10HTE: Maureen Russell

The San Francisco Bay Area is still home to a rich cinephilic culture nurtured in large part by a diverse array of cinemas, programmers and moviegoers. I'm honored to present a selection of favorite screenings experienced by local cinephiles in 2016. An index of participants can be found here.

Eight-time IOHTE contributor Maureen Russell is a cinephile, a Noir City volunteer, and member of various screening organizations (SFIFF, The Roxie, SF Silent Film Fest, SFMOMA).

In preparing this list, I noticed almost all my screenings were at my favorite theater, the Castro. My favorite film festivals are also held there.

Blood Simple screen capture from MGM DVD

1. Blood Simple (1984) - SFIFF, The Castro - The Coen Bros in person with Peter Becker and Jonathan Turell
Mel Novikoff Award - Janus Films and the Criterion Collection

This the first time I saw Blood Simple – the tense plot doesn’t let up. The stories in the onstage interviews were funny and fascinating.

2. The Station Agent (2003) SFIFF - BAMPFA
Kanbar Award with writer / director Tom McCarthy for onstage interview

3. Noir City 14 – The Art of Darkness - The Castro
This is one of my favorite festivals and I catch most of the screenings.
Highlights:
The Red Shoes (1948, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger – screenplay, directors) I hadn’t seen this since I was a child. The creative scenes vivid Technicolor and the use of actors who are also dancers (Moira Shearer) make this film magical.
The Bitter Stems (1956, Argentina, Director: Fernando Ayala) Beautifully shot with a tense plot and even a great nightclub scene, the end shocks.
Peeping Tom (1960, Michael Powell)

4. San Francisco Silent Film Festival – The Castro I’m choosing the whole festival since I like the variety of films. Highlights:
The Italian Straw Hat (Rene Clair, 1928)
Behind the Door (1919) - Live accompaniment by Stephen Horne – restoration
One of the most shocking endings out there.
A Woman of the World (1925) – restoration. Live accompaniment by Donald Sosin
Pola Negri is spot on in this comedy dealing with American values and scandal.

Barry Lyndon screen capture from Warner DVD

5. Barry Lyndon - (1975) Stanley Kubrick - The Castro - 35 mm screening
The use of candle light and natural light is an achievement in itself.

Notable film event for 2016: Kubrick exhibit at the Contemporary Jewish Museum
Film clips included, but props, memorabilia and how the films were shot were fascinating.

6. Cast a Dark Shadow (1955, UK, Lewis Gilbert, The Castro) - SFIFF - starring Dirk Bogarde

7. Bruce Conner- films as part of the Bruce Conner: It’s All True retrospective exhibit at SFMoMA

8. San Francisco Silent Film Festival – A Day of Silents – The Castro (December)
Sadie Thompson (1928) Gloria Swanson stars in and made this film happen
The Last Command (1928)

Multiple Maniacs screen capture from Strand DVD of The Cockettes 

9. Multiple Maniacs – John Waters (1970)
New DCP restoration – The Castro – Halloween, 2016
It’s been a while since I had the shock of the first time viewing of a John Waters’ film. Unavailable for decades, his second feature looked beautiful in this restoration. The black and white images were funny, gross and perverse.

10. Wild at Heart (1990) – The Castro 35mm, scope – X-rated version (David Lynch) I didn’t know there was an X-rated version of this, but 35mm scope is the way to see this one.

10HTE: Adam Hartzell

The San Francisco Bay Area is still home to a rich cinephilic culture nurtured in large part by a diverse array of cinemas, programmers and moviegoers. I'm honored to present a selection of favorite screenings experienced by local cinephiles in 2016. An index of participants can be found here.

Eight-time IOHTE contributor Adam Hartzell is a local writer and Roxie board member. He has a piece on Advantageous in the recently released Directory of World Cinema: American Independents 3

This is where I tell you how seriously bummed I was when I found out I missed an opportunity to see First Nations Canadian director Alanis Obomsawin's films at the Pacific Film Archives. (Sad face.)

5) REBECCA (Alfred Hitchcock, USA 1940) - Balboa Theatre - February 20th, 2016

One of two films on this rep/revival list that I'm glad I held out on to see on screen. I always try to catch a couple films at each year's Mostly British Film Festival. Normally they screen at The Vogue, but this suspenseful classic of Hitchcock's played at The Balboa theatre, a theatre with a special place in my heart that I'm always game to patronize. And it doesn't hurt that such a trip gives me an excuse to eat at Shanghai Dumpling King.

Tokyo-Ga screen capture from Criterion DVD extra for Late Spring

4) TOKYO STORY (Yasujiro Ozu, Japan, 1953) - September 3rd, 2016/TOKYO-GA (Wim Wenders, West Germany, 1986), the latter with an intro by composer/vocalist Ken Ueno - Pacific Film Archives - September 8th, 2016

My cousin, who lives in Berkeley, has a partner who is a cinephile like me. And ones appreciation of Ozu is one of those cinephilic connectors. So it was totally appropriate that my cousin, her man, and I would have Ozu's classic TOKYO STORY as our first viewing experience together as a triple. This was also my first visit to the new BAM/PFA building, so much more convenient from BART than the previous location. Although I've seen TOKYO STORY many times before, the PFA also offered the opportunity to finally see Wim Wenders' documentary about Ozu's Tokyo which includes interviews with regular Ozu collaborators actor Chishu Ryu and cinematographer Yuharu Atsuta. This time I saw it with just my cousin's partner who I'm sure will be a regular PFA companion for me.

3) TAMPOPO (Juzo Itami, Japan, 1985) - Opera Plaza - December 4th, 2016 I hadn't seen TAMPOPO for quite some time. My wife, who is Japanese, had never seen this film. The re-release offered each of us a different experience. My wife laughed at the sight of a young Koji Yakusho and even younger Ken Watanabe. In the end, she was surprised that she found such an 'older' film so delightful, since she tends to find older films boring. I was struck by the scenes I'd forgotten about, such as the French restaurant and the homeless foodies. TAMPOPO clearly transcends its time. Off we went afterward for ramen, but just as we were with our sushi after a screening of JIRO DREAMS OF SUSHI (David Gelb, USA, 2011), we were disappointed that the dishes just weren't up to par with what we'd had in Japan.

2) WITHIN OUR GATES (Oscar Micheaux, USA, 1920) - Castro Theatre - May 4th, 2016 Micheaux is the grandfather of Black Cinema in the US. So when the San Francisco Silent Film Festival brought one of his silents this year, I had to attend. In this time of Black Lives Matter, revisiting WITHIN OUR GATES has an even greater impact. The lynching scene is shocking and leads one to reflect on the context of now, what we've witnessed captured on video via smartphone technology. The harrowing intensity of all this was heightened by the accompaniment of the Oakland Symphony and Chorus under the direction of Michael Morgan.

Screen capture from Criterion DVD. 

1) Tanya Tagaq sings as NANOOK OF THE NORTH (Robert J. Flaherty, USA/France, 1926) plays in the background at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts - November 17th, 2016 I have had a couple opportunities to see this proto-documentary but failed to take advantage of them. I'm now glad I waited to see it until Polaris-winning Inuk Canadian throat singer Tanya Tagaq reinterpreted it. Placing the document in its time and place while still confronting its legacy, Tagaq brought new life and agency to the documentary's subjects. Seeing Tagaq has been a bucket-list item for me. Finally checking it off, the experience stays and resonates with me as you hope all bucket-list items will.

The Golden Chance (1915)

Screen capture from Image DVD

WHO: Cecil B. DeMille directed, produced, edited and (with Jeanie Macpherson) co-wrote this film.

WHAT: This is one of my very favorite DeMille pictures, and I even selected it as object of study for a collaborative blogging project several years ago (that seems to have propagated an image to the wikipedia page for Japanese actor Yutake Abe, if nothing else more lasting). Later that year, my friend Laura Horak wrote an article about it and a pair of other Cecil B. DeMille films (as well as one directed by his brother William) released on DVD for The Moving Image journal. Here's an excerpt from her article:

The story follows Mary Denby (Cleo Ridgely), a "Cinderella of the Lower East Side," who escapes from grueling tenement life and her abusive husband, Steve (Horace B. Carpenter), for one magical night. The film is surprisingly explicit about the way money and sex are intertwined. Seeking work as a seamstress, Mary enters Mr. and Mrs. Hillary's "House of Enchantment," where they convince her to play the part of a socialite for a night, unaware that her real purpose is to charm a young millionaire, Roger Manning (Wallace Reid), into investing in Mr. Hillary's business venture. At first, Mary is happy to play her role in exchange for one night of luxurious clothes, shoes, and jewelry but, even after suspecting the nature of the exchange, desperate poverty forces her to accept the money. 

WHERE/WHEN: Screens tonight only at the Edison Theatre in Niles, CA, as part of the Broncho Billy Silent Film Festival.

WHY: The Broncho Billy Silent Film Festival, while perhaps not as glamorous or public-transit-accessible (or expensive!) as the San Francisco Silent Film Festival, deserves equal consideration from Frisco Bay silent film fans. Its film programming is in many ways just as strong- and for film purists stronger -, its musical accompaniments not as flashy but equally adept and professional, and its extra features, including a walking tour and a train ride, represent a world away from the hustle and bustle of Castro Street.

Additional screenings at this year's festival include rarities and proven favorites from the Essanay Studios which made Niles a movie hub for a few years a century ago, and a pair of films starring the Gish sisters, Nell Gwyn with forgotten Dorothy and a masterpiece (directed by Swedish import auteur Victor Seastrom) The Scarlet Letter with the legendary Lillian.

Of this year's festival screenings, I'm probably most interested in seeing Behind the Front, a Wallace Beery war film whose title seems to refer to the 1919 film that was the big discovery of the SF Silent Film Festival earlier this month for me and for quite a few other festgoers, Behind the Door. Beery played a villain in that, and stole the show out from under Louise Brooks in the festival opener Beggars of Life. I'm especially anxious to see it because it screens with Broncho Billy and the Bandit's Secret, a 35mm made-in-Niles production released just last year, but still unscreened in San Francisco (it's hard to find venues willing and able to show a modern-day 35mm silent short film). 

If you can't make it this weekend, the July Niles schedule has been announced and includes a Gary Cooper Western, a Clara Bow flapper film, a Lon Chaney circus tragedy, and much, much, much more. July schedules for the Stanford, the Castro, YBCA and BAMPFA are also online, so start planning your month if you haven't already!

HOW: Screens from a tinted 16mm print, along with 35mm prints of 2 Niles-produced shorts Broncho Billy's Wild Ride and Slippery Slim and the Impersonator, all with live keyboard accompaniment from Jon Mirsalis.

Nanook of the North (1922)

Screen capture from Music Box Films DVD of The Story of Film

WHO: Robert Flaherty directed this. He was also a producer and (uncredited) writer and cinematographer on the piece.

WHAT: The last time I watched Robert Flaherty's seminal Nanook of the North I was sitting in on a City College of San Francisco course taught by Ira Rothstein. He introduced the showing with a quote from Jean-Luc Godard on fiction or "narrative" films: that they are "nothing more than documentaries of actors at work."

One might say the same thing about non-fiction or "documentary" films as well (I use quotes around the word "documentary" because the term was not in use at the time Nanook of the North was made). Acting is not just merely a profession, marked by its connection to training facilities and professional guilds.  It's also an action that each of us has learned to perform to make it through the varied situations of the modern world.  And when we are conscious that there is a camera trained upon us, we tend to "act" differently than we otherwise would, whether we want to or not.  If the photographer explicitly asks us to pose or to perform a certain action, we're all the more likely to be pulled out of the actions we would take were a camera not present; we may attempt to conform to the requester's expressed wishes, or else rebel against them, but it becomes difficult if not impossible to act as we would if we didn't know the camera was there.

As one learns when watching Claude Massot's 1988 documentary Nanook Revisited (available on the Flicker Alley Blu-Ray edition of Flaherty's film), Nanook of the North was made with the hearty cooperation of its Inuit subjects.  Indeed Allakariallak, the actor who played the title character (Nanook was not his real name) was delighted to comply with his director's requests, which included: acting as if he had not heard a phonograph record before, when in fact he had, and engaging in a walrus hunt using methods that he and his fellow tribesmen had not employed for years - which Erik Barnouw seems to imply was actually an idea generated by Allakariallak himself, knowing it would be in sync with Flaherty's own aims in encasing in the amber of celluloid film the singular traditions of the Inuits.  

It's often noted that Nanook and its offspring like Chang (Cooper & Shoedsack, 1927) are not "pure" documentaries because the actions of their subjects were not merely observed and captured, but directed by their makers, and because they're edited, with the help of title cards, into a narrative form that distorts fact in the service of adventure and excitement (and, say the cynical, box-office). But is there not documentary value in seeing people perform tasks that, even if they may be obsolete on a day-to-day basis, are still in their living muscle memory? Allakariallak may or may not have ever hunted walrus without a rifle himself, but at the very least he'd known people who'd had no other option, and was a far more authentic choice to do so on screen than any Hollywood actor would have been.  As Barnouw wrote about the Inuits involved in the film: "Unquestionably the film reflected their image of their traditional life."

WHERE/WHEN: Nanook of the North screens today only at the Castro Theatre, at 1:45 PM, presented by the San Francisco Silent Film Festival.

WHY: Though I haven't seen the shorts screening as part of the Fantasia of Color in Early Cinema program launching the 21st SFSFF's final day, nor the Hal Roach two-reeler What's the World Coming To?, which plays as part of the Girls Will Be Boys noon program, I've seen all five "feature-length" films screening today: Ernst Lubitsch's I Don't Wan't To Be a Man (the other piece of the aforementioned gender-bending showcase), Nanook of the North, Fritz Lang's haunting Destiny, Rene Clair's final silent Les Deux Timides and the mindblowing Douglas Fairbanks extravaganza (and Victor Fleming's directorial debut) When the Clouds Roll By, though of these only Les Deux Timides in a cinema with live musical accompaniment.  If I could see only one of them again today (and I'm so grateful that this is not so) it would be Nanook. Though I'm excited to finally see the Lubitsch, Lang and Fleming on the Castro screen with an audience, I remember them all (and it's been quite a while, especially for Destiny) as films with incredible scenes rather than as incredible films from start to finish. Nanook is a more consistent, coherent work despite its controversial aspects.

Despite being the most famous of today's films, it also seems the least likely candidate to screen again in a Frisco Bay venue any time soon. I could picture When the Clouds Roll By appearing at the Stanford Theatre, for instance (Victor Fleming seems pretty popular there; his most famous film Gone With the Wind screens July 1-3 to celebrate Olivia de Havilland's 100th birthday). And it's been long enough since the last Lubitsch, Lang, and especially Clair retrospectives at BAMPFA that I wouldn't be so surprised to see their films show up there (though I wouldn't count on it either). Nanook of the North could appear as well, but since it's screening SFSFF as a BAMPFA co-presentation I rather doubt it would be soon.

Probably the most likely venue to show any of these films again is the most consistent silent film venue around: the Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum's Edison Theatre, the same room where Charlie Chaplin watched movies over 101 years ago. Next weekend the Edison will play host to two days and one night full of Chaplin film screenings as well as a Chaplin look-alike contest on Sunday in honor of the annual Niles, CA Charlie Chaplin Days. The following weekend Chaplin's The Vagabond opens a four-film program of comedy shorts also including a Charley Chase film, a Laurel & Hardy, and Buster Keaton's Cops (in case you missed it at SFSFF yesterday), all in 16mm with live piano accompaniment from Judith Rosenberg. And the final weekend of June is given over to the Broncho Billy Silent Film Festival, whose line-up seems especially strong this time around, with an opening night showing of my favorite early Cecil B. DeMille drama The Golden Chance (RIP Bob Birchard), a Saturday evening show including this year's SFSFF MVP Wallace Beery in Behind the Front, and a Gish-filled Sunday afternoon with Dorothy in Nell Gwyn followed by her better-remembered sister Lillian in the excellent Victor Seastrom adaptation of The Scarlet Letter. Not to mention a plethora of one-and two-reelers shot in Niles and/or other Essanay locations, including the 2015 throwback Broncho Billy and the Bandit's Secret, which was shot in the area by a modern crew using vintage equipment. Diana Serra Carey (the former silent-era child star Baby Peggy) is among the cast members.

But I suspect Niles is not likely to show Nanook of the North in the near future, if only because it just screened there this past February and repeats of that sort are rare for this venue.

HOW: Nanook of the North screens via a 35mm print, with live musical accompaniment from the Matti Bye Ensemble.

The Balloonatic (1923)

Screen capture from Kino DVD

WHO: Buster Keaton co-wrote, co-directed and stars in this alongside Phyllis Haver, perhaps the biggest female star he ever played opposite, at least in the silent era. Haver is perhaps best known for playing Roxie Hart in the 1927 silent Chicago, but she worked with many top directors such as John Ford (in 3 Bad Men), Raoul Walsh (What Price Glory), Howard Hawks (Fig Leaves) and D.W. Griffith (The Battle of the Sexes) and retired very shortly after talkies took over in Hollywood.

WHAT: Keaton's penultimate short before making the switch to feature films later in 1923 (tentatively at first, with The Three Ages, which could easily have been broken into short films had it flopped as a feature). He'd revert back into the short film world in the mid-1930s, well into the talkie era.

Without giving away any of the film's gags, it's fair to say that The Balloonatic is not one of Keaton's most inventive films story-wise, but it still features many very wonderful and hilarious sequences, including some of his most physical work to that point in his career. You really get a sense of Keaton battling the elements (quite literally, as he takes on air, water, fire and even earth, in approximately that order).

WHERE/WHEN: Screens this morning at the Castro Theatre, on a San Francisco Silent Film Festival program beginning at 10AM.

WHY: The San Francisco Silent Film Festival has been gradually working its way through showing all of Buster Keaton's silent films. By my count they've shown the following features over the years: Steamboat Bill, Jr. in 2000, Go West in 2003, Our Hospitality at the February 2009 Winter event, Sherlock, Jr. at the December 2009 Winter event, The Cameraman in 2012, The Navigator in 2014, and The General at the 2014 Silent Autumn event. Which leaves only six more of his eligible features unscreened by the organization (for the record: The Saphead, Three Ages, Seven Chances, Battling Butler, College and Spite Marriage) But then there are the shorts. I believe SFSFF has shown The Cook (in which he's the featured player to Roscoe Arbuckle's star), The Goat, The Love Nest, One Week, The Scarecrow, The Playhouse, and The Blacksmith. Today Cops and The Balloonatic add to that list, leaving another eleven shorts in which he stars, and thirteen in which he features with Arbuckle. At this rate, it'll take the 21-year-old festival at least another 21 years to come close to covering Keaton's entire pre-talkie filmography. It'll be quite a while before they'll have to start scraping the bottom of the barrel, or resorting to repeat showings. Cops is one of my very favorite of his shorts, and The Balloonatic is excellent as well.

They screen this morning along with The Battle of the Century, a Laurel and Hardy short that has not been seen in its complete form in decades. It's no coincidence that pianist Jon Mirsalis makes his long-delayed return to SFSFF playing the accompaniment for this program, as he's the one who found the long-missing reel 2 in a private collector's stash and brought it to public light for the first time (although a very small portion of the film still remains missing- so check your attic!) Also on the program: the delightful/disturbing (can't decide which) French short The Dancing Pig.

Also screening SFSFF today are Axel Lindblom & Alf Sjöberg's The Strongest and Anthony Asquith's debut Shooting Stars, neither of which I know much of anything about, Black American director Oscar Micheaux's earliest surviving film Within Our Gates, Rene Clair's most famous (but not my personal favorite) silent film The Italian Straw Hat, and finally The Last Warning. This, Paul Leni's final film before his untimely death from an infected tooth in 1929, was the 2016 SFSFF film I was most excited to see programmed when the schedule was initially announced, simply because it was one of the few films that I'd heard of but never seen before. After yesterday's disappointingly corporate-boilerplate-heavy Amazing Tales From the Archives presentation from the Universal team involved in its digital restoration, I'm actually slightly less interested in seeing it tonight than I was before. But I probably will anyway, and am thankful that the other Amazing Tales presentations were strong enough that it was still well worth running out the door early for. The Last Warning will have to be pretty amazing to match last night's late-show screening Behind the Door, perhaps the only silent film that ever made me think of Quentin Tarantino and Abel Ferrara by the end.

HOW: Both the Keaton shorts, the Battle of the Century and the Dancing Pig are expected to screen digitally, with live piano accompaniment from Jon Mirsalis.

That Night's Wife (1930)

Screen shot from Eclipse DVD

WHO: The great Yasujiro Ozu directed this. It's my personal favorite of his pre-1932 work, or should I say, the half of his output from this period that still survives in full or in part. So much of Japanese cinema history of this era is lost to us.

WHAT: When I last saw this on the big screen (at the Pacific Film Archive) I found it so compelling it made my list of best repertory screenings of 2011. But I'll all the more excited to revisit the film after reading Imogen Sara Smith's marvelous essay on the film in the newly-published San Francisco Silent Film Festival program guide. Here's a brief excerpt:

There has been a long-running debate about whether Ozu was essentially a formalist, an experimental filmmaker, as Bordwell argues, or whether, as Donald Richie contends, he was primarily interested in a singular narrative theme, the dissolution of the family. That Night's Wife shows how these two impulses were integrated as one: to tell a story through purely cinematic means. 

WHERE/WHEN: Screens 3PM today only at the Castro, as part of the San Francisco Silent Film Festival.

WHY: Thanks to David Hudson for including me in his essential Keyframe Daily round-up of articles about this year's SFSFF. Read all the articles linked there, and listen to Andrea Chase's excellent podcast interview with Anita Monga, and you'll get a pretty complete picture of this festival weekend.

Today is perhaps the day I'm most excited about overall, with the Amazing Tales From the Archives program, two Bay Area-shot features (A Woman of the World was shot in Pleasanton and Mothers of Men was made in Santa Cruz, Berkeley and Sacramento- thanks to Michael Hawley for alerting me to this website highlighting the locations where it was films), and the newly-restored submarine thriller Behind the Door, starring Wallace Beery, who stole the show from Louise Brooks last night in Beggars of Life. I've never seen any of these before. I have seen E. A. Dupont's Variety but only via a very poor VHS transfer, and am excited to watch it on the Castro screen with a 14-piece orchestral accompaniment.

HOW: Carl Martin of the Film on Film Foundation has published a detailed report on all the 35mm presentations at this year's SFSFF, and That Night's Wife is among these. It will screen with live piano accompaniment by Maud Nelissen, who is making her SFSFF debut with this presentation. She is actually the first woman to perform a SFSFF musical accompaniment on her own, unless you count Judith Roseberg's performances for Champagne and Easy Virtue at the festival-produced Hitchcock 9 program three years ago. 

Beggars of Life (1928)

Screen capture from Criterion DVD

WHO: Louise Brooks features as one of the three lead performers in this film, her first major dramatic role according to the Louise Brooks: Looking For Lulu documentary found on the Criterion edition of Pandora's Box, and which features short clips from Beggars of Life including the one I took a screen capture from for the above image (which doesn't do anywhere near justice to how this film looks on 35mm). I wrote a long-ish essay on Brooks the last time the San Francisco Silent Film Festival opened with one of her films, Prix de Beauté, and don't have much of an update of thoughts about her after less than three years. But read on:

WHAT: Brooks fans who fall in love with her European phase are sometimes disappointed that she plays a less traditionally glamorous role in this film, but in all honesty it's a terrific, if superficially atypical, performance for her. Reportedly she enjoyed making this film more than any other. But it's also a great showcase for Richard Arlen, made after Wings but before Thunderbolt, the Four Feathers and Tiger Shark (to name a few of my other favorite Arlen films), and was in fact sold as a Wallace Beery picture upon its initial release.


On some days, I think Beggars of Life is my very favorite film in which Louise Brooks appeared (noting that I have yet to see a few important ones, including her screen debut The Street of Forgotten Men). It's a constantly surprising train thriller with great performances all around-- only one character's arc (Blue Washington as Black Mose- a very interesting character undermined in his last reel) is a disappointment. And the filmmaking is frequently astonishing- some of director William Wellman's best work, deploying multi-exposed frames as a storytelling engine with a boldness unparalleled in narrative cinema until the the 1960s, unless I'm forgetting something.

If you want to read more about Beggars of Life you can't go wrong with Laura Horak's essay originally published in the 2007 SFSFF program guide. (Much more on that in a bit.) This was the last public screening of the film in a Frisco Bay cinema, according to Thomas Gladysz of the Louise Brooks Society, who has posted a comprehensive list of all local theatres that ever advertised screenings of the film, going back to 1928. He's also prepared a collection of international screening ephemera, and I might as well also link to his review of the 2007 Castro showing.

WHERE/WHEN: Screens 7PM tonight only at the Castro Theatre, opening the 21st San Francisco Silent Film Festival.

WHY: Writing this post inspired me to pull out one of the program guides I saved from the 2007 SFSFF, in which Beggars of Life also screened. It put me in a wistful mood, so let me recount my full history with the festival, something I've never done on this blog before. 

I first learned about SFSFF in 1999, while attending a Truffaut double-feature at the Castro and seeing flyers out for the 4th annual program, which was to screen Wellman's Oscar-winning Wings among other films (I hadn't heard of the others before at that time: Love, By the Law and a set of short animations). I was intrigued but already had river rafting plans that weekend, so filed the event away for future investigation. I missed the 2000 festival because I was living abroad, but upon my return I made sampling the 2001 SFSFF a priority. Out of the four programs that July Sunday I selected the Italian Maciste all'inferno to attend, and was simply blown away, not by the film itself, which was rather mediocre, but with the enthusiasm of the costumed crowd around me, and the presentation itself, which included a surprise Koko the Clown short beforehand, an enlightening introduction, and of course a tremendous musical accompaniment, in this case by pianist Michael Mortilla. I regretted not having planned to attend the whole day of screenings, though in the meantime I've since caught up with the other three features shown that day. (Peter Pan and It in cinemas, and thus far Within Our Gates only on Turner Classic Movies; I'm excited to finally have another chance to see it at the Castro this Saturday!)

In 2002 & 2003 I caught half the programs, attending a full day of showings each year (the festival had just doubled in size) but having to work the other weekend day. These were my first experiences seeing Cecil B. DeMille, Harold Lloyd, and King Vidor films on the big screen, and I knew I was hooked. In 2003 I was able to volunteer for the festival as an usher, making the financial sting a little easier on my struggling wallet. In 2005 I volunteered in the festival office a couple days, got to meet the friendly folks who put on the event, and signaled my interest in joining the volunteer research committee, which prepared the information-packed festival essays and slideshows for each program. In early 2007 (after covering the festival as press on this blog in 2006) I was invited to join that group, which was and still is one of the biggest honors of my movie-loving life.

It was quite an experience for a humble blogger with lots of passion for silent film but only a short history watching it and no formal training or expertise, to sit down at a table with the other members of the group, which included SFSFF board member (now president and film restorer) Rob Byrne, TCM writer and editor extraordinaire Margarita Landazuri, the brilliant David Kiehn of the Niles Film Museum, and rising star scholar Laura Horak (who will present the Girls Will Be Boys program at the festival on Sunday, in conjunction with her newly-published book of that title about gender-fluidity in silent cinema). At that time there were still few enough programs, determined far enough in advance, for a group of nine of us (the amazing Shari Kizarian contributed to and edited the program book and slideshows from her home abroad) to discuss our research and writing ideas around a table of snacks in the festival office for months before the program needed to be printed. I learned so much, not only about silent film, but about writing and being edited, from being allowed in that group. No other single experience as a writer has marked my cinephilia in such a profound way.

I ultimately wrote seven 1200-word essays for the festival between 2007 and 2011, about films (sort-of) spanning five continents: Miss Lulu Bett (North America), Jujiro (Asia), Sunrise: a Song of Two Humans (set in an undetermined location, filmed in North America but based on a European story), The Gaucho (Hollywood-ized version of South America), West of Zanzibar (Hollywood-ized version of Africa), Man With a Movie Camera (Europe) and I Was Born, But... (again Asia). By the last couple years, however, the festival had expanded to four days and it became impossible to fit all the program book writers around a table in the festival office, or to lock in all the programs with enough advance notice for amateurs in the group (mostly I mean yours truly) to work at the pace we'd been accustomed to. The program book is more than an oversized pamphlet now, but a glossy publication, and the essays have stepped up a notch or three to match; now they're written by some of the leading silent film scholars, critics and journalists around (including some of the same folks who I was so honored to share a table with nine years ago-- I can't wait to read what David Kiehn has to say about the Wallace Beery submarine thriller Behind the Door when I pick up my program tonight!)

But thumbing through that old "oversized pamphlet" provides a stark reminder of some of the many changes to San Francisco over the past nine years, through the ads alone. In 2009 the booklet started placing them in the back, but in 2007 they were interspersed throughout the 48 pages. The inside front cover has an ad for KDFC, which still exists but has moved down the dial to the 90.3 frequency that my old favorite community radio station KUSF occupied until 2011. Film Arts Foundation, advertised on the same page as Kizirian's wonderful Hal Roach essay, completely dissolved into the San Francisco Film Society in 2008 and nothing really has emerged to fill some of its most important shoes (support for experimental work, providing access to equipment, etc.) An ad for the region's best source for rare movies on VHS and DVD, Le Video, sits between Landazuri's essay on Camille and Horak's on Beggars of Life; it shuttered late last year and although Alamo Drafthouse announced plans to integrate its collection into that of Lost Weekend Video, which as of this past April now occupies part of the New Mission lobby, I've yet to hear any indication that this will actually happen anytime soon. Turn the program guide page and there's an ad for Booksmith, which changed ownership in 2007 and jettisoned its once-incredible silent film book section; now SFSFF partners with Books, Inc. for its amazing line-up of Castro mezzanine book signings. Perhaps the hardest of them all is the loss of the San Francisco Bay Guardian, which is advertised underneath Richard Hildreth's barnstorming essay on DeMille's The Godless Girl; this weekly paper had by far the best film, arts and politics coverage of any local print newspaper, and it pressed its last issue in 2014.

As sad as it is to contemplate all of these losses over the past near-decade (and as sad as losing a vital institution is, it cannot compare to the human toll change has taken on San Franciscans; it was such an irony that the SF Chronicle published an article praising Wellman's quasi-remake of Beggars of Life on the same day another of its cruel campaigns against homeless people succeeded) makes it all the more heartening that an institution like the San Francisco Silent Film Festival has thrived and grown in these years. Now in the business not only of presenting films in the best possible way, it also undertakes restorations of important classics and forgotten gems, like this year's record FIVE re-premieres: Mothers of Men, Behind the Door, The Italian Straw Hat, What's the World Coming To and Les Deux Timides. That all five of these are finished on 35mm ought to gladden celluloid purists who might take note that although there's a slightly higher proportion of digital presentations in this year's festival than ever before, SFSFF will still screen just as many all-35mm programs as it did back in 2007 when there were ten programs not counting "Amazing Tales From the Archives" (which still exists as a major part of the festival, and is still free, although donations are becoming more emphasized). 

 

And although the festival is noted for annually showcasing many of the world's most-anticipated silent film restorations, it's very nice to know that the 35mm print of Beggars of Life set to screen tonight is the same one, I'm told by festival director Anita Monga, that showed on Saturday night of the 2007 festival, the first and last time I and maybe a thousand or more people ever saw it on a big screen. The musical accompaniment, which I recall was wonderful last time, will be the same as well. In a world in which the new so frequently threatens to pave over the old, there's something very comforting about that kind of consistency.

HOW: 35mm print from George Eastman House, with live musical accompaniment by Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra. Just like in 2007, as noted above.

Marisa Vela: IOHTE

The San Francisco Bay Area is still home to a rich cinephilic culture nurtured in large part by a diverse array of cinemas, programmers and moviegoers. I'm honored to present a selection of favorite screenings experienced by local cinephiles in 2015. An index of participants can be found here. 

IOHTE contributor Marisa Vela is a cinephile and artist.

So much of my focus this past year was fighting for the right to remain in our studio spaces, a fight that we ultimately lost. I did not make it to as many films as i would have liked.

1. Wanda- Barbara Loden 1970 SFIFF screening Castro Theater. introduction by Rachael Kushner, who wrote about the film in her novel, The Flamethrowers. Beautiful, painful film, it has stayed with me. Saturated color and graininess of 16mm blown up to 35mm

2. The Wild Wild Rose- Tian-Ling Wang 1960 A Rare Noir Is Good To Find, Roxie. Grace Chang dazzles in this Hong Kong nightclub update of Carmen.

3. The Swallow and the Titmouse- Andre Antoine 1920 Silent Film Festival, Castro Theater. Woefully under attended, being the final film of a long day. Gorgeous scenes on a barge floating down waterways, with a tougher more perceptive view of the characters than one is initially led to believe.

4. The Honeymoon Killers- Leonard Kastle 1969 Noir City, Castro Theater. What’s not to like?

5. The Sleeping Tiger- Joseph Losey 1954 Noir City, Castro Theater Dirk Bogarde bringing that “something” to the screen that we will see more of in The Servant.

6. The Devils- Ken Russell 1971, Castro Theater. A full house on a Tuesday night.

7. Dementia- John Parker 1953, I Wake Up Dreaming, Castro Theater. A dark dream with a George Antheil score.

8. The Scarlet Dove- Matti Kassila 1961 A Rare Noir Is Good To Find, Roxie. Shared a double-bill with The Wild Wild Rose. This Finnish film is a cautionary tale of the lengths the protagonist will go once he begins to doubt his wife.

9. A Man Escaped- Robert Bresson 1956 Roxie.

10. Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me- David Lynch 1992, Castro Theater.

Michael Hawley: IOHTE

The San Francisco Bay Area is still home to a rich cinephilic culture nurtured in large part by a diverse array of cinemas, programmers and moviegoers. I'm honored to present a selection of favorite screenings experienced by local cinephiles in 2015. An index of participants can be found here. 

IOHTE contributor Michael Hawley runs the film blog film-415.

Favorite Bay Area Repertory/Revival Screenings of 2015

Screen capture from Flicker Alley DVD

Cibo Matto: New Scene (San Francisco International Film Festival, Castro Theatre) 
My top repertory highlight of 2015 was this inspired pairing of fave rock band Cibo Matto with seven avant garde shorts, including Marcel Duchamp's 1928 Anemic Cinema, the 1970 adaptation of Oskar Schlemmer's trippy, geometry-obsessed Bauhaus-era Das Triadische Ballet, and most fabulously, Yoko Ono and John Lennon's Fly.

The Honeymoon Killers (Noir City, Castro Theatre) 
I was gobsmacked by this revisit to one-film-wonder Leonard Kastle's 1969 American true crime shocker, shown at Noir City in a pristine 35mm print. François Truffaut once called this his favorite American movie. I'd always gotten a kick out of it, but hadn't realized what a god-damned masterpiece it was until now.

Rebels of the Neon God (Landmark's Opera Plaza Cinemas) 
Perhaps the most unlikely commercial re-release of 2015 was slow-cinema, Taiwanese auteur Tsai Ming-liang's 1992 debut feature, which I missed seeing at the 1993 San Francisco International Film Festival. It was worth waiting 22 years for a second opportunity.

The Happiest Girl in the World (Romanian Film Festival, Coppola Theatre, SF State University) 
I had read many terrific things about Romanian New Wave director Radu Jude, but none of his features ever came to town (nor had any reasonably priced, small screen options presented themselves). I was therefore thrilled when this previously unknown-to-me festival, now in its fifth year, finally brought Jude's droll 2009 social satire to town last fall.

Screen capture from Miramax DVD of My Voyage To Italy

Two Women & The Gold of Naples (Castro Theatre) 
Cinema Italia San Francisco brought a one-day, five-film Vittorio De Sica retrospective to the Castro in late September. The program featured two spanking new 35mm restorations, including Sophia Loren's Oscar®-winning performance in 1960's Two Women followed by 1954's The Gold of Naples. The latter was comprised of six self-contained short stories set in Napoli, the best of which starred De Sica himself as a pathetic gambling aristocrat.
  

54: The Director's Cut (San Francisco International FilmFestival, Castro Theatre)

While hardly the "minor masterpiece" some critics wanted us to believe, this reconstruction of Mark Christopher's 1998 ode to NYC's famed discotheque, featuring 44 previously unseen minutes, was the most fun I had at the movies last year. In addition to director Christopher, stars Ryan Philippe and Brecklin Meyer were on-hand for the revival's U.S. premiere. They were ogled both on-screen and on-stage by a whooping, exuberant Castro audience. 

It's a Gift (Sunday Funnies: Laurel and Hardy and W.C. Fields, Pacific Film Archive)
W.C. Fields is a hen-pecked hubby trying to get some sleep on the back porch in this raucous, 1934 featurette from director Norman Z. McLeod. It's my favorite comedy of all time and I'd never seen it on a big screen (let alone in 35mm) until last summer at the PFA.

Screen capture from Warner Archive DVD

Noir City, Castro Theatre
In addition to The Honeymoon Killers, there were other perverse delights at last year's Noir City. I was particularly taken by the Saturday afternoon triple bill of nail-biting suspense dramas The Steel Trap (1952), Julie (1956) and Cry Terror! (1958), all from Hollywood husband-and-wife filmmaking team Andrew and Virginia Stone (he wrote and directed, she produced and edited). Who knew that Doris Day singlehandedly landed a jet plane 19 years before Karen Black? Other Noir City 2015 flicks I'm still thinking about one year later include Ossessione (Luchino Visconti's 1943 homoerotic adaptation of The Postman Always Rings Twice), Robert Siodmak's The Suspect (1944) and Douglas Sirk's Shockproof (1949).

San Francisco Silent Film Festival (Castro Theatre)
The world's second most prestigious silent film showcase celebrated its 20th edition back in May with a tremendous 21-program line-up. What I remember most fondly are three comedies. In the UK/German co-production Ghost Train (1927), hijinks ensue when passengers take refuge in a haunted railway station overnight. Harold Lloyd's final silent film Speedy (1928) featured Babe Ruth in a supporting role (as himself) and an unforgettable 20-minute sequence set in Coney Island's famed Luna amusement park. Then in Amazing Charley Bowers, preservationist/showman Serge Bromberg introduced us to the surrealistic genius of American comic Bowers and his insane combinations of live action and stop-motion animation. At that same festival I was also blown away by the intense eroticism of John Gilbert and Greta Garbo in Flesh and the Devil (1926) and the immense spectacle of Ben Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1925).

Backstreet (Melodrama Master: John M. Stahl, Pacific Film Archive)
While I didn't get to the PFA as often as I would've liked in 2015, I'm sure glad to have caught this low-key but intensely moving 1932 adaptation of Fanny Hurst's novel, starring Irene Dunne as a career woman who spends 25 years as a married man's mistress.