Special Events
Chicago premiere!
Keya Lea Horiuchi in person!
CONSIDERING DEMOCRACY:
8 THINGS TO ASK YOUR REPRESENTATIVE
2008, Keya Lea Horiuchi, USA, 60 min.
A timely film in this election season, CONSIDERING DEMOCRACY journeys from the Beltway corridors of power to ten countries around the globe to see how the United States stacks up and to ask why things aren’t better here. Filmmaker Horiuchi avoids a dry civics-lesson approach through her own lively onscreen presence, her skillful integration of face-in-the-crowd interviews, and her ability to bring key issues to life in a vivid and comprehensible manner. This is a film designed to stimulate discussion, and Horiuchi will be on hand to host the post-screening Q&A. Mini-DV video. (MR)
Tuesday, October 7, 8:00 pm
Chicago premiere!
WILD COMBINATION:
A PORTRAIT OF ARTHUR RUSSELL
2008, Matt Wolf, USA, 70 min.
“Think of it as a nonfiction answer to BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN: more shattering, nuanced, and hopeful.”--Johnny Ray Huston, San Francisco Bay Guardian
“A profoundly moving love story.”--Kurt B. Reighley, Time Out New York
Cellist/singer/composer Russell was a gay Iowa farm boy who ran away to hippie San Francisco and then settled in downtown Manhattan, where his uncompromising, unclassifiable music made fans out of Allen Ginsberg, Philip Glass, and the Modern Lovers’ Ernie Brooks (who called Russell “one of the greatest songwriters ever, greater than the Beatles”). Under such pseudonyms as Dinosaur L and Loose Joints, he wrote some of the most idiosyncratic hits of the disco era. It is only recently, fifteen years after his death from AIDS in 1992, that Russell’s work has blossomed into a cult phenomenon. Director Wolf avoids music-doc clichés to produce a visually inventive, heartfelt film as haunting as its remarkable subject. HDCAM video. (MR)
Friday, October 10, 8:00 pm
Monday, October 13, 8:00 pm
Tuesday, October 14, 6:15 pm
Special event!
BUENA VISTA SOCIAL CLUB
1999, Wim Wenders, USA/UK/France, 105 min.
“Seductive…most everyone with a pulse will want to get into this club.”--Eddie Cockrell, Variety
Nearly a decade ago, director Wim Wenders and American guitarist Ry Cooder assembled the legendary old-guard of Havana’s musicians, some in their nineties, for a series of recording sessions and concerts that Wenders filmed for the documentary that has become legendary in its own right. Many of those musicians have now passed on, making this document of their ageless energy and timeless legacy all the more vital. Performances include: Ibrahim Ferrer, “the Cuban Nat King Cole,” guitarist Compay Segundo, pianist Ruben Gonzalez, guitarist Barbito Torres, and vocalist Manuel “Puntillita” Licea. In English and Spanish with English subtitles. 35mm. (BS)
The Gene Siskel Film Center presents this screening in cooperation with Nonesuch Records on the release date of the long-awaited 2-CD live recording of the group's Carnegie Hall concert. Ticket-buyers will have the opportunity to purchase a copy of the CD set in the lobby at a very special price.
Tuesday, October 14, 8:00 pm
Agostino Ferrente in person!
THE ORCHESTRA OF PIAZZA VITTORIO
(L’ORCHESTRA DI PIAZZA VITTORIO)
2007, Agostino Ferrente, Italy, 93 min.
“Contagiously upbeat...a rousing call to arms for world-music aficionados.”-- Deborah Young, Variety
This feel-good documentary was a sleeper smash in Italy and a crowd-pleaser at international film festivals. Piazza Vittorio is the heart of the most ethnically diverse neighborhood in Rome--and a favorite target for xenophobic right-wing demonstrations. When its last movie theater is threatened with extinction, two residents--musician Mario Tranco and filmmaker Ferrente--come up with a daring idea for revitalizing the neighborhood: an orchestra recruited from the area’s many ethnicities. But can a Cuban trombonist, a Gypsy cymbonist, and an Indian tabla drummer play in perfect harmony? Presented in partnership with the Istituto Italiano di Cultura, Chicago. In Italian with English subtitles. 35mm. (MR)
Director and orchestra co-founder Agostino Ferrente will be present for audience discussion.
Saturday, October 25, 3:00 pm
Halloween special!
Come in costume!
Mark Toscano in person!
NIGHT TIDE
1961, Curtis Harrington, USA, 84 min.
With Dennis Hopper, Linda Lawson
Exquisitely balanced on the edge of a bad dream, NIGHT TIDE sucks the innocent sailor Johnny Drake (Hopper) into the dark, watery realm of a piscine temptress in hauntingly sinister Venice, California. Avant-garde director Harrington conjures up references from Kenneth Anger to Maya Deren in casting the net of the supernatural over the tawdry seaside locale where every half-loony local and crumbling Venetian-themed edifice seems to emanate from another world. A fortune-teller signals danger but Johnny is smitten at the sight of amusement-pier mermaid Mora (Lawson), a woman whose mysterious origin is shrouded in Greek mythology. Presented in partnership with IFP/Chicago and the Chicago Underground Film Festival. The Academy Film Archive restored NIGHT TIDE in 2008 with support from The Film Foundation and Curtis Harrington. (BS)
Friday, October 31, 8:00 pm
THE LAST WRIGHT
2008, Lucille Carra, USA, 60 min.
THIS AMERICAN GOTHIC
2008, Sasha Waters Freyer, USA, 63 min.
Two documentaries from our Iowa neighbors focus on architectural treasures that become rallying points for declining rural communities:
THE LAST WRIGHT is set in Mason City, once a booming commerce center known as “Little Chicago,” then the model for hometown hero Meredith Willson’s River City in The Music Man, later a strip-joint mecca known as “Porn City,” and currently the site of a preservation battle centered on the crumbling Park Inn, Frank Lloyd Wright’s only surviving hotel.
THIS AMERICAN GOTHIC is set in tiny Eldon, pop. 998, where local boosters seek to revive their fading town by erecting a Gothic House Visitor Center in honor of the local structure that inspired Grant Wood’s iconic American Gothic. The harsh economic realities of rural America are counterpointed by the mythic image both immortalized and satirized by Wood’s painting. Both in DigiBeta video. (MR)
Directors Lucille Carra of THE LAST WRIGHT and Sasha Waters Freyer of THIS AMERICAN GOTHIC will be present for audience discussion.