Alejandro Jodorowsky takes viewers on quite an acid trip in surreal Western EL TOPO
THE CINEMATIC ALCHEMY OF ALEJANDRO JODOROWSKY: EL TOPO (Alejandro Jodorowsky, 1970)
Museum of Arts & Design
2 Columbus Circle at 58th St. & Broadway
Thursday, September 23, $10, 7:00
212-299-7777
www.madmuseum.org
Chilean-born Mexican filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky’s EL TOPO is a psychedelic head trip, an acid Western that will blow your mind. Jodorowsky stars as the title character, a gunslinger traveling through a deserted landscape accompanied by his naked young son, who already knows his way around a firearm. After coming upon a town that has been decimated by a nasty group of marauders working for the Colonel, El Topo seeks violent revenge, eventually taking off with a woman and leaving his boy behind as he meets four masters on his path to proving he is the best there is. But soon El Topo is praying for redemption with a community of inbred cripples trapped in a cave. EL TOPO is a wild and bizarre journey through religious imagery, romance, and vengeance, a surreal spaghetti Western strained through the mad mind of Jodorowsky, widely hailed as the creator of the midnight movie. The film melds Bergman with Leone, Tod Browning’s FREAKS with Hiroshi Inagaki’s Samurai Trilogy, filtered through Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima’s LONE WOLF AND CUB. It’s like nothing you’ve ever seen before and, despite your better instincts, will lure you into the cult of Jodorowsky. EL TOPO kicks off the Blood into Gold: The Cinematic Alchemy of Alejandro Jodorowsky series at the Museum of Arts & Design, which continues with screenings of THE HOLY MOUNTAIN (1973) on September 24, FANDO Y LIS (1968) on September 30, SANTA SANGRE (1989) on October 1, Jodorowsky’s LA CRAVATE and Louis Mouchet’s LA CONSTELLATION JODOROWSKY (1994) on October 7, and RAINBOW THIEF (with Peter O’Toole and Omar Sharif!) on October 8. Jodorowsky himself will be on hand to teach a sold-out master class on September 25 that should be quite an event.
After celebrating the Jewish New Year, the JCC in Manhattan is holding its annual open house, a free day to get to know the very busy Upper West Side institution. The myriad activities include a Kidzapalooza concert, a children’s sports expo, a postnatal Pilates boot camp, a video contest, skin cancer screenings, and workouts, demonstrations, and lessons in yoga, meditation, self-defense, Gypsy dance, indoor cycling, life coaching, Hebrew, low-flying trapeze, sand art, time management, cooking, dating, salsa, and much more, with special classes for kids, new mothers, and seniors, along with prizes and membership discounts. The afternoon ends with a screening of the eye-opening film THE LOTTERY.
One of the greatest documentaries ever made about New York will be shown in a stunning 35mm restoration at Film Forum September 17-23. ON THE BOWERY offers a new look at an underground classic that caused quite a stir upon its release in 1956, winning prizes at the Venice Film Festival while earning criticism at home for daring to portray the grim reality of America’s dark underbelly. After spending six months living with the poor, destitute alcoholics on Skid Row as research, idealistic young filmmaker Lionel Rogosin spent the next four months making ON THE BOWERY, a remarkable examination of the forgotten men of New York, ne’er-do-wells who can’t find jobs, sleep on the street, and will do just about anything for another drink. Rogosin centers the film around the true story of Ray Salyer, a journeyman railroad drifter stopping off in New York City seeking temporary employment. Salyer is quickly befriended by Gorman Hendricks, who not only shows Salyer the ropes but also manages to slyly take advantage of him. Although the film follows a general structure scripted by Mark Sufrin, much of it is improvised and shot on the sly, in glorious black and white by Richard Bagley. The sections in which Bagley turns his camera on the streets, showing the decrepit neighborhood under the El, set to Charles Mills’s subtle, jazzy score and marvelously edited by Carl Lerner, are pure poetry, yet another reason why ON THE BOWERY is an American treasure. The film is screening with THE PERFECT TEAM, a behind-the-scenes look at the making of ON THE BOWERY directed by Rogosin’s son, Michael, which includes a terrific 1999 interview with Lionel in which he talks about his attempt to get James Agee on board, his firing of Helen Levitt as editor, the relationships he developed with the cast and crew, and his intense desire to get at the truth.
Ben Affleck, who displayed great skill as a director in his debut feature, 2007’s GONE BABY GONE, has done it again with his follow-up, the romantic thriller THE TOWN. Affleck, who also cowrote the script, stars as Doug MacRay, the leader of a small group of bank robbers in tough Charlestown, Massachusetts, the bank robbery capital of America. As the film opens, the thieves are just hitting a bank and are forced to take a hostage, manager Claire Keesey (Rebecca Hall). After later letting her go unharmed, they soon realize that she lives in their neighborhood and might be able to recognize one of them, so Doug starts hanging around her, pretending to be interested in her so he can tap her for information. Meanwhile, Boston cop Dino (Titus Welliver) and FBI Special Agent Frawley (Jon Hamm) are getting closer to the gang, who continue to pull off daring heists regardless of the heat on them. Although there are a handful of plot holes you could drive an armored truck through, THE TOWN ends up being a compelling action film and love story, with car chases, massive shootouts, and a tender relationship as Doug begins to fall for Claire, and vice versa, even though the truth threatens to blow everything apart. Also threatening to blow everything apart is Doug’s right-hand man, Jem (Jeremy Renner, channeling James Cagney in WHITE HEAT), who likes hurting and killing way too much. Affleck, who as a director allows his actors a large amount of freedom, has gotten fine performances across the board; the cast also includes Pete Postlethwaite as an underworld florist, Chris Cooper as Doug’s long-incarcerated father, Blake Lively as a drug-dealing tramp, and Boston rapper Slaine, who contributed songs to the soundtrack as well. The film, based on the Chuck Hogan novel PRINCE OF THIEVES, also benefits from Affleck’s genuine affection for the place where he grew up, shooting on location and setting the finale in a world-famous landmark.
