Chicago has turned into a real movie-lover’s dream town. From mainstream theaters to art houses to midnight movie series to revival programs, cinephilia is spreading across the city. This Friday, June 3, marks the beginning of a new film program called Shock Theater, organized by Michael Phillips, former programmer of the Bank of American Cinema. On the first Friday of every month, Phillips will screen a double feature of classic-era horror films in Chicago’s hip Wicker Park neighborhood.

Nothing could be better than seeing films on a big screen with an appreciative audience, especially for the low price of $5.00, except for perhaps seeing them projected on celluloid. Each film will be projected from a 16mm print. The series opens with The House on Haunted Hill and Screaming Skull, followed by The Amazing Transparent Man and Beyond the Time Barrier on July 1. August brings two films from Roger Corman’s studio, Dementia 13 and The Terror, while September offers The Phantom Planet and Night of the Blood Beast. In October, Phillips will show two Italian horror flicks, Nightmare Castle and Caltiki the Undying Monster, while November brings Bloodlust and She-Demons. Finally, Shock Cinema celebrates the Christmas season with Lady Frankenstein and Frankenstein’s Daughter on December 2. Michael Phillips graciously agreed to be interviewed  about Shock Theater, the joys of programming, and the movie-going scene in Chicago.

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Any dedicated cinephile who has traveled to London and Paris knows that those two magnificent cities are a film lovers’ paradise catering to the discerning movie buff with countless repertory cinemas and alternate screening venues (museums, holy shrines like the BFI and the Cinematheque Francaise, hole-in-the-wall movie clubs, etc.) But who knew that Madrid was just as hot wired with its eclectic, diverse offerings, both grand and intimate theatres and movie-mad audiences?        READ MORE

I’ve been watching the coverage of Cannes with a lot of interest—and my mouth is positively watering for The Artist, the popular new silent film by Michel Hazanavicius.  I haven’t seen it yet, and this blog isn’t even really about it—but rather about the curious double-standards that the film critical community has when it comes to French films.

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Women in prison movies are the universal language – go to any corner of the world and some filmmaker has at one time or another stuck a bunch of actresses behind bars and made a movie about what goes in a world without men. In Spain you’ve got your 99 WOMEN (1969), in Italy your WOMEN IN CELLBLOCK 7 (1973), in Japan your FEMALE CONVICT SCORPION: JAILHOUSE 41 (1972), in Argentina your CONDEMNED TO HELL (1984), in Indonesia your VIRGINS FROM HELL (1987), in Hong Kong your WOMEN PRISON (1987), in Poland your INTERROGATION (1989), in Iran your WOMEN’S PRISON (2002). Hollywood spat out a few W.I.P. movies during the classic era, including LADIES THEY TALK ABOUT (1933) with Barbara Stanwyck, PRISON FARM (1938) with Shirley Ross and Marjorie Main (Ma Kettle!) as a sadistic guard, GIRLS IN CHAINS (1943) from Edgar Ulmer, CAGED (1950) with Eleanor Parker, WOMEN’S PRISON (1955) with Ida Lupino and HOUSE OF WOMEN (1962) with Shirley Knight. At some point in the 1970s, our common appetite women’s prison jiggery pokery turned ravening and we had women-in-prison movies coming from every quarter, from the grindhouse/drive-in circuit (THE BIG DOLL HOUSE… I ESCAPED FROM DEVIL’S ISLAND… CAGED HEAT… THE HOT BOX… THE BIG BIRD CAGE… BLACK MAMA, WHITE MAMA… SWEET SUGAR) and from American television (WOMEN IN CAGES… CAGE WITHOUT A KEY… NIGHTMARE IN BADHAM COUNTY). The subgenre peaked and plateaued by the mid-70s (at least in America; elsewhere, it was business as usual) but there was a slight bump in the early-to-mid 80s with the release of CHAINED HEAT (1983). Directed by Paul Nicholas (aka Lutz Schaarwaechter), this grotty little exploitation nugget jettisoned all the boring stuff from old prison movies (exposition, character development, harmonica solos) in favor of amping up the licentious bits, the violence, the sleaze and the woman-on-woman action that had always been part and parcel of the women-in-prison movie. Nicholas foregrounded and made explicit what had often been implicit in the W.I.P. canon, as if stating baldly to the moviegoing public “We all know why we’re here.” Panik House Entertainment, in conjunction with Mr. Skin (you know, the where-to-find-your-favorite-actress-naked website that has become such an institution that it rated a name-check in Judd Apatow’s KNOCKED UP) has packaged this long-time favorite (which gained most of its estimable fanbase via video cassette) with two other like-dirty-minded features: RED HEAT (1985) and JUNGLE WARRIORS (1983). Cast and crew recur from feature to feature, making this three-fer of chicks-in-chains flicks sort of like a summer stock rep company presenting one hell of a subscriber season. READ MORE

If you weren’t able to attend the 64th Annual Cannes Film Festival this year you can still enjoy a little taste of the French Rivera at MUBI.com this week. MUBI has partnered with La Semaine de la Critique (Critics’ Week) in association with Fundación MAPFRE FC4+1 and is playing host to a small retrospective of select films from the festival’s history. These films are free to watch online for the first 1,000 viewers until June 30 and runs through December 2011.

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On Friday, May 20, influential independent film distributor Donald Krim died after a year-long battle with cancer. For 33 years, Don was the president of Kino International Corp, which specialized in contemporary international films as well as classic Hollywood titles.  Most famously Kino was the distributor of the restored Metropolis, which had its North American premiere at the 2010 TCM Classic Film Festival.

As word of Don’s death spread through the international film community, there were heartfelt expressions of sympathy from filmmakers (Joseph Cedar dedicated his Best Screenplay award at Cannes this year to Don’s memory) and critics.  The New York Times‘s Dave Kehr wrote at his blog, “ Don was one of the rare distributors who cared as passionately about silent film as the latest indie productions and foreign imports.” Manohla Dargis, in a dispatch from Cannes, described him as “A gentleman in a business filled with braggarts…Mr. Krim enriched our lives and expanded our vision.” In the Village Voice J. Hoberman notes that, “In a business filled with blustering rogues, Don was a modest man distinguished not only by his taste but by his integrity and kindness.”  I’m not name-dropping, I’m paying homage.  Whenever a new film was released, Don would pore over the reviews and pull the juiciest quotes and lay them out on a page to circulate to exhibitors and in ads.  I know because I worked for Don for more than 23 years and during the time that I occupied the art department desk, I would show up early on release days (he would always be there earlier) and cut-and-paste the articles under his immediate supervision.  The process gave him such satisfaction that I am proud to glean quotes in his memory.

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It is hard to separate a film from its context. This becomes especially clear with Ishtar (1987), Elaine May’s notorious flop that is known more as a punchline than a movie. Last week, 92nd Street Y in NYC screened the “Director’s Cut” of Ishtar,  followed by a rare discussion with May (a blu-ray of the film was announced, then delayed, by Sony, but hopefully this cut will see release by year’s end). This is the first time I have seen the film, and cannot say what differences appear in this cut.

In a much needed reversal, May was delivering the punchlines while Ishtar the movie was talked about more than its account books. The coverage before its initial release fixated on its $55 million budget, with the Los Angeles Times repeatedly referring to it as “Warrensgate”, imputing both Watergate criminality and Heaven’s Gate excess to its cost overruns. An epic New York Magazine profile from March 16, 1987, reports on the doomed casting of a camel, and that May shot 50 takes of one scene, “with three cameras rolling at all times”. And this was from a writer seemingly sympathetic to the project. Ishtar was eclipsed by its own production history before it hit screens.

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I wonder how many people remember the first film they ever saw in a theater. I remember mine vividly: It was Visit to a Small Planet (1960) starring Jerry Lewis. I was about five or six years old, and my cousins took me to a double feature at the Bula Theater in my hometown of Ashtabula, Ohio. The other film on the double bill was Ulysses, starring Kirk Douglas, which also made an impression on me, but it was not nearly as long-lasting. I recently watched Visit to a Small Planet again, and while its weaknesses were apparent to me, I laughed out loud and thoroughly enjoyed it. And, I was surprised that I could recall certain scenes and jokes so well.

In Visit to a Small Planet, Jerry Lewis stars as a young space alien named Kreton who is studying the planet Earth in school. He is so fascinated with earthlings that he repeatedly visits the planet against the better judgment of his teacher. On yet another trip, he hopes to land in 1861 so he can study the Civil War directly. However, he miscalculates and lands in contemporary America, circa 1960. Kreton quickly befriends the Speldings, a suburban family in Manassas, Virginia, who are amazed at the alien’s special powers, including a peculiar kind of mind-reading, the ability to control another’s speech, and levitation.  Kreton becomes attached to the family, particularly daughter Ellen Spelding, which breaks one of the cardinal rules of his teacher. Eventually, Kreton returns to his home planet after discovering that 20^th century Earth is one crazy world. The story unfolds through the aliens’ point of view, which serves as a distancing device so that viewers can see the fads, issues, and trends of 1960 as Kreton and his teacher see them—as ridiculous and. . . well. . .alien.

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I spent this morning watching a compilation DVD that was sent to me by filmmaker/artist/musician Cory McAbee. It was titled “TnT” (which stands for Titles and Trailers), and it was the focus of a presentation he did a few months ago for the UnionDocs Collaborative in Brooklyn in conjunction with Rooftop Films (whose byline is: “Underground Movies Outdoors”). Their program notes that short films have now become a predominant form of entertainment, thanks in part to the growing popularity of video-sharing websites. But long before everyone was glued to YouTube or their cell phone, we were (and are still) watching short films on the big screen in the form of trailers and credit sequences – both being made, for the most part, by “outside parties (who) were hired to create a short interpretation from the film itself or from unused elements.” Cory’s TnT collection were specific “short films” that had influenced his own work in meaningful ways. While I can’t think of title-sequences that have influenced my life, I can certainly think of more than a few trailers that had a big impact on who I am now.  READ MORE