The L.A. Conservancy has announced a list of tentative titles for the 2010 edition of “Last Remaining Seats,” held annually at old movie palaces in downtown Los Angeles.
They are: How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (1967), a musical satire with Robert Morse and Jonathan Winters; Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train (1951), with Farley Granger, Robert Walker, and Ruth Roman; George Lucas’ gigantic sleeper hit American Graffiti (1973), featuring lots of newcomers including Richard Dreyfuss, Harrison Ford, Suzanne Somers, and Candy Clark; and Mike Nichols’ The Graduate (1967), with Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft, and Katharine Ross.
None of the above could be considered a “rarity,” but perhaps showing rare movies isn’t the festival’s intent. Watching movies on the big screen in rococo theaters is.
Even so, two less well-known films will be presented. One of them is Flor Silvestre (Wild Flower), Emilio Fernández’s 1943 Mexican melodrama starring Dolores del Rio and Pedro Armendariz. Great filmmaking? Not exactly. Should you check it out? Definitely. Douglas Sirk, Curtis Bernhardt and other post-war Hollywood filmmakers may well have drawn from those Mexican productions when they created their over-the-top 1950s melodramas.
The other lesser-known work is Herbert Brenon’s Peter Pan (1924), starring Betty Bronson (as Peter), Esther Ralston (as Mrs. Darling), Mary Brian (as Wendy), Anna May Wong (as Tiger Lily), and Virginia Brown Faire (as Tinker Bell). This silent fantasy is perfectly watchable, and offers one of the most moving moments I’ve seen on film. That’s when only your own hands can help save a dying fairy – and create movie magic as a result.
HOW TO SUCCEED IN BUSINESS WITHOUT REALLY TRYING (1967) / May 26, Los Angeles Theatre
STRANGERS ON A TRAIN (1951) / June 2, Million Dollar Theatre
AMERICAN GRAFFITI (1973) / June 9, Orpheum Theatre
THE GRADUATE (1967) / June 16, Los Angeles Theatre
FLOR SILVESTRE (Wild Flower) (1943) / June 23, Million Dollar Theatre / Co-presented by the Latin American Cinemateca of Los Angeles
PETER PAN (1924) / June 30, Orpheum Theatre
Penélope Cruz, José Luis Gómez in Broken Embraces (Emilio Pereda & Paola Ardizzoni / El Deseo / Sony Pictures Classics).
Los Angeles’ American Cinematheque will host the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s series of screenings devoted to the films and filmmakers nominated for the 2010 Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
They are: Baaria (Italy) from Giuseppe Tornatore; Broken Embraces (Spain) from Pedro Almodóvar; The Maid (Chile) from Sebastian Silva; A Prophet (France) from Jacques Audiard; and The White Ribbon (Germany) from Michael Haneke. These films will each screen once between Jan. 11 and 15 at either the Egyptian in Hollywood or the Aero Theatre in Santa Monica.
Baaria, A Prophet, and The White Ribbon have also been submitted for the 2010 Oscar for best foreign language film.
This year’s free Golden Globe Foreign Language Nominees Panel Discussion will take place at the Egyptian Theatre on Saturday, January 16, at 1:00 PM. Screen International‘s Mike Goodridge will act as moderator.
Additionally, both Sebastian Silva and Giuseppe Tornatore are scheduled to introduce their respective films at the Aero. See below.
EGYPTIAN THEATRE – HOLLYWOOD
6712 Hollywood Boulevard, Hollywood, CA 90028
Monday, January 11 – 7:30 PM – Egyptian Theatre
THE WHITE RIBBON
2009, Das Weisse Band – Eine Deutsche Kindergeschichte, Germany, Sony Pictures Classics, 144 min.
Dir. Michael Haneke.Golden Globe® Foreign-Language Nominee from Germany
Winner of the Palme d’Or at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival. In a village in Protestant northern Germany on the eve of World War I, a series of mysterious crimes sets off a firestorm of gossip and suspicion and exposes local secrets. As trust erodes among the townspeople, it becomes harder and harder to determine who is behind the strange incidents. In German with English subtitles.
Tuesday, January 12 – 7:30 PM – Egyptian Theatre
A PROPHET
2009, Un Prophete, France, Sony Pictures Classics, 155 min.
Dir. Jacques Audiard.Golden Globe® Foreign-Language Nominee from France
Sneak Preview!
Stunning audiences at the 2009 Cannes, Toronto, and Telluride film festivals, A PROPHET tells the story of 19-year-old Malik, a young man who has just been sentenced to six years in prison. Initially less hardened than his fellow inmates, Malik is cornered by the prison’s members of a Corsican gang and pressured to complete “missions” that ultimately solidify his stature as a skilled gangster. Yet, while rising through the ranks of the gang, Malik makes plans of his own. Justin Cheng of Variety writes that A PROPHET is “a tough, absorbingly intricate account of a young French-Arab thug’s improbable education behind bars.”
Saturday, January 16 – 1:00 PM – Egyptian Theatre
Golden Globe® Foreign-Language Nominees Panel Discussion
Co-presented with the Hollywood Foreign Press Association.
Discover the best of 2009’s foreign-language films with the Golden Globe’s five foreign-language nominees. Please join us for a FREE round-table panel discussion with the directors of the nominated films. Moderated by Mike Goodridge of Screen International. Free parking in the Classic Parking lot at Las Palmas Avenue and Selma Avenue behind the Egyptian. This parking is first come, first served. You must tell the attendent that you are going to the Egyptian Theatre for the Golden Globe event.
AERO THEATRE – SANTA MONICA
1328 Montana Avenue, Santa Monica, CA 90403
Wednesday, January 13 – 7:30 PM – Aero Theatre
BAARIA
2009, Italy, Summit Entertainment, 150 min.
Dir. Giuseppe Tornatore.Golden Globe® Foreign-Language Nominee from Italy
From Academy Award® winner Giuseppe Tornatore (CINEMA PARADISO) comes a sweeping, period epic about a poor Sicilian man’s struggle for agrarian reform and justice for all in a community controlled by Mafia. BAARIA is as entertaining as it is melancholic, in its depiction of a small 20th-century Sicilian village and the many sharply drawn characters who populate it. “A moving, autobiographical, nostalgic tribute to the director’s Sicilian hometown of Bagheria (“Baaria” in the local dialect) as well as his family.” – The Hollywood Reporter Giuseppe Tornatore to introduce the screening.
Thursday, January 14 – 7:30 PM – Aero Theatre
BROKEN EMBRACES
2009, Los Abrazos Rotos, Spain, 127 min, Sony Pictures Classics,
Dir. Pedro Almodovar.Golden Globe® Foreign-Language Nominee from Spain
In Almodovar’s most recent melodrama-noir delicacy, a blind film director’s memories of an irretrievable love are brought back into sharp focus when an oddly familiar young filmmaker arrives unannounced at his door. Through an unraveling series of flashbacks, the betrayal and passion of the past begin to have urgent meaning for the blind director’s present life. Penélope Cruz is at her best as an aspiring actress caught between her husband and lover. New York Times critic A.O. Scott glowingly writes that BROKEN EMBRACES is “in the company of Mr. Almodovar’s other recent masterworks.”
Friday, January 15 – 7:30 PM – Aero Theatre
THE MAID
2009, La Nana, Chile, 95 min; Forastero; Elephant Eye Films,
Dir. Sebastian Silva.Golden Globe® Foreign-Language Nominee from Chile
The recipient of the World Cinema Jury Prize at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival, THE MAID follows the crafty hijinks of Raquel (Catalina Saavedra), a loyal servant to the same family for 23 years. Raquel feels an intimacy with her employers, as if she has become an honorary member of the family. When additional help is hired to ease the strain of Raquel’s duties, she feels bitterly dethroned and tries to sabotage the new employees with juvenile– and hilarious– antics. Robert Abele of the Chicago Tribune writes, “Saavedra’s increasingly desperate measures to protect her turf are at once startling, funny and weirdly poignant, as is the film itself.” Sebastian Silva to introduce the screening.