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The Great Transition:
World Cinema in the 1950s

Lecturer: Jonathan Rosenbaum

From Sept. 5 through Dec. 12, we offer a series of fourteen programs entitled The Great Transition: World Cinema in the 1950s, with weekly lecture/discussions by Jonathan Rosenbaum, internationally renowned film critic for the Chicago Reader and author of numerous books including Discovering Orson Welles. The series is made possible in part through the sponsorship of American Airlines, the Film Center's Educational Underwriter, and is presented in cooperation with the School of the Art Institute's Department of Art History, Theory, and Criticism. Please note that this year's lectures are on Wednesday, rather than on Tuesday as in previous years. Additional screenings of the films on Friday do not include Jonathan Rosenbaum's lecture. Admission to all Great Transition programs is $4 for Film Center members; usual admission prices apply for non-members.

-- Martin Rubin

In between Italian neorealism and the European new waves, one can find a ferment of creativity in many different cinemas around the world. This two-part series will investigate the phenomenon in all its complexity and diversity. Mainstream and independent films from the U.S., France, Sweden, and Japan will be among those represented. In Part One, devoted mainly to the 1950s, the critical writings of such critics and future filmmakers as Jean-Luc Godard, Jacques Rivette, and Fran¨ois Truffaut will be discussed alongside many of the films they championed and wrote about, such as Nicholas Ray's PARTY GIRL, Robert Bresson's A MAN ESCAPED, and Howard Hawks's THE BIG SKY. The second part of the series, The Great Transition: World Cinema in the 1960s, will be presented in spring 2008.

-- Jonathan Rosenbaum

TOUCH OF EVIL
1958, Orson Welles, USA, 111 min.
With Orson Welles, Charlton Heston

From its sensational opening camera movement to its haunting Marlene Dietrich envoi, TOUCH OF EVIL is Welles’s most spectacularly stylized film. The plot pits a corrupt border-town sheriff (Welles) against a Mexican narc (Heston) and his vulnerable bride (Janet Leigh). Lecturer and leading Wellesologist Jonathan Rosenbaum was consultant on this latest version of the film, which was restored according to instructions left by Welles. 35mm. (MR)

Friday, November 2, 6:00 pm
Wednesday, November 7, 6:00 pm

MURDER BY CONTRACT
1958, Irving Lerner, USA, 81 min.
With Vince Edwards, Herschel Bernardi

A Zen-cool hit man (Edwards) is given the assignment of rubbing out a heavily guarded witness whose identity throws him for a loop. This low-budget classic’s high-profile fans include James Ellroy (who hosted the film on TCM), Jim Jarmusch (who drew upon it for GHOST DOG), and Martin Scorsese (who said, “This is the film that has influenced me the most”). 35mm. (MR)

Friday, November 9, 6:00 pm
Monday, November 12, 8:00 pm
Wednesday, November 14, 6:00 pm

GOOD MORNING
(OHAYO)
1959, Yasujiro Ozu, Japan, 94 min.
With Chishu Ryu, Kuniko Miyake

When their father (Chishu Ryu) refuses to buy a TV set, two boys go on a silence strike, refusing even to say, “Good morning!” Notable for its fart jokes, vibrant colors, observant depiction of suburbia, and cheerful satire of modern life, this loose remake of I WAS BORN, BUT. . . shows Ozu at his earthiest and funniest. In Japanese with English subtitles. 35mm. (MR)

Friday, November 16, 6:00 pm
Wednesday, November 21, 6:00 pm

THE BIG SKY
1952, Howard Hawks, USA, 140 min.
With Kirk Douglas, Dewey Martin

Set in 1832, Hawks’s rousing adventure saga centers on two frontiersmen (Douglas, Martin) who join a 2,000-mile trading expedition up the Missouri River to Montana. Lecturer and Reader critic Jonathan Rosenbaum calls the film “a particular favorite of mine--mysterious, beautiful, and even utopian in some of its sexual and cultural aspects.” 35mm. (MR)

Friday, November 23, 6:00 pm
Wednesday, November 28, 6:00 pm

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Upcoming films in The Great Transition:

December 7 and 12
CURSE OF THE DEMON
1957, Jacques Tourneur, Britain, 95 min.
With Dana Andrews, Peggy Cummins