this week in lectures, signings, panel discussions, workshops, and Q&As

ILLUSIONS REVEALED: RASHOMON

Akira Kurosawa masterpiece examines misperception and human fallibility

CABARET CINEMA: RASHOMON (Akira Kurosawa, 1950)
Rubin Museum of Art
150 West 17th St. at Seventh Ave.
Friday, March 1, free with $7 bar minimum, 9:30
212-620-5000
www.rmanyc.org

One of the most influential films of all time, Akira Kurosawa’s 1950 masterpiece stars Toshirô Mifune as a bandit accused of the brutal rape of a samurai’s wife (Machiko Kyo) and the murder of her husband (Masayuki Mori). However, four eyewitnesses tell a tribunal four different stories, each told in flashback as if the truth, forcing the characters — and the audience — to question the reality of what they see and experience. Kurosawa veteran Takashi Shimura — the Japanese Ward Bond — plays a local woodcutter, with Minoru Chiaka as the priest. The mesmerizing work, which won an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, is beautifully shot by Kazuo Miyagawa; Rashomon is nothing short of unforgettable. (What is forgettable is the English-language remake, The Outrage, directed by Martin Ritt and starring Edward G. Robinson, Paul Newman, Laurence Harvey, Claire Bloom, and William Shatner.) Rashomon is screening March 1 at 9:30 as part of the Rubin Museum Cabaret Cinema series “Illusions Revealed,” consisting of films that address misperception, and will be introduced by neuroscientist John J. Sakon. The series continues with such films as Rosemary’s Baby, Cinema Paradiso, Black Moon, and Cross of Iron through April 26.

FIRST SATURDAY — GRAVITY AND GRACE: MONUMENTAL WORKS BY EL ANATSUI

El Anatsui, “Ozone Layer,” aluminum and copper wire, 2010 (photograph by Andrew McAllister, courtesy of the Akron Art Museum)

Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway at Washington St.
Saturday, March 2, 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 celebrates the recent opening of “Gravity and Grace: Monumental Works by El Anatsui,” the first solo museum show by the West African artist who uses recycled material to create dazzling wall pieces, at its March free First Saturday program. (Anatsui’s “Pot of Wisdom” was recently on view at the Jack Shainman Gallery in Chelsea, and his “Broken Bridge II” can be seen along the High Line through next summer.) There will be African-influenced live performances by the Sway Machinery, Ria Boss, and Zozo Afrobeat; a curator talk on El Anatsui led by Kevin Dumouchelle; a screening of Jareth Merz’s An African Election, which is set in El Anatsui’s native Ghana; pop-up gallery talks honoring the sixth anniversary of the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art; an artist talk with Fernando Mastrangelo, whose work is featured in “Connecting Cultures: A World in Brooklyn”; and interactive collaborative projects including a group photo mosaic and a Brooklyn Kung Fu & Tai Chi Academy workshop.

FIRST TIME FEST: LITTLE FUGITIVE

Joey Norton goes on the adventure of a lifetime in Coney Island in underground indie classic LITTLE FUGITIVE

LITTLE FUGITIVE (Morris Engel, Ray Ashley, and Ruth Orkin, 1953)
Loews Village VII
66 Third Ave. at Eleventh St.
Friday, March 1, $15, 11:00 am
Festival runs March 1-4
646-580-1383
www.firsttimefest.com

One of the most influential and important — and vastly entertaining — works to ever come out of New York City, Morris Engel’s charming Little Fugitive will be having a special sixtieth anniversary tribute screening on March 1 at 11:00 at the inaugural First Time Fest, followed by a panel discussion with Mary Engel and Foster Hirsch. Written and directed with Ray Ashley and Ruth Orkin, Engel’s future wife, Little Fugitive follows the gritty, adorable exploits of seven-year-old wannabe cowboy Joey Norton (Richie Andrusco, in his only film role), who runs away to Coney Island after his older brother, Lennie (Richard Brewster), and his brother’s friends, Harry (Charlie Moss) and Charley (Tommy DeCanio), play a trick on the young boy, using ketchup to convince Joey that he accidentally killed Lennie. With their single mother (Winifred Cushing) off visiting their ailing mother, Joey heads out on his own, determined to escape the cops who are surely after him. But once he gets to Coney Island, he decides to take advantage of all the crazy things to be found on the beach, along the boardwalk, and in the surrounding area, including, if he can get the money, riding a real pony.

A no-budget black-and-white neo-Realist masterpiece shot by Engel with a specially designed lightweight camera that was often hidden so people didn’t know they were being filmed, Little Fugitive explores the many pleasures and pains of childhood and the innate value of home and family. As Joey wanders around Coney Island, he meets all levels of humanity, preparing him for the world that awaits as he grows older. Meanwhile, Engel gets into the nooks and crannies of the popular beach area, from gorgeous sunrises to beguiling shadows under the boardwalk. In creating their beautifully told tale, Engel, Ashley, and Orkin use both trained and nonprofessional actors, including Jay Williams as Jay, the sensitive pony ride man, and Will Lee, who went on to play Mr. Hooper on Sesame Street, as an understanding photographer, while Eddie Manson’s score continually references “Home on the Range.” Rough around the edges in all the right ways, Little Fugitive became a major influence on the French New Wave, with Truffaut himself singing its well-deserved praises. There’s really nothing quite like it, before or since. The underground classic, which won the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival in 1953, was nominated for a Best Screenplay Oscar, and was entered into the National Film Registry in 1997, will be presented in a newly restored 35mm print at the fest, which continues through March 4 with debut films from emerging and established directors.

FIRST TIME FEST

Amy Nicholson’s ZIPPER is among the debut films seeking to gain notice at the inaugural First Time Fest

The Players Club, 16 Gramercy Park South
Loews Village VII, 66 Third Ave. at Eleventh St.
March 1-4, $15 per screening, special passes $75-$500
646-580-1383
www.firsttimefest.com

Everyone remembers their first time — even Martin Scorsese, Gay Talese, Harry Belafonte, Michael Shannon, Ellen Burstyn, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Ryan, and other stars who will share their experiences and/or judge those of others at the inaugural First Time Fest. No, they won’t be discussing their sexual initiations. First Time Fest celebrates debut works by seminal and up-and-coming directors, held over the course of four days of screenings, panel discussions, and conversations. Along with such classic fare as Barbara Kopple’s Harlan County U.S.A., Darren Aronofsky’s Pi, John Huston’s The Maltese Falcon, Todd Solondz’s Welcome to the Dollhouse, Wes Anderson’s Bottle Rocket, and Todd Haynes’s Poison is such new fare as Benj Binks’s Mongolian Bling, Luciano Quilici’s I Love You All (Los Quiero a Todos), Seth Fisher’s Blumenthal, Amílie van Elmbt’s Headfirst (La Tête la Première), and Amy Nicholson’s Zipper. Belafonte and Shannon will participate in special intimate conversations, while panels includes such topics as “Diversity in Cinema,” “Show Me the Money,” “The Critical Eye,” “ADD — Transmedia Storytelling in the Crazed 21st Century,” “How They Did It,” and “Sell Baby Sell!” One of the new films will be awarded the grand prize of theatrical distribution, and Scorsese will present Aronofsky with the John Huston Award for Outstanding Achievement in Cinema.

MoMA SELECTS — POV: MY REINCARNATION

Documentary looks at the complex relationship between a father and son

DOCUMENTARY FORTNIGHT 2013 — MOMA’S INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL OF NONFICTION FILM AND MEDIA: MY REINCARNATION (Jennifer Fox, 2010)
MoMA Film, Museum of Modern Art
11 West 53rd St. between Fifth & Sixth Aves.
Saturday, March 2, 5:00
Festival runs February 27 – March 4
Tickets: $12, 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 beginning at 9:30 am
212-708-9400
www.moma.org
www.myreincarnationfilm.com

More than twenty years in the making, Jennifer Fox’s My Reincarnation tells the fascinating story of a very unusual father-son relationship amid the modern world of tulkus, or reincarnated Tibetan lamas. World-renowned high Tibetan Buddhist Master Chögyal Namkhai Norbu travels around the world teaching meditation and Dzogchen practice. He meets with the Dalai Lama, advises students and fans, signs copies of his many books, and builds support for his beleaguered native land, Tibet. But his son, Yeshi Silvano Namkhai, who was born in 1970 in Italy (where Rinpoche Namkhai Norbu taught at university from 1964 to 1992), had no desire to follow in his father’s footsteps and instead went into the computer business, starting a family and rejecting nearly everything his father believes in — including that Yeshi might just be the reincarnation of his great-uncle, Khyentse Rinpoche Chökyi Wangchug, and so is destined for a life of service and tradition. “Everybody knows about me and nobody knows me at all,” Yeshi says about trying to establish his own identity. Father and son and the rest of the family allowed Fox remarkable access, holding nothing back as they talk about their lives and each other; Yeshi is particularly vocal about his father’s treatment of him over the years. But soon Yeshi has a change of heart, and the documentary takes an unexpected turn. Fox, who has previously made such films as Beirut: The Last Home Movie, Flying: Confessions of a Free Woman, and An American Love Story, shot more than one thousand hours of footage, which she edited down to a tight seventy-five-minutes, including archival and newsreel footage as well. As much as it is about a father and a son, My Reincarnation is also about the old vs. the new, tradition vs. modernization, private love vs. public responsibility, the spiritual vs. the technological, and, above all, familial legacy. My Reincarnation is screening at MoMA on March 2 at 5:00 as part of the “MoMA Selects: POV” section of “Documentary Fortnight 2013: MoMA’s International Festival of Nonfiction Film and Media” and will be followed by a Q&A with the director; the POV portion, which runs February 27 to March 4, celebrates a quarter-century of the award-winning PBS program POV and also includes such films as Marlon Riggs’s Tongues Untied, Freida Lee Mock’s Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision, Robert Kenner’s Food, Inc., and Alan Berliner’s Nobody’s Business. “As we celebrate our twenty-fifth anniversary on PBS, MoMA’s retrospective program allows us to review our history, share insights about documentary craft and culture with the public, and celebrate with the indie filmmaking community,” POV co-executive producer Cynthia López said in a statement. “The ways in which documentaries have contributed to our culture will be a focus of conversations at the screenings. We hope the public will find that these documentaries inform, entertain, and challenge conventional wisdom.”

PARK CHAN-WOOK: STOKER

India (Mia Wasikowska) and Uncle Charlie (Matthew Goode) develop a rather unusual relationship in STOKER

STOKER (Park Chan-wook, 2013)
Museum of the Moving Image
35th Ave. at 36th St., Astoria
Thursday, February 28, $20, 7:00
Series runs through March 3
718-777-6800
www.movingimage.us
www.foxsearchlight.com/stoker

Korean auteur Park Chan-wook has made some of the most suspenseful and violent films of the young century, beginning with the military thriller Joint Security Area and continuing with the Vengeance trilogy, consisting of Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, Oldboy, and Lady Vengeance, as well as Thirst and the romantic comedy I’m a Cyborg But That’s OK. A master of mood, Park finally makes his long-awaited English-language debut with Stoker, a creepy, atmospheric work that evokes Alfred Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt, Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby, Michael Haneke’s Funny Games, Paul Wendikos’s The Mephisto Waltz, the television show Dark Shadows, and Richard Donner’s The Omen while also managing to be wholly original. Rising Australian actress Mia Wasikowska (In Treatment, The Kids Are All Right) stars as India Stoker, a shy, introverted high school student whose father, Richard (Dermot Mulroney), has just died in a terrible accident and whose mother, Evelyn (Nicole Kidman), is too quick to grow close with Richard’s brother, Charlie (Matthew Goode) — whom India and her mom didn’t even know existed until he just showed up at the funeral. Uncle Charlie seems to have a mysterious power over people and a chilling need to control situations, especially when it comes to those who know about his secret past, including the old housekeeper, Mrs. McGarrick (Phyllis Somerville), and Charlie’s aunt, Gin (Jacki Weaver). He also takes great pleasure in placing himself firmly in the middle of a potential incestuous love triangle with Evelyn and India. But once India learns more than she ever wanted to know about her uncle, she is both repulsed by and attracted to what he is capable of. Written and coproduced by actor Wentworth Miller (The Human Stain, Prison Break), Stoker is another compelling mood piece from Park, who creates a gripping, fearful, claustrophobic world inside the Stoker’s large Nashville mansion. He releases information ever-so-slowly over the course of the film’s ninety-nine minutes, resulting in plenty of frustration as well as suspense. The look of the film, courtesy of production designer Thérèse DePrez and cinematographer Chung Chung-hoon, often has a dated, 1950s feel to it, even though it is set in the present day, with flat colors that offset India’s black-and-white shoes. The film suffers from several leaps of faith Park requires the audience to make, asking them to forgive some relatively unforgivable plot holes, and Goode is not quite convincing enough as Charlie, but Wasikowska’s portrayal of the troubled young woman is riveting, and everything comes around full circle in the shattering conclusion. Stoker, which opens theatrically on March 1, is having a special advance screening on February 28 as part of the Museum of the Moving Image tribute to Park and will be followed by a discussion with the director; the series continues through March 3 with Park’s Oldboy, Joint Security Area, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, Lady Vengeance, and a trio of shorts (Night Fishing, N.E.P.A.L. Never Ending Peace and Love, and Cut).

SPECIAL PREVIEW: HAVA NAGILA (THE MOVIE)

Documentary delves into the fascinating history behind traditional Jewish song that became an international sensation

HAVA NAGILA (THE MOVIE) (Roberta Grossman, 2012)
JCC in Manhattan
334 Amsterdam Ave. at West 76th St.
Thursday, February 28, $10, 7:00
646-505-5708
www.havanagilamovie.com
www.jccmanhattan.org

“What’s up with this song? So kitschy, yet so profound,” director and narrator Roberta Grossman says at the beginning of her rollicking documentary, Hava Nagila (The Movie). “And what’s the deal with the chair?” A staple at Jewish celebrations, primarily weddings and bar/bat mitzvahs, “Hava Nagila” instantly gets friends and family members out on the dance floor, forming a circle and doing the Hora. Grossman delves into the history and mystery of the catchy song, which over the years has been performed by an unlikely crew that has included Harry Belafonte, Connie Francis, Glen Campbell, Johnny Yune, and Regina Spektor, all of whom appear in the film and discuss the tune’s popularity. (There are also archival performances from all around the world as well as an anti-“Hava” song from Bob Dylan.) Also putting “Hava Nagila” into perspective are Yiddish theater veteran Leonard Nimoy, communications professor Josh Kun, and KlezKamp founder Henry Sapoznik, a “Hava” hater who says with a more than a touch of cynicism, “It’s relentless. It’s resilient. But then again, so are cockroaches,” a statement that exemplifies Grossman’s playful attitude, exemplified by her corny captioning and clever clips from such TV shows and movies as Laugh-In, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Thoroughly Modern Millie, The Danny Kaye Show, A Serious Man, Wedding Crashers, History of the World Part I, and Fiddler on the Roof. But she also reveals another side to the song, as described by professor James Loeffler, who explains, “‘Hava’ is a portal into a century and a half of Jewish history.” Grossman ( Blessed Is the Match: The Life and Death of Hannah Senesh) sets off on what she calls a “Hava Quest,” venturing to the village of Sadagora in Ukraine, the birthplace of the song, and later meeting with two warring families battling over authorship of the words and music. She traces its impact on the development of the State of Israel and the Jewish migration to suburban America, and, yes, she lays out precisely what the words of the song mean. Like the song itself, Hava Nagila (The Movie) is a fun and fanciful frolic into the fascinating story behind one of the most famous songs that so many know so little about. The film opens March 1 in New York, but you can catch a special sneak preview on February 28 at 7:00 at the JCC in Manhattan, followed by a conversation with Grossman.