Jimmy Stewart and Grace Kelly might have just stumbled into the middle of a murder mystery in Hitchcock classic
REAR WINDOW (Alfred Hitchcock, 1954)
BAMcinématek, BAM Rose Cinemas
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
July 13-18
Series runs July 13-26
212-415-5500
www.bam.org
One of Alfred Hitchcock’s best films is an unforgettable voyeuristic thriller starring James Stewart as temporarily wheelchair-bound photojournalist L. B. Jeffries and Grace Kelly as his society-girl friend (and extremely well dressed) Lisa Carol Fremont. Bored out of his mind, Jeffries grabs a pair of binoculars and starts spying on the apartments across the courtyard from him, each one its own television show, including a musical comedy, a lonely romance, an exercise program, and, most ominously, perhaps a murder mystery. Ever the reporter, Jeffries decides to go after the possible killer, Lars Thorwald (Raymond Burr), and he’ll risk his life — and Lisa’s — to find out the truth. Sensational from start to finish, Rear Window works on so many levels, you’ll discover something new every time you watch it. Rear Window is screening July 13-18 at BAM Rose Cinemas, kicking off BAMcinématek’s “Grace Kelly: The Cool Blonde” series, honoring the career of the gorgeous, talented actress who made eleven films between 1951 and 1956 before being swept off her feet by Prince Rainier, starting a family, and building an international reputation that has continued even after she died in a car accident in 1982 at the age of fifty-two. The series also includes such other Kelly classics as High Society, High Noon, To Catch a Thief, and The Country Girl as well as her lesser-known debut, Fourteen Hours.
“What difference does it make — black, white, yellow? They are just kids,” says Olga Nenya in the intriguing documentary Family Portrait in Black and White. Evoking the classic nursery rhyme about an old woman who lives in a shoe, Nenya runs a foster home in the Ukraine suburb of Sumy, where she takes care of as many as twenty-seven children (including four of her own), most of whom are mixed-race boys and girls abandoned by their parents, primarily local women and African men who were studying in Eastern Europe. Because of their heritage, the children are despised by neighbors, the growing, violent neo-Nazi movement, and the government, which gives Nenya very little money but then sends inspectors who decry the living conditions in her house. Canadian filmmaker Julia Ivanova, who wrote, directed, and edited the eighty-five-minute documentary in addition to serving as cinematographer, follows the kids as they do their daily chores, go to school, spend the summer with families in Italy, and look forward to the day when they are old enough to go out on their own, either to be legally adopted or to attend university. For as much as most of them love and respect Nenya, she can be a tough, dominating taskmaster with old-fashioned values who selfishly holds on to her flock even when better opportunities are out there for some of her children. A product of Stalinism, Nenya can be dictatorial, yet she clearly loves and cares deeply about her children; as Ivanova focuses in on Kiril, Roman, Anya, and Andrey, each of whom has serious issues about the way they are being raised, the individual relationships become more and more tense. A multiple-award-winning international festival favorite, Family Portrait in Black and White is a compelling look at racism, value systems, and just what family means in today’s ever-changing society. 
Nancy Savoca’s Union Square arrives like an unwanted relative suddenly showing up on the doorstep carrying a heavy suitcase. But, as in real life, family often wins out as long-standing issues rise to the surface and are dealt with in both painful and humorous ways. As the film opens, the wild and wacky Lucy (Mira Sorvino) emerges from the Union Square subway station, ready for some shopping and a tryst with Jay, who angers and frustrates her by not wanting to see her. In a rage, an out-of-control Lucy visits her estranged sister, the tightly wound Jenny (Tammy Blanchard), insinuating herself into her life, deciding that she and her dog, Murray, just have to stay there for a little while until she gets herself together. Jenny is disgusted, embarrassed, and annoyed by her freewheeling, overemotional sister, who drinks, smokes, and says what’s on her mind, whereas Jenny has carved out a carefully constructed existence for herself, pretending she is a good girl from Maine instead of a woman with a past from the Bronx, as she prepares to marry the preppy, organic, and health-obsessed Bill (Mike Doyle). Things come to a head on Thanksgiving, when secrets are revealed and everyone has to face some hard truths. Although inconsistent and, like Lucy, extremely annoying at first, Union Square, featuring a bumpy script by Savoca (Dogfight, Household Saints) and Mary Tobler and cameos by Daphne Rubin-Vega, Michael Rispoli, and Patti LuPone, eventually settles down as the two sisters slowly reconnect. The eighty-minute film was made on a shoestring budget with a skeleton crew and shot by Lisa Leone in HD using the small, handheld Canon 5D, with much of it set in producer Neda Armian’s real loft overlooking Union Square. Stick around for Madeleine Peyroux’s lovely rendition of Warren Zevon’s “Keep Me in Your Heart for a While,” which plays over the closing credits. Savoca will be on hand opening night at the Angelika for a Q&A following the 7:00 screening.
