Stanley Kubrick’s first feature-length film, Fear and Desire, is screening at Metrograph in new 4K restoration
FEAR AND DESIRE (Stanley Kubrick, 1953)
Metrograph
7 Ludlow St. between Canal & Hester Sts.
September 22-27
metrograph.com
As part of its ongoing “First & Last” series, Metrograph is presenting a new 4K restoration of Stanley Kubrick’s seldom-seen 1953 psychological war drama, Fear and Desire. The Bronx-born ex-pat’s debut full-length film, made when he was twenty-four, Fear and Desire is a curious tale about four soldiers (Steve Coit, Kenneth Harp, Paul Mazursky, and Frank Silvera) trapped six miles behind enemy lines. When they are spotted by a local woman (Virginia Leith), they decide to capture her and tie her up, but leaving Sidney (Mazursky) behind to keep an eye on her turns out to be a bad idea. Meanwhile, they discover a nearby house that has been occupied by the enemy and argue over whether to attack or retreat. Written by Howard Sackler, who was a high school classmate of Kubrick’s in the Bronx and would later win the Pulitzer Prize for The Great White Hope, and directed, edited, and photographed by the man who would go on to make such war epics as Paths of Glory, Full Metal Jacket, and Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, Fear and Desire features stilted dialogue, much of which is spoken off-camera and feels like it was dubbed in later.
Many of the cuts are jumpy and much of the framing amateurish. Kubrick was ultimately disappointed with the film and wanted it pulled from circulation; instead it was preserved by Eastman House in 1989 and restored twenty years later — and now available in a digital restoration from Kino Lorber and the Library of Congress, which is good news for film lovers, as it is fascinating to watch Kubrick learning as the film continues. His exploration of the psyche of the American soldier is the heart and soul of this compelling black-and-white war drama that is worth seeing for more than just historical reasons. “There is a war in this forest. Not a war that has been fought, nor one that will be, but any war,” narrator David Allen explains at the beginning of the film. “And the enemies who struggle here do not exist unless we call them into being. This forest then, and all that happens now, is outside history. Only the unchanging shapes of fear and doubt and death are from our world. These soldiers that you see keep our language and our time but have no other country but the mind.” Fear and Desire lays the groundwork for much of what was to follow in Kubrick’s remarkable career; Metrograph is also screening Kubrick’s swan song, 1999’s Eyes Wide Shut, an adaptation of an Arthur Schnitzler novella that stars Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman and features one of the most memorable parties ever put on celluloid.