oct 2011 - 92nd Street Y

oct 2011
The theme for this season of Flaherty NYC at 92YTribeca
is Snapshots: Tourism in Cinema, exploring documentary
as a form of tourism, of the filmmaker as an outsider looking
at a place through the gaze of the outsider. Programmed by
Miriam Bale.
wed, oct 5, 7:30 pm
FILM
Deserted streets! Blood-red skies! Total Social
Breakdown!
sat, oct 22, 9:30 pm
Join us for a selection of rare-to-infamous apocalyptic
films and several talks with a wide variety of Doomday
experts—neuroscientists, authors, critics, roboticists, and
even a chaplain. The festival also incorporates a gallery
exhibit, bomb shelter lounge, and a DJ’d mix of PSAs,
industrial noise, and nuclear meltdown sirens—in short, the
End will be all kinds of Nigh.
Introduced by Mike Sampson of JoBlo
Pre-Screening Complimentary Sexy Alien Zombie Makeup.
fri, oct 21, 8 pm
Director: Tobe Hooper. 116 min. 1985. 35 mm.
Miracle Mile
Followed by Q&A with Steve DeJarnatt.
Gone to Earth
In this, Michael Powell’s and Emeric Pressburger’s rarely screened, enchanted
Technicolor masterpiece, Jennifer Jones is a half gypsy who runs barefoot
through the rolling Welsh countryside with her pet fox (named Foxy) in arm.
The gorgeous Jones as Hazel is pursued by both a kind pastor who wants to
save her and a brutal Baron who wants to savage her. Hazel is torn between
the two, but really belongs to the forest and hills where she feels most at home.
Directors: Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger.
110 min. 1950. 35mm.
Program also includes the short film Union, Paul Clipson’s unnerving Super
8 short inspired by Gone to Earth. (15 min. 2010. 16mm).
Wed, oct 12, 7:30 pm
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou
Another tourist film of imaginary places, this film could be considered a
documentary about Cinecittà, the Italian film studio where it was shot. “This
is a documentary. It’s all really happening,” says a character in Wes Anderson’s
maligned and misunderstood epic fantasy about a Jacques Cousteau-inspired
filmmaker and his crew. The film, like a Disney live action adventure made
by Godard, is a self-conscious examination of the overlap between fiction
and documentary. Matt Zoller Seitz, author of the forthcoming book The
Wes Anderson Collection, calls this his favorite Wes Anderson film and will be
in attendance to discuss.
Director: Wes Anderson. 119 min. 2004. 35mm.
Doomed romantic Anthony Edwards finally stumbles into a meet-cute with a
dream girl, but on the eve of their second date, he picks up a stray ringing pay
phone at 4 a.m, and gets some unfortunate news—WWIII has been launched,
giving him 70 minutes before nukes descend upon the streets of L.A.
Director: Steve De Jarnatt. 87 min. 1988. 35mm.
fri, oct 21, 10:30 pm
Last Night
Special guest curated by Edgar Wright (in person, schedule permitting)
Leave it to the Canadians to best capture the aw-shucks benign resignation
of late ‘90s angst—with six hours left until some unidentified cataclysm,
the radio counts down the best songs of all time, a gas-utility exec (David
Cronenberg) makes thank-you calls, and a family politely goes through the
motions of their last meal. Instead of cowering or rising up against their
doomsday, Don McKellar’s touching myriad of hapless citizens just sort of
carry on. With a doozy of a finale, rivaling “Giulietta Massina smiling into
the camera in Nights of Cabiria, or the seaside sunset in Eric Rohmer’s
The Green Ray.” – Amy Taubin
Director: Don McKellar. 98 min. 1999. 35mm.
sat, oct 22, 6 pm
Colossus: The Forbin Project
wed, oct 19, 7:30 pm
Followed by “The Singularity is Nigh” panel discussion.
Le mort du rat, Chicken Real
and Ukiah
Bizarrely forgotten, Colossus was actually produced before 2001 but delayed
because its studio was so upset by the grim flippant tone. Nowhere as grave and
bloodless as your standard Luddite paranoid fantasy, the film is actually closer
in spirit to Strangelove, with its wry literate script, crisp pacing, mordant take
on human folly and increasingly odd twists—notably when Colossus puts its
scientist-creator’s every move (including sexy time) under surveillance.
Le mort du rat
The man Tarkovsky called “the great hope of French cinema” is virtually
unknown now, both in the United States and in France. Aubier plays with the
industrial film format in this experimental short.
Director: Pascal Aubier. 5 min. 1975.
Chicken Real
This surprisingly gorgeous 16mm short about chicken factory farming has
been described as “probably the most hilariously subversive industrial film
ever made.” Commissioned by Holly Farms Poultry and one of the last
industrial films Blank made, his unidentifiable tone of arch cynicism with an
overriding sensuous pleasure was established with this film, yet it was notably
absent in the last two Blank retrospectives in NY.
Director: Les Blank. 23 min. 1970.
Director: Joseph Sargent. 100 min. 1970. 35mm.
Followed by a panel discussion featuring author Maggie Jackson, critic Joshua
Rothkopf, writer Jason Zinoman, roboticist Chris Bregler and president of
the Singularity Institute Michael Vassar. Moderated by Motherboard editorin-chief Michael Byrne.
Lifeforce
Essentially an apocalyptic film festival unto itself, Lifeforce conjures no less
than every conceivable doomsday scenario, with an emphasis on perverse
sexual imagery so often ignored by the apocalyptic canon. Unfairly derided
at the time as incoherent junk, this is far from phoned -in hackwork, with
director Tobe Hooper (Texas Chainsaw Massacre) and writer Dan O’Bannon
(Alien), at their most demented, dialing up their pet obsessions to 11.Your
new favorite cult classic, this is a film made for drinking games, and not to
be missed on the big screen.
sun, oct 23, 2 pm
Dr. Strangelove
Followed by “Doomsday on the Brain” panel discussion.
Fearful the Russkies are fluoridating America’s drinking water to pollute
“our precious bodily fluids,” General Jack D. Ripper fires up the “Doomsday
Machine,” sending the world’s power players scrambling. Released when
the End was awfully close to nigh, Strangelove was intended to be gravely
serious, but as Kubrick began to contemplate “mutally assured destruction”
(aka MAD), he couldn’t help but zero in on the lunacy. “One of the great
adolescent pranks perpetrated in movies.” – J. Hoberman
Director: Stanley Kubrick. 91 min. 1964. 35mm.
Following the film, we’ll be joined by a panel of experts in an attempt to
diagnose our collective doomsday complex and wrap our heads around the
lunacy of it all. Featuring neuroscientist Joseph Le Doux, Dr. Mark Siegel,
author Lee Quinby and critic Keith Uhlich.
sun, oct 23, 4:30 pm
Doomsday Shorts
An international array of brand-new apocalypse films including: crazed
prophet street art, psychedelic animation starring a single lemon, docs
tracking the daily lives of Harold Camping’s devoted followers, Slamdance
award winners, experimental collage art featuring haunted meteorologists,
and steampunk ninjas courtesy of the FX wizard behind Star Wars and
Starship Troopers.
sun, oct 23, 7 pm
God Told Me To
Followed by Skype Q&A with director Larry Cohen
Co-presented by Alt Screen.
Perhaps the most radical of Cohen’s populist genre works, God Told Me
To is the paranoid skuzzy downtown flipside to Rosemary’s Baby’s uptown
neurosis. Tautly paced, with an uneasy blend of fever dream deaths, sly social
commentary, sacrilegious black comedy, edgy verite lensing, Catholic guilt
played straight, and scene after scene of rich pulpy dialogue delivered by a cast
of old pro character actors. Released during a time where both the cult craze
and the Christian Right had just made their ascension, the film’s guerilla
derangement of the Gospel leaves absolutely no spiritual anxiety unprodded.
Director: Larry Cohen. 87 min. 1976. 16mm.
thu, oct 6, 7:30 pm
Squirm
This ambiguous utopian dreamworld was shot at an artists’ project in Northern
California.The gorgeous images were shot using the movie setting on a
still camera, so he was able to document the project almost unnoticed, from
completely inside. Haunting and funny, the film has the logic of a child’s mind
making sense of the unreal. Fleischner, the director of Wah Do Dem and Below
the Brain, will be in attendance to discuss.
Director: Sam Fleischner. 15 min. 2010.
City slicker Don Scardino crosses the Mason-Dixon for the
love of Southern girl Patricia Pearcy (Cockfighter), but everything goes
to hell as soon as he tries to find a good egg cream. A toppled power
line does something to the local bait industry, a heretofore disorganized
earthworm population who suddenly transform into a slippery, wriggling,
flesh-hungry legion, burrowing under exposed skin and making the
world unsafe for showerheads and spaghetti dinners. The enormous
assembled cast of heaped nightcrawlers make this deeply, deeply gross
movie the Ben-Hur of worm-attack films.
Director: Jeff Lieberman. 92 min. 1976. 35mm.
Wed, oct 26, 7:30 pm
thu, oct 6, 9:30 PM, $10
Super 8 Snapshots
Slither
The night will begin with filmmaker Brian Frye presenting a selection
of found footage from his collection and discussing the influence of this
type of work on his own filmmaking. Then Kevin Allen and Jen Heuson
will present their own Super 8 films documenting places (including Peru,
Bolivia,Vietnam) that plays with this same format. Then Heuson will
present her latest film, Sweet Clover, which uses Super 8 travel footage
from the Black Hills, SD to weave together an autobiographical tale of her
family’s history, cowboys and Indians and tourism in the West.
Debut director James Gunn (Super) continues Squirm’s grand tradition
of films about gross things threatening attractive women in bathrooms,
while exploring the new avenues for perverse violation allowed by
modern CGI. A meteor crash lands near small-town Woodville, bringing
a cargo of alien parasites that resemble animate beef tongues, which
have the ability to zombify their hosts when ingested. Sheriff Bill Pardy
(Nathan Fillion) is the only man standing in the way of colonization,
with Elizabeth Banks as his backup. Fillion gives a standout performance
of bemused incredulity, working from a profane and funny script.
Director: James Gunn. 95 min. 2006. 35mm.
Ukiah
The Flaherty NYC series continues into November. Check 92YTribeca.
org/Flaherty for details.
In olden times, back when people gave a hoot, video
stores would set aside certain movies on an altar to refined,
idiosyncratic expertise called “Employee Picks.” In that
spirit, critics Nick Pinkerton and Nicolas Rapold present
their very own secret history of cinema.
Order online and pay no service fees at 92YTribeca.org or call 212.601.1000
All screenings are $12 unless otherwise noted. NEW! Text “Tribeca” to 86213 and be the first to learn about new events
and special offerings! Standard message rates apply. Visit 92YTribeca.org for updates and additions.
200 Hudson Street at Canal |
An agency of UJA-Federation
moses and aaron
thu, oct 13, 7 pm
thu, oct 27, 7 pm
Samba’s Evening (Noitada de samba
foco de resistencia)
Semper Fi: Always Faithful
Part of the series Janeiro in New York. Co-presented with Cinema Tropical.
In 1971, under Brazil’s military dictatorship, Jorge Coutinho and Leonides
Bayer began holding weekly “Samba Evenings” at Teatro Opinião in Rio
de Janeiro, importing popular musicians from the suburbs to entertain
Rio’s elite. Radical in both concept and execution, the series transformed
the theater into a symbol of political and cultural resistance over its 617
performances in 13 years. Samba’s Evening recounts this history through
music, rare footage and interviews with Alcione, Beth Carvalho, D.Yvone
Lara, Eliana Pittman, Elton Medeiros, Gilberto Braga, Martinho da Vila,
Maurício Sherman and others whose stories powerfully evoke the period.
- MoMA Premiere Brazil!
Movies that get better after you’ve had a few. This month’s
theme: Funny/Gory!
fri, oct 14, 8 pm
Dead Alive
Lionel Cosgrove is a devoted mama’s boy—so devoted that when she
is bit by a strange monkey and starts behaving outrageously, he lovingly
comes to her aid, whether gluing her skin back on or apologizing when
she eats a dog. His budding romance with Paquita starts to suffer, and
when he suddenly becomes responsible for more gooey walking-dead
types, he tries to spare her by breaking it off. But his gaggle of horny,
oozing monsters starts to increase, (including the most terrible baby ever)
and he realizes he will have to eliminate them rather than protect them.
A lawnmower comes in handy with doing the job quick, but does he
have the, um, guts to do in his own mum? One of Peter Jackson’s early
movies and arguably one of the most bloody disgusting comedy-horrors
of all time, Dead Alive will be a cringe-inducing joy on the big screen!
Director: Peter Jackson. 104 min. 1992. 35mm.
fri, oct 14, 10:15 PM, $10
Re-Animator
When genius medical student Herbert West creates a serum that brings
the dead back to life, he naturally did not foresee the trouble it would
cause. One test-case revived corpse goes on a rampage, with bloody
results. West struggles to seize control when things continue to go awry,
but moving cadavers and dismembered body parts get in the way. Based
on an H.P. Lovecraft story, this adaptation found a cult following as well
as unlikely critical praise, with Janet Maslin remarking that it “has as
much originality as it has gore, and that’s really saying something.”
Director: Stuart Gordon. 86 min. 1985. 35mm.
Island of lost souls
The Iron Mule Short Comedy
Film Festival
The Iron Mule Short Comedy Screening Series was founded in
April 2002 under the name First Sundays at the Chicago City Limits
Theater in NYC, and has been screening monthly ever since. We are a
collective of filmmakers and film lovers who meet monthly to celebrate
funny and inventive short cinema among friends. Join us if you dare!
This month, we’re featuring comedies about vampires, domestic
violence, distant families and product recalls. Plus the Wanna
Be a Star movie “Garbage Dump,” starring audience member
Ally Cunningham!
tue, oct 4, 7:30 pm
Director: Cély Leal. 75 min. 2010. Portuguese with English
subtitles.
sat, oct 15, 7 pm
Directors: Rachel Libert and Tony Hardmon. 76 min. 2011.
Moses and Aaron
fri, oct 28, 8 pm
Programmed by Miriam Bale.
Richard Roud wrote of this little-seen atonal biblical masterpiece, “a
faithful version of Schoenberg’s opera and an original film in its own
right.” In it, Straub and Huillet succeed in rendering visible not only the
philosophical content of the work—the struggle between word (Moses)
and image (Aaron)—but also its dramatic potential.” Moses is the idea
and Aaron is the expression of the idea. As explored by Straub and Huillet,
through sound and space, this profoundly dialectical film is about what
cinema is, apart from its conflicting elements. Also, in the filmmakers’
reliably anti-bourgeois way, it’s about the inevitable fall of the powerful
from the height of success. This is why, they supposed, the film never
caught on in America.
Tremors
Directors: Danièle Huillet & Jean-Marie Straub.
107 min. 1975. 35mm.
sun, oct 16, 6 pm
Edward Parker (Richard Arlen) is shipwrecked at sea, punched off
a freighter, and things only get worse from there. Now the guest
of the mysterious Dr. Moreau (Charles Laughton), Parker’s trapped
among ape-men, panther-girls and the grisly secrets of the House
of Pain as he tries desperately to escape the island of a mad scientist
determined to transform animals into men. The first and still best
adaptation of H.G.Wells’s “Island of Dr. Moreau”, Lost Souls is one
of the least-seen great ‘30s horror movies. More lurid and shocking
than the genteel Universal monster movies, it was banned in England
for 25 years. Featuring bizarre make-up effects, Charles Laughton’s
most maniacal performance and film’s first man/animal sexual tension,
Lost Souls is an off-putting nightmare.
In this affectionate send-up of schlocky ‘50s creature features, podunk
cowpokes Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward finally wise up and try to ditch
their nowhere desert town, but it just so happens to be the very day giant
prehistoric man-eating sandworms begin sucking the townspeople underground. Scary-fun and retro drive-in, Tremors was released during a time
when the “animals attack” subgenre had all but become extinct, but Ron
Underwood’s horror-comedy served as a reminder of why it was such a
staple in the first place. While decidedly cheeky in tone (the monsters are
called “graboids”), the film’s shocks are nonetheless genuine, with tension
ramped to seismic levels. Like Jaws before it, Tremors distinguishes itself from
bargain-bin monster-movie fare with inspired casting choices for the affably
rag-tag townsfolk—notably Michael “Family Ties” Gross and country singer
Reba McEntire as a pair of endearingly nutjob survivalists, overjoyed that
the day has finally come to mobilize their arsenal of elephant guns.
Director: Ron Underwood. 96min. 1990. 35mm.
6 pm
The Exterminator
Labyrinth Sing-Along and
Costume Party
This film shows us what it might look like if someone applied superhero
methods in real life. After his army buddy is paralyzed by a ruthless gang,
John Eastland (Robert Ginty) blows away those involved. He doesn’t stop
there, setting out on a spree to off as many depraved individuals as one
man can track down in late 1970s New York City. The movie found an
enthusiastic audience and launched director James Glickenhaus’s career.
Expect blood, guts (machine-processed) and scorched bodies and witness
NYC when it was at its dingiest.
Director: James Glickenhaus. 101 min. 1980. 35mm.
Part of our Sing-Along series. Hosted by Chris Kelly.
8:30 pm
Shakedown
sat, oct 29, 8 pm
$13 ticket includes one beer
8 years after leveling the scum of the city by any means necessary in The
Exterminator, Times Square auteur James Glickenhaus goes big budget and
leaves a wake of destruction through some of the most iconic locations of
pre-Giuliani New York. An overworked lawyer (Peter Weller) teams with an
undercover cop (a never more grizzled Sam Elliott) to take on drug kingpins
and high-level police corruption. The actual level of corruption within the
NYPD is debatable, but one fact remains clear: action movies are rarely this
exciting, intelligent and unpretentious. Features an astonishing shootout/car
chase on super sleazy 42nd street and the untouchable tagline, “Whatever
you do… don’t call the cops.”
Double Feature: Fiend and Society
mon, oct 17, 8 pm
Meet the Lady: Beth Grant
Part of our Meet The Lady series.
Meet The Lady begins its second season with an in-person tribute to
great American character actress Beth Grant, known for her memorable
performances in films such as Donnie Darko, Sordid Lives, Little Miss Sunshine,
To Wong Foo ... and many more. For one night only, Grant will appear in
person to screen and discuss selections from her prolific career—which spans
150 film and television credits—and to accept presentations in her honor
delivered by a cavalcade of New York artists.
Hosted by Tom Blunt, with special guests Frank DeCaro, Roslyn Hart,
Kevin Maher and Nellie McKay. Music by Brooklyn Instrument Museum.
Reception to follow in the 92YTribeca café.
PUNCH: Puppet Slam
Part of the series Closely Watched Films.
Part of the series Basic Cable Classics.
James Glickenhaus Double Feature:
The Exterminator and Shakedown
thu, oct 20, 7:30 pm
Island of Lost Souls
Part of the series Story Leads to Action, co-presented with Chicken
and Egg Pictures and Working Films.
Marine Corps. SGT Jerry Ensminger was a devoted marine for nearly
25 years. As a drill instructor he lived and breathed the “Corps” and was
responsible for indoctrinating thousands of new recruits with its motto
Semper Fidelis or “Always Faithful.” When Jerry’s nine-year old daughter
Janey died of a rare type of leukemia, his world collapsed. As a grief-stricken
father, he struggled for years to make sense of what happened. His search
for answers led to the shocking discovery of a Marine Corps cover-up of
one of the largest water contamination incidents in U.S. history. Semper Fi:
Always Faithful follows Jerry’s mission to expose the Marine Corps and
force them to live up to their motto to the thousands of soldiers and their
families exposed to toxic chemicals. His fight reveals a grave injustice at
North Carolina’s Camp Lejeune and a looming environmental crisis at
military sites across the country.
Director: James Glickenhaus. 112 min. 1988. 35mm.
sat, oct 1, 8 pm, $10
tremors
PUNCH puppet slam: short films is back at 92YTribeca with award-winning cinema, rocking music videos, comedic shorts, probing political commentary and more; with rod puppets, hand puppets, Muppet-style puppets,
shadows and other. Brought to you by the fine people at Drama of Works.
fri, oct 28, 10:15 pm, $13 ticket includes one beer
Put on your spandex and practice your crystal ball juggling – it is time once
again for the Labyrinth sing-along! David Bowie and Jennifer Connelly star
along with some homely Muppets, taking us through a maze of upside down
staircases and talking door-knockers. Beer will help you to admit that you
know the words to the songs.
The night will include a costume competition and other surprises!
Director: Jim Henson. 101 min. 1986. 35mm.
NotComing.com is hosting a double feature of 1980s frights, beginning
with a foray into homemade horror (screened on VHS!) and culminating in
a quintessential gross-out, screening on 35mm film. Featuring trailers from
other horror favorites.
8 pm
Fiend
A one-time underground comic-book magnate and publisher of the DIY
horror effects zine Cinemagic, low-budget horror master Don Dohler is a
veritable repository of frugal grotesquerie. Dohler crafted a distinctive
subgenre of beige suburban Maryland cul-de-sac horror, of which Fiend is
the zenith, featuring a dazzling compendium of turn-of-the-eighties hairstyles,
home furnishings, and all-around fiendishness. Alternately taking the form of
a glowing-red spermatozoon and a paunchy, mustachioed violin teacher and
Satanist named Mr. Longfellow, this titular demonic entity sates its nefarious
insatiable hunger for the lifeforce of average suburban folks and innocent
little girls.
Directed by Don Dohler. 90 min. 1980. VHS.
10 pm
society
For its first two-thirds, Society is not dissimilar to other 1980s horror/thriller
films that craft suburban settings of high school strife or Reagan-era, socioeconomic anxiety. This portion of the film is in itself a fine example of whodunit
tension, centering on a lettered high school senior, Bill, and his relationship
with his increasingly and peculiarly libidinous family and friends. But unlike its
peers (it is akin to everything from Scooby Doo to Blue Velvet, Salò, and even Eyes
Wide Shut), Society builds to a climax so profane and outlandish that its shock
holds firm over twenty years after the film’s original release. Genre maven Brian
Yuzna’s first, Society remains not only his best film, but an underappreciated
satire and one of horror’s quintessential special effects extravaganzas.
Directed by Brian Yuzna. 99 min. 1989. 35mm.
Host Elliott Kalan and special guest John Hodgman (Areas of My
Expertise, The Daily Show, This American Life) will discuss mad scientists,
old-time horror and just how bewildered a pre-comic book world
had to have been by marauding animal-men.
Director: Erle Kenton. 70 min. 1932. 35mm.
oct 2011
FILM
the exterminator
labyrinth sing-along and costume party
Order online and pay no service fees at 92YTribeca.org or call 212.601.1000
All screenings are $12 unless otherwise noted. NEW! Text “Tribeca” to 86213 and
be the first to learn about new events and special offerings! Standard message rates apply.
Visit 92YTribeca.org for updates and additions. 200 Hudson Street at Canal