Goings On: Zvyagintsev, Schatzberg, and More
New York. Starting today at MoMA, The Banishment (2007), “the second feature from the Russian director Andrey Zvyagintsev, is finally receiving a run in New York more than ten years after its lead, Konstantin Levronenko, took the best-actor prize at Cannes,” writes Ben Kenigsberg in the New York Times.
Kenigsberg also spotlights tonight’s screening of Hiroshima at Japan Society: “Hideo Sekigawa’s 1953 film, an independent production that presents a dramatized look at the lives of survivors of the bomb, was perceived as anti-American and was shown in the United States in an edited version; according to Donald Richie, a scholar of Japanese cinema, some scenes were also included uncredited in the French director Alain Resnais’s great Hiroshima, Mon Amour.”
“For nearly three decades,” writes Tyler Maxin at Screen Slate, “Trent Harris has been repeatedly dubbed a ‘cult filmmaker,’ a bittersweet term. His initial notoriety came off the tape-swapping success of The Beaver Kid, a guerrilla parking lot document of a hammy twenty-one-year old (his name is ‘Groovin’ Gary,’ he tells the camera) that lead to two subsequent remakes by Harris, with pre-fame Sean Penn and Crispin Glover in the title role. The fascination around the films have lead to underground fame, a very precious This American Life episode, a documentary, VICE article/s, and countless Internet blogposts. It also gave Harris the traction he needed to begin the production of the ill-fated 1991 feature Rubin and Ed, playing tonight at Spectacle.”
On Sunday, Jerry Schatzberg will be at the Metrograph to present a 35 mm print of his 1970 film Puzzle of a Downfall Child with Faye Dunaway—as seen in the image at the top. Jeva Lange, also at Screen Slate: “No oppressor of women escapes without blame: religion, capitalism, sex, the fashion industry, and above all others, men get no mercy from Schatzberg.”
Meanwhile, the schedule for the first half of Martin Scorsese Presents Republic Rediscovered: New Restorations from Paramount Pictures, running at MoMA from February 1 through 15, is now set. And To Save and Project: The 15th MoMA International Festival of Film Preservation is underway, while 60s Verité opens at Film Forum today.
Los Angeles. On Sunday, as part of Ism, Ism, Ism: Experimental Cinema in Latin America, the Hammer Museum presents Testamento Cinemático: The Films of Narcisa Hirsch: “A pivotal figure in Latin American experimental cinema, Narcisa Hirsch—a German émigré raised in Argentina—first focused on painting, then performances and happenings, before making a crucial move to film. These six short films are meditations on female independence, eroticism, violence, and mortality, forming an important intervention into the history of structural and experimental film.”
Nathaniel Bell picks out more highlights of the next several days for the LA Weekly.
Chicago.Michael Smith “could not be more excited to announce that my film Mercury in Retrograde will receive its Chicago premiere at the Gene Siskel Film Center next month.”
Berkeley. With the Pacific Film Archive series Ida Lupino: Hard, Fast, and Beautiful running through February 24, Michael Guillen’s posted Frako Loden’s 2009 piece on Outrage (1950) and The Bigamist (1953).
Austin. From today through January 27, Mondo Gallery presents Universal Studios’ Monsters, and Richard Whittaker talks with creative director Mitch Putnam for the Chronicle.
Paris. With the Cinémathèque française’s Sam Fuller retrospective running through February 15, Sabzian alerts us to a few new publications: Samuel Fuller. Le Choc et la Caresse is a collection of essays by Bernard Eisenschitz, Chris Fujiwara, among others; Jean Narboni’s Samuel Fuller. Un homme à fables; and Frank Lafond’s Samuel Fuller. Jusqu’à l’épuisement. And on France Culture, “you can listen to a recent one-hour talk on Fuller with the critic Jean Narboni and Samantha Fuller, the filmmaker’s daughter who directed the documentary A Fuller Life (2013), which has just been released on DVD and Blu-Ray this month by Carlotta.”
Berlin. There aren’t any new lineups from the Berlin International Film Festival today (so far), but there’ve been a couple of announcements. First, the Berlinale Co-Production Market’s “CoPro Series” will host “eight new, selected series projects have the chance to find appropriate co-production and financing partners here.” And “EFM Horizon,” a program “successfully launched at last year’s European Film Market (EFM),” will “spotlight hot new themes such as artificial intelligence, virtual reality, blockchain, and diversity in the film industry.” The sixty-eighth edition of the festival runs from February 15 through 25.
Belgium.Sabzian looks ahead to goings on in February.
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