Filed under: entertainment, film festival, preservation | Tags: Enrest Borgnine, Sam Peckinpah, The Jules Verne Film Festival, The Wild Bunch
On November 12, The Jules Verne Film Festival will present a special 40th Anniversary screening of Sam Peckinpah’s classic 1969 Western The Wild Bunch.
The event, to be held at the beautiful Million Dollar Theatre in the historic Broadway district of Downtown Los Angeles, will feature a special homage to the surviving principle leads—including the legendary Ernest Borgnine— who will be on hand to receive the “Jules Verne Lengendaire Award.”
The Jules Verne Festival is such a great, unique event, so why not spend an evening with a classic film, some silver screen legends and, in doing so, demonstrate your support for the preservation of film as well as Los Angeles’ architectural heritage! This one is a no-brainer.
Tickets are only $15 and proceeds go to the JVA Nature & Education Program. For more information and full lineup, visit the Jules Verne festival website
Filed under: culture, history, preservation, vintage | Tags: convservation, historical preservation, Hollywood history, Los Angeles Archives Bazaar, Los Angeles history, preservation, USC
On Saturday, October 17th, USC Libraries is hosting the 4th annual Los Angeles Archives Bazaar.
For local historians, and historians-in-training, this is an event you simply can’t afford to miss. Presented by L.A. as Subject, USC’s alliance dedicated to preserving LA history, you will have the opportunity to browse rare collections from over 60 historical archives including universities, museums and community organizations. There will be a slew of experts on hand and you’ll have the chance to chat with a number of authors and documentary filmmakers. Educational sessions are slated with the likes of Robert Birchard (author of Cecil B DeMille’s Hollywood) and forensic genealogist Colleen Fitzpatrick who will bestow tips and techniques for household archivists.
If you have a research project involving Los Angeles as its subject, or even just a supporting character, it is absolutely imperative event to attend.
Admission is free. For more information, including a complete list of participating exhibitors, visit USC’s L.A. as Subject site:
http://www.usc.edu/libraries/archives/arc/lasubject/
Hot off the Los Angeles Times press:
Responding to public outcry over the Los Angeles County Museum of Art’s decision to end its 40-year-old weekend film program, two outside organizations have stepped forward to pledge a total of $150,000 in the fight to save the screening series.
The Hollywood Foreign Press Assn., which organizes the annual Golden Globe Awards, and Time Warner Cable, in association with Ovation TV, have each agreed to put up $75,000 toward the LACMA film program, which had been scheduled to close in October.
In addition, Time Warner Cable and Ovation said that they will spend more than $1.5 million to market the film program across their multiple media platforms, both locally and nationally.
A spokeswoman for the museum told The Times that as a result of the new money, the film program will now continue at least through the end of the fiscal year in June 2010. She added that the museum will continue to seek additional donors and patrons in support of the film program.
In a statement, LACMA Director Michael Govan said that the museum is ”grateful to the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, Time Warner Cable, and Ovation TV, for expressing their tangible support for the art of film at LACMA, and we’re very pleased that we can keep film rolling while we build for the future.”
The museum also announced that it intends to create a film department within its curatorial ranks that will be in charge of “thinking about the history and future of film as art as well as film’s increasing importance in the larger narrative of art history.”
– David Ng
Thanks to Marty and Mr. Shickel for getting the ball rolling on this, and to the Hollywood Foreign Press Assoc and (I never thought I’d say this) Time Warner Cable (even though they overcharged me two months in a row) for keeping LA’s premier film program alive!
Filed under: architecture, cinema, design, history, preservation | Tags: (500) Days of Summer, Downtown Los Angeles, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Los Angeles conservancy, Marc Webb, walking tour, Zooey Deschanel
Joseph Gordon-Levitt & Zooey Deschanel
OK all you Los Angelinos, mark your calendars: this Sunday, August 30, the Los Angeles Conservancy is holding a (500) Days of Summer architectural tour.
If you’ve had the chance to see this excellent indie rom-com, you’ll no doubt remember that the biggest scene-stealer in the film was the city of Angels herself. It is a singularly unique ‘LA movie’ in that it is in no way affiliated with anything Hollywood or Westside, but rather it revels in the neglected beauties of Broadway and Hill and Hope and Fig.
If you’re interested in seeing these gorgeous pieces of architecture first hand and are looking for something free to do, join the Conservancy on Sunday at 3:00pm for what will surely be a fascinating walking tour.
Here’s the lowdown from the Conservancy’s Flavorpill page:
Do you love the hit movie and want to know more about the locations where it was filmed? If so, join two film experts on Sunday, August 30 from 3 – 6 p.m. for a tour of some of the sites. Harry Medved, author of the SoCal movie location guidebook Hollywood Escapes, and Marty Cummins, a key assistant location manager for the film, will host and lead the tour. The tour starts at Old Bank DVD, 400 S. Main St.
There’s no charge, although donations are welcome. Harry will be selling copies of Hollywood Escapes before and after the tour, with proceeds going directly to the Conservancy.
Filed under: art, arts, culture, film, movies, preservation | Tags: los angeles, Martin Scorsese; LACMA; Richard Schickel;, museum of art
Marty
I heart Marty Scorsese.
And when he goes and does things like this, well, it just sends me all aflutter.
First, a bit of background.
For nearly four decades, the film program at the Los Angeles Country Museum of Art has been a primary venue for film lovers to gather for some of the most engaging retrospectives in LA.
But LACMA director Michael Govan has decided to pull the film program, citing declining audiences and $1 million in losses over the past decade. Govan claims that the move will allow them to “pause for re-thinking.” But you, me, Marty and just about everyone else who gives a damn about film history can see through that one like an episode of Gray’s Anatomy.
Over the past two weeks, a slew of damning op-eds have appeared from some of the most powerfully persuasive pens in the industry—Richard Schickel and Kenneth Turan to name the few.
Mr. Schickel states “It is the duty of museums to place before us the accumulated works of the ages, movies definitely included — old and new; obscure and well known; good, bad and absurd — in order to keep us in touch with the rich and ever-informative history of an ever-evolving, yes, I’ll say it, art form …The fact that good movies arise out of a corrupt commercial system makes it more, not less, worthy of our attention. How in the world does a “Chinatown” arise out of that unpromising soil?”
And now, a letter to Mr. Govan from that preeminent film crusader, Martin Scorsese.
“I am deeply disturbed by the recent decision to suspend the majority of film screenings at LACMA. For those of us who love cinema and believe in its value as an art form, this news hits hard.
We all know that the film industry, like many other institutions and industries, has to be radically rebuilt for the future. This is now apparent to everyone. But in the midst of all this change, the value and power of cinema’s past will only increase, and the need to show films as they were intended to be shown will become that much more pressing. So I find it profoundly disheartening to know that a vital outlet for the exhibition of what was once known as “repertory cinema” has been cut off in L.A. of all places, the center of film production and the land of the movie-making itself. My personal connection to LACMA stretches back almost 40 years to when I lived in L.A.during the ’70s and regularly attended their vibrant film series, programmed by the legendary Ron Haver. It was actually at LACMA, during a 20th Century Fox retrospective, that I first became aware of the issues of color film fading and the urgent need for film preservation. Ian Birnie, a programmer of immaculate taste and knowledge, has continued in the tradition of Ron Haver, who was so well-versed in cinema past and present. I do not understand why this approach to programming needs to be re-thought. I am puzzled by the notion of pegging future film programming to “artist-created films,” as stated in the letter announcing this shift – to do this would be tantamount to downgrading the worth of cinema. Aren’t the best films made by artists in the first place?
Without places like LACMA and other museums, archives, and festivals where people can still see a wide variety of films projected on screen with an audience, what do we lose? We lose what makes the movies so powerful and such a pervasive cultural influence. If this is not valued in Hollywood, what does that say about the future of the art form? Aren’t museums serving a cultural purpose beyond appealing to the largest possible audience? I know that my life and work have been enriched by places like LACMA and MoMA whose public screening programs enabled me to see films that would never have appeared at my local movie theater, and that lose a considerable amount of their power and beauty on smaller screens.
I believe that LACMA is taking an unfortunate course of action. I support the petition that is still circulating, with well over a thousand names at this point, many of them prominent. It comes as no surprise to me that the public is rallying. People from all over the world are speaking out, because they see this action – correctly, I think – as a serious rebuke to film within the context of the art world. The film department is often held at arms’ length at LACMA and other institutions, separate from the fine arts, and this simply should not be. Film departments should be accorded the same respect, and the same amount of financial leeway, as any other department of fine arts. To do otherwise is a disservice to cinema, and to the public as well.
I hope that LACMA will reverse this unfortunate decision.
–Martin Scorsese
New York, N.Y.
I hope that Mr. Govan reads Marty’s letter without the sort of culturecrat piety that seems have crippled his powers of reason on this particular decision.
Filed under: cinema, classic movies, film, preservation | Tags: Anton Walbrook, Emeric Pressburger, Moira Shearer, The Archers, The Red Shoes; Michael Powell
Moira Shearer in The Red Shoes, 1948
Last night, I had the supreme pleasure of attending the North American world premiere of the newly restored version of Powell and Pressburger’s 1948 artistic marvel The Red Shoes. The film, one of cinema’s crowning achievements in color, motion and music, has been restored by the UCLA Film and Television archive, with the support of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, The Louis B Mayer Foundation and The Film Foundation. Why a film that, even on shoddy VHS transfers is still eye-popping, would need restoration was the subject of last night’s opening discourse..
Thankfully the UCLA film preservationists got to work on the matter as mold had begun to deteriorate the original prints and color flickering, color fringing and misalignment turned the restoration process into a three-year labor of love. He prints are now ‘properly preserved for posterity.’
The results, I can assure you, are marvelous. It is a pity that films such as these cannot be easily seen on the big screen because the experience is truly, well, cinematic. The sheer creative energy of the late, great Jack Cardiff’s cinematography is amplified ten-fold. Anton Walbrook, whose performance is riveting enough as it is even on the tiniest of screens, in its full-scale projected form nothing short of mesmerizing. Moira Shearer’s acrobatic elegance is absolutely breathtaking on a thirty-foot screen–which turns into a swirling canvas of dreamy color for an exquisite 133 minutes.
The following is an excerpt from film historian Ian Christie’s lovely assessment of the meaning and importance of the Red Shoes:
“Seen in full-scale projection, The Red Shoes is not only one of cinema’s great sensuous experiences, but a profound mediation on the power and the price of the all-consuming spectacle. Beyond the intensity of its performances and the beauty of its images, it is this reflexive quality, shared with other masterpiece of the 1940s, that makes it a true classic, capable of being endlessly re-interpreted and rediscovered.
The Red Shoes was indeed born from a determination to throw caution to the winds. “You go too far,” the distinguished art director Alfred Jungle warned Michael Powell, whereupon Powell dropped him to take a chance on the painter Hein Heckroth, who would triumphantly unify the film’s backstage and on-stage elements. SO too with the all-important music and dance elements. Powell and his partner Emeric Pressburger rejected a score by their established composer in favor of one by the young Brian Easdale, taking the same risk that the impresario Lermontov does with Julian Craster in the film’s story.
Pressburger had written the first version of the script whiel under contract to Alexander Korda in 1939. Intended as a vehicle for Korda’s future wife Merle Oberon, it was assumed that a real ballerina would double in the dance sequences. But when Powell and Pressubrger now sharing their credits as The Archers, returned to the subject in 1947, Powell insisted that the role of Vicky must be entirely performed by a dancer and that a real ballet must be created. So the rising young ballerina Moira Shearer became the star of Lermontov’s ambitious new production and the film. In Hans Christian Andersen’s savage, moralistic fairy tale, the red shoes that a girl covets lead to her destruction as they dance her to death. In The Archers’ film, the girl lives a more complex version of the story both on stage and in life, when she joins an international ballet company and The Red Shoes brings her fame and love, but also intolerable pressure to submit to the impresario’s will in order to live her dream.
What was revolutionary in 1948 was to create and show a continuous 15-minute ballet that takes us from the stage world into the subjective heart of Vicky’s desires and conflicts. Easdale’s music, Heckroth’s surreal design, Jack Cardiff’s painterly use of Technicolor, and the inspired partnership of leading dancers Helpmann and Massine with Shearer, all combined to make it a landmark in film as ‘total art,’ and immediate inspiration to contemporary filmmakers such as Vincente Minnelli and Stanley Donen. Standing midway between Maya Deren’s avant-garde psychodrama Meshes of the Afternoon (1943) and Jean Cocteau’s poetic allegory Orphee (195), it is now belatedly recognized as a major achievement of Britain’s Neo-Romantic movement, usually identified with painting and poetry, but here triumphantly carried into cinema.”
There are five special screenings of “The Red Shoes” scheduled at UCLA July 31 – August 2. Tickets may be purchased at : https://secure.cinema.ucla.edu/onlineboxoffice/
Filed under: 1920s, cinema, classic movies, entertainment, film, history, hollywood, movies, preservation, vintage | Tags: nitrate film; film preservation; douglas fairbanks; billie dove; the black pirate; ramon navarro; ben hur; lon chaney; the phantom of the opera; anna may wong;, technicolor; 2 strip technicolor; 3 strip technicolor; the aviator; martin scorsese;
Not long ago I was watching Martin Scorsese’s The Aviator, which I’ve watched multiple times—not because I feel it is necessarily a great film, but because few modern films have so accurately pinpointed the look and feel of early Hollywood. A friend of mine was watching it with me and suddenly she shouted out in horror: “Eew! Gross! His peas are blue!”
Howard Hughes' dinner in The Aviator
Yep. And I like ‘em that way.
Scorsese had done a near flawless job of recreating the old Technicolor “two strip” color process that so aptly coincided with the setting of the scene: Hollywood, circa 1930. The process was actually called “Subtractive Two-Color Dye Transfer Print,” (often referred to, albeit incorrectly, as “two strip”) and was used between 1927 and 1933. It was a marked improvement on the previous “Subtractive Cement” print procedure wherein film matrices were literally bathed in dye and cemented back-to-back to the original for printing. Starting in 1927, the wizards at Technicolor (namely Herbert Kalmus) developed a technique for matrices to be optically generated from the actual camera negative. According to the extensive website The Widescreen Museum: “[the new process] used the matrices to transfer the dye to a specially prepared clear base film. The groundbreaking dye transfer process won substantial acclaim and Technicolor’s output increased markedly from 1928 through 1930.”
It is this process that Scorsese had his special effects team employ to recreate the warm dreaminess of early movie color in The Aviator. Scorsese’s film has a fantastic special effects website where it describes the technique more succinctly than my non-technical brain ever could: “Natural skin tone was achieved by filming two black and white strips of film (with a red and green filter on the lens) and later adding Yellow dye to the resulting Cyan and Magenta printing matrices. The yellow dye makes up for the lack of yellow color found in skin tone pigment but ultimately can not reproduce yellow or any shade or variation of blue (as a result of the missing blue layer.) The resulting matrices appear orange and a warmer version of cyan more than the normal magenta and cyan found in the later three color process. This look creates an odd but pleasing hand-painted look where faces appear normal and green takes on a blue-green quality while the sky and all things blue appear cyan.”
Like peas!
Here’s how Scorsese’s crew did it in 2004:
The Process
The Result
Here’s how Kalmus did it in 1927:
Original System Example, Courtesy Widescreen Museum.
Result: Gold Diggers of Broadway (1929)
Some of the earlier subtractive color systems, namely from 1922-1926, produced some truly eye-popping moments in some of the era’s best silent films:
Anna May Wong in The Toll of the Sea, 1922
Lon Chaney in The Phantom of the Opera, 1925
Ramon Navarro in Ben-Hur, 1925
Betty Bronson in Ben-Hur, 1925
Billie Dove and Douglas Fairbanks in The Black Pirate, 1926
Filed under: cinema, classic movies, entertainment, film, history, hollywood, movies, nostalgia, preservation, vintage | Tags: chaplin; keaton; lloyd; fairbanks; forbidden hollywood, two modern guys in classic hollywood; jeffrey vance; tony maietta; classic movie summer; old hollywood; summer events; summertime;
Jeffrey Vance & Tony Maietta
Jeffrey Vance and Tony Maietta are Hollywood’s resident time travelers. Classic film lovers may not readily recognize their names, but you certainly know their work: Vance is archivist for the film holdings of both the Chaplin family and the Harold Lloyd Trust, and has authored a superlative set of silent-film bios on Chaplin, Keaton and Lloyd; Maietta co-authored the new (and most excellent) Douglas Fairbanks biography and has recorded the commentary for Warner Bros’ acclaimed Forbidden Hollywood series. And on their blog, Two Modern Guys in Classic Hollywood, they have just announced their intent to give we the toiling classic movie-going masses a Classic Hollywood Summer to remember! To quote:
“Getting depressed because summer is here, and every movie fan knows one thing is certain? Hollywood will be scraping the bottom of it’s barrel to pollute the cineplexes around the world? Well, never fear, because the the good news is that we don’t have to take it!! Just travel back with us to Classic Hollywood to revel in the glory of the days of motion pictures…where there are plenty of opportunities to experience the magic and splendor of Hollywood movies in the days when they truly were the stuff that dreams were made of.”
Thanks Jeff and Tony–we look forward to a Summer chock full of events for the classic movie lover!
Check their blog often for updates!
Filed under: arts, cinema, classic movies, culture, entertainment, film, film review, history, hollywood, movies, nostalgia, preservation, vintage | Tags: Norma Shearer, The Midnight Palace; reccommended website; website for classic movie fans; best classic movie website on the web; best of the web; classic movie clips;
The Pictorial believes that we just might have found the Internet’s most perfect classic movie website.
The Midnight Palace is only three years old, but contains an entire lifetime of goodies that are sure to soothe the sweet tooth of even the most voracious classic film fan. Owner Gary Sweeney states that The Midnight Palace “is an echo in time, a manifestation of yesterday that has resurfaced like a spectre with unfinished business. This is a grand theater that holds within its walls an era of unforgettable proportions. From the great silent films of German Expressionism to the final examples of Film Noir, The Midnight Palace stands as a testament to these landmarks of classic excellence.” (Edward Hopper’s iconic New York Movie serves as an exceptionally appropriate visual to this noble manifesto.)
But The Midnight palace just doesn’t promise excellence, it delivers. With its exhaustive collection of film reviews, book reviews, interviews, essays, online film courses and plenty of pics and clips besides, the Pictorial is proud to pronounce, without any reservation, that the superlative Midnight Palace is simply the best of its kind on the web.
Check it out now and read The Midnight Palace’s great profile of its star of the month, Norma Shearer
Filed under: architecture, preservation, vintage | Tags: california, los angeles, los angeles conservancy; century plaza hotel; architectural heritage; historical preservation; preservation
The infinitely noble Los Angeles Conservancy has just issued this important alert for all interested in preserving the architectural heritage of Los Angeles:
THE CENTURY PLAZA HOTEL: ONE OF AMERICA’S 11 MOST ENDANGERED HISTORIC PLACES
The National Trust for Historic Preservation named the Century Plaza Hotel to its list of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places on Tuesday, April 28. Now’s the time to take action to save this mid-century modern landmark from the wrecking ball. Take a pledge and support preserving it today! Take the Pledge
On the Conservancy’s website you can learn interesting facts, read recent articles, and view TV broadcast pieces on the hotel. Go to the LAC Site
On the National Trust’s website you can learn more about the Century Plaza, share your stories, and view a historic timeline. Go to the 11 Most Site
If you’re on Facebook, join our fan discussion about the Century Plaza’s significance. If you aren’t a fan, become one now to get updated information on this issue. Go to Facebook.
About the Century Plaza:
Completed in 1966 by architect Minoru Yamasaki, the Century Plaza Hotel is a highly significant example of mid-century modern architecture and an important part of Los Angeles history. The hotel has played host to U.S. presidents, most notably Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, whose frequent stays at the hotel earned it the nickname “The West Coast White House.” Richard Nixon held the first Presidential State Dinner outside of the White House at the Century Plaza in 1969 to welcome the Apollo 11 astronauts back to earth after the first manned moon landing. Countless entertainment, charity, and political events have been held at the Century Plaza over the years, not to mention numerous weddings and other family celebrations.
Minoru Yamasaki designed the hotel with its unique arc that conveys the optimism of the 1960s and of Los Angeles at that time. Yamasaki also designed the World Trade Center twin towers, the twin Century City Towers, and many other buildings across the country and the world. As one of only about a dozen architects ever featured on the cover of TIME Magazine, Yamasaki was a highly influential architect, and the Century Plaza Hotel is one of his greatest works.
