Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 47: Wed Feb 16

It Felt Like Love (Hittman, 2013): BFI Southbank, NFT2, 8.30pm

This film, also screening on February 6th, part of the female coming-of-age films at BFI Southbank (full details here).

Chicago Reader review:
Eliza Hittman’s Brooklyn-shot debut feature (2013) ruminates on our society’s sexualization of early adolescent girls, centering on a lonely 14-year-old who starts indulging her curiosity about sex without understanding the risks. There are many explicit images involving teens, yet they make one feel sorrowful rather than voyeuristic; Hittman draws attention to the pervasive cultural forces (rap music, Internet pornography, suggestive dancing on TV) that present young girls as sexual objects, making the scenes of exploitation seem sadly inevitable. In her approach to teen sexuality, Hittman shows uncommon seriousness for an American filmmaker, but if you’ve seen any recent French art movies on the subject, you may find this rather familiar (at one point, she re-creates the most famous scene in Catherine Breillat’s Fat Girl).
Ben Sachs

Here (and above) is the trailer.

 

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 46: Tue Feb 15

The Green Room (Truffaut, 1978): BFI Southbank, NFT3, 8.40pm

This Francois Truffaut film is part of the director's season is also being screened on Ferbruary 10th and 23rd at BFI Southbank (full details here).

Chicago Reader review:
Stillborn but intriguing Francois Truffaut film (1978), assembled from two short stories by Henry James. The filmmaker himself stars as a journalist whose life is centered on the memory of his dead wife; he meets a young woman (Nathalie Baye) with a similar obsession, and together they construct an altar to all their dead–family, friends, heroes–in an abandoned chapel. Truffaut is attempting a philosophical disquisition on the presence of the lost, the ways in which the dead remain a part of our lives, but his theme can’t escape the morbid eccentricity of his characters; the film dead-ends in sheer neurosis. Photographed, in fecund greens and withering yellows, by Nestor Almendros.
Dave Kehr

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 45: Mon Feb 14

In the Mood for Love (Kar-wai, 2000): Close-Up Cinema, 8.15pm

Chicago Reader review:
A brooding chamber piece (2000) about a love affair that never quite happens. Director Wong Kar-wai, Hong Kong’s most romantic filmmaker, is known for his excesses, and in that sense the film’s spareness represents a bold departure. Claustrophobically set in adjacent flats in 1962 Hong Kong, where two young couples find themselves sharing space with other people, it focuses on a newspaper editor and a secretary at an export firm (Tony Leung and Maggie Cheung, the sexiest duo in Hong Kong cinema) who discover that their respective spouses are having an affair on the road. Wong, who improvises his films with the actors, endlessly repeats his musical motifs and variations on a handful of images, rituals, and short scenes (rainstorms, cab rides, stairways, tender and tentative hand gestures), while dressing Cheung in some of the most confining (though lovely) dresses imaginable, whose mandarin collars suggest neck braces.
Jonathan Rosenbaum

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 44: Sun Feb 13

Fahrenheit 451 (Truffaut, 1966): BFI Southbank, NFT1, 12.40pm

This film, part of the Francois Truffaut season, is an oddity that has grown in stature over the years. When the movie was released no one really expected a sci-fi movie from Francois Truffaut and most were both puzzled and disappointed but its depiction of an authoritarian state that has outlawed books looks amazing (partly thanks to Nic Roeg's superb cinematography).

There are other numerous pleasures along the way, including Julie Christie (think Deborah Kerr in The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp or the central character in Luis Bunuel's That Obscure Object of Desire) playing both the hero's wife and his lover and the innovative opening credits. There is also the music which, and I don't say this lightly, contains some of Bernard Herrmann's finest work. The film may lose its way towards the end but the denoument aside this is a work very much worthy of investigation.

Here is an interview with Truffaut on Hitchcock (just for the hell of it). The film is also being screened at the NFT (oh go on indulge me) on February 5th and 27th (details here).

Time Out review:
An underrated film, perhaps because it is less science fiction than a tale of 'once upon a time'. Where Ray Bradbury's novel posited a strange, terrifyingly mechanised society which has banned books in the interests of material well-being, Truffaut presents a cosy world not so very different from our own, with television a universal father-figure pouring out reassuring messages, and the only element of menace a fire-engine tearing down the road. A bright, gleaming childhood red, the engine is like a reminder of toyhood days; and as Werner's fireman hero goes about his task of destroying literature, his growing awareness of the almost human way in which books curl up and die in the flames gradually assumes the dimensions of a quest for a legendary lost treasure - movingly glimpsed as he slowly and painfully deciphers the title-page of David Copperfield. Here the rich, nostalgic pull of the past wins out over technocracy, and the film ends, as it began, with a scene lifted right out of time: a wonderful shot of the rebels - each dedicated to the preservation of a literary masterpiece by committing it to memory - wandering in contented, idyllic exile by the edge of a glitteringly icy lake.
Tom Milne

Here (and above) are the sublime opening credits.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 43: Sat Feb 12

 Silken Skin (Truffaut, 1964): BFI Southbank, NFT1, 5.20pm

 
This Francois Truffaut film is part of the director's season is also being screened on Ferbruary 6th and 26th at BFI Southbank (full details here).

Time Out review:
Those whose knowledge of French nouvelle vague linchpin François Truffaut begins with ‘The 400 Blows’ and ends with ‘Jules and Jim’ should seek out this steely 1964 study in the cruel mechanics of illicit love. Like one of Eric Rohmer’s ‘Moral Tales’ recast as a smouldering thriller, the film is marked by an intense, unromantic rigour absent in the director’s early work. It traces paunchy, middle-aged publisher and lecturer Pierre Lachenay (Jean Desailly) as he heedlessly ditches his loving wife and child so he can romp around the countryside with a coquettish air hostess (Françoise Dorléac). It’s conservative, as Truffaut views Pierre’s actions as immoral. But it’s more concerned with the logistics of love, asking whether the time and energy one must exhaust for a little something on the side is worth it.
David Jenkins

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 42: Fri Feb 11

Thirteen (Hardwicke, 2003): BFI Southbank, NFT2, 6.10pm

This is a 35mm presentation in the Seen & Heard, female coming-of-age season.

BFI introduction:
Thirteen-year-old Tracy begins the seventh grade as a smart and modest student but she craves more, yearning to shed her goody-two-shoes image and catch the attention and approval of Evie, one of the most popular girls at school. Catherine Hardwicke’s groundbreaking debut feature, co-written by then-14-year-old Nikki Reed (Evie) is a brutally honest film about the joys and the horrors of being a teenager.

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 41: Thu Feb 10

Diamantino (Abrantes/Schmidt, 2018): Castle Cinema, 9pm

This is a Jellied Reels (who specialise in surprise and special screenings) production.

Chicago Reader review:
The title character of this Portuguese comedy is a dim-witted soccer star who likes to imagine his opponents on the field are giant puppies. After he fails to make a penalty kick and loses the World Cup for Portugal, he decides to redeem himself by adopting an African refugee, unaware that the “boy” is actually an undercover female government agent investigating his family’s ties to a money-laundering operation. Meanwhile, Diamantino’s twin sisters sell out the hero to a far-right organization with designs of getting Portugal to leave the EU. There are also developments involving cloning, experimental psychotherapy, and a motorcycle-riding nun. The plot may suggest an early Pedro Almodóvar farce, but directors Gabriel Abrantes and Daniel Schmidt (who previously made the underground feature Palaces of Pity) avoid big laughs, underplaying everything with the aim of making viewers marvel at how weird it all is. The strategy smacks of false modesty, since the film isn’t really all that weird—it’s too cannily plotted and self-aware to achieve the sort of gonzo energy one associates with genuine cult items.
Ben Sachs

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 40: Wed Feb 9

The Story of Adele H (Truffaut, 1975): BFI Southbank, NFT1, 8.55pm

 
This Francois Truffaut film is part of the director's season is also being screened on Ferbruary 12th and 19th at BFI Southbank (full details here).

Chicago Reader review:
The critics loved to honor the late Francois Truffaut for his glowingly humanistic films, yet as time goes by it becomes more and more clear that his dark, obsessive works (The Soft Skin, The Green Room, The Man Who Loved Women) are by far the most personal and most enduring. This 1975 effort revealed a falsely promising Isabelle Adjani as the daughter of Victor Hugo, devoted to the point of demented self-destructiveness to a feckless British lieutenant. Though, like Truffaut’s other black films, it suffers from a monotony of tone, its intensity is impressive and remains uncompromised by the prettifying aesthetic touches Truffaut adds here and there in an apparent attempt to distance himself from the overcharged material. The further Truffaut steps back, the more implicated he seems to be.
Dave Kehr

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 39: Tue Feb 8

The Woman Next Door (Truffaut, 1981): BFI Southbank, NFT3, 8.30pm

 
This intriguing Francois Truffaut film is part of the director's season is also being screened on Ferbruary 21st and 24th at BFI Southbank (full details here).

Chicago Reader review:
Certainly the coldest film ever made about l’amour fou, Francois Truffaut’s 1981 production fails to satisfy emotionally but contains some of his most creative direction post-Jules and Jim. It’s a very studied, very formal work in which a tale of fatal attraction (betweeen Gerard Depardieu and Fanny Ardant) becomes a study of the contrasting implications of long takes and crosscutting, stiff compositions and fluid camera movements. Throughout, Truffaut insists on the physical barriers between his lovers—the space that separates their adjacent homes, the windows through which they look longingly at each other, and ultimately the film frame itself, with its narrowness and claustrophobia. In the end, the film is not about an attraction between two people, but about the love of the spectator for the image—the perverse transactions between the audience and the screen.
Dave Kehr

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 38: Mon Feb 7

Jules et Jim (Truffaut, 1962): BFI Southbank, NFT2 6.20pm & NFT3, 8.30pm

This famous Francois Truffaut film is part of the director's season and is on an extended run at BFI Southbank (full details here).

Chicago Reader review:
That eternal theme of melodrama—the love too fine to last—given intelligent and sensitive treatment by Francois Truffaut. Oskar Werner and Henri Serre are the two friends of the title, who, when World War I breaks out, must fight on different sides; Jeanne Moreau, in a performance that combines the intensely physical and the fleetingly enigmatic, is Catherine, the woman who loves them both. With this 1961 film Truffaut comes closest to the spirit and sublimity of his mentor, Jean Renoir, and the result is a masterpiece of the New Wave.
Dave Kehr

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 37: Sun Feb 6

The Hunter's Diary (Nakahira, 1964): ICA Cinema, 6.10pm

This 35mm presentation is part of the Japan Foundation Touring Film Programme at the ICA Cinema. Full details here.

ICA introduction: Misogynist and philanderer Ichiro Honda (Noboru Nakaya) has an insatiable sexual appetite which is not being satisfied by his distant wife whom he only really sees on weekends. While he is away from Osaka for work, his time is spent living a double life in Tokyo, filling his nights with consecutive sexual conquests, the details of which he meticulously records in his ‘hunter’s diary’. One day, he reads about the murder of a woman in the paper; she is one of his previous ‘preys’. A few days later, another such woman dies in mysterious circumstances. Suddenly, a string of women he has bedded start dropping like flies in a calculated killing spree, with Ichiro as the only suspect. Adapting a novel written by Masako Togawa, who portrays the role of the deceived wife, silver screen master Ko Nakahira (Plants from the Dune) directs this stylish suspense drama which we are happy to present in glorious 35mm format.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 36: Sat Feb 5

There Will be Blood (Anderson, 2007): Everyman Screen on the Green, 10.30pm

This is part of the Everyman Screen on the Green Paul Thomas Anderson on 35mm season at the cinema. Full details here.

Chicago Reader review:
Paul Thomas Anderson's fifth feature (2007), a striking piece of American self-loathing loosely derived from Upton Sinclair's Oil!, is lively as bombastic period storytelling but limited as allegory. The cynical shallowness of both the characters and the overall conception—American success as an unholy alliance between a turn-of-the-century capitalist (Daniel Day-Lewis) and a faith healer (Paul Dano), both hypocrites—can't quite sustain the film's visionary airs, even with good expressionist acting and a percussive score by Radiohead's Jonny Greenwood. Day-Lewis, borrowing heavily from Walter and John Huston, offers a demonic hero halfway between Thomas Sutpen in Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom! and James Dean's hate-driven tycoon in Giant (shot on the same location as this movie), but Kevin J. O'Connor in a slimmer part offers a much more interesting and suggestive character. This has loads of swagger, but for stylistic audacity I prefer Anderson's more scattershot Magnolia.
Jonathan Rosenbaum

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 35: Fri Feb 4

The Bride Wore Black (Truffaut, 1968): BFI Southbank, NFT1, 8.45pm

This film is part of the Francois Truffaut season at BFI Southbank and also screens on February 13th and 27th. Full details here.

Chicago Reader review:
Despite the dedication of this 1967 film to Hitchcock and the use of his most distinguished collaborator, composer Bernard Herrmann, Francois Truffaut’s first Cornell Woolrich adaptation—the second was Mississippi Mermaid—is most memorable for lyrical moods and poetic flights of fancy that don’t seem especially Hitchcockian. Jeanne Moreau stalks gracefully through the film, wooing and dispatching a series of men like an avenging angel whose motivating obsession is spelled out only gradually; among her prey are Claude Rich, Jean-Claude Brialy, Michel Bouquet, Michel Lonsdale, and Charles Denner. Basically an exercice de style, and a good one at that.
Jonathan Rosenbaum

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 34: Thu Feb 3

Goldfinger (Hamilton, 1964): Prince Charles Cinema, 3.30pm

The Prince Charles Cinema continues its full 007 Retrospective showing every James Bond movie over the coming months. You can see all the details of the screenings here.

The press reviews of the films don't capture the excitement of this retrospective for Bond fans and I am recommending the Blogalongabond series by Neil Alcock (aka @theincrediblesuit on Twitter). Here is his take on Goldfinger.

Time Out review:
Guy Hamilton’s Pinewood-produced ‘Goldfinger’ is the first of four James Bond films he directed and the third to star Sean Connery as 007. Any kid growing up in the early ’60s will remember this one for several reasons: Birley Shassey’s screamer of a theme; Bond’s shocking use of a beautiful girl as a human shield; bullion-obsessed baddie Auric Goldfinger’s top hat-wielding henchman, Oddjob; Honor Blackman’s risquely monikered Pussy Galore; and, above all, Bond’s stupendous, gadget-infested silver Aston Martin DB5, the car that spurred a thousand Corgi purchases. Presented here in a newly restored digital print, it should look especially swish on the big screen.
Derek Adams

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 33: Wed Feb 2

A Soul In Torment (Curtiz, 1921): Cinema Museum, 7.30pm

Cinema Museum introduction:
A Soul in Torment (1921) aka Frau Dorothys Bekenntnis / Mrs. Dane’s Confession is an Austrian film directed by Michael Curtiz, with cinematography by Gustav Ucicky, and starring Lucy Doraine, Alfons Fryland, Otto Tressier, Kurt Lessen, Harry DeLoon, Anton Tiller and Max-Ralph Ostermann. In 1919, Mihály Kertész (his stage name at the time – he was born Mano Kaminer) had moved to Austria from Hungary, where he made nearly 20 films, often with his wife Lucy Doraine (until their divorce in 1923). In 1926, he answered the call from Warner Bros., changing his name again to Michael Curtiz.

Dorothy (Lucy Doraine) awakens next to a body and is immediately arrested. Grilled by the police who accuse her of the murder, she protests that she’s innocent. Bit by bit Dorothy’s memories are pieced together, starting with the death of her parents and how she came under the tutelage of her uncle. But her seemingly safe life is derailed when she is saved from an attempted kidnapping by a dashing man. Unfortunately he is not really after her but her money.

We are screening a 35mm archive print, courtesy of the BFI. The film will be introduced by Michelle Facey.

Here (and above) is an extract.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 32: Tue Feb 1

Shoot the Pianist (Truffaut, 1960): BFI Southbank, NFT3, 8.50pm 

This film is part of the Francois Truffaut season at BFI Southbank and also screens on February 11th and 26th. Full details here.

Chicago Reader review:
After The 400 Blows, Francois Truffaut turned to what he described as “a pastiche of the Hollywood B film” for his 1962 second feature. Its ironic shifts of mood, from farce to near tragedy, conceal a deeper tone of despair. Charles Aznavour stars as a timid man, driven from society, who hurts when he tries to be kind and kills when he tries to love. Made with enthusiasm and audacity, it still seems fresh.
Don Druker

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 31: Mon Jan 31

Love On the Run (Truffaut, 1979): BFI Sothbank, NFT2, 8.40pm

This film is part of the Francois Truffaut season at BFI Southbank.

Chicago Reader review:
Francois Truffaut took a few steps toward modernism with this very self-conscious experiment in narrative form (1979). It’s not so much another episode in the Antoine Doinel cycle as a reflection on it, using extensive clips from the previous features to examine the ways in which art devours life—a theme that has always been present in Truffaut’s autobiographical cinema, but never so directly stated. Still, the results are more interesting than satisfying; it is a film more thought than felt. With Jean-Pierre Leaud, Marie-France Pisier, and Claude Jade.
Dave Kehr

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 30: Sun Jan 30

Under Your Skin (Niskanen, 1966): Close-Up Cinema, 8.15pm

This 35mm presentation is part of the Never on Sunday season at Close-Up Cinema. The season is a series of screenings of rare classics, archive masterpieces, obscure delights and forgotten gems carefully curated by Ehsan Khoshbakht and taking place the last Sunday of each month at Close-Up.

Close-Up Cinema introduction:
Directed by Mikko Niskanen, an indispensable figure of Finnish new cinema of the 1960s, Under Your Skin (Käpy selän alla) is one of the most significant films in the history of Finnish cinema which, in the spirit of New Wave, embraces a whole new generation of Finns dreaming of "a universal sense of responsibility." (Peter von Bagh). The tender and real depiction of this new politically-conscious generation, as well as fresh cinematic ideas employed, were warmly welcomed by both the Finnish audiences (making the film the second box office hit of 1966) and the critics, the latter leading to the film winning six Jussi awards, the Finnish equivalent of the Oscar.

"Set against a background of white birch trees, a glittering lake and early summer greenery, [Under Your Skin] has a rhapsodic character and describes the relationships between four young adults. The agile camera work still captures [the] fluidity of the relationships and the private feelings of the characters in a spontaneous way. The summer beauty of nature corresponds gracefully with the Scandinavian fantasy world that is always associated with freedom, youth and sentimentality. But Käpy selän alla also breaks the illusion of reality of the narrative cinema on several levels, and the focus of the camera goes beyond the confines of the narrative, and draws in the audience." Tytti Soila

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 29: Sat Jan 29

He Stands in a Desert Counting the Seconds of His Life (Mekas, 1969-1985):
Close Up Cinema, 7.30pm 

This film is also being shown on January 30th (full details here).

Close Up Cinema introduction to Jonas Mekas season (full details here): A Lithuanian, arriving in New York in flight from war-torn Europe, Jonas Mekas became one of the leading figures of American avant-garde filmmaking. In 1954, he became editor and chief of Film Culture; in 1958 he began writing his “Movie Journal” column for the Village Voice; in 1962 he co-founded the Film-Makers’ Cooperative (FMC) and the Filmmakers’ Cinematheque in 1964, which eventually grew into Anthology Film Archives, one of the world’s largest and most important repositories of avant-garde films. His own output ranged from narrative films (Guns of the Trees) to documentaries (The Brig) and to “diaries” (Walden). Mekas' highly personal film diaries recorded many of the underground events from the 1950s to the 80s as well as his own life, creating a unique body of work that is both a record of those eventful years and remarkable film poetry. 2022 would have been the 100th anniversary of this legendary filmmaker, and to celebrate this occasion we’re delighted to present 10 of Mekas’ landmark films.

Senses of Cinema review:
The great achievement of American avant-garde film has been the interiorization of the cinema image: the creation of a body of films whose techniques are geared not toward using the film image for objective presentation of external events but for the exploration of the varieties of the private personas and inner visions of their makers. Jonas Mekas’s film, He Stands in a Desert Counting the Seconds of His Life, is one of the most intense, beautiful, and moving examples of that tradition.
Fred Camper

Here (and above) is an extract.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 28: Fri Jan 28

Absolute Beginners (Temple, 1986): BFI Southbank,NFT3, 8.45pm

This presentation is part of the David Bowie season at BFI Southbank. Full details here

Chicago Reader review:
A fascinating attempt by rock video director Julien Temple to do several things at once—adapt a Colin MacInnes novel, show the London youth scene in 1958 (while dealing at length with the racial tensions of the period), build on some of the stylistic innovations of Frank Tashlin, Vincente Minnelli, and Orson Welles, and put to best use a fascinating score by Gil Evans that adapts everything from Charles Mingus to Miles Davis. A mixed success, but an exhilarating try (1986). With David Bowie, Keith Richards, and James Fox.
Jonathan Rosenbaum

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 27: Thu Jan 27

My Little Eye (Evans, 2002): BFI Southbank, NFT3, 8.30pm

The film is part of the Terror Vision strand at BFI Southbank.

Time Out review:
The six months are nearly up. Another few days of voluntary captivity under the ever-watchful eyes of a hundred webcams and the five housemates will be home free - and a million dollars better off. But when Danny gets word that his grandfather has died, the group is unwilling to forfeit the prize so he can attend the funeral. And when, instead of the usual package of supplies, the contestants receive a bottle of champagne and a loaded gun, can they convince themselves that it's just another mind game, that survival is not at stake? A disturbing renovation of the classic 'old dark house' blood-chiller, this takes the logic of opportunism and runs with it. The film is shot entirely from the fixed vantage points of digital surveillance cameras and, in keeping with the tenets of voyeur TV, the contestants are noxious exhibitionists willing to endure any humiliation so long as Big Brother keeps watching. In the most chilling scene, they discover that this may not be the case - that their imagined fame doesn't extend beyond a handful of sadistic high-rollers. A nasty piece of work, but we probably deserve it.
Tom Charity

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 26: Wed Jan 26

Bigger Than Life (Ray, 1956): BFI Southbank, NFT2,  6.05pm

Here's a chance to see Bigger Than Life, generally regarded to be one of Nicholas Ray's finest films. I saw the film on TV recently again and was mightily impressed. (The screening on January 19th is introduced by programmer-at-large, Geoff Andrew (full details here)).

Ray was one of the most interesting directors of Hollywood's Golden Age. Famously lauded for Rebel Without A Cause, he was also responsible for some of the most remarkable movies to emerge from America in the 1950s.

Ray directed the weird western Johnny Guitar and a fascinating anti-war drama in Bitter Victory, a Richard Burton vehicle now almost entirely forgotten but which deserves its growing reputation. However, Bigger Than Life is Ray's masterpiece. A searing indictment of American middle-class values, the film was trashed on release but came to the attention of film buffs in the 1960s after being championed by Francois Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard.

In the movie James Mason plays a quiet sububan teacher who is transformed into a murderous megalomaniac following his addiction to cortisone. If the radical story wasn't recommendation enough, Ray's use of colour and his unequalled use of Cinemascope are masterful.

Chicago Reader review:
Nicholas Ray's potent 1956 CinemaScope melodrama dealt with the ill effects of cortisone on a frustrated middle-class grammar-school teacher (James Mason) at about the same time that the first wave of “wonder” drugs hit the market. But the true subject of this deeply disturbing picture is middle-class values—about money, education, culture, religion, patriarchy, and “getting ahead.” These values are thrown into bold relief by the hero's drug dependency and resulting megalomania, which leads to shocking and tragic results for his family (Barbara Rush and Robert Simon) as well as himself. Ray's use of 'Scope framing and color to delineate the hero's dreams and dissatisfactions has rarely been as purposeful. (It's hard to think of another Hollywood picture with more to say about the sheer awfulness of “normal” American family life during the 50s.) With Walter Matthau in an early noncomic role as the hero's best friend; scripted by Cyril Hume, Richard Maibum, and an uncredited Clifford Odets.
Jonathan Rosenbaum 

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 25: Tue Jan 25

Shadow of A Doubt (Hitchcock, 1943): BFI Southbank, NFT3, 2.30pm

This film, part of the Francois Truffaut Big Screen Classics strand at BFI Southbank, is alose screened on January 22nd. Full details here.

Chicago Reader review:
Alfred Hitchcock’s first indisputable masterpiece (1943). Joseph Cotten is Uncle Charlie, aka the Merry Widow Murderer, who returns to his hometown to visit his niece and namesake, played by Teresa Wright. Hitchcock’s discovery of darkness within the heart of small-town America remains one of his most harrowing films, a peek behind the facade of security that reveals loneliness, despair, and death. Thornton Wilder collaborated on the script; it’s Our Town turned inside out.
Dave Kehr

Here (and above) is the trailer.

Capital Celluloid 2022 — Day 24: Mon Jan 24

L'Enfant sauvage (Truffaut, 1970): NFT 1. 6.10pm

This film is part of the Francois Truffaut season at BFI Southbank.

Chicago Reader review:
This feature is one of Francois Truffaut’s best middle-period films, albeit one of his darkest and most conservative. Filmed in black and white by the gifted Nestor Almendros, it’s based on the true story of a nine-year-old boy (Jean-Pierre Cargol) found living in the wilderness and educated by a young physician (played by Truffaut himself). There are certain parallels here with Arthur Penn’s The Miracle Worker, about the “civilizing” of Helen Keller, but Truffaut’s message is more pessimistic than inspirational; it suggests that the joys of primitivism are incompatible with the achievement of culture.
Jonathan Rosenbaum

Here (and above) is the trailer.