Revivals and Rediscoveries

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In this recurring series, Block Cinema screens rare and often hard-to-see American and international films—from revered classics to more obscure works–that deserve a second look. This fall’s offerings include three classic films on 35mm. Our fall program opens with a tribute to famed film programmer and author, Amos Vogel, with one of his favorite films, Bernardo Bertolucci’s Before the Revolution, presented in an archival print imported from Rome. Also screening are two newly struck 1940s films from 20th Century Fox; Otto Preminger’s noir masterwork, Laura, and Busby Berkeley’s legendary Technicolor musical, The Gang’s All Here.

 

Before the Revolution (Prima della rivoluzione)

Friday, September 28, 2012 7:00 PM
(Bernardo Bertolucci, 1964, Italy, 35mm, 115 min.)

This key early film by Bertolucci signaled themes that would develop in his work over the next two decades: a critical examination of Italian society and politics and their intersection with his characters’ sexual and personal relationships. Here, Fabrizio, a young bourgeois man struggling to reconcile his conservative upbringing with his Marxist beliefs, begins a taboo relationship with his aunt. “A flood of poetic visuals, montage, and sound, it is a shamelessly passionate, intensely personal statement of political and sexual coming of age.”—Amos Vogel (Viennale catalog).

Showing in memory of Amos Vogel, the pioneering programmer of the influential and long-running Cinema 16 film series in New York City, who died earlier this year. Revolution was a particular favorite of Vogel’s. Archival 35mm print courtesy of Cinecittá Luce, Rome.

 

Laura

Friday, November 9, 2012 7:00 PM
(Otto Preminger, 1944, USA, 35mm, 88 min.)

Preminger’s Laura is a masterful whodunit and one of the pinnacle works of the film noir genre. After a beautiful young advertising executive (Gene Tierney) is murdered, hard-boiled NYPD detective, Mark McPherson (Dana Andrews) is assigned to find the culprit, who may be amongst the unseemly cast of eccentric men in Laura’s life. While investigating her life and death, McPherson himself begins to fall for the late Laura, becoming obsessed with the beautiful image reflected in her portrait. But in true noir fashion, things are not as they seem when another mysterious suspect soon appears.

 

The Gang's All Here

Friday, December 7, 2012 7:00 PM
(Busby Berkeley, 1943, USA, 35mm, 103 min.)

We close our fall film program with Busby Berkeley’s Technicolor musical extravaganza. The war-time plot involves a soldier on leave who falls for a New York nightclub singer (Fox superstar Alice Faye–in her last leading role), but it’s the over-the-top musical numbers that have made the film legendary, including one with scantily-clad dancers cavorting with gigantic bananas (the picture was banned in some countries for its supposed sexual suggestiveness). The film was also a career-defining vehicle for the inimitable Carmen Miranda–“the lady in the tutti frutti hat.” Presented in a new print from Fox.

Contact The Block Museum of Art for more information: (847) 491-4000 or email us at block-museum@northwestern.edu