Letterboxd — Your life in film

"Launched in November 2012, “The Deuce,” a monthly, 35mm-only series celebrating the 12 theaters on 42nd Street between 7th and 8th Avenues and the grindhouse fare they pumped out daily in the 1970s and ‘80s, has become a cherished ritual to many of the hundred people that show up each month, and as such naturally provides a soothing mnemonic device for a catastrophic moment like the shutdown of the city.
... 'The Deuce' is a full-fledged Event, intended to transport the crowd through space and time."

Madelyn Sutton for Screen Slate.
Featured 2/9/23 at Nitehawk Williamsburg on 35mm, the hundredth screening of the series “The Deuce.”

"Godland, despite its violence, is a gentle viewing experience. It invites meditation on home, grief, desire, the passage of time, and the indifference of nature. Those who adapt to the pace of the film’s two and a half hours will be rewarded with the kind of sublime peace that comes from a long, silent afternoon watching sheep graze from the earth to which we all will return."

Brittany Dennison for Screen Slate.

"Kagero-za concerns the horniness of Shungo Matsuzaki (Yūsaka Matsuda), a sophisticated playwright caught in a love triangle between a ghost and a European woman in disguise, whose blue eyes and blonde hair only reveal themselves under moonlight. To make matters worse, both paramours have been married to his patron, Tamawaki (a hilarious Katsuo Nakamura)."

Nicholas Pedrero-Setzer for Screen Slate. Featured 2/3/23 at Japan Society on 35mm.

"Product placement abounds. Jokes are used again and again. Two-thirds of the way through the movie, it becomes an ad for Royal Caribbean cruises. But the most bizarre aspect of Jack and Jill, and the reason for its enduring place in popular culture, is the very last scene: the ad Pacino shoots for Dunkin’.

It's a stunning thing, the Dunkaccino commercial—all the more so when you know it's coming and have sat through the entirety of Jack and Jill in advance of it."

Merritt K for Screen Slate. Featured 2/1/23 at Nitehawk Prospect Park in 35mm.

"Lubitsch is known for sharp, acrobatic dialogue, and indeed, he and George Cuckor would remake The Marriage Circle in 1932 as a musical (One Hour With You). But even in silence, the director offers viewers a richly layered scenario with his typical urbanity and unrivaled “touch” for comic and sexual implication."

Chris Shields for Screen Slate. Featured on 1/30/23 and 2/2/23 at the Museum of Modern Art.

"René Clair, who was previously renowned for his funny, often fantastical silent films in France (The Italian Straw Hat, 1928; Under the Roofs of Paris, 1930), utilizes charming visual gags that laid the groundwork for future witch-centric popular media such as Bewitched: broomsticks appear sentient and zip around, Lake works spells next to a bubbling black cauldron, and the disembodied spirits regularly travel around in the form talking wisps of smoke."

Stephanie Monohan for Screen Slate. Featured 1/30/23 at the Museum of Modern Art.

"This evening, if you find yourself curious about the cosmic adventures of giant blue humanoid aliens and the technofascist menace threatening their prelapsarian society, you can scratch that particular itch while still avoiding James Cameron’s profligacy by attending the French Institute’s screening of animator René Laloux’s final feature, Gandahar (1987)."

Patrick Dahl for Screen Slate. Features 1/29/23 at the French Institute Alliance Française as part of the Animation First Festival.

"Wuxia master King Hu’s Legend of the Mountain (1979) is a gentle and reflective epic that overwhelms viewers with natural beauty and mystery. Shot the same year as the director’s Raining in the Mountain, the film is loosely based on Pu Songling’s highly influential collection of Qing Dynasty stories, Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio. To this source material, Hu adds his flair for the sonorous majesty of Chinese opera, visual abstraction, and the soft mountain imagery of traditional Chinese painting to create an unhurried tale of magic, love, and deception."

Chris Shields for Screen Slate.Featured through 2/2 at Metrograph.