Classic Film Series

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SPRING 2013
The Spring 2013 Classic Film Series is divided into two smaller film series organized around specific themes: The Future of Film Series and Justice & Multiculturalism in the 21st Century Film Series.

Events are free and open to the public and located at Page Hall on UAlbany’s downtown campus.

	The Future of Film Series: The Writers Institute continues its Future of Film series with screenings on February 8, 22, March 1 and 8. The selections for The Future of Film series are based on film critic J. Hoberman’s list of global cinema’s quintessential 21st century motion pictures that appear in his book Film After Film (2012). Justice & Multiculturalism in the 21st Century Film Series: The Writers Institute continues its partnership with UAlbany’s School of Criminal Justice to present three films on February 15, April 5 and 26 that will explore issues relating to environmental justice, juvenile justice, wrongful conviction, domestic violence, and gender issues. Each screening will be followed by a discussion. For additional information go to: https://www.albany.edu/justiceinstitute/. CANCELLED Due to weather! The Future of Film Series: RUSSIAN ARK February 8 (Friday) Film screening — 7:30 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus Directed by Aleksandr Sokurov (Russia, 2002, 99 minutes, color) In Russian with English subtitles Widely acclaimed as both a technical masterpiece and a captivating spectacle, this tour of three hundred years of Russian history represents, in its entirety, the single longest continuous shot in the annals of cinema. Featuring two thousand actors and three live orchestras, the film follows an invisible narrator and a group of dead souls as they cavort through thirty-three rooms of the Hermitage museum in St. Petersburg. Writing in the Village Voice, J. Hoberman called it, “Sublime…. blithely anachronistic and slyly achronological…. [a] dazzling dance to the music of time.”
	Justice & Multiculturalism in the 21st Century Film Series: HOMELAND: FOUR PORTRAITS OF NATIVE ACTION February 15 (Friday) Film screening — 7:30 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus Directed by Roberta Grossman (United States, 2006, 88 minutes, color) An artful and moving example of documentary filmmaking, HOMELAND follows the stories of Native American activists fighting to protect their lands against corporate exploitation and environmental destruction. Variety called the film, “Beautifully crafted...,” and said “Roberta Grossman skillfully intersperses vastly varied archival clips with quietly impassioned testimonials by tribal leaders and stunning lensing showcasing both the natural wonders and the man-made degradation of the landscape.”
	The Future of Film Series: FLIGHT OF THE RED BALLOON [LE VOYAGE DU BALLON ROUGE] February 22 (Friday) Film screening — 7:30 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus Directed by Hsiao-hsien Hou (France/Taiwan, 2007, 115 minutes, color, in French and Mandarin with English subtitles) This intercultural homage by a Taiwanese director to the beloved children’s film, THE RED BALLOON (1956), by French director Albert Lamorisse, made numerous top ten lists of the year. Writing in the Village Voice, J. Hoberman called it, “explicitly an outsider’s movie, full of odd perspectives and founded on dislocation,” and said, “In its unexpected rhythms and visual surprises, its structural innovations and experimental performances, its creative misunderstandings and its outré syntheses, this is a movie of genius.”
	The Future of Film Series: THE DEATH OF MR. LAZARESCU [MOARTEA DOMNULUI LAZARESCU] March 1 (Friday) Film screening — 7:30 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus Directed by Cristi Puiu (Romania, 2005, 150 minutes, color, in Romanian with English subtitles) An elderly man is compelled by illness to embark on an all-night tour of the Romanian medical system in this brilliant and peculiar film by leading “Romanian New Wave” director Cristi Puiu. Winner of the Un Certain Regard prize at Cannes, the film was named the best feature of 2006 by J. Hoberman in the Village Voice. Stephen Holden of the New York Times proclaimed it “a thorny masterpiece,” and Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian called it a “blacker-than-black, deader-than-deadpan comedy.”
	The Future of Film Series: HUNGER March 8 (Friday) Film screening — 7:30 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus Directed by Steve McQueen (Ireland, 2008, 96 minutes, color) Starring Michael Fassbender as Bobby Sands Video installation artist Steve McQueen adapts his art form for the big screen in this harrowing tale of Irish Republican political prisoners who commit to a 1981 hunger strike to protest inhumane prison conditions. J. Hoberman called it, “A compelling drama that is also a formalist triumph.” Writing in the Washington Post, Ann Hornaday said, “McQueen has taken the raw materials of filmmaking and committed an act of great art.”
	Justice & Multiculturalism in the 21st Century Film Series: CENTRAL PARK FIVE April 5 (Friday) Film Screening — 7:00 p.m., [Note early start time] Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus Directed by Ken Burns, Sarah Burns and David McMahon (United States, 2012, 119 minutes, b/w and color) Ken Burns’ newest documentary, based on the book by his daughter Sarah Burns (who codirects), is a probing inquiry into the 1989 “Central Park Jogger” rape case that resulted in the wrongful conviction of five Harlem teenagers. The five spent more than a decade in prison until their sentence was vacated in 2002. Burns received a subpoena from the City of New York for access to his original footage for use in addressing lawsuits brought by the five. By special arrangement with Ken Burns’ film company and local PBS-affiliate WMHT, we will be screening this much-talked-about film in advance of its national PBS air date on April 16. The film was named Best Nonfiction Film at the 2012 New York Film Critics Circle Awards. The film will be followed by Q&A with with codirectors Sarah Burns and David McMahon. Cosponsored by WMHT
	DESTINY [DER MÜDE TOD] April 12 (Friday) Film Screening — 7:30 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus Directed by Fritz Lang (Germany, 1921, 105 minutes, b/w) SILENT with live accompaniment by Mike Schiffer. A dark fairy tale, DESTINY tells the story of a young woman’s bargain with the Angel of Death after he slays her lover. Death agrees to revive him if she can save at least one of three lives in peril in three different settings: medieval Persia, Renaissance Venice, and imperial China. The film influenced a succeeding generation of filmmakers, including Luis Buñuel, who said in his autobiography, “When I saw DESTINY, I suddenly knew that I wanted to make movies,” and Alfred Hitchcock, who cited it as a film that deeply impressed him as a young man.
	Justice & Multiculturalism in the 21st Century Film Series: ONCE WERE WARRIORS April 26 (Friday) Film Screening — 7:30 p.m., Page Hall, 135 Western Avenue, Downtown Campus Directed by Lee Tamahori (New Zealand, 1995, 102 minutes, color, in English and Maori with English subtitles) Set in a public housing project in Auckland, New Zealand, ONCE WERE WARRIORS tells the story of a modern-day Maori family plagued by domestic violence, crime, poverty, and alcohol abuse. Directed by Maori filmmaker Lee Tamahori, the film is based on a bestselling novel by Maori author Alan Duff. Austin Chronicle reviewer Marjorie Baumgarten said, “Harrowing…. both culturally specific and broadly universal…. the film’s searing performances are matched by the lovely camerawork of cinematographer Stuart Dryburgh (The Piano).”
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