After two years, Dance with Bach is back (photo courtesy the Sebastians / Christopher Caines Dance)
Who:The Sebastians,Christopher Caines Dance What: Music and dance celebrating Johann Sebastian Bach Where:Good Shepherd-Faith Presbyterian Church, 152 West Sixty-Sixth St. between Amsterdam & Columbus Aves. When: Friday, May 20, and Saturday, May 21, $20 virtual, $30-$50 in-person and virtual Why: In 2014, the Sebastians, a chamber ensemble named after Johann Sebastian Bach, joined forces with Christopher Caines Dance to present Henry Purcell’s 1692 opera, The Fairy Queen, an adaptation of William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, merging baroque music with modern dance. Following a two-year delay because of the pandemic, the two companies are back together for Dance with Bach, a trio of Bach suites choreographed by Christopher Caines, taking place May 20-21 at the Good Shepherd-Faith Presbyterian Church by Lincoln Center as well as streaming online, photographed by multiple cameras. The program begins with Jean-Marie Leclair’s Ouverture from Deuxième récréation de musique d’une execution facile, Op. 8, followed by Bach’s Cello Suite No. 6 in D major, BWV 1012, performed on viola da spalla; English Suite No. 5 in E minor, BWV 810 for harpsichord; and Orchestral Suite No. 2 in B minor, BWV 1067 for flute, strings, and continuo.
“We are thrilled to finally bring Dance with Bach to fruition,” Sebastians artistic director Jeffrey Grossman said in a statement. “Christopher and the dancers had put in countless hours of rehearsal when we were forced to cancel our May 2020 performances. We discussed ways of producing the project virtually, with recorded music and dancers wearing masks, but decided there would be too many compromises. After such a long journey, the experience of being back in the same room with the dancers, to feel their energy and respond musically to their physicality, is incredible.” Caines added, “I am one lucky choreographer to have had this band really throw down the gauntlet by asking me to choreograph three iconic masterpieces by their namesake master composer. What a challenge! And my dancers could not be more thrilled at the prospect of taking the stage backed up by one of the finest baroque ensembles anywhere.”
The works will be danced by CCD members Michael Bishop, Elisa Toro Franky, Genaro Freire, Jeremy Kyle, Michelle Vargo, and Leigh Schanfein in addition to student dancers from New York Theatre Ballet School (Charlotte Anub, Audrey Cen, Josephine Ernst, Madeline Goodwin, Clara Rodrigues-Cheung, Emely Leon Rivas, Eva Sgorbati). The ensemble consists of David Ross on flute, Nicholas DiEugenio on violin, Daniel Lee on viola da spalla and violin, Jessica Troy on viola, Ezra Seltzer on cello, Nathaniel Chase on violone, and Grossman on harpsichord.
Who:ReelAbilities Film Festival: New York What: Annual festival of films celebrating stories of people with disabilities Where:Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan and other venues as well as online When: April 7-13, free – $15 Why: Since 2007, the ReelAbilities Film Festival has been showcasing shorts, features, and animated works from around the world to continue its mission “dedicated to promoting awareness and appreciation of the lives, stories, and artistic expressions of people with disabilities.” The fourteenth annual event takes place at the host venue, the Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan, as well as Lincoln Center, the IAC Building, the Museum of the Moving Image, the Maysles Documentary Center, the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum, and online. The opening-night selection is Olivier Nakache and Éric Toledano’s The Specials, about caregivers of autistic youths in underprivileged areas, starring Vincent Cassel, Reda Kateb, and Hélène Vincent; Victor Calise, former commissioner of the New York City Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities, will be the guest honoree. The closing-night film is Brian Malone and Regan Linton’s imperfect, about a theater group staging Chicago; the screening will be followed by a Q&A with the directors moderated by actor Gregg Mozgala and the presentation of the ReelAbilities Spotlight Award to deaf actress Lauren Ridloff.
Among the other full-length films are Marc Schiller’s deeply personal No Bone: Scars of Survival, Jim Bernfield’s Me to Play, Margaret Byrne’s Any Given Day, Lynn Montgomery’s Amazing Grace, Teemu Nikki’s The Blind Man Who Did Not Want to See Titanic, Linda Niccol’s Poppy, and Jack Youngelson’s Here. Is. Better.; the films deal with such issues as stroke, Parkinson’s disease, mental illness, Acute Flaccid Myelitis, multiple sclerosis, Down syndrome, deafness, ADHD, and PTSD. In addition, there will be workshops on film puppetry and storytelling, an accessibility summit, a solo musical by Anita Hollander, a conversation with Deaf Utopia author Nyle DiMarco, the panel discussion “Just Do It?: The Impact of Perfectionism & Productivity on Mental Health and Disability,” and such shorts programs as “Out of the Box,” “Relationships,” and “Autism.” Many of the screenings will be followed by a Q&A with the filmmakers, actors, documentary subjects, and health experts.
Emi (Katia Pascariu) goes on a strange journey in Rade Jude’s Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn
BAD LUCK BANGING OR LOONY PORN: A SKETCH FOR A POSSIBLE FILM (BABARDEALA CU BUCLUC SAU PORNO BALAMUC) (Radu Jude, 2021)
Film at Lincoln Center, Walter Reade Theater, Francesca Beale Theater
144/165 West Sixty-Fifth St. at Amsterdam Ave.
Film Forum, 209 West Houston St.
Opens Friday, November 19 www.filmlinc.org filmforum.org
Radu Jude’s brilliantly absurdist Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn lives up to its title, a wildly satiric takedown of social mores that redefines what is obscene. Winner of the Golden Bear for Best Film at the 2021 Berlinale, the multipart tale begins with an extremely graphic prologue, a XXX-rated homemade porn video with a woman and an unseen man holding nothing back. In the first main section, the woman, a successful teacher named Emi (Katia Pascariu), is distressed to learn that the video is threatening to go viral. She determinedly walks through the streets of Bucharest, buying flowers (which she holds upside down), discussing her dilemma with her boss, the headmistress (Claudia Ieremia), and calling her husband, Eugen, trying to get the video deleted before her meeting with angry parents at the prestigious private school where she teaches young children.
Jude and cinematographer Marius Panduru follow the masked Emi — the film was shot during the pandemic, so masks are everywhere — on her journey, the camera often lingering on the scene well after Emi has left the frame, focusing on advertising billboards, couples in the middle of conversations, people waiting for a bus, and other random actions, before finding Emi again. She sometimes fades into the background, barely seen through the windows of a passing vehicle or amid a crowd crossing at a light. She gets into an argument with a man who has parked on the sidewalk, blocking her way; she insists that he move the car, but he unleashes a stream of misogynistic curses. Swear words are prevalent throughout the film, mostly adding poignant humor.
The second segment consists of a montage of archival and new footage that details some of Romania’s recent history, involving the military, the government, religion, fascism, Nazi collaboration, patriotism, the two world wars, the 1989 revolution, Nicolae Ceaușescu, domestic violence, jokes about blondes, and the value of cinema itself. The bevy of images also points out which NSFW word is most commonly looked up in the dictionary, as well as which is second. (The film is splendidly edited by Cătălin Cristuțiu, with a fab soundtrack by Jura Ferina and Pavao Miholjević.)
It all comes together in the third section, in the school garden, where Emi faces a few dozen masked, socially distanced, very angry parents and grandparents who want her fired immediately, while the headmistress demands a calm discussion. The masked Emi is a stand-in for all of us, facing the wrath of the unruly mob forcing its sanctimonious platitudes on others when it really needs to look at itself. It’s a riotously funny sitcomlike debate in which Jude roasts many common, hypocritical beliefs held by Romanians (and people all over the world) that have not necessarily changed much from the news clips shown in the previous part.
The cartoonish cast, which includes Olimpia Mălai as Mrs. Lucia, Nicodim Ungureanu as Lt. Gheorghescu, Alexandru Potocean as Marius Buzdrugovici, and Andi Vasluianu as Mr. Otopeanu, really gets to strut its stuff while making sure their masks are properly covering their mouths and noses. They argue about beloved national poet Mihai Eminescu and Russian writer Isaac Babel, delve into various sexual positions, repeat Woody the Woodpecker’s trademark call, and quote long, intellectual passages from the internet as Jude (I Do Not Care If We Go Down in History as Barbarians,Aferim!) reveals where society’s true obscenities lie. It’s an irreverent tour de force that offers three distinct endings to put a capper on the strangely alluring affair, turning a scary mirror on the sorry state of twenty-first-century existence.
Playfully subtitled A Sketch for a Possible Film in a reference to André Malraux’s description of Eugène Delacroix’s belief that his sketches could be of the same quality as his paintings, Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn, Romania’s official Oscars submission, opens November 19 at Lincoln Center and Film Forum.
Moses (Jon Michael Hill) and Kitch (Namir Smallwood) are startled by the arrival of a white man (Gabriel Ebert) in Pass Over (photo by Joan Marcus)
PASS OVER
August Wilson Theatre
245 West Fifty-Second St. between Broadway & Eighth Ave.
Tuesday – Sunday through October 10, $39-$199 www.passoverbroadway.com
A pair of three-actor plays dealing with contemporary social issues, with spare sets and unique staging but curious endings, were among the first to open following the pandemic lockdown. Following earlier versions at Steppenwolf in Chicago in 2017 (which was filmed by Spike Lee) and at Lincoln Center’s Claire Tow Theater in the summer of 2018, Antoinette Chinonye Nwandu’s Pass Over, which deals with police brutality and the dreams of young Black men, made its Broadway debut at the August Wilson Theatre in August. Meanwhile, Martyna Majok’s Sanctuary City, a New York Theatre Workshop production at the Lucille Lortel, looks into the lives of DREAMers trying to stay in America.
Pass Over is a reimagination of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot filtered through the biblical story of the exodus of Jewish slaves from Egypt along with the fairy tale “Little Red Riding Hood.” Kitch (Namir Smallwood) and Moses (Jon Michael Hill) are like brothers, two men hanging out on a ghetto street, rambling on about life. Wilson Chin’s set is a slightly raised sidewalk with a few pieces of detritus and a central lamppost evoking Beckett’s tree. The script explains that the time is “the (future) present / but also 2021 CE / but also 1855 CE / but also 1440 BCE,” identifying Moses as “a tramp / a n*gga on the block / but also a slave driver / but also the prophesied leader of God’s chosen” and Kitch as “a tramp / a n*gga on the block / but also a slave / but also one of God’s chosen.” Moses, the wiser of the two, tells his best friend, “yo ass gon rise up to yo full potential too / gon git up off dis block / matter fact / man / i’m gon lead you.” Kitch replies, “Amen!”
Moses (Jon Michael Hill) searches for the promised land in Pass Over (photo by Joan Marcus)
They are surprised when a white man (Gabriel Ebert), dressed in a white suit like a plantation owner, suddenly arrives out of nowhere, holding a picnic basket and telling them his name is Master. “What da fuck,” Kitch says upon hearing that. Master, who uses such trite language as “gosh golly gee” and “salutations,” offers them food from the basket he was going to bring to his mother before getting lost, but while Kitch wants to dig in, Moses is suspicious of this unexpected largesse.
Shortly after Master departs, Kitch and Moses are visited by Ossifer (Ebert), a uniformed police officer who says he will protect them but soon pulls out his gun and commands that they put their hands behind their heads. When the cop leaves, Moses is furious, but Kitch philosophizes, “damn man / we still here / sun comin up yeah / iss a new day / and we still on dis block / but damn n*gga / it cud be worse / we cud be dead / we still here / mean we still livin / so tomorrow / tomorrow.”
Fluently directed by Danya Taymor and featuring three all-star performances, Pass Over is riding smoothly until the final scenes. Nwandu significantly changed the ending for Broadway, and not necessarily for the better. It now attempts to make a grander statement about the times we live in and a possible future, with an added dash of stagecraft that is beautiful but feels out of place. It might be more hopeful, but it’s head-scratchingly confusing and strays too far from the tight, succinct narrative that led up to it. In the script, Nwandu writes, “This play should NOT have an intermission. If Moses and Kitch cannot leave, neither can you. (And if, by the end, the magic has worked, you shouldn’t want to.)” The same should have gone for the finale.
Childhood friends B (Jasai Chase-Owens) and G (Sharlene Cruz) encounter immigration issues in Sanctuary City (photo by Joan Marcus)
SANCTUARY CITY
New York Theatre Workshop at the Lucille Lortel Theatre
121 Christopher St.
Tuesday – Sunday through October 17, $30 (20% off with code FRIEND) www.nytw.org/show
Sanctuary City takes a head-scratching turn as well as the ending approaches, detracting from everything that came before it, which was powerful and moving, as is the case with Pass Over. The play takes place in Newark between 2001 and 2006, as childhood friends B (Jasai Chase-Owens) and G (Sharlene Cruz) contemplate their immigration status, wondering whether they should stay in the United States or move back to their native countries. They walk across Tom Scutt’s spare stage, a cantilevered platform that more than hints at unease. Isabella Byrd has filled the Lucille Lortel with standard and unusual varieties of lighting, on the floor, on the walls, on the ceiling, and in unexpected places. Various lights flash on and off after short scenes that sometimes repeat themselves and travel through time, reminiscent of Nick Payne’s Constellations on Broadway, which also had a set by Scutt (and lighting by Lee Curran).
“She’s goin back,” B says about his mother. “She’s afraid of stayin in the country. There’s some shit at work, she said. Boss keeps takin money from her tips cuz, y’know, he can, what’s she gonna do? report it? to who? And she’s afraid what happened to Jorge’s gonna happen to her and so she’s goin back. And cuz of September. Cuz of the towers.”
G spends a lot of time at B’s apartment, often sleeping over in order to avoid repeated beatings by her stepfather. She skips school, pretending to be sick, but she is running out of excuses. “She’s scared they’ll send us back if they find out what’s goin on at home. She’s scared they’d separate us,” she says about her mother. “Who would send you back?” B asks. G: “America. If they wanted to investigate. If they like — checked. She worked with a fake social security for years. He’s threatened to report her before. Everyone’s more, y’know—” B: “Yeah.” G: “—cuz of September. Cuz of the towers. Or maybe they’d put me in some kind of — some place for kids — separate us. I don’t know if she even knows specifically what to be afraid of but she is. She’s scared.”
Sharlene Cruz and Jasai Chase-Owens star in new play by Martyna Majok (photo by Joan Marcus)
Without the DREAM Act, they are always in danger of being deported, so they can’t apply for student aid or other benefits. Since she sleeps over so much, G offers to pay rent to help B out, but he refuses to accept it. They grow closer and closer and soon are asking each other personal questions about their lives, preparing to get married strictly so B can get a green card. While G looks like she might be interested in something more, B stands back, keeping things platonic. A few years later, Henry (Austin Smith) enters the picture, creating an entirely new dynamic.
Pulitzer Prize winner Majok (Cost of Living,Ironbound), who was born in Poland and contributed short works to A Dozen Dreams and the Homebound Project during the pandemic, and director Rebecca Frecknall (Summer and Smoke,Three Sisters) have our full attention for two-thirds of the play, maintaining a compelling mystery about B and G as well as numerous plot intricacies, and Chase-Owens (The Tempest,A Midsummer Night’s Dream) and Cruz (Mac Beth,The Climb) are appealing as the two leads.
It all comes to a screeching halt when Henry arrives, through no fault of Smith (An Octoroon,Socrates). “Did I just fuck everything up?” Henry asks. Till then, the play had avoided theatrical clichés, challenging the audience to keep pace. But from this point on, it all becomes standard, losing the edge that had made it so compelling. The flash lighting is gone, and instead of quick, staccato scenes with cut-off, incomplete dialogue, the scenes become longer and more drawn out, crossing every T and dotting every I. As with Pass Over,Sanctuary City pulls us into its claustrophobic, carefully built world but then, when opening up, leaves us behind, no longer trusting its own dialectic.
John Cale and Lou Reed reunite to honor Andy Warhol in Songs for ’Drella
SONGS FOR ’DRELLA (Ed Lachman, 1990)
New York Film Festival, Lincoln Center
Francesca Beale Theater, Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center
144 West 65th St. between Broadway & Amsterdam Ave.
Tuesday, October 5, 4:30 www.filmlinc.org
In December 1989, Velvet Underground cofounders John Cale and Lou Reed took the stage at BAM’s Howard Gilman Opera House and performed a song cycle in honor of Andy Warhol, who had played a pivotal role in the group’s success. The Pittsburgh-born Pop artist had died in February 1987 at the age of fifty-eight; although Cale and Reed had had a long falling-out, they reunited at Warhol’s funeral at the suggestion of artist Julian Schnabel. Commissioned by BAM and St. Ann’s, Songs for ’Drella — named after one of Warhol’s nicknames, a combination of Dracula and Cinderella — was released as a concert film and recorded for an album. The work is filled with factual details and anecdotes of Warhol’s life and career, from his relationship with his mother to his years at the Factory, from his 1967 shooting at the hands of Valerie Solanis to his dedication to his craft.
Directed, photographed, and produced by Ed Lachman, the two-time Oscar-nominated cinematographer of such films as Desperately Seeking Susan,Mississippi Masala,Far from Heaven, and Carol — Lachman also supervised the 4K restoration being shown at the New York Film Festival this week — Songs for ’Drella is an intimate portrait not only of Warhol but of Cale and Reed, who sit across from each other onstage, Cale on the left, playing keyboards and violin, Reed on the right on guitars. There is no between-song patter or introductions; they just play the music as Robert Wierzel’s lighting shifts from black-and-white to splashes of blue and red. Photos of Warhol and some of his works (Electric Chair,Mona Lisa,Gun) are occasionally projected onto a screen on the back wall.
“When you’re growing up in a small town / Bad skin, bad eyes — gay and fatty / People look at you funny / When you’re in a small town / My father worked in construction / It’s not something for which I’m suited / Oh — what is something for which you are suited? / Getting out of here,” Reed sings on the opener, “Smalltown.” Cale and Reed share an infectious smile before “Style It Takes,” in which Cale sings, “I’ve got a Brillo box and I say it’s art / It’s the same one you can buy at any supermarket / ’Cause I’ve got the style it takes / And you’ve got the people it takes / This is a rock group called the Velvet Underground / I show movies of them / Do you like their sound / ’Cause they have a style that grates and I have art to make.”
Songs for ’Drella is screening at NYFF59 in new 4K restoration
Cale and Reed reflect more on their association with Warhol in “A Dream.” Cale sings as Warhol, “And seeing John made me think of the Velvets / And I had been thinking about them / when I was on St. Marks Place / going to that new gallery those sweet new kids have opened / But they thought I was old / And then I saw the old DOM / the old club where we did our first shows / It was so great / And I don’t understand about that Velvets first album / I mean, I did the cover / and I was the producer / and I always see it repackaged / and I’ve never gotten a penny from it / How could that be / I should call Henry / But it was good seeing John / I did a cover for him / but I did it in black and white and he changed it to color / It would have been worth more if he’d left it my way / But you can never tell anybody anything / I’ve learned that.”
The song later turns the focus on Reed, recalling, “And then I saw Lou / I’m so mad at him / Lou Reed got married and didn’t invite me / I mean, is it because he thought I’d bring too many people? / I don’t get it / He could have at least called / I mean, he’s doing so great / Why doesn’t he call me? / I saw him at the MTV show / and he was one row away and he didn’t even say hello / I don’t get it / You know I hate Lou / I really do / He won’t even hire us for his videos / And I was so proud of him.”
Reed does say hello — and goodbye — on the closer, “Hello It’s Me.” With Cale on violin, Reed stands up with his guitar and fondly sings, “Oh well, now, Andy — I guess we’ve got to go / I wish some way somehow you like this little show / I know it’s late in coming / But it’s the only way I know / Hello, it’s me / Goodnight, Andy / Goodbye, Andy.”
It’s a tender way to end a beautiful performance, but Lachman has added a special treat after the credits, with one final anecdote and the original trailer he made for Reed’s 1974 song cycle, Berlin.Songs for ’Drella is screening October 5 at 4:30 at the Francesca Beale Theater; it is also being shown October 2 prior to the free outdoor presentation of Todd Haynes’s new documentary, The Velvet Underground, in Damrosch Park, which will be followed by a Q&A with Lachman and Haynes. Lachman and Haynes will also be part of a Q&A with producers Christine Vachon and Julie Goldman and editors Affonso Gonçalves and Adam Kurnitz at the September 30 screening of The Velvet Underground at Alice Tully Hall; Cale was supposed to attend but has had to cancel.
Todd Haynes documents the history of the Velvet Underground in new film
THE VELVET UNDERGROUND (Todd Haynes, 2021)
Thursday, September 30, Alice Tully Hall, 6:00
Saturday, October 2, Damrosch Park, 7:00
Film Comment Live: The Velvet Underground & the New York Avant-Garde, Sunday, October 3, Damrosch Park, free, 4:00 www.filmlinc.org
Much of Haynes’s documentary, which will have its theatrical premiere October 14–21 at the Walter Reade (and streaming on Apple+ beginning October 15), focuses on Warhol’s position in helping develop and promote the Velvets. “Andy was extraordinary, and I honestly don’t think these things could have occurred without Andy,” Reed, who died in 2013, says. “I don’t know if we would have gotten the contract if he hadn’t said he’d do the cover or if Nico wasn’t so beautiful.”
Haynes details the history of the group by delving into Cale and Reed’s initial meeting, the formation of the Primitives with conceptual artists Tony Conrad and Walter DeMaria, and the transformation into the seminal VU lineup at the Factory under Warhol’s guidance — singer-songwriter-guitarist Reed, Welsh experimental composer and multi-instrumentalist Cale, guitarist Sterling Morrison, drummer Maureen Tucker, and German vocalist Nico.
Haynes and editors Gonçalves and Kurnitz pace the film like VU’s songs and overall career, as they cut between new and old interviews and dazzling archival photographs and video, frantic and chaotic at first, then slowing down as things change drastically for the band They employ split screens, usually two but up to twelve boxes at a time, to deluge the viewer with a barrage of sound and image. Among the talking heads in the film are composer and Dream Syndicate founder La Monte Young, actress and film critic Amy Taubin, actress and author Mary Woronov, Reed’s sister Merrill Reed-Weiner, early Reed bandmates and school friends Allan Hyman and Richard Mishkin, filmmaker and author John Waters, manager and publicist Danny Fields, composer and philosopher Henry Flynt, and avant-garde filmmaker and poet Jonas Mekas. “We are not part really of the subculture or counterculture. We are the culture!” Mekas, who passed away in 2019 at the age of ninety-six, declares.
Haynes, who has made such previous music-related films as Velvet Goldmine, set in the 1970s glam-rock era, and I’m Not There, a fictionalized musical inspired by the life and career of Bob Dylan, also speaks extensively with Cale and Tucker, who hold nothing back, in addition to Sterling Morrison’s widow, Martha Morrison; singer-songwriter Jackson Browne, who opened up for the Velvets; and big-time fan Jonathan Richman (of Modern Lovers fame). While everyone shares their thoughts about Warhol, the Factory, the Exploding Plastic Inevitable shows, and the eventual dissolution of the band, Haynes bombards us with clips from Warhol’s Sleep,Kiss,Empire, and Screen Tests (many opposite the people who appear in the film) as well as works by such artists as Maya Deren, Jack Smith, Kenneth Anger, Barbara Rubin, Tony Oursler, Stan Brakhage, and Mekas and paintings by Warhol, Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, and Mark Rothko. It’s a dizzying array that aligns with such VU classics as “I’ll Be Your Mirror,” “I’m Waiting for the Man,” “Heroin,” “White Light / White Heat,” “Sister Ray,” “Pale Blue Eyes,” and “Sweet Jane.”
Several speakers disparage the Flower Power era, Bill Graham, and Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention, with Tucker admitting, “This love-peace crap, we hated that. Get real.” They’re also honest about the group’s own success, or lack thereof. Tucker remembers at their first shows, “We used to joke around and say, ‘Well, how many people left?’ ‘About half.’ ‘Oh, we must have been good tonight.’” And there is no love lost for Reed, who was not the warmest and most considerate of colleagues.
The Velvets continue to have a remarkable influence on music and art today despite having recorded only two albums with Cale (The Velvet Underground and Nico and White Light / White Heat) and two with Doug Yule replacing Cale (The Velvet Underground and Loaded) in a span of only three years. Haynes (Far from Heaven,Safe) sucks us right into their extraordinary world and keeps us swirling in it for two glorious hours of music, gossip, art, celebrity, and backstabbing. If you end up watching the film at home, turn it up loud. No, louder than that. Even louder. . . .
Emi (Katia Pascariu) goes on a strange journey in Rade Jude’s Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn
BAD LUCK BANGING OR LOONY PORN: A SKETCH FOR A POSSIBLE FILM (BABARDEALA CU BUCLUC SAU PORNO BALAMUC) (Radu Jude, 2021)
New York Film Festival, Lincoln Center
Saturday, September 25, Alice Tully Hall, with virtual Q&A, 9:00
Sunday, September 26, Francesca Beale Theater, 8:00 www.filmlinc.org
Radu Jude’s brilliantly absurdist Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn lives up to its title, a wildly satiric takedown of social mores that redefines what is obscene. Winner of the Golden Bear for Best Film at the 2021 Berlinale, the multipart tale begins with an extremely graphic prologue, a XXX-rated homemade porn video with a woman and an unseen man holding nothing back. In the first main section, the woman, a successful teacher named Emi (Katia Pascariu), is distressed to learn that the video is threatening to go viral. She determinedly walks through the streets of Bucharest, buying flowers (which she holds upside down), discussing her dilemma with her boss, the headmistress (Claudia Ieremia), and calling her husband, Eugen, trying to get the video deleted before her meeting with angry parents at the prestigious private school where she teaches young children.
Jude and cinematographer Marius Panduru follow the masked Emi — the film was shot during the pandemic, so masks are everywhere — on her journey, the camera often lingering on the scene well after Emi has left the frame, focusing on advertising billboards, couples in the middle of conversations, people waiting for a bus, and other random actions, before finding Emi again. She sometimes fades into the background, barely seen through the windows of a passing vehicle or amid a crowd crossing at a light. She gets into an argument with a man who has parked on the sidewalk, blocking her way; she insists that he move the car, but he unleashes a stream of misogynistic curses. Swear words are prevalent throughout the film, mostly adding poignant humor.
The second segment consists of a montage of archival and new footage that details some of Romania’s recent history, involving the military, the government, religion, fascism, Nazi collaboration, patriotism, the two world wars, the 1989 revolution, Nicolae Ceaușescu, domestic violence, jokes about blondes, and the value of cinema itself. The bevy of images also points out which NSFW word is most commonly looked up in the dictionary, as well as which is second. (The film is splendidly edited by Cătălin Cristuțiu, with a fab soundtrack by Jura Ferina and Pavao Miholjević.)
It all comes together in the third section, in the school garden, where Emi faces a few dozen masked, socially distanced, very angry parents and grandparents who want her fired immediately, while the headmistress demands a calm discussion. The masked Emi is a stand-in for all of us, facing the wrath of the unruly mob forcing its sanctimonious platitudes on others when it really needs to look at itself. It’s a riotously funny sitcomlike debate in which Jude roasts many common, hypocritical beliefs held by Romanians (and people all over the world) that have not necessarily changed much from the news clips shown in the previous part.
The cartoonish cast, which includes Olimpia Mălai as Mrs. Lucia, Nicodim Ungureanu as Lt. Gheorghescu, Alexandru Potocean as Marius Buzdrugovici, and Andi Vasluianu as Mr. Otopeanu, really gets to strut its stuff while making sure their masks are properly covering their mouths and noses. They argue about beloved national poet Mihai Eminescu and Russian writer Isaac Babel, delve into various sexual positions, repeat Woody the Woodpecker’s trademark call, and quote long, intellectual passages from the internet as Jude (I Do Not Care If We Go Down in History as Barbarians,Aferim!) reveals where society’s true obscenities lie. It’s an irreverent tour de force that offers three distinct endings to put a capper on the strangely alluring affair, turning a scary mirror on the sorry state of twenty-first-century existence.
Playfully subtitled A Sketch for a Possible Film in a reference to André Malraux’s description of Eugène Delacroix’s belief that his sketches could be of the same quality as his paintings, Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn is making its US premiere September 25 and 26 at the New York Film Festival; the first screening will be followed by a virtual Q&A. The film opens in theaters November 19.
New documentary focuses on George Balanchine’s teaching methods (photo by Martha Swope)
IN BALANCHINE’S CLASSROOM (Connie Hochman, 2021)
Film Forum
209 West Houston St.
Opens Friday, September 17
212-727-8110 filmforum.org
This summer, dance fans have been treated to behind-the-scenes glimpses at the creative process of three legendary choreographers. First was Bill T. Jones in Rosalynde LeBlanc and Tom Hurwitz’s Can You Bring It: Bill T. Jones and D-Man in the Waters, followed by Alvin Ailey in Jamila Wignot’s Ailey. Now comes an exciting look at New York City Ballet cofounder George Balanchine in Connie Hochman’s In Balanchine’s Classroom, opening September 17 at Film Forum. Hochman, who trained at Balanchine’s School of American Ballet and danced with the Pennsylvania Ballet, has been working on the film since 2007, interviewing one hundred people who worked with Balanchine and gaining access to the archives of the George Balanchine Trust, incorporating rare, never-before-seen footage of Balanchine teaching his company in his unique style.
Several prominent former NYCB dancers share their experiences of the classes, in which Balanchine would focus on every minute aspect of movement, from the hands and the feet to the size of jumps. “He not only started a company; he changed the whole look of ballet,” says Gloria Govrin, artistic director of Eastern Connecticut Ballet. “It was more than just technique that he taught. It’s everything together that made the dancer,” Suki Schorer, senior faculty member of the School of American Ballet, explains. “The classroom was where he went to see how far he could make his dancers go,” Balanchine coach and stager Merrill Ashley notes. “He was our artistic father,” Edward Villella, founding artistic director of Miami City Ballet, says, pointing out how important it was for everyone to try to please him.
Hochman also speaks extensively with Balanchine-method coach and mentor Heather Watts and Jacques d’Amboise, the founder and president of National Dance Institute, who passed away in May at the age of eighty-six. (Sadly, twenty of Hochman’s subjects are no longer with us.) Photographs and film clips of all of the above show them dancing for the NYCB, interacting with Balanchine, and keeping his legacy alive by teaching such dancers as Tiler Peck, Stella Abrera, and Unity Phelan of NYCB, Calvin Royal III of ABT, and other professionals as well as young kids. “I think as teachers we have an obligation to share with the younger generation the way that he advocated, but it’s become the problem,” Ashley says. “We’re not Balanchine.”
There’s terrific, though grainy, black-and-white footage (and some later color) from such classic Balanchine ballets as Apollo, Prodigal Son, Serenade, Symphony in C, Orpheus, Agon, Jewels, and Stravinsky Violin Concerto while Hochman also explores Balanchine’s early years: He was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, in 1904, started dancing when he was nine, was hired as a choreographer by Serge Diaghilev for the Ballets Russes, was brought to American by Lincoln Kirstein, who cofounded the NYCB with Balanchine and helped fund the construction of the company’s home at the New York State Theater at Lincoln Center, and developed a fruitful working relationship with composer Igor Stravinsky. Balanchine is heard in numerous audio clips unearthed by Hochman. “I don’t accept the way it looks and it’s very difficult to discuss why,” he says. “I can’t say what inspires, if you use that high-class word, ‘inspiration.’ It’s your past, where you were born, what you’ve done in your life.”
All of the interview subjects agree that Balanchine could be extremely hard on his dancers, but he also gave them a freedom, appreciating them as individuals. They are also afraid of what might become of his ballets in the future, but Balanchine’s legacy seems safe in their capable hands. Film Forum will host three in-person Q&As opening weekend, with Hochman and Ashley on September 17 at 6:30 and September 19 at 5:20 and with Hochman and Villella on September 18 at 6:30. The 2021–22 NYCB season opens September 21 and will include Balanchine’s Serenade, Symphony in C, Western Symphony, Agon, La Valse, and The Nutcracker.
