Ang Lee’s LIFE OF PI will open the fiftieth annual New York Film Festival
Alice Tully Hall, 1941 Broadway at 65th St.
Walter Reade Theater, 165 West 65th St. at Amsterdam Ave.
Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center: Francesca Beale Theater, Howard Gilman Theater, Amphitheater, 144 West 65th St. between Broadway & Amsterdam Ave.
Bruno Walter Auditorium, 111 Amsterdam Ave. between West 64th & 65th Sts.
September 28 – October 14
212-875-5601
www.filmlinc.com
The New York Film Festival is paying tribute to a pair of milestones this year, as 2012 marks the fiftieth anniversary of the festival, and longtime program director Richard Peña is stepping down after a quarter century of inspired service at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, leaving behind quite a legacy. This year’s festival begins on September 28 with the world premiere of Ang Lee’s Life of Pi, adapted from Yann Martel’s novel, and closes on October 14 with the world premiere of Robert Zemeckis’s Flight, starring Denzel Washington, Melissa Leo, and Don Cheadle. The centerpiece selection is the world premiere of David Chase’s hotly anticipated Not Fade Away, reuniting him with his Sopranos star, James Gandolfini. Other films, by some of the greatest directors from around the globe, include Michael Haneke’s Amour, Cristian Mungiu’s Beyond the Hills, the Taviani brothers’ Caesar Must Die, Noah Baumbach’s Frances Ha, Sally Potter’s Ginger and Rosa, Abbas Kiarostami’s Like Someone in Love, Raúl Ruiz’s Night Across the Street, Brian De Palma’s Passion, Olivier Assayas’s Something in the Air, Alain Resnais’s You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet, and Lee Daniels’s The Paperboy, part of the Gala Tribute to Nicole Kidman.
Peter O’Toole’s eyes should shine even more in 4K restoration of David Lean’s LAWRENCE OF ARABIA at the New York Film Festival
The Masterworks section reexamines such films as Amos Gitai’s Field Diary, Bob Rafelson’s The King of Marvin Gardens, Laurence Olivier’s Richard III, Federico Fellini’s Fellini Satyricon, a 4K restoration of David Lean’s Lawrence of Arabia, and Michael Cimino’s Heaven’s Gate, with Cimino on hand to talk about one of Hollywood’s most famous financial disasters. (Was the film really that bad?) Among the special events are Oliver Stone’s Untold History of the United States, theater legend Richard Foreman’s Once Every Day, and a twenty-fifth-anniversary screening of the cult classic The Princess Bride, with a reunion bringing together director Rob Reiner and stars Billy Crystal, Cary Elwes, Carol Kane, Mandy Patinkin, Chris Sarandon, and Robin Wright. The Convergence section looks at cutting-edge technology in cinematic storytelling, with keynote conversations, works-in-progress, and the live multimedia presentation Whispers in the Dark. The annual Views from the Avant-Garde sidebar features works by Ruiz, Peter Kubelka, Chris Marker, Luke Fowler, Nathaniel Dorsky, and others. There will also be a daily talk show, NYFF Live, taking place at 7:00 in the evening in the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center Amphitheater with various actors, directors, critics, and other insiders discussing the state of modern cinema.
Christopher Nolan’s challenging, insightful murder mystery stars Guy Pearce (L.A. Coinfidential) as Leonard Shelby, a man with no short-term memory; to remember things, he takes Polaroids and has important information tattooed on his body. Joe Pantoliano (The Sopranos) and Carrie-Anne Moss (The Matrix) costar in this thriller with a twist — the story is essentially told in backward time. You’ll want to see it in the theater because there is a quick shot at the end that will have you debating with the other viewers around you what you just saw; the shot loses its charm when you’re watching it at home and can freeze-frame the action so you can see what really happened.
The first half of Christopher Nolan’s nearly successful remake of Erik Skjoldbjærg’s creepy psychological thriller does a good job of building the tension so prevalent in the original, following it nearly scene by scene, but with one major flaw — creating definitive motive where in the 1997 Norwegian film there was doubt and soul searching. Ultimately, indie god Nolan gets trapped in showcasing Hollywood acting — his cast includes Al Pacino, Robin Williams, and Hilary Swank — obvious plot twists, and easy resolutions that pale in comparison to the original, which starred Stellan Skarsgård, bringing the whole film down. But Warner Bros. knows that most people will never see the 1997 original; that’s why the only mention of Skjoldbjærg’s film comes after the final acting credits, when most filmgoers are already on their way out of the theater.
Christopher Nolan turns to the world of magic in The Prestige, but you’ll feel like you’ve seen this rabbit pulled out of a hat before — especially if you checked out two other 2006 films, The Illusionist, Neil Burger’s murder mystery about a magician, and Scoop, in which Woody Allen plays a magician who gets caught up in a murder mystery with his “daughter” (Scarlett Johansson) and the son of a powerful lord (Hugh Jackman). In The Prestige, dueling magicians Robert Angier (Jackman) and Alfred Borden (Christian Bale) have a bitter relationship right out of Amadeus, with Angier being more the Salieri type and Borden the Mozart wunderkind. They each keep trying to up the ante with the constantly morphing trick called the Transported Man, eventually involving electricity expert and oddball Nikola Tesla (David Bowie) in the mix, as well as sexy magician’s assistant Olivia (Johansson). Parts of the film are indeed thrilling, and the ending packs a wallop, but much of the meat of the movie is far too repetitive and, ultimately, not quite believable.
Christopher Nolan’s follow-up to his 2005 hit Batman Begins is one of the most brilliant superhero films ever made. Christian Bale is back as billionaire bachelor Bruce Wayne, who spends his evenings fighting crime in Gotham City, which is under siege, victim to a brutal crime spree led by the vicious Joker (Heath Ledger in a massive, Oscar-winning performance). As the madman with the wild hair and evil clown face starts knocking off public officials, mob bosses, ordinary citizens, and even his own minions, Wayne is also beset by the blossoming relationship between Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhall), the woman he loves and who knows his secret, and the new DA, Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart), who has come into his high-profile job with both arms swinging, determined to make Gotham City safe. The Bat Man is joined once again by his faithful butler, Alfred (Michael Caine), Wayne Industries exec Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman), and police lieutenant Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman); the film also features Anthony Michael Hall as a television talk-show host who finds himself in danger, Eric Roberts as a smooth-talking gangster, and Cillian Murphy as Scarecrow in a brief cameo. The Dark Knight is a carefully constructed tale of good and evil, love and death, and everything in between, working as both a thrilling action movie as well as a psychoanalytic examination of what lurks deep in the soul. Although there are special effects aplenty, it is primarily a very intimate, personal film about one man’s tortured existence. In a summer of the high-octane superhero flick (Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk, Hellboy II, Hancock), The Dark Knight towers above them all.
Based on a 1964 Roald Dahl novel, Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory is a fanciful frolic through a children’s wonderland, filled with fear, trepidation, love, and lots of candy, both sweet and sour. Charlie Bucket (Peter Ostrum, in his only film appearance) lives with his dirt-poor family in a ramshackle room, where Grandpa Joe (Jack Albertson) can’t even get out of bed. But when goodhearted Charlie finds one of the golden tickets that will allow him to join a once-in-a-lifetime tour of Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory, Grandpa Joe is suddenly up and about, singing and dancing, and so will you be. Among the other kids with the golden tickets are the spoiled Veruca Salt (Julie Dawn Cole), the selfish Violet Beauregarde (Denise Nickerson), the tube-loving Mike Teevee (Paris Themmen), and the rather sloppy Augustus Gloop (Michael Bollner). As they are led through this dreamland by the unpredictable Willy Wonka (Gene Wilder), they encounter chocolate rivers, bubble machines that make people float, and small Oompa Loompas who are quick to clean up any messes. The soundtrack of this thoroughly entertaining, charming family film includes “The Candy Man Can,” “(I’ve Got a) Golden Ticket,” “Pure Imagination,” and, of course, “Oompa Loompa, Doompa-Dee-Do.” The film was remade by Tim Burton in 2005 starring Johnny Depp as Wonka with mixed results, but you can catch the original at the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center for a mere six bucks on December 4 and 17 as part of the Film Society of Lincoln Center’s “Family Films” series, which also includes a pair of other Dahl tales, James and the Giant Peach (Henry Selick, 1996) and Matilda (Danny DeVito, 1996).