Tag Archives: bamcinematek

NOSTALGIA FOR THE LIGHT

NOSTALGIA FOR THE LIGHT offers a breathtaking look at memory and the past, from above and below

NOSTALGIA FOR THE LIGHT (NOSTALGIA DE LA LUZ) (Patricio Guzmán, 2010)
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at Third St.
Opens Friday, March 18
212-924-7771
www.ifccenter.com
www.nostalgiaforthelight.com

Master documentarian Patricio Guzmán’s Nostalgia for the Light is a brilliant examination of memory and the past, one of the most intelligent and intellectual films you’re ever likely to see. But don’t let that scare you off — it is also a vastly entertaining, deeply emotional work that will blow you away with its stunning visuals and heartbreaking stories. Guzmán, who chronicled the assassination of Salvador Allende and the rise of Augusto Pinochet in the landmark three-part political documentary The Battle of Chile, this time visits the Atacama Desert in his native Chile, considered to be the driest place on Earth. Situated ten thousand feet above sea level, the desert is home to La Silla and Paranal Observatories, where astronomers come from all over the world to get unobstructed views of the stars and galaxies, unimpeded by pollution or electronic interference. However, it is also a place where women still desperately search for the remains of their loved ones murdered by Pinochet’s military regime and hidden away in mass graves. In addition, archaeologists have discovered mummies and other fossilized bones dating from pre-Columbian times there. Guzmán seamlessly weaves together these three journeys into the past — as astronomers such as Gaspar Galaz and Luis Hernandez note, by the time they see stars either with the naked eye or through the lens of their massive telescopes, the celestial bodies have been long dead — creating a fascinating narrative that is as thrilling as it is breathtaking. Constructing a riveting tale of memory, Guzmán speaks with architect Miguel Lawner, who draws detailed maps of the Chacabuca desert concentration camp where he and so many other political prisoners were held; Valentina, a young astronomer whose grandparents had to give up her parents in order to save her when she was a baby; archaeologist Lautaro Nunez, who digs up mummies while trying to help the women find “los desaparecidos”; and Victoria and Violeta, who regularly comb the barren landscape in search of their relatives. “I wish the telescopes didn’t just look into the sky but could also see through the earth so that we could find them,” Violeta says at one point. Spectacularly photographed by Katell Dijan, Nostalgia for the Light is a modern masterpiece, an unparalleled cinematic experience that has to be seen to be believed. (Guzmán will be at the IFC Center for the 8:10 screenings on Friday and Saturday night to talk about the film, and BAMcinématek will be presenting “Obstinate Memories: The Documentaries of Patricio Guzmán” April 1-7, including Nostalgia for the Light, The Battle of Chile, The Pinochet Case, Robinson Crusoe Island, and Salvador Allende.)

DENEUVE: BELLE DE JOUR

Catherine Deneuve is captivating in Luis Buñuel’s BELLE DE JOUR

BELLE DE JOUR (Luis Buñuel, 1967)
BAMcinématek
BAM Rose Cinemas
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
Sunday, March 13, 2:00, 4:30, 6:50, 9:15
Series runs through March 31
718-636-4100
www.bam.org

Based on the 1928 novel by Joseph Kessel, whose L’armée des ombres was turned into Jean-Pierre Melville’s 1969 French Resistance drama Army of Shadows, Luis Buñuel’s Belle de Jour stars the elegant Catherine Deneuve as Séverine Serizy, a bored housewife who finds the excitement she’s missing at home by becoming a high-class prostitute by day, when her husband (Jean Sorel) is at work. But when one of her clients, Marcel (Pierre Clémenti), starts falling for her, her life turns more complicated than she’s ever imagined in all her fantasies. Buñuel won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival for this erotically charged story that features a shocking ending.Belle de Jour is screening March 13 as part of BAMcinématek’s “Deneuve” series, which continues through March 31 with such films as Le Sauvage (Call Me Savage) (Jean-Paul Rappeneau, 1975), Don’t Touch the White Woman (Touche pas à la femme blanche) (Marco Ferreri, 1975), Scene of the Crime (Le lieu du crime) (André Téchiné, 1986), and Donkey Skin (Peau d’âne) (Jacques Demy, 1970).

DENEUVE: CHANGING TIMES

Catherine Deneuve will be at BAM Friday night to kick off twenty-five-film retrospective with REPULSION (above) and POTICHE

BAMcinématek
BAM Rose Cinemas
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
March 4-31
718-636-4100
www.bam.org

They don’t make ’em like Catherine Deneuve anymore. The elegant French superstar, still ravishing at sixty-seven, has had a remarkable career that is still going strong. The longtime Chanel No. 5 spokesmodel has appeared in more than one hundred films, including too many classics to list here, but here are just a few: The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (Jacques Demy, 1964), Repulsion (Roman Polanski, 1965), The Creatures (Agnès Varda, 1966), Belle de Jour (Luis Buñuel, 1967), The Last Metro (François Truffaut, 1980), Time Regained (Raoul Ruiz, 1999), and A Christmas Tale (Arnaud Desplechin, 2008), all of which are part of an exciting twenty-five-film retrospective at BAM running March 4-31, presented in collaboration with the Cultural Services of the French Embassy and Institut Francais. No mere sex kitten, Deneuve has taken chances from the very beginning, choosing challenging roles and working with such directors as André Téchiné, Louis Malle, François Ozon, Manoel de Oliveira, Marco Ferreri, and others, in addition to those mentioned above. Following last month’s appearance at BAM by her Hunger costar Susan Sarandon, Deneuve will be at the Brooklyn institution Friday to participate in a sold-out Q&A with Ozon and Judith Godrèche after a sneak peek of her latest, Ozon’s Potiche; she will also introduce the 9:40 showing of Repulsion that same night. Deneuve is a marvel to watch on the big screen, mixing intelligence with beauty, vulnerability with a powerful emotional depth and strength that will surprise those who have not seen many of her films. Now is a great time to catch up, and in Brooklyn, of all places.

Catherine Deneuve stars as a bored housewife stalked by an old acquaintance in CHANGING TIMES

CHANGING TIMES (LES TEMPS QUI CHANGENT) (André Téchiné, 2004)
Saturday, March 5, 4:30
www.1000films.com

In 1980, Catherine Deneuve and Gérard Depardieu teamed up for the first time in Claude Berri’s Je Vous Aime, followed by François Truffaut’s The Last Metro. They appeared in several more films together but not in dual leading roles since François Dupeyron’s A Strange Place to Meet (1988). Fortunately, in the ensuing years, they have been more successful than the characters they play in André Téchiné’s absorbing drama Changing Times. Deneuve, as beautiful as ever in her early sixties, stars as Cécile, a lonely woman feeling way too settled in her role as wife, mother, and radio host. Depardieu is Antoine, a lonely engineer who has been burning a candle for Cécile, his first love, for more than thirty years. When her grown son, Sami (Malik Zidi), comes to visit, he surprises everyone by bringing his girlfriend, Nadia (Lubna Azabal), and her young son, Said (Jabi Elomri). Both Sami and Nadia have other reasons for coming to Tangier: He wants to see his very good friend Bilal (Nadem Rachati), a groundskeeper for a rich family, and she wants to see her twin sister, Aicha (Azabal), a devout Muslim who works in McDonald’s. Meanwhile, Cécile’s husband, the younger Nathan (Gilbert Melki), hangs around the house, goes for long swims, and takes care of Antoine’s smashed nose. Depardieu is unnerving as a creepy stalker, and Deneuve is enchanting as the bored wife; Téchiné (Scene of the Crime, Alice et Martin) treats their awkward relationship with intelligence and subtlety, allowing it to play out in unexpected ways.

SEVERELY DAMAGED: A TALE OF TWO SISTERS

A TALE OF TWO SISTERS is part of Kim Jee-woon retrospective at BAM

THE CINEMA OF KIM JEE-WOON: A TALE OF TWO SISTERS (Kim Jee-woon, 2003)
BAMcinématek
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
Sunday, February 27, 2:00, 4:30, 6:50, 9:15
Series continues through March 2
718-636-4100
www.bam.org

Returning home after having been hospitalized for mental reasons, sisters Su-mi (Im Su-jeong) and Su-yeon (Moon Geun Young) find their house very different — in addition to their father (Kim Kap-su) and his second wife, Eun-joo (Yeom Jeong-ah), there appears to be an unexplained presence that seems particularly interested in the extremely vulnerable Su-yeon. As tensions mount between the girls and the wicked stepmother, more and more blood shows up, as well as far too many confusing twists and turns. Though there is a lot to admire in this gripping psychological thriller, you’ll be scratching your head at the end, wondering just what the heck you have just seen. An Asian mix of The Sixth Sense (M. Night Shyamalan, 1999), Sisters (Brian DePalma, 1973), and the Cinderella fairy tale, Kim Jee-woon’s film has plenty of creeps that unfortunately never come together. Still, it was recently remade by Hollywood as The Uninvited, directed by Charles and Thomas Guard and starring David Strathairn and Elizabeth Banks.

A Tale of Two Sisters is screening February 27 as part of BAMcinématek’s “Severely Damaged: The Cinema of Kim Jee-woon,” which began last night with the Korean director’s latest, I Saw the Devil (2010), and continues today with A Bittersweet Life (2005), The Quiet Family (1998) on February 28, The Foul King (2000) on March 1, and The Good, the Bad, the Weird (2008) on March 2. The series gets its title from what the Korean government said about I Saw the Devil before seven minutes were cut out, proclaiming that it “severely damaged the dignity of human values.”

J. HOBERMAN: AN ARMY OF PHANTOMS

J. Hoberman looks at the invasion of Cold War fears in Hollywood at BAM festival

BAMcinematek
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
February 18 – March 28
718-636-4100
www.bam.org

Way back in 1977, J. Hoberman reviewed Eraserhead for the Village Voice. More than thirty-three years later, he’s still there, serving as their longtime senior film critic. The author of such previous books as The Dream Life: Movies, Media, and the Mythology of the Sixties, On Jack Smith’s Flaming Creatures and Other Secret-Flix of Cinemaroc, and Bridge of Light: Yiddish Film Between Two Worlds, Hoberman is poised to release his latest tome, An Army of Phantoms: American Movies and the Making of the Cold War, due from the New Press on March 15. In conjunction with the book’s release, Hoberman has been once again invited by BAM to curate a film series, this one dealing with movies made during the Cold War era. “An Army of Phantoms” begins Friday, February 18, with the granddaddy of them all, Don Siegel’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), the ultimate exercise in paranoia starring Kevin McCarthy as a man whose friends are turning into loveless pod people. Hoberman will introduce the 6:50 screening and sign books afterward. On Saturday, Pickup on South Street (1953) follows three-time loser Skip McCoy (Richard Widmark), who gets more than he bargained for when he lifts femme fatale Candy’s (Jean Peters) wallet on the subway, landing him in trouble with mysterious Joey (Richard Kiley) and the Feds in Samuel Fuller’s fab Cold War noir set in New York City. On Sunday, Hoberman delivers the extremely tongue-in-cheek Cold War Western Johnny Guitar (1954), Nicholas Ray’s tale of a butch nighclub owner (Joan Crawford), a six-string-strumming former gunslinger (Sterling Hayden), and campy subtext galore. Opening weekend concludes on Presidents’ Day with a double feature of alien gems, Invaders from Mars (William Cameron Menzies, 1953) and The Thing from Another World (Christian Nyby, 1951), provocative parables of potential Soviet attacks. The series continues through March 28 with such other great flicks — including ones that you might not have thought about within a Cold War context before — as a double bill of Them! (Gordon Douglas, 1954) and The Wild One (Laslo Benedek, 1953), The Fountainhead (King Vidor, 1949), Panic in the Streets (Elia Kazan, 1950), and Kiss Me Deadly (Robert Aldrich, 1955).

THE SUSAN SARANDON PICTURE SHOW

Susan Sarandon will participate in celebratory career tribute at BAM this week

BAMcinématek
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
February 10-13
718-636-4100
www.bam.org

Perhaps no contemporary American actress other than Meryl Streep has given the world of motion pictures as many iconic characters and memorable cinematic moments as Susan Sarandon, but there’s one thing Sarandon has that not even Streep does — a simmering sexuality portrayed with comfort and ease, still burning at the age of sixty-four. The Academy Award-winning, New York City-born sex symbol has been on the scene since her dazzling debut as Melissa Compton in JOE (John G. Avildsen, 1970), going on to star in such unforgettable films as THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW (Jim Sharman, 1975), PRETTY BABY (Louis Malle, 1978), ATLANTIC CITY (Louis Malle, 1980), THE HUNGER (Tony Scott, 1983), BULL DURHAM (Ron Shelton, 1988), THELMA & LOUISE (Ridley Scott, 1991), and DEAD MAN WALKING (Tim Robbins, 1995). If the last decade has not been quite as kind to her, she still has already amassed one helluva resume, and her career is being celebrated this week with a too-brief retrospective at BAM. “The Susan Sarandon Picture Show” begins February 10 with a screening of ROMANCE & CIGARETTES (John Turturro, 2006), which will be followed by a Q&A with Sarandon and writer-director Turturro, after which Sarandon will switch theaters for a Q&A with writer-director Paul Schrader following a screening of the underrated LIGHT SLEEPER (Paul Schrader, 1992). Friday’s lineup includes JOE GOULD’S SECRET (Stanley Tucci, 2000), PRETTY BABY, THE FRONT PAGE (Billy Wilder, 1974), and a late-night showing of ROCKY HORROR, with Saturday steaming up with THE WITCHES OF EASTWICK (George Miller, 1987) and THE HUNGER. On Sunday afternoon, BAM will hold concurrent screenings of DEAD MAN WALKING, THELMA & LOUISE, ATLANTIC CITY, and BULL DURHAM, after which all attendees will move into the Howard Gilman Opera House for a conversation with Sarandon, moderated by Bob Balaban.

BAMcinématek: MACBETH

BAMcinématek
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
Monday, December 13, $12, 7:00
718-636-4100
www.bam.org

Back in March and April of 2008, BAM presented director Rupert Goold’s reimagining of Shakespeare’s MACBETH, a multimedia production from the Chichester Festival Theatre starring Patrick Stewart as the embattled title character. We called it “bold, boisterous, and very loud . . . Stewart is a solid if unspectacular and unconventional Macbeth, giving noogies, poking playfully at ties, and pointing with pickles — and he seems to make one helluva killer ham sandwich.” The show later moved to Broadway and was filmed for broadcast on public television. The 161-minute film, which also stars Kate Fleetwood as Lady Macbeth and Michael Feast as Macduff, will be screened at BAM on Monday night, introduced by Stewart, who is currently on Broadway in a revival of David Mamet’s A LIFE IN THE THEATRE.