this week in film and television

HOT AND HUMID: SUMMER FILMS FROM THE ARCHIVES — A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM

Warner Bros. production of Shakespeare play is a bizarre classic

A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM (Max Reinhardt & William Dieterle, 2004)
MoMA Film
Museum of Modern Art
11 West 53rd St. between Fifth & Sixth Aves.
Thursday, August 11, 4:30; Friday, August 19, 4:00
Series runs through September 7
Tickets: $10, in person only, may be applied to museum admission within thirty days, same-day screenings free with museum admission, available at Film and Media Desk
212-708-9400
www.moma.org

Max Reinhardt and William Dieterle’s 1935 adaptation of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is one freakishly weird flick. In a misty forest, fairies go around sprinkling love potions on sleeping humans, creating mixed-up relationships that even venture out into the realm of bestiality. “The course of true love never did run smooth,” Lysander tells Hermia, and that sums up this star-studded screwball comedy of a sort. Warner Bros. put together quite a lineup for this big-time production, with plenty of strange casting choices that end up working rather splendidly. James Cagney prances about as Bottom, Dick Powell plays Lysander, Olivia de Havilland makes her film debut as Hermia, Joe E. Brown is Flute, Billy Barty plays Mustardseed, and a teenage Mickey Rooney offers a delirious take on Puck, howling at the moon with sheer glee. The wacky movie also features Ian Hunter, Arthur Treacher, Victor Jory, and Anita Louise as the fairy queen Titania. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which was nominated for four Oscars, including Best Picture, and won for Best Cinematography and Best Film Editing, will be screening August 11 at 4:30 and August 19 at 4:00 as part of MoMA’s “Hot and Humid: Summer Films from the Archives” series, which continues through September 7 with such seasonal dramas as Hou Hsiao-hsien’s A Summer at Grandpa’s, Federico Fellini’s I vitelloni, Ingmar Bergman’s Summer with Monika, André Téchiné’s Wild Reeds, Michelangelo Antonioni’s L’Avventura, Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing, and Steven Spielberg’s Jaws.

HILARIOUS HAIKU FOR BROOKLYN / SPIRITED AWAY

All sorts of folk will be heading into Brooklyn for humorous haiku and the Miyazaki classic SPIRITED AWAY

SPIRITED AWAY (SEN TO CHIHIRO NO KAMIKAKUSHI) (Hayao Miyazaki, 2001)
Leon S. Kaiser Park
2401 Neptune Ave. at West 27th St.
Friday, August 12, free, 7:00
718-907-0709
www.nausicaa.net
www.nycgovparks.org

Prepare to have your spirits lifted up and away in this sensational animated feature from Japanese master Hayao Miyazaki, who made one of our all-time faves, 1992’s Porco Rosso (Kurenai No Buta). Ten-year-old Chihiro is unhappy about moving to a new home despite her parents’ best efforts to convince her otherwise. When her father takes a wrong turn on the road, the family ends up in an oddly deserted village that Chihiro soon finds out is a lot more than it seems. Chihiro’s adventures through this dreamlike, surreal, magical place filled with bizarre characters and evil beings are unforgettable, with nuances and references from such diverse works as The Wizard Of Oz and The Seventh Seal. The sheer visual beauty of the animation is staggering; many of the backgrounds are reminiscent of Impressionism. The film includes the voice talents of Daveigh Chase (Chihiro), Jason Marsden (Haku), Susan Egan (Lin), Michael Chiklis (Chihiro’s father), Lauren Holly (Chihiro’s mother), Suzanne Pleshette (Yubaba and Zeniba), John Ratzenberger (assistant manager), David Ogden Stiers (Kamaji), and Tara Strong (baby Boh). Joe Hisaishi’s maudlin music is way overpraised, as usual, but this Japanese box-office champ deservedly won the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival and was named Best Asian Film at the Hong Kong Film Awards. Spirited Away is screening August 12 at Mark Twain Circle in Leon S. Kaiser Park on Gravesend Bay, where it will be preceded by “Hilarious Haiku for Brooklyn,” spoken-word poetry presented by Staten Island OutLOUD.

EPIX MOVIE FREE FOR ALL: ANNIE HALL

Woody Allen impersonation contest will precede free screening of ANNIE HALL in Coney Island

ANNIE HALL (Woody Allen, 1977)
Coney Island Beach
Boardwalk at West 12th St.
Monday, August 8, free, 7:00
www.epixhd.com

One of the funniest, most-quoted romantic comedies in film history, Woody Allen’s Annie Hall is a pure delight from start to finish. It’s ostensibly a luuuuuurve story about a nebbishy Jew (Allen as Alvy Singer) and the ultimate WASPy goy (Diane Keaton as the title character), but it’s really about so much more: large vibrating eggs, right turns on red lights, television, Existential Motifs in Russian Literature, California, slippery crustaceans, driving through Plutonium, dead sharks, Freud, Hitler, Leopold and Loeb, religion, cocaine, Shakespeare in the Park, Buick-size spiders, planet Earth, and, well, la-di-da, la-di-da, la la. One of the all-time great New York City movies, it’s partly set in Coney Island, where Alvy grew up under the old Thunderbolt roller coaster. Tonight, Epix, in conjunction with Rooftop Films, will be screening the multiple Oscar winner — for Best Original Screenplay (Allen and Marshall Brickman), Best Director (Allen), Best Actress (Keaton), and Best Film — not far from that site, on the boardwalk by West 12th St. It will be preceded by a live DJ at 7:00, followed by Kirsten Lepore’s charming beach-set short, Bottle, and, yes, a Woody Allen impersonation contest. You know you so want to participate. Which section would you quote from? We’re still deciding which scene is our favorite….

KUROSAWA: YOJIMBO

Toshiro Mifune can’t believe what he sees in YOJIMBO.

Toshirō Mifune can’t believe what he sees in YOJIMBO, being shown in HD at Symphony Space

YOJIMBO (Akira Kurosawa, 1961)
Symphony Space, Leonard Nimoy Thalia
2537 Broadway at 95th St.
Sunday, August 7, 3:00
Series continues through August 28
212-864-5400
www.symphonyspace.org

Kuwabatake Sanjuro (Toshirō Mifune) is a lone samurai on the road following the end of the Tokugawa dynasty in yet another of Akira Kurosawa’s unforgettable masterpieces. Sanjuro comes to a town with two warring factions and plays each one off the other as a hired hand. Neo’s battles with myriad Agent Smiths are nothing compared to Yojimbo’s magnificent swordfights against growing bands of warriors that include the evil Unosuke (Tatsuya Nakadai), who is in possession of a new weapon that shoots bullets. Try watching this film and not think of several Clint Eastwood Westerns (including Sergio Leone’s pasta remake, A Fistful of Dollars) as well as High Noon. The film is being screened as part of Symphony Space’s “Kurosawa” series, featuring the first time ever many of the Japanese auteur’s finest films are being shown on the big screen in HD; coming up is High and Low on August 13, Hidden Fortress on August 14, Stray Dog on August 27, and Rashomon on August 28.

HOLLYWOOD MUSICALS OF THE 1970s & 80s, PART 2: THE 1980s — GET CRAZY

Malcolm McDowell gets plenty crazy as rock god Reggie Wanker in Allan Arkush’s GET CRAZY

GET CRAZY (Allan Arkush, 1983)
Anthology Film Archives
32 Second Ave. at Second St.
Saturday, August 6, 7:00
Series continues through August 9
212-505-5181
www.anthologyfilmarchives.org

One of the most underrated, little-seen rock-and-roll movies ever made, Get Crazy should be a cult classic. Directed by Allan (Rock ‘n’ Roll High School) Arkush, Get Crazy evokes the closing of the Fillmore East as Neil Allen (Daniel Stern) and Willy Loman (Gail Edwards) help put together a New Year’s Eve farewell concert for the beloved Saturn Theater, which the conniving Colin Beverly (Ed Begley Jr.) is trying to steal out from under Max Wolfe (Allen Garfield). Among the special guests at the show are Bill Henderson as the Muddy Waters clone King Blues, Captain Cloud (Howard Kaylan of the Turtles) and the Rainbow Telegraph, and Nada (Kid Creole Coconut Lori Eastside) with Piggy (Lee Ving of Fear), but the movie is stolen by Malcolm McDowell as the Mick Jagger ripoff Reggie Wanker, who literally lets his member do the talking, and Lou Reed as the Dylan/Donovan homage Auden, a folksinger desperate to write a song before the show, so he spends most of the film riding around in a cab, rambling on about whatever is right in front of him. And be sure to keep an eye out for John Densmore, Fabian, Bobby Sherman, Clint Howard, Linnea Quigley, and Paul Bartel. In addition to the live numbers, the soundtrack includes songs by Sparks, Marshall Crenshaw, the Ramones, and Reed, whose awesome “Little Sister” plays over the closing credits. Extremely silly but still loads of fun Get Crazy is screening August 6 at Anthology Film Archives as part of the series Hollywood Musicals of the 1970s & 80s, Part 2, which continues through August 9 with such classics and not-so-classics as Walter Hill’s Streets of Fire, John Landis’s The Blues Brothers, Robert Altman’s Popeye, John Waters’s Cry-Baby, and David Byrne’s True Stories.

FIRST SATURDAYS: CARIBBEAN COUNTDOWN

The Cool and Deadly will play at Brooklyn Museum First Saturday program on August 6

Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway
Saturday, August 6, free, 5:00 – 11:00 (some events require free tickets distributed in advance at the Visitor Center)
212-864-5400
www.brooklynmuseum.org

The Brooklyn Museum is getting its annual Caribbean celebration under way early this year with a full slate of activities as part of its free August First Saturdays program. Things get going at 5:00 with Tribal Legacy leading a funky reggae get-down. At 6:00, visitors have their choice of curator Rich Aste giving a talk on the new acquisition “Free Women of Color With Their Children and Servants in a Landscape” and a screening of Frances-Anne Solomon’s 1995 Trinidad drama What My Mother Told Me. At 6:30, Trinidad native Hazelle Goodman will perform her one-woman show, Don’t Get Me Started, and the Hands-on Art workshop will offer participants the chance to decorate fabrics with Afro-Caribbean designs. At 7:00, NYU associate professor of anthropology Aisha Khan will discuss South Asian and Islamic cultural influences on the museum’s holdings. At 8:00, DJ Spice will get the monthly dance party going, with the Cool and Deadly and DJ Jillionaire highlighting the Afro-Punk Festival at 8:30. As always, the galleries are open until 11:00, giving everyone the chance to see such exhibitions as “Vishnu: Hinduism’s Blue-Skinned Savior,” “reOrder: An Architectural Environment by Situ Studio,” “Lorna Simpson: Gathered,” “Skylar Fein: Black Lincoln for Dooky Chase,” “Split Second: Indian Paintings,” “Four Bathers by Degas and Bonnard,” and “Sam Taylor-Wood: Ghosts.”