this week in film and television

CHELSEA CLASSICS: STRAIT-JACKET

Lucy Harbin (Joan Crawford) doesn’t take kindly to marital infidelity in STRAIT-JACKET

STRAIT-JACKET (William Castle, 1964)
Chelsea Bowtie Cinemas
260 West 23rd St. between Eighth & Ninth Aves.
Thursday, January 22, $8, 7:00
212-777-3456
www.bowtiecinemas.com

One of the posters for William Castle’s 1964 camp classic, Strait-Jacket, screams out, “Warning! Strait-Jacket vividly depicts ax murders!” accompanied by a lurid illustration of an ax swinging down and spraying blood. Indeed, when Lucy Harbin (Joan Crawford) comes home early one night and catches her younger husband (Lee Majors) in bed with another woman (Patricia Crest), she grabs an ax and gives them each a nasty whack. After twenty years in an asylum, she returns to her farm to find her daughter, Carol (Diane Baker), engaged to Michael Fields (John Anthony Hayes), whose parents (Howard St. John and Edith Atwater), don’t particularly approve of the union. Soon heads are rolling, and no one is safe. The first of a handful of low-budget exploitation films made by Crawford at the end of her career — which also included Castle’s I Saw What You Did, Jim O’Connolly’s Berserk! and Freddie Francis’s Trog — Strait-Jacket has quite a pedigree, written by Robert Bloch, the screenwriter of Psycho; produced and directed by Castle, who had previously made House on Haunted Hill and The Tingler; photographed in black-and-white by two-time Oscar nominee Arthur E. Arling (The Yearling, I’ll Cry Tomorrow); a Theremin-heavy soundtrack by bandleader and composer Van Alexander; and costarring future Oscar winner George Kennedy, Six Million Dollar Man Majors, WWII navy hero Leif Erickson, and Pepsi vice president and nonactor Mitchell Cox. (Crawford was the widow of former Pepsi president Al Steele and was still on the board of directors of the company, resulting not only in Cox’s appearance but also in overt product placement in the movie.)

But most of all, Strait-Jacket has Crawford, who chews up the scenery with relish, living up to Faye Dunaway’s portrayal of her in Mommie Dearest. Just wait till you see her light a match using a record on a turntable and her reaction to a bust of her that her daughter has made — an actual bust of Crawford from her time at MGM in the 1930s. And be sure not to miss the Columbia Pictures logo at the end. Strait-Jacket is being shown January 22 at Chelsea Bowtie Cinemas as part of Hedda Lettuce’s weekly Chelsea Classics series, in which the self-described “eco-friendly drag queen” hosts screenings of popular movies; the long-running series continues in January and February with Thelma and Louise, Titanic, All About Eve, It Happened One Night, and From Here to Eternity, so Strait-Jacket finds itself in some pretty good company.

TWI-NY TALK: STEPHEN BELBER

Patrick Stewart, Matthew Lillard, and Carla Gugino star in Stephen Belber’s MATCH

MATCH (Stephen Belber, 2014)
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at West Third St.
Through January 20
212-924-7771
www.ifccenter.com

In 2001, Stephen Belber turned his 2000 play, Tape, into a feature film starring Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman, directed by Richard Linklater. He has now adapted his 2004 Broadway debut, Match, into a feature film starring Sir Patrick Stewart, Carla Gugino, and Matthew Lillard. The beautifully told story takes place in New York City, where married couple Lisa (Gugino) and Mike (Lillard) are interviewing dance teacher and choreographer Tobi Powell (Stewart) purportedly for her thesis, but their ulterior motives bring the three of them together in uncomfortable, unexpected ways, dredging up a long-buried past. Belber’s second film as writer and director — in 2009 he made Management, a romantic comedy with Jennifer Aniston, Steve Zahn, and Woody Harrelson — is an intimate, involving tale about family and the choices we make, led by superb performances by Stewart and Gugino, who are magical together. Belber discussed the film and other aspects of his career with twi-ny shortly after it opened at the IFC Center.

twi-ny: Nearly fifteen years ago, you adapted your play Tape into a film, directed by Richard Linklater, who just won a Golden Globe for Boyhood. Now you’ve adapted your 2004 play, Match, into a film. How did the transference of the two plays onto the big screen differ? Why did you choose to direct this time around?

Stephen Belber: Up to the point when I adapted Tape, I’d written exactly one screenplay, and so I basically just put the text into final draft. (In fact, I didn’t even do that; someone else did; I’m not even sure final draft was around then) Rick Linklater and I briefly talked about breaking it out of the motel but decided it would diffuse the necessary claustrophobic feel. When I adapted Match, I’d just finished directing my first film and so I was able to approach the whole thing more globally, knowing more of what it takes to make a film, yet I also specifically wanted to reduce the scope of my next project to almost pure character interaction; I was less interested in more classic film “splendor.” That said, I did try to open up the screenplay a bit, but only when it felt justified and organic; otherwise I just doubled-down on my actors, who I was more than confident were strong enough to convey the “cinematic landscape” of emotion that I was going for. I think the reason I decided to direct was due to my memory of having watched Tape amidst a crowd at Sundance in 2001 and thinking to myself, “There is a thirst for this kind of small, ‘emotional thriller’ movie” — and wanting to try that for myself.

twi-ny: When it debuted on Broadway, Match starred Frank Langella, Ray Liotta, and Jane Adams. How did you approach casting for the film version?

Stephen Belber: Frank was attached to play the role of Tobi for a while, but when we finally found the financing, he was unavailable for our time window, so the fortune of then being able to find Patrick was immense. I couldn’t have been happier. I also knew that I wanted the movie to be different from the play. I wanted it to be more of an even three-hander; I wanted the role of Lisa to be almost the strongest of the three, in terms of her ability to force these two semi-blinded individuals together. I’d long known and admired Carla for her dominant stage work in New York, so she was an early choice of mine. Matthew I knew less well, but when I met him and perceived his rare mix of strength and vulnerability, as well as the simply excellent person that he is, I knew I’d found the type of actor I love to work with.

twi-ny: The film depicts the deep bond between Tobi and New York, echoing the bond that has clearly developed between Patrick and the city. When he and Carla go up to his Inwood rooftop, I immediately thought of the video that went viral a few summers ago of Stewart and his soon-to-be wife, Sunny Ozell, goofing around on their Brooklyn rooftop. Can you talk about that connection, and its importance to the film? You were born in DC; what are some of your favorite things about New York?

Stephen Belber: Well, to begin with, I do love New York City, but specifically, when I discovered the uniqueness and beauty of Inwood, it was one of those moments when New York reveals itself to you in a lovely and unexpected way. (Granted, the roof scene is technically Washington Heights and we shot the rest of the film in Crown Heights.) But more so, the character of Tobi, perhaps not unlike Patrick, has decamped to New York relatively late in life — and fallen in love with its excitement and ever-present vivacity. Funnily enough, my father recently moved back to NYC after forty years in DC, and he now goes on incessantly about how great a place it is to be old, and not just because of all the food delivery services. There’s something about the constant life of the city that surrounds you, ambushes and assaults you, but undeniably keeps you in the present; it fills you with a sense of aliveness, awareness, and acute feeling. It’s very different than Phoenix.

twi-ny: Stewart’s character is inspired by dancer, choreographer, and longtime Juilliard ballet teacher Alphonse Poulin, who attended the opening night of the play on Broadway. Has he seen the film? What has been his reaction to your exploration of at least part of his life, first onstage, then in the movies?

Stephen Belber: Alphy has been incredibly supportive of this entire project. I think the play made him happy, and yet it was a broader comedy than the film; it had a heightened, almost farcical reality, theatrically speaking, and I think that I, as the writer, consequently short-changed some of the complexity and humanity of the Tobi character. On film, heightened reality tends to be harder to pull off; the intimacy of a film close-up almost insists on a naturalism and dramatic “realness,” in which farce doesn’t fly. At the same time, I’d become aware of wanting a more dramatic and grounded version of this character and this story.

twi-ny: You are a Juilliard grad yourself, and the play begins at the beautiful Glorya Kaufman Dance Studio there. What was your Juilliard experience like? How has it helped shape your career?

Stephen Belber: My two years as a writer at Juilliard were vital and extremely happy ones. It’s the first time I truly took myself seriously as a writer. I feel at home there to this day. (Even if everyone else looks at me like an odd guy peering into piano rehearsal rooms.)

twi-ny: On February 6, Matthew Shepard Is a Friend of Mine is being released in theaters, in conjunction with the twenty-fifth anniversary of the passage of the Hate Crime Statistics Act, which was modified in 2009 by the Matthew Shepard & James Byrd, Jr., Hate Crimes Prevention Act. You examined the murder of Matthew Shepard in The Laramie Project Cycle, which played at BAM two years ago. What kind of progress, if any, do you think has been made in America in regard to hate crimes?

Stephen Belber: Not enough. Certainly there’s progress, legislatively as well as in a national “moral” sense. Yet there are hundreds of thousands of Americans who continue to misunderstand why these laws are important. This, to me, implies a lack of ability to put one’s self in another person’s shoes, to truly feel what it is to be “other” in this country. We are still coming up way short in that regard.

twi-ny: Do you have any plans to bring any of your other plays to the big screen?

Stephen Belber: Myself and Matthew Lillard are discussing a screen adaptation of my 2008 play, Fault Lines. Matt would direct. I would love this to happen.

NEW YORK JEWISH FILM FESTIVAL — WAR AGAINST WAR: THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS

Members of the FLN hide from French paratroops in Gillo Pontecorvo’s neo-Realist classic THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS

THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS (Gillo Pontecorvo, 1966)
Film Society of Lincoln Center, Walter Reade Theater
165 West 65th St. between Eighth Ave. & Broadway
Wednesday, January 21, 6:15
Festival runs January 14-29 at the Film Society of Lincoln Center and the Jewish Museum
212-875-5050
www.filmlinc.com

In Italian director Gillo Pontecorvo’s gripping neo-Realist war thriller The Battle of Algiers, a reporter asks French paratroop commander Lt. Col. Mathieu (Jean Martin), who has been sent to the Casbah to derail the Algerian insurgency, about an article Jean-Paul Sartre had just written for a Paris paper. “Why are the Sartres always born on the other side?” Mathieu says. “Then you like Sartre?” the reporter responds. “No, but I like him even less as a foe,” Mathieu coolly answers. In 1961, French existentialist Sartre wrote in the preface to Frantz Fanon’s Wretched of the Earth, the seminal tome on colonialism and decolonialism, “In Algeria and Angola, Europeans are massacred at sight. It is the moment of the boomerang; it is the third phase of violence; it comes back on us, it strikes us, and we do not realize any more than we did the other times that it’s we that have launched it,” referring to European colonization. “There are those among [the oppressed creatures] who assert themselves by throwing themselves barehanded against the guns; these are their heroes. Others make men of themselves by murdering Europeans, and these are shot down; brigands or martyrs, their agony exalts the terrified masses. Yes, terrified; at this fresh stage, colonial aggression turns inward in a current of terror among the natives. By this I do not only mean the fear that they experience when faced with our inexhaustible means of repression but also that which their own fury produces in them. They are cornered between our guns pointed at them and those terrifying compulsions, those desires for murder which spring from the depth of their spirits and which they do not always recognize; for at first it is not their violence, it is ours, which turns back on itself and rends them; and the first action of these oppressed creatures is to bury deep down that hidden anger which their and our moralities condemn and which is however only the last refuge of their humanity. Read Fanon: you will learn how, in the period of their helplessness, their mad impulse to murder is the expression of the natives’ collective unconscious.” Sartre’s brutally honest depiction of colonialism serves as a perfect introduction to Pontecorvo’s film, made five years later and then, unsurprisingly, banned in France. (In 1953, the Martinique-born Fanon, who fought for France in WWII, moved to Algeria, where he became a member of the National Liberation Front; French authorities expelled him from the country in 1957, but he kept working for the FLN and Algeria up to his death in 1961. For more on The Wretched of the Earth, see the new documentary Concerning Violence: Nine Scenes from the Anti-Imperialistic Self-Defense.)

Terrorism and counterinsurgency take to the streets in Oscar-nominated THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS

In The Battle of Algiers, Pontecorvo (Kapò, Burn!) and screenwriter Franco Solinas follow a small group of FLN rebels, focusing on the young, unpredictable Ali la Pointe (Brahim Haggiag) and the more calm and experienced commander, El-hadi Jafar (Saadi Yacef, playing a character based on himself; the story was also inspired by his book Souvenirs de la Bataille d’Alger). Told in flashback, the film takes viewers from 1954 to 1957 as Mathieu hunts down the FLN leaders while the revolutionaries stage strikes, bomb public places, and assassinate French police. Shot in a black-and-white cinema-vérité style on location by Marcello Gatti — Pontecorvo primarily was a documentarian — The Battle of Algiers is a tense, powerful work that plays out like a thrilling procedural, touching on themes that are still relevant nearly fifty years later, including torture, cultural racism, media manipulation, terrorism, and counterterrorism. It seems so much like a documentary —the only professional actor in the cast is Martin — that it’s hardly shocking that the film has been used as a primer for the IRA, the Black Panthers, the Pentagon, and military and paramilitary organizations on both sides of the colonialism issue, although Pontecorvo is clearly on the side of the Algerian rebels. However, it does come as a surprise that the original conception was a melodrama starring Paul Newman as a Western journalist. All these years later, The Battle of Algiers, which earned three Oscar nominations (for Best Foreign Language Film in 1967 and Best Director and Best Original Screenplay in 1969), still has a torn-from-the-headlines urgency that makes it as potent as ever. The Battle of Algiers is screening on January 21 at 6:15 at the Walter Reade Theater as part of the War Against War sidebar program of the twenty-fourth annual New York Jewish Film Festival, which focuses on antiwar films from the 1950s and 1960s; the schedule also includes Stanley Kubrick’s Fear and Desire with Peter Watkins’s The War Game, Kon Ichikawa’s Fires on the Plain, Konrad Wolf’s I Was Nineteen, and Jean-Luc Godard’s Les Carabiniers, centered by a panel discussion on January 19 at 3:00 at the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center (free with advance RSVP) with Kent Jones, Martha Rosler, Harrell Fletcher, and Trevor Paglen, moderated by Jens Hoffmann.

ORSON WELLES 100: COMPULSION & THE LONG, HOT SUMMER

Will Varner (Orson Welles) runs just about everything and everybody in THE LONG, HOT SUMMER

THE LONG, HOT SUMMER (Martin Ritt, 1958) & COMPULSION (Richard Fleischer, 1959)
Film Forum
209 West Houston St.
Tuesday, January 20
Series continues through February 3
212-727-8110
www.filmforum.org

Upon first look, it might seem that there is little in common between two of the movies Film Forum is screening together in its ambitious and exhaustive “Orson Welles 100” series other than the involvement of Mr. Welles himself. But it turns out that the double feature is somewhat of a genius pairing of two 1950s pictures that echo each other in more ways than one. In order to finance his career as a director (and pay off tax debts), Welles acted in numerous films, from the sublime (A Man for All Seasons, The Third Man, both of which are part of this month-long tribute to the centennial of his birth) to the ridiculous (Casino Royale, Butterfly, both of which are not). Between 1958 and 1961, he appeared in or narrated nearly a dozen and a half films; two of the best, Martin Ritt’s The Long, Hot Summer and Richard Fleischer’s Compulsion, are playing Film Forum on January 20. In both, the big, blustery Welles, his sweat practically dripping off the screen, takes center stage though primarily a supporting character. Welles claimed that he hated making The Long, Hot Summer, a fiery Tennessee Williams-like melodrama based on several works by William Faulkner, although clearly inspired by Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Welles plays Will Varner, a wealthy plantation magnate who essentially owns a small southern town. He is grooming his son, Jody (Anthony Franciosa), to take over his empire, but when ambitious drifter and rumored barn burner Ben Quick (Paul Newman, who played Brick in Cat the same year) shows up looking for work, Will decides to set him against Jody, with the winner capturing the spoils, which in the case of Quick might also include Will’s young but already spinsterish daughter, Clara (Joanne Woodward, who married Newman during production). Shot in blazing CinemaScope, the film, which also stars Angela Lansbury as Will’s girlfriend, Lee Remick as Jody’s shopping-loving wife, and Richard Anderson as Clara’s momma’s boy beau, boils over with sexual energy that lives up to the original trailer’s declaration that “nothing — but nothing! — will be withheld!” The Long, Hot Summer earned no Oscar nominations and was not a box-office hit, but Newman became an international superstar by being named Best Actor at the Cannes Film Festival, while the film was in competition for the Palme d’Or.

Jonathan Wilk (Orson Welles) meets with clients Judd Steiner (Dean Stockwell) and Artie Strauss (Bradford Dillman) in COMPULSION

The next year, Welles and costars Dean Stockwell and Bradford Dillman shared the Best Actor award at Cannes for Compulsion, a searing exploration of crime and punishment in the guise of a teen exploitation flick. (Dig that crazy opening credit sequence!) Based on the novel and play by Meyer Levin that fictionalized the Leopold and Loeb case, Compulsion explores the nature of good and evil as it follows wealthy Chicago law school students Artie Strauss (Dillman) and Judd Steiner (Stockwell) on their mad rampage of murder and rape, determined to commit the perfect crime and get away with it because of their superior intellect. But when fellow student Sid Brooks (Martin Milner) finds a pair of glasses that might be the key to discovering who killed little Paulie Kessler, it’s going to take a lot more than understanding Friedrich Nietzsche to keep Artie and Judd from the hangman’s noose. Fleischer, who had a diverse career that ranged from Violent Saturday, The Vikings, Fantastic Voyage, and Doctor Dolittle to The Boston Strangler, Red Sonja, and Amityville 3-D, adds Hitchcockian flourishes to Compulsion, evoking the homoeroticism of Strangers on a Train and Rope (which was also a fictionalized retelling of the Leopold and Loeb story) while having most of the violence occur offscreen. (Fleischer’s cinematic use of the pair of glasses is also a direct reference to the glasses in Strangers on a Train, while Judd’s study of ornithology, highlighted by the stuffed birds in his bedroom, foresees Norman Bates’s taxidermy obsession in Psycho, made a year later.) Like The Long, Hot Summer, Compulsion boasts a strong — and familiar — supporting cast, including E. G. Marshall (The Bold Ones) as clever DA Harold Horn, Gavin MacLeod (The Love Boat) as one of his assistants, Diane Varsi (Peyton Place) as Sid’s girlfriend, Edward Binns (12 Angry Men) as a crack reporter, and Anderson (Oscar Goldman in The Six Million Dollar Man) as Judd’s older brother. But it is Welles’s presence that takes over the film in its later stages; playing larger-than-life defense attorney Jonathan Wilk, a character based on Clarence Darrow, he enters the film in a grand manner, as Fleischer opens up a space for him to come through a door and dwarf everyone else. Wilk’s eloquent closing argument about capital punishment is one that should be studied by lawyers, actors, directors, and death penalty proponents — even if Welles required the use of a teleprompter to get him through the powerful speech in a single take. Like The Long, Hot Summer, Compulsion received no Oscar nominations and was a box-office failure. Seen back-to-back, the two films work extremely well together, with smoldering story lines, expert cinematography (by Joseph LaShelle in the former, William C. Mellor in the latter), intense acting, and, yes, Orson Welles.

STRANGER THAN FICTION — FAR OUT ISN’T FAR ENOUGH: THE TOMI UNGERER STORY

Illustrator Tomi Ungerer talks about his fascinating life in compelling documentary (photo by Sam Norval / Corner of the Cave Media)

FAR OUT ISN’T FAR ENOUGH: THE TOMI UNGERER STORY (Brad Bernstein, 2012)
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at West Third St.
Monday, January 19, 8:00
Winter series runs Tuesdays at 8:00 through March 24
212-924-7771
www.faroutthemovie.com
www.stfdocs.com

“I am a self-taught raving maniac, but not as crazy as Tomi, or as great as Tomi,” Maurice Sendak says early on in Brad Bernstein’s engaging documentary, Far Out Isn’t Far Enough: The Tomi Ungerer Story, adding, “He was disarming and funny and not respectable at all.” Another children’s book legend, Jules Feiffer, feels similarly, explaining, “Tomi was this wonderfully brilliant, innovative madman.” Born in Alsace in 1931, Tomi Ungerer developed a remarkably diverse career as an illustrator, incorporating the emotional turmoil he suffered after losing his father when he was still a young child and then living under Nazi rule. In Far Out Isn’t Far Enough, Ungerer takes Bernstein and the audience on a fascinating journey through his personal and professional life, traveling to Strasbourg, Nova Scotia, New York City, and Ireland, which all served as home to him at one time or another as he wrote and illustrated such picture books as The Three Robbers and Crictor for editor Ursula Nordstrom, made bold political posters in support of the civil rights movement and against the Vietnam War, and published a book of erotic drawings, Fornicon, that ultimately led to a twenty-three-year exile from America during which he stopped making books for children. “I am full of contradictions, and why shouldn’t I be?” the eighty-one-year-old Ungerer says in the film. Ungerer discusses how he uses fear, tragedy, and trauma as underlying themes in his stories, trusting that kids can handle that amid the surreal nature of his entertaining tales.

He opens up his archives, sharing family photographs and old film footage, which reveal that he’s been pushing the envelope for a very long time, unafraid of the consequences. He also visits the Eric Carle Museum to check out a retrospective of his work for children, appropriately titled “Tomi Ungerer: Chronicler of the Absurd.” Meanwhile, Rick Cikowski animates many of Ungerer’s drawings, bringing to life his characters, both for children and adults, adding another dimension to this wonderful documentary. Far Out Isn’t Far Enough is a lively, engaging film about a seminal literary figure with an infectious love of life and art, and a unique take on the ills of society, that is a joy to behold. The film kicks off the IFC Center’s winter season of Stranger than Fiction on January 19 at 8:00, followed by a Q&A with Bernstein and Ungerer; Ungerer aficionados will also want to check out the new exhibit ”Tomi Ungerer: All in One” at the Drawing Center through March 22. Stranger than Fiction continues Tuesday nights through March 24 with such other nonfiction works as The Hand that Feeds, Freeway: A Crack in the System, Occupation: Dreamland, Seymour: An Introduction, and A Dangerous Game; each screening will be followed by a Q&A with the director(s), producer(s), and/or subject.

MLK DAY 2015

New York City celebration of MLK Day includes a screening of KING: A FILMED RECORD…MONTGOMERY TO MEMPHIS at Film Forum

Multiple venues
Monday, January 19
www.mlkday.gov

In 1983, the third Monday in January was officially recognized as Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, honoring the birthday of the civil rights leader who was assassinated in Memphis on April 4, 1968. Dr. King would have turned eighty-six this month, and you can celebrate his legacy on Monday by participating in a Martin Luther King, Jr. Day of Service project or attending one of numerous special events taking place around the city. BAM’s twenty-ninth annual free Brooklyn Tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. includes a keynote speech by Dr. Cornel West, live performances by Sandra St. Victor & Oya’s Daughter and the New York Fellowship Mass Choir, the theatrical presentation State of Emergence, the NYCHA Saratoga Village Community Center student exhibit “Picture the Dream,” and a screening of Ken Burns, Sara Burns, and David McMahon’s 2012 documentary The Central Park Five. The JCC in Manhattan will host an Engage MLK Day of Service in Brooklyn: Feeding Our Neighbors community initiative, a screening of Rachel Fisher and Rachel Pasternak’s 2014 documentary Joachim Prinz: I Shall Not Be Silent, and “Thank You, Dr. King,” in which Dance Theater of Harlem cofounder Arthur Mitchell shares his life story, joined by dancers Ashley Murphy and Da’Von Doane.

The Harlem Gospel Choir will play a special matinee at B.B. King’s on MLK Day

The Children’s Museum of Manhattan will teach kids about King’s legacy with the “Martin’s Mosaic” and Mugi Pottery workshops, the “Heroic Heroines: Coretta Scott King” book talk, and Movement & Circle Time participatory programs, while the Brooklyn Children’s Museum hosts the special hands-on crafts workshops “Let’s March!” and “Let’s Join Hands,” screenings of Rob Smiley and Vincenzo Trippetti’s 1999 animated film Our Friend, Martin, and a Cultural Connections performance by the Berean Community Drumline. The Museum at Eldridge Street will be hosting a free reading of Kobi Yamada and Mae Besom’s picture book What Do You Do with an Idea? along with a collage workshop. Also, Film Forum will show the 1970 three-hour epic documentary King: A Filmed Record . . . Montgomery to Memphis at 7:00, and the Harlem Gospel Choir will give a special MLK Day matinee at 12:30 at B.B. King’s in Times Square.

NEW YORK JEWISH FILM FESTIVAL — WAR AGAINST WAR: FEAR AND DESIRE

Stanley Kubrick’s first film is a curious, intense psychological war drama

FEAR AND DESIRE (Stanley Kubrick, 1953)
Film Society of Lincoln Center, Walter Reade Theater
165 West 65th St. between Eighth Ave. & Broadway
Tuesday, January 20, 6:15
Festival runs January 14-29 at the Film Society of Lincoln Center and the Jewish Museum
212-875-5050
www.nyjff.org
www.filmlinc.com

Fear and Desire, Stanley Kubrick’s seldom-seen 1953 psychological war drama and his first full-length film, made when he was just twenty-four, 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 they 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 powerful, influential 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, which was 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.

The sudden arrival of a local woman (Virginia Leith) complicates things in FEAR AND DESIRE

“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 is to follow in Kubrick’s remarkable career. Fear and Desire is screening with Peter Watkins’s The War Game on January 20 at 6:15 at the Walter Reade Theater as part of the War Against War sidebar program of the twenty-fourth annual New York Jewish Film Festival, which focuses on antiwar films from the 1950s and 1960s; the schedule also includes Gillo Pontecorvo’s Battle of Algiers, Kon Ichikawa’s Fires on the Plain, Konrad Wolf’s I Was Nineteen, and Jean-Luc Godard’s Les Carabiniers, centered by a panel discussion on January 19 at 3:00 at the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center (free with advance RSVP) with Kent Jones, Martha Rosler, Harrell Fletcher, and Trevor Paglen, moderated by Jens Hoffmann. Dr. Strangelove is part of the NYJFF as well, showing at the Walter Reade on January 18 at 9:15, introduced by Jennie Livingston.