Teorema (1968)

WHO: Pier Paolo Pasolini wrote and directed this.

WHAT: From what I've heard, the most expensive Pasolini film for an institution to procure a 35mm print of, which is probably why it has not been part of every stop on the current national tour of his films (UCLA for instance passed on showing it). A shame, since it's one of his best, and an especially good entry point for a Pasolini newbie.

WHERE/WHEN: Tonight only at the Pacific Film Archive at 6:30.

WHY: Support the PFA's commitment to providing an essentially complete Pasolini series by attending a screening that (if the figure I heard quoted to another venue is correct) is mathematically incapable of making back its print rental cost through ticket sales.

Now's as good a time as any to mention other upcoming PFA series I've not highlighted on this blog. Most of them were just revealed this past week.

October 10-27: Moumen Smihi: Poet of Tangier, dedicated to a Moroccan filmmaker I'm unfamiliar with, but who has been making films since the days of Pasolini and Fassbinder (both of whom shot films in that country).

November 4-22: Afterimage: Agnès Varda on Filmmaking. The "mother of the French New Wave" will be on hand to screen four of her films on November 4th and 5th.

November 8-December 8: Beauty and Sacrifice: Images of Women in Chinese Cinema. Two films starring 1930s Shanghai film icon Ruan Lingyu, two starring Maggie Cheung (including one where she plays Ruan), and Cecile Tang's 1969 film The Arch, which I've been wanting to see for ten years or more.

November 13-17: Arrested History: New Portuguese Cinema. 6 recent films from one of the most interesting European national cinemas today. Includes in-person appearances by filmmakers Susana de Sousa Dias and João Pedro Rodrigues, and the 1st Frisco Bay screening of Miguel Gomes's acclaimed Tabu since last year's Mill Valley Film Festival (but this time in 35mm.)

November 21-24: Behind the Scenes: The Art and Craft of Cinema with Randy Thom, Sound Designer. Three in-person screenings of diverse films featuring sound work by an Academy Award-winner whose film career started with work on one of the greatest-sounding films American of all time, Apocalpyse Now.

December 1-15: The Resolution Starts Now: 4K Restorations from Sony Pictures. Grover Crisp will be on hand two evenings to try to sell us skeptics on the merits of high quality digital projection of nine classic Columbia pictures.

HOW: New 35mm print.