Capital Celluloid 2016 - Day 139: Wed May 18

The Tall T (Boetticher, 1957) & Ride Lonesome (Boetticher, 1959):
BFI Southbank, NFT3, 8.10pm


This brilliant (35mm) double-bill is part of the 'Ride Lonesome: Psychological Western' season at BFI Southbank and also screens on May 29th. Details here.

Chicago Reader review of The Tall T:
One of the best of the Randolph Scott-Budd Boetticher B westerns (1957), in which the action is almost entirely psychological (Scott tries to pry Maureen O'Sullivan away from the outlaws—Richard Boone, Henry Silva, Skip Homeier—who are holding her for ransom) and the landscape is deftly stylized into dark interiors (caves, a fateful well) that punctuate the wide-open spaces. Boone makes one of the most memorable of Boetticher's witty, intelligent villains; no other western director so seductively gave evil its due.
Dave Kehr

Chicago Reader review of Ride Lonesome:
Budd Boetticher stretched the format of his Randolph Scott westerns into CinemaScope with this 1959 entry in the cycle, and in some respects the narrative seems drawn out as well: there is hardly any pretense of action or suspense as the characters move, almost aimlessly, through an open landscape, testing each other's strengths and weaknesses through conversations that become psychological chess games. Scott, as usual, is looking for the man who murdered his wife; his companions are two wisecracking outlaws (James Coburn and Pernell Roberts) and a woman whose husband has been killed by Indians (Karen Steele).
Dave Kehr


Here (and above) is the trailer for The Tall T.

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Subsequent to the initial posting for today's pick this message was sent out by the Prince Charles Cinema: Next Wednesday 18th May's screening of THE PASSION OF ANNA has been cancelled. The print has been taken out of service by the distributor.
 
The Passion of Anna (Bergman, 1969): Prince Charles Cinema, 8.45pm


This (35mm) screening is part of a short Ingmar Bergman season at the Prince Charles Cinema. You can find full details here.

Chicago Reader review:
Ingmar Bergman's 1970 film about the impossibility of purity and consistency in a world where to live is to contradict yourself. The passion of the title is not sexual, but the ability to live with the contradictions of life and to bear them without resignation. A tentative, plotless film that pulses with the rhythms of life rather than the rhythms of drama.
Don Druker

Here (and above) is the brilliant trailer.

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