through French Cinema. Introducing her interview with Tavernier for the American Cinematheque, Susan King notes that he’ll “also be on hand for the first four days of the Aero’s French film noir retrospective which features such classics as Casque d’Or and Elevator to the Gallows.”

“Ultra-stylized, weirdly discomfiting, and boldly overblown, Starship Troopers may be one of the most hilarious political satires this side of Dr. Strangelove,” writes Witney Seibold for the New Beverly. Paul Verhoeven’s 1997 adaptation of Robert A. Heinlein’s 1959 novel screens tomorrow and Saturday.

San Francisco. “Frameline, aka ‘the world's longest-running and largest showcase of queer cinema,’ celebrates its 41st edition from June 15 to 25. This year's 147 films from 19 countries are split almost evenly between features and shorts, with an unprecedented 40 percent coming from women filmmakers.” Michael Hawley’s posted his “thoughts on a dozen I had the chance to preview, with additional spotlights on others I'm hoping to catch during the festival proper.”

Seattle. Cinelicious’s new 4K restoration of Toshio Matsumoto’s Funeral Parade of Roses (1969) continues its trek across the country, arriving today at Northwest Film Forum and tomorrow at the Hollywood Theatre. “A gender-fluid take on Oedipus Rex that takes cues from Jonas Mekas (who’s name-checked in the film), Seijun Suzuki, and Andy Warhol, Funeral is a frenetic hodgepodge of styles and moods,” writes Robert Ham in the Stranger. More from Dana Reinoos, writing for BOMB; and see, too, the entry at Critics Round Up.

Washington, D.C. The exhibition Marlene Dietrich: Dressed for the Image opens tomorrow at the National Portrait Gallery. It’s on through April 15, 2018.

Culpeper, Virginia. The Library of Congress’s sixth “Mostly Lost” workshop begins today at the Packard Campus for Audio Visual Conservation and carries on through Saturday. “The quest of the film detectives is to find clues that will lead to the identification of unidentified, under-identified or misidentified silent and early sound films.”

Cambridge. From tomorrow through September 1, the Harvard Film Archive presents That Certain Feeling... The Touch of Ernst Lubitsch. Introducing the series, Carson Lund considers “Lubitsch’s peculiar case as a mainstream artist whose eccentricity was the very substance of his populism.”

Cherry Hill, N.J.Film International has the lineup for the third annual Reel East Film Festival. All screenings happen on Saturday.

London. Artist and curator George Clark will be leading a Termite Workshop for LUX tomorrow. “The day will consist of screenings, readings and practical projects, featuring the writings and works of figures such as Raul Ruiz, Hugo Santiago, Chen Chieh-jen, Hito Steyerl, Trinh T. Minh Ha and The Office of Culture and Design in Manila, amongst others.”

Brussels. The first edition of the Festival Mondial des Cinémas Sauvages (World Festival of Wild Cinema) takes place from Tuesday through June 25. Sabzian notes that the event “aims to bring together films and practices that defy notions of property, authorship, or copyright.”

Pesaro, Italy. At Cineuropa, Camillo De Marco previews the 53rd edition of the Pesaro International Festival of New Cinema, opening Saturday and running through June 24.

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