Is this year's Noir City Festival theme. I've got a full-on festival ticket in my attempt to catch all of 'em (snowball's chance). I figure if I get to half, I've done it justice. And the $$ is for a good cause.
Powered by PMS ™
Couldn't manage the double feature last night - sleepy - so I only saw the first film: Highwall
Robert Taylor (on the back side of his career and still fab!) is Steve Kenet accused of strangling his wife then trying to kill himself. He admits to killing her, but he can't really remember as he's subject to blackouts after a head injury during the war. He's also prone to violent outbursts so he's sent to a psych hospital for eval where he meets Dr Ann L(something or other), psychiatrist.
Kenet is convinced to have brain surgery to remove a hematoma that's pressing on his brain causing the headaches, etc. He also lets Dr Ann put him under with sodium pentathol to help him remember the night of the murder. He realizes that he blacked out just as he started to strangle his wife (he discovers she's been cheating on him while he was in Burma flying freight) and woke up to find her dead.
He's determined to confront the guy who really killed her. Ann helps (we know she's going to fall for him when she suddenly starts calling him Steve instead of Mr Kenet. A short time later she calls him "darling" and the audience knows she's smitten). Kenet tries to convince Ann not to get involved because of her career, but she says that doesn't matter now (audience laughs 'cause we all know she's gonna give that career up for L O V E).
We get the good ending.
This afternoon I'm catching Gaslight (Ingrid Bergman & Charles Boyer), one of my favorites. It will be awesome to see it on the big screen.
Powered by PMS ™
Toger said:
Is this year's Noir City Festival theme. I've got a full-on festival ticket in my attempt to catch all of 'em (snowball's chance). I figure if I get to half, I've done it justice. And the $$ is for a good cause.
Oh man, I should do that. I was just screening a bunch of 4th generation noir movies knock-offs tonight on Netflix and never ended up watching any of them. Brick is pretty good but the bible for this genre was written in sepia and celluiod a long ago.
Toger are these playing one theater or are they spread around?
Scout, no it's all in one theatre - The Castro - in all its rocco glory. Every evening performance begins with the Mighty Wurlizter interlude which ends, appropriately, with the song San Francisco. I'm under the impression that Muller (organizer & president of Film Noir Foundation) does do screenings at UCLA as they do the restorations.
Touch of Evil is not part of this year's theme; also, the majority of the films screened aren't available on DVD and/or haven't been screened in decades.
Powered by PMS ™
Touch of Evil is Welles's ultimate film. You have to see three: Kane, obviously; The Lady from Shanghai; and Touch of Evil. And you must see them in that order.
I had a film professor in my Welles and Kubrick class who did that – a triple screening one after the other. She said, "You need to see the movies, but more than that you need to see Orson Welles. What happens to him, his deterioration. Because if you really want to make movies this is what happens to geniuses. Ask yourself if you're willing to pay the price he paid."
Toger, I gather then that classics like White Heat and Woman in the Window will also not be there? Not a bad thing; those films are available elsewhere. Cinema obscura is at its best in noir.
Life is the misery we endure between disappointments.
I've seen Lady from Shanghai and it made absolutely no sense to me. I'm fairly sure I've seen Touch of Evil as well, but not recently.
Some classics are included - this year includes Gaslight and Sorry, Wrong Number - but the bulk of them are "B" and/or obscure movies not seen on TV or theatres in quite some time. Or movies produced by now-defunct studios where they lay idle and deterorating only to be discovered when the someone is cleaning out a film vault.
Powered by PMS ™
Most Users Ever Online: 252
Currently Online:
4 Guest(s)
Currently Browsing this Page:
1 Guest(s)
Top Posters:
Spike: 1187
Pokey: 894
Jarrod: 607
Finkbug: 468
Armand: 318
kaythomas: 307
Member Stats:
Guest Posters: 9
Members: 15035
Moderators: 18
Admins: 6
Forum Stats:
Groups: 1
Forums: 4
Topics: 816
Posts: 18549
Newest Members:
Stabrovspeen, KennethCax, RobertFuery, Humaner, ButZoste, HoustonPulgeModerators: Jen: 631, Orb: 0, Scout: 1205, Toger: 1488, Yapette: 836, Dobralov: 17, xtal: 1685, Meho: 82, Tap-Repeatedly: 0, geggis: 1435, Lewis B: 214, Mat: 245, AJLange: 200, Dix: 483, Cheeta: 0, LewisB: 0, Amy Louise: 12, l0vetemper: 3
Administrators: admin: 2, MrLipid: 31, Steerpike: 3310, Helmut: 795, Synonamess Botch: 1127, heddhunter: 27