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There are enough New Yorkers in the Lounge (and plenty of folks from elsewhere who like to visit NYC) that I thought it might be a good idea to have a Film Forum thread. They've got some great stuff coming up in the next few months, including a four-week retrospective of Depression movies called "Breadlines and Champagne: Depression Movies--Pre-Code, Social Consciousness & Screwball Comedies" (details below), followed by a week-long run of LEAVE HER TO HEAVEN and a Jules Dassen retrospective, among other delights.
Here's the rundown on "Breadlines and Champagne":
February 6 Fri
I'M NO ANGEL & Selected Short Subjects!
(1933, Wesley Ruggles) Mae West tames a den of lions, an all-male jury, and socialite Cary Grant, in the supremely Pre-Code picture that scandalized the Legion of Decency.
Plus vintage trailers, cartoon, and Hearst Metrotone News!
Complete program at
1:00, 3:15, 5:30, 7:45, 10:00
POST-INAUGURATION SPECIAL:
ALL SEATS 35 cents / Film Forum members: 25 cents
February 7/8/9 Sat/Sun/Mon
MAN'S CASTLE & THE THREE LITTLE PIGS
(1933, Frank Borzage) Dead-broke Spencer Tracy and homeless teenager Loretta Young find each other in a ramshackle East River Hooverville. Grounded in the grittiest realities of the day, but still among the most romantic of Borzage's many romantic fables. "A neglected masterpiece." -- Dave Kehr. Plus Disney's The Three Little Pigs (1933) trill "Who's afraid of the big, bad wolf?" -- could this be a Depression allegory?
Sat/Sun 1:00, 4:05, 7:10, 10:15 Mon 1:00, 4:05
AMERICAN MADNESS -- - New 35mm Print!
(1932, Frank Capra) Bank president Walter Huston insists on lending on "character," despite an almost-cheating wife, embezzling cashier, and spectacular bank run. "One of the most beautifully assembled, lighted and photographed pictures of the 30s." -- Elliott Stein.
Sat/Sun 2:35, 5:40, 8:45 Mon 2:35
February 9 Mon
OUR DAILY BREAD
(1934, King Vidor) The ultimate expression of the Depression's collective spirit, as a young couple (including future blacklistee Karen Morley) and assorted jobless drifters team up to work a drought-threatened farm. "Brimming with hope and enthusiasm." -- Jonathan Rosenbaum.
7:30 only
STAND UP AND CHEER
(1934, Hamilton MacFadden) The President names Broadway producer Warner Baxter "Secretary of Amusement," a new cabinet post created to "put smiles" on the faces of Depression-plagued Americans, but it's toddler Shirley Temple who steals the show with "Baby, Take a Bow."
6:00, 9:00
February 10 Tue
EMPLOYEES ENTRANCE
(1933, Roy Del Ruth) Relentlessly paced shop girl's 42ND STREET, as Warren William's department store manager ("the caddish personification of ruthless capitalism" -- J. Hoberman) drives himself and everyone else to the limit to stay in business, en route seducing Loretta Young, both before and after marriage to nice guy Wallace Ford.
1:00, 4:35, 8:10
SKYSCRAPER SOULS
(1932, Edgar Selwyn) Over-sexed Warren William as the Donald Trump of his day, in Pre-Code paean to the modern (and Deco) office building. Habituees of this Gotham Grand Hotel include Hedda Hopper, Verree Teasdale, Anita Page, and Maureen O'Sullivan -- on the receiving end of a shocking seduction.
2:35, 6:10, 9:45
*BANK NITE DRAWING! (6:10 & 8:10 ticketholders only)
February 11 Wed
PLATINUM BLONDE
(1931, Frank Capra) Smart-talking newspaperman Robert Williams breaks the heart of reporter chum Loretta Young when he weds eponymous socialite Jean Harlow, a class-crossing that gets him tagged "Cinderella Man" (a moniker inherited by Longfellow Deeds: see Feb. 7). Screenplay by Robert Riskin.
2:40, 6:05, 9:30
THREE-CORNERED MOON
(1933, Elliott Nugent) When those mining stocks prove worthless, the Rimplegar family -- mom Mary Boland, daughter Claudette Colbert, and her three hapless brothers -- are forced to (gasp) work.
1:00, 4:25, 7:50
February 12 Thu -- Special Event!
LINCOLN BICENTENNIAL DOUBLE FEATURE
YOUNG MISTER LINCOLN -- New 35mm Print!
(1939, John Ford) Henry Fonda's Abraham Lincoln loves and loses Ann Rutledge, studies law, runs his first political race, meets Mary Todd and Stephen A. Douglas, and takes on a climactic murder trial at the behest of family friend Alice Brady -- with its solution found in a farmer's almanac. "Ford's mythologizing has seldom seemed stronger or more subtle.”" -- Dave Kehr. "Explodes in the histrionic splendor and 'excess' of the celebrated final sequence." -- Time Out (London). "A masterpiece of concision, yet it breathes an air of casual improvisation." -- Geoffrey O'Brien.
1:00, 4:35, 8:05
THE TALL TARGET
(1951, Anthony Mann) On board Lincoln's inauguration-bound train, freelancing NYC cop Dick Powell (character name: John Kennedy!) teams up with Union officer Adolphe Menjou to foil an assassination plot -- or does he? "A Noir mini-masterpiece. Sinewy camera movement, elegantly modulated rhythms, and arresting paranoia." -- Fernando F. Croce, Slant.
3:00, 6:30, 10:00
February 13 Fri
HEROES FOR SALE
(1933, William Wellman) Richard Barthelmess' trip to Calvary, from the trenches of WWI to the breadlines and railroad ties of 1933, encountering communism, welfare capitalism, drug addiction, Red Squads, police brutality and riots along the way. "One of the very few Depression films not to cop out." -- William K. Everson.
1:30, 4:40, 7:50
WILD BOYS OF THE ROAD
(1933, William Wellman) Instead of burdening their penniless families, Frankie Darro, Edwin Phillips, and Dorothy Coonan (soon to be Mrs. Wellman) decide to ride the rails, dodging train detectives in search of jobs and shelter. "Has a claim to greatness." -- Todd McCarthy.
3:15, 6:25, 9:35
February 14 Sat
MY MAN GODFREY
(1936, Gregory La Cava) Dizzy heiress Carole Lombard wins the scavenger hunt by producing bum William Powell as a "forgotten man" -- then hires him as her butler, joining air-headed mom Alice Brady's menagerie of acidulous relatives and hangers-on.
1:00, 4:35, 8:20
EASY LIVING
(1937, Mitchchell Leisen) Working girl Jean Arthur is mistaken for a Wall St. lion's mistress, but finds love in the Automat with Ray Milland, in Preston Sturges' most famed pre-directorial screwball comedy. "If you paired it with MY MAN GODFREY, you'd have a beautiful portrait of money in New York -- and a happy audience." -- David Thomson.
2:50, 6:25, 10:10
February 15 Sun
BABY FACE -- THE UNCENSORED VERSION
(1933, Alfred E. Green) Barbara Stanwyck ("the ultimate Pre-Code hottie" -- J. Hoberman) turns tricks out of her dad's dreary Erie, Pa., speakeasy, then sleeps her way up the corporate ladder. The CITIZEN KANE of Pre-Code movies became even racier with the discovery of five more sordid minutes in 2005.
2:35, 5:40, 8:45
BLESSED EVENT
(1932, Roy Del Ruth) The apotheosis of Lee Tracy, inventor of the fast-talking newspaperman, here machine-gunning his way through a raucous send-up of Walter Winchell, and attaining utter delirium when he talks Allen Jenkins through his own imagined electrocution.
1:00, 4:05, 7:10, 10:15
February 16 Mon
GABRIEL OVER THE WHITE HOUSE
(1933, Gregory La Cava) Mysteriously "possessed" by a heavenly spirit, party hack chief exec Walter Huston is suddenly transformed into a Super-President, single-handedly wiping out crime, unemployment, mortgage payments (!) -- and Congress itself.
1:00, 4:20, 7:40
WASHINGTON MERRY-GO-ROUND
(1932, James Cruze) Pre-MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON, as fast-talking Lee Tracy's Congressman "Button Gwinnett Brown" teams up with the Bonus Army to expose an influence peddler/murderer. Plus BETTY BOOP FOR PRESIDENT!
2:40, 6:00, 9:30
February 17 Tue
NIGHT NURSE
(1931, William Wellman) Barbara Stanwyck and Joan Blondell, quick-changing between uniforms and deshabille, breezily battle bootleggers, drunken mothers, corrupt doctors, and a tawdry child abuse case master-minded by menacing chauffeur Clark Gable. "Pre-Code with a vengeance." -- William K. Everson.
2:45, 6:00, 9:30
HOLD YOUR MAN
(1933, Sam Wood) Sent to a reformatory after con man Clark Gable gets her "in trouble," tough cookie Jean Harlow slugs it out with drunken Dorothy Burgess and warbles "Onward Christian Soldiers" while plotting her getaway.
1:00, 4:15, 7:30
*BANK NITE DRAWING! (6:00 & 7:30 ticketholders only)
February 18 Wed
BLACK LEGION
(1936, Archie Mayo) Factory worker Humphrey Bogart, sore at losing promotion to a "foreigner," joins a Klan-like secret society, but then it's a few short steps to murder and that look on wife Ann Sheridan's face.
1:00, 4:30, 8:00
BLACK FURY
(1935, Michael Curtiz) Despite union opposition, Polish miner Paul Muni is schnookered by rabble-rousers into leading a wildcat strike in the Pennsylvania coalfields. "The most powerful strike picture that has yet been made, and I am aware of the better-known Soviet jobs in the field." -- Otis Ferguson.
2:40, 6:10, 9:40
February 19 Thu
HALLELUJAH, I'M A BUM
(1933, Lewis Milestone) Al Jolson, as the "mayor" of Central Park, and his homeless constituents ("30s versions of beatniks" -- Pauline Kael) come to the aid of amnesiac Madge Evans in one-of-a-kind Rodgers & Hart musical, complete with "rhythmic dialogue," Soviet cutting, and Bolshevik Harry Langdon.
3:30, 7:10
VITAPHONE VARIETIES OF 2009
More rare Vitaphone sound shorts from the late '20s and early '30s, all restored by the UCLA Film Archive. Tonight's program includes a prologue from "czar of all the rushes" Will Hays; banjo ace Roy Smeck; Gus Arnheim's band, featuring Crosby/Vallee rival Russ Columbo; and vaudevillians Shaw & Lee, Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy, and Bert Lahr, all topped by Jolson's pre-Jazz Singer "Plantation Act." Introduced by Ron Hutchinson of The Vitaphone Project.
1:30, 5:10, 8:50
February 20 Fri
DEAD END
(1937, William Wyler) Along the East River, ritzy apartments bump up against crummy tenements, as unemployed architect Joel McCrea yearns for a stuck-up socialite, while slum-raised Sylvia Sidney yearns for him and the Dead End Kids idolize local-boy-made-hood Humphrey Bogart.
1:30, 4:40, 7:50
THREE ON A MATCH
(1932, Mervrvyn LeRoy) At a slum girls' reunion, steno Bette Davis, socialite Ann Dvorak and showgirl Joan Blondell light up -- and then it's change partners and dance as one power dives to the skids, courtesy of angel dust. With young Humphrey Bogart already in form as a kidnapper.
3:20, 6:30, 9:45
*Amy Lehr, granddaughter of director William Wyler, will introduce the 7:50 show
February 21 Sat
SCARFACE
(1932, Howard Hawks) X marks the corpses, as they drop in garages, lunch rooms, and bowling alleys: Paul Muni's Capone prototype wastes his boss and takes over his moll, aided by coin-flipping cohort George Raft, but his (extremely possessive) heart belongs to sister Ann Dvorak.
2:50, 6:10, 9:30
BLOOD MONEY
(1933, Rowland Brown) Bailbondsman George Bancroft dallies with thrill-seeking heiress Frances Dee, despite his longtime mistress (debuting-Dame-to-be Judith Anderson), but then finds himself holding the bag after a half-mill bank robbery. Condemned by censors because it "would incite law-abiding citizens to crime."
1:30, 4:50, 8:10
February 22/23 Sun/Mon
IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT
(1934, Frank Capra) Following a memorable New York-bound Greyhound bus ride, only the "walls of Jericho" separate story-hungry newshound Clark Gable from bratty runaway heiress Claudette Colbert, in the first picture to sweep the major Oscars. "Made audiences happy in a way only a few films in each era can do... the ANNIE HALL of its day." -- Pauline Kael.
Sun 1:30, 5:20, 9:10 Mon 2:50
BOMBSHELL
(1933, Victor Fleming) Jean Harlow's Lola Burns -- the infamous If Girl -- supports sponging family, endless entourage and a major Hollywood studio, while fending off stop-at-nothing press agent Lee Tracy and romantic con artist Franchot Tone. "A masterpiece of comic engineering." -- Michael Sragow.
Sun 3:30, 7:20 Mon 1:00, 4:50
February 24 Tue (3 Films for 1 Admission)
FEMALE
(1933, Michchael Curtiz) Tycoon Ruth Chatterton runs her auto company by day and dips into the junior executive pool by night, until George Brent shows who's wearing the pants. "Startlingly bold in its sexual themes." -- Dave Kehr, NY Times.
2:20, 6:15, 10:20
EX-LADY
(1933, Robert Florey) Bohemian artist Bette Davis shacks up with Gene Raymond, but after their "oh, why not?" marriage, things go sour. Daring scenes in a High Deco boudoir kept censors steaming.
1:00, 4:55, 9:00
MILLS OF THE GODS -- New 35mm Print!
(1934, Roy William Neill) With the family plow factory on the verge of going belly up, matriarch May Robson finds her trust fund kids just don't give a darn, but as rioting workers battle police, granddaughter Fay Wray finds solidarity and love with union leader Victor Jory.
3:35, 7:30
*BANK NITE DRAWING! (6:15 & 7:30 ticketholders only)
February 25 Wed
LITTLE CAESAR
(1931, Mervyn LeRoy) "Mother of Mercy, is this the end of Rico?" moans Edward G. Robinson at the climax of his star-making incarnation of an Al Capone type's rise and fall. Adapted from the hard-boiled classic by W.R. Burnett.
1:30, 4:40, 7:50
TWO SECONDS
(1932, Mervrvyn LeRoy) That's how long it takes Edward G. Robinson to die once they turn on the juice, with flashbacks to a drunken marriage, death on the high iron, and murder. "Luridly expressionist. A tawdry gem." -- J. Hoberman.
3:15, 6:25, 9:35
February 26 Thu
NO GREATER GLORY
(1934, Frank Borzage) Two groups of Budapest boys, imitating their elders' hero worship of militarism, go to literal -- and eventually mortal -- battle over a lumber yard, in this powerful, rarely-seen anti-war allegory, adapted from Ferenc (Lilliom / Carousel) Molnar's The Boys of Saint Paul.
1:30, 4:40, 7:50
THIS DAY AND AGE
(1933, Cecil B. DeMille) A vigilante fantasy -- some say an incitement to fascism -- with schoolboys finding new ways to rid their town of rampant gangsterism, including grilling mobster Charles Bickford over a pit of rats.
3:00, 6:10, 9:20
February 27 Fri
MR. DEEDS GOES TO TOWN
(1936, Frank Capra) Gary Cooper's greeting-card-versifying Vermonter Longfellow Deeds inherits 20 million from an uncle he's never known -- and then he's whisked to Park Avenue before he knows what hit him. With Jean Arthur as a cynical newsgal. "A comedy quite unmatched on the screen." -- Graham Greene.
3:25, 7:30
THEODORA GOES WILD - New 35mm Print!
(1936, Richard Boleslawski) When smalltown librarian Irene Dunne (in her first screwball role, pre-THE AWFUL TRUTH) is exposed as a racy bestseller's author, she escapes to Manhattan, where urban sophisticate Melvyn Douglas falls for her. "The best light comedy since MR. DEEDS." -- Graham Greene.
1:30, 5:35, 9:40
February 28 Sat
KING KONG
(1933, Merian C. Cooper & Ernest B. Schchoedsack) "Bring-'em-back-alive" filmmaker Robert Armstrong, with scream queen (and Film Forum member) Fay Wray in tow, sets out in search of the Ultimate Attraction: The Greatest Ape of Them All. Released the week of FDR's bank holiday, the Mighty Kong still smashed box office records.
2:45, 6:25, 10:10
42ND STREET
(1933, Lloyd Bacon) "A New Deal in Entertainment!" Landmark paean to "The Deuce," as running-on-nerves director Warner Baxter gives the pep talk to understudy Ruby Keeler after temperamental star Bebe Daniels breaks that ankle. Three must-be-seen-to-be-believed Busby Berkeley numbers provide the finale.
1:00, 4:40, 8:25
March 1 Sun
GOLD DIGGERS OF 1933
(1933, Mervyn LeRoy) Coin-clad Ginger Rogers warbles "We're In The Money," while Ruby Keeler and Joan Blondell pursue rich admirers Warren William and Dick Powell. The Pre-Code Busby Berkeley musical features the wrenching Depression anthem "Remember My Forgotten Man" and the downright smutty "Pettin' in the Park" number. "Sums up what is meant by the phrase 'pure thirties'." -- The New Yorker.
1:30, 5:30, 9:30
FOOTLIGHT PARADE
(1933, Lloyd Bacon) Busbyberkeleython climaxed by three of his most elaborate numbers: Jimmy Cagney's high-steppin' search through the opium dens for "Shanghai Lil" Ruby Keeler, aquatic ballet "By a Waterfall" ("truly delirious" -- David Thomson), and a stop at the hot and horny Honeymoon Hotel. "One of the greatest of the Depression era musicals." -- Elliott Stein.
3:30, 7:30
March 2 Mon
ME AND MY GAL
(1932, Raoul Walsh) Cop Spencer Tracy's slanging matches with hash-slinger Joan Bennett, spiced with a hilarious parody of O'Neill's Strange Interlude, are interrupted when director Walsh's brother George blasts his way into a bank. "The quintessential gum-chewing, fast-talking romance comedy of the period." -- Elliott Stein.
2:15, 5:15, 8:15
CENTRAL PARK
(1932, John G. Adolfi) Equally unemployed Joan Blondell and Wallace Ford "meet cute" over stolen hot dogs, then contend with crooked cops, a going-blind park policeman, an insane zoo keeper, an escaped lion, and a shootout during a beauty contest -- in other words, just another day in the park. "Exhibits [the park] as a battlefield of crime and dissipation... Thoroughly diverting." -- Time.
1:00, 4:00, 7:00, 10:00
March 3 Tue
TAXI!
(1932, Roy Del Ruth) Amid city sounds in lieu of music, cocky Yiddish redndiker cabby Jimmy Cagney ("a deese, dem and dose on-the-make example of young America" -- Variety) can't keep his hands off bride Loretta Young at their wedding supper, then bucks a rival taxi outfit in two-fisted union war.
1:00, 5:25, 10:05
LAWYER MAN
(1932, William Dieterle) Fast-talking William Powell, with ever-loyal secretary Joan Blondell in tow, moves from schlmiely Second Ave. mouthpiece to natty Park Ave. assistant D.A. "Its active libido is resolutely Pre-Code." -- William K. Everson.
2:25, 6:50
BLONDE CRAZY
(1931, Roy Del Ruth) Hustling bellboy James Cagney moves from gin procurement to the shakedown racket, aided and abetted by chambermaid Joan Blondell.
3:50, 8:30
*BANK NITE DRAWING! (5:25 & 6:50 ticketholders only)
March 4 Wed
COUNSELLOR AT LAW
(1933, William Wyler) Posh lawyer John Barrymore finds that, as his personal and professional crises loom, he can't escape his Lower East Side background. Wyler directs this adaptation of Elmer Rice's play at vintage '30s breakneck pace. "One of the first cinematic intimations of melting pot politics and anti-Semitic snobbery." -- Andrew Sarris. 3:00, 6:15, 9:40
THE MOUTHPIECE
(1932, Elliott Nugent & James Flood) Assistant D.A. Warren William, devastated by his railroading of an innocent man, decides to go for the buck as a gangland front man, with dazzling success. "One of the most immoral of these many moral tales." -- David Shipman.
1:20, 4:35, 8:00
*Catherine Wyler, daughter of the director, will introduce the 6:15 show
March 5 Thu
UPPERWORLD
(1934, Roy Del Ruth) Double trouble for millionaire Warren William: beating two murder raps, and choosing between friendly chorus girl Ginger Rogers and neglectful wife Mary Astor. Based on a story by Ben Hecht. "AMERICAN TRAGEDY in reverse. A surprisingly mature sex drama." -- William K. Everson.
1:00, 3:55, 6:50, 9:50
NIGHT WORLD
(1932, Hobart Hensley) GRAND HOTEL in a seedy night club, complete with Busby Berkeley number, as boozing playboy Lew Ayres and dancer Mae Clarke (Cagney's grapefruit recipient) are befriended by surprisingly sympathetic owner Boris Karloff.
2:30, 5:25, 8:25
Here's the rundown on "Breadlines and Champagne":
February 6 Fri
I'M NO ANGEL & Selected Short Subjects!
(1933, Wesley Ruggles) Mae West tames a den of lions, an all-male jury, and socialite Cary Grant, in the supremely Pre-Code picture that scandalized the Legion of Decency.
Plus vintage trailers, cartoon, and Hearst Metrotone News!
Complete program at
1:00, 3:15, 5:30, 7:45, 10:00
POST-INAUGURATION SPECIAL:
ALL SEATS 35 cents / Film Forum members: 25 cents
February 7/8/9 Sat/Sun/Mon
MAN'S CASTLE & THE THREE LITTLE PIGS
(1933, Frank Borzage) Dead-broke Spencer Tracy and homeless teenager Loretta Young find each other in a ramshackle East River Hooverville. Grounded in the grittiest realities of the day, but still among the most romantic of Borzage's many romantic fables. "A neglected masterpiece." -- Dave Kehr. Plus Disney's The Three Little Pigs (1933) trill "Who's afraid of the big, bad wolf?" -- could this be a Depression allegory?
Sat/Sun 1:00, 4:05, 7:10, 10:15 Mon 1:00, 4:05
AMERICAN MADNESS -- - New 35mm Print!
(1932, Frank Capra) Bank president Walter Huston insists on lending on "character," despite an almost-cheating wife, embezzling cashier, and spectacular bank run. "One of the most beautifully assembled, lighted and photographed pictures of the 30s." -- Elliott Stein.
Sat/Sun 2:35, 5:40, 8:45 Mon 2:35
February 9 Mon
OUR DAILY BREAD
(1934, King Vidor) The ultimate expression of the Depression's collective spirit, as a young couple (including future blacklistee Karen Morley) and assorted jobless drifters team up to work a drought-threatened farm. "Brimming with hope and enthusiasm." -- Jonathan Rosenbaum.
7:30 only
STAND UP AND CHEER
(1934, Hamilton MacFadden) The President names Broadway producer Warner Baxter "Secretary of Amusement," a new cabinet post created to "put smiles" on the faces of Depression-plagued Americans, but it's toddler Shirley Temple who steals the show with "Baby, Take a Bow."
6:00, 9:00
February 10 Tue
EMPLOYEES ENTRANCE
(1933, Roy Del Ruth) Relentlessly paced shop girl's 42ND STREET, as Warren William's department store manager ("the caddish personification of ruthless capitalism" -- J. Hoberman) drives himself and everyone else to the limit to stay in business, en route seducing Loretta Young, both before and after marriage to nice guy Wallace Ford.
1:00, 4:35, 8:10
SKYSCRAPER SOULS
(1932, Edgar Selwyn) Over-sexed Warren William as the Donald Trump of his day, in Pre-Code paean to the modern (and Deco) office building. Habituees of this Gotham Grand Hotel include Hedda Hopper, Verree Teasdale, Anita Page, and Maureen O'Sullivan -- on the receiving end of a shocking seduction.
2:35, 6:10, 9:45
*BANK NITE DRAWING! (6:10 & 8:10 ticketholders only)
February 11 Wed
PLATINUM BLONDE
(1931, Frank Capra) Smart-talking newspaperman Robert Williams breaks the heart of reporter chum Loretta Young when he weds eponymous socialite Jean Harlow, a class-crossing that gets him tagged "Cinderella Man" (a moniker inherited by Longfellow Deeds: see Feb. 7). Screenplay by Robert Riskin.
2:40, 6:05, 9:30
THREE-CORNERED MOON
(1933, Elliott Nugent) When those mining stocks prove worthless, the Rimplegar family -- mom Mary Boland, daughter Claudette Colbert, and her three hapless brothers -- are forced to (gasp) work.
1:00, 4:25, 7:50
February 12 Thu -- Special Event!
LINCOLN BICENTENNIAL DOUBLE FEATURE
YOUNG MISTER LINCOLN -- New 35mm Print!
(1939, John Ford) Henry Fonda's Abraham Lincoln loves and loses Ann Rutledge, studies law, runs his first political race, meets Mary Todd and Stephen A. Douglas, and takes on a climactic murder trial at the behest of family friend Alice Brady -- with its solution found in a farmer's almanac. "Ford's mythologizing has seldom seemed stronger or more subtle.”" -- Dave Kehr. "Explodes in the histrionic splendor and 'excess' of the celebrated final sequence." -- Time Out (London). "A masterpiece of concision, yet it breathes an air of casual improvisation." -- Geoffrey O'Brien.
1:00, 4:35, 8:05
THE TALL TARGET
(1951, Anthony Mann) On board Lincoln's inauguration-bound train, freelancing NYC cop Dick Powell (character name: John Kennedy!) teams up with Union officer Adolphe Menjou to foil an assassination plot -- or does he? "A Noir mini-masterpiece. Sinewy camera movement, elegantly modulated rhythms, and arresting paranoia." -- Fernando F. Croce, Slant.
3:00, 6:30, 10:00
February 13 Fri
HEROES FOR SALE
(1933, William Wellman) Richard Barthelmess' trip to Calvary, from the trenches of WWI to the breadlines and railroad ties of 1933, encountering communism, welfare capitalism, drug addiction, Red Squads, police brutality and riots along the way. "One of the very few Depression films not to cop out." -- William K. Everson.
1:30, 4:40, 7:50
WILD BOYS OF THE ROAD
(1933, William Wellman) Instead of burdening their penniless families, Frankie Darro, Edwin Phillips, and Dorothy Coonan (soon to be Mrs. Wellman) decide to ride the rails, dodging train detectives in search of jobs and shelter. "Has a claim to greatness." -- Todd McCarthy.
3:15, 6:25, 9:35
February 14 Sat
MY MAN GODFREY
(1936, Gregory La Cava) Dizzy heiress Carole Lombard wins the scavenger hunt by producing bum William Powell as a "forgotten man" -- then hires him as her butler, joining air-headed mom Alice Brady's menagerie of acidulous relatives and hangers-on.
1:00, 4:35, 8:20
EASY LIVING
(1937, Mitchchell Leisen) Working girl Jean Arthur is mistaken for a Wall St. lion's mistress, but finds love in the Automat with Ray Milland, in Preston Sturges' most famed pre-directorial screwball comedy. "If you paired it with MY MAN GODFREY, you'd have a beautiful portrait of money in New York -- and a happy audience." -- David Thomson.
2:50, 6:25, 10:10
February 15 Sun
BABY FACE -- THE UNCENSORED VERSION
(1933, Alfred E. Green) Barbara Stanwyck ("the ultimate Pre-Code hottie" -- J. Hoberman) turns tricks out of her dad's dreary Erie, Pa., speakeasy, then sleeps her way up the corporate ladder. The CITIZEN KANE of Pre-Code movies became even racier with the discovery of five more sordid minutes in 2005.
2:35, 5:40, 8:45
BLESSED EVENT
(1932, Roy Del Ruth) The apotheosis of Lee Tracy, inventor of the fast-talking newspaperman, here machine-gunning his way through a raucous send-up of Walter Winchell, and attaining utter delirium when he talks Allen Jenkins through his own imagined electrocution.
1:00, 4:05, 7:10, 10:15
February 16 Mon
GABRIEL OVER THE WHITE HOUSE
(1933, Gregory La Cava) Mysteriously "possessed" by a heavenly spirit, party hack chief exec Walter Huston is suddenly transformed into a Super-President, single-handedly wiping out crime, unemployment, mortgage payments (!) -- and Congress itself.
1:00, 4:20, 7:40
WASHINGTON MERRY-GO-ROUND
(1932, James Cruze) Pre-MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON, as fast-talking Lee Tracy's Congressman "Button Gwinnett Brown" teams up with the Bonus Army to expose an influence peddler/murderer. Plus BETTY BOOP FOR PRESIDENT!
2:40, 6:00, 9:30
February 17 Tue
NIGHT NURSE
(1931, William Wellman) Barbara Stanwyck and Joan Blondell, quick-changing between uniforms and deshabille, breezily battle bootleggers, drunken mothers, corrupt doctors, and a tawdry child abuse case master-minded by menacing chauffeur Clark Gable. "Pre-Code with a vengeance." -- William K. Everson.
2:45, 6:00, 9:30
HOLD YOUR MAN
(1933, Sam Wood) Sent to a reformatory after con man Clark Gable gets her "in trouble," tough cookie Jean Harlow slugs it out with drunken Dorothy Burgess and warbles "Onward Christian Soldiers" while plotting her getaway.
1:00, 4:15, 7:30
*BANK NITE DRAWING! (6:00 & 7:30 ticketholders only)
February 18 Wed
BLACK LEGION
(1936, Archie Mayo) Factory worker Humphrey Bogart, sore at losing promotion to a "foreigner," joins a Klan-like secret society, but then it's a few short steps to murder and that look on wife Ann Sheridan's face.
1:00, 4:30, 8:00
BLACK FURY
(1935, Michael Curtiz) Despite union opposition, Polish miner Paul Muni is schnookered by rabble-rousers into leading a wildcat strike in the Pennsylvania coalfields. "The most powerful strike picture that has yet been made, and I am aware of the better-known Soviet jobs in the field." -- Otis Ferguson.
2:40, 6:10, 9:40
February 19 Thu
HALLELUJAH, I'M A BUM
(1933, Lewis Milestone) Al Jolson, as the "mayor" of Central Park, and his homeless constituents ("30s versions of beatniks" -- Pauline Kael) come to the aid of amnesiac Madge Evans in one-of-a-kind Rodgers & Hart musical, complete with "rhythmic dialogue," Soviet cutting, and Bolshevik Harry Langdon.
3:30, 7:10
VITAPHONE VARIETIES OF 2009
More rare Vitaphone sound shorts from the late '20s and early '30s, all restored by the UCLA Film Archive. Tonight's program includes a prologue from "czar of all the rushes" Will Hays; banjo ace Roy Smeck; Gus Arnheim's band, featuring Crosby/Vallee rival Russ Columbo; and vaudevillians Shaw & Lee, Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy, and Bert Lahr, all topped by Jolson's pre-Jazz Singer "Plantation Act." Introduced by Ron Hutchinson of The Vitaphone Project.
1:30, 5:10, 8:50
February 20 Fri
DEAD END
(1937, William Wyler) Along the East River, ritzy apartments bump up against crummy tenements, as unemployed architect Joel McCrea yearns for a stuck-up socialite, while slum-raised Sylvia Sidney yearns for him and the Dead End Kids idolize local-boy-made-hood Humphrey Bogart.
1:30, 4:40, 7:50
THREE ON A MATCH
(1932, Mervrvyn LeRoy) At a slum girls' reunion, steno Bette Davis, socialite Ann Dvorak and showgirl Joan Blondell light up -- and then it's change partners and dance as one power dives to the skids, courtesy of angel dust. With young Humphrey Bogart already in form as a kidnapper.
3:20, 6:30, 9:45
*Amy Lehr, granddaughter of director William Wyler, will introduce the 7:50 show
February 21 Sat
SCARFACE
(1932, Howard Hawks) X marks the corpses, as they drop in garages, lunch rooms, and bowling alleys: Paul Muni's Capone prototype wastes his boss and takes over his moll, aided by coin-flipping cohort George Raft, but his (extremely possessive) heart belongs to sister Ann Dvorak.
2:50, 6:10, 9:30
BLOOD MONEY
(1933, Rowland Brown) Bailbondsman George Bancroft dallies with thrill-seeking heiress Frances Dee, despite his longtime mistress (debuting-Dame-to-be Judith Anderson), but then finds himself holding the bag after a half-mill bank robbery. Condemned by censors because it "would incite law-abiding citizens to crime."
1:30, 4:50, 8:10
February 22/23 Sun/Mon
IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT
(1934, Frank Capra) Following a memorable New York-bound Greyhound bus ride, only the "walls of Jericho" separate story-hungry newshound Clark Gable from bratty runaway heiress Claudette Colbert, in the first picture to sweep the major Oscars. "Made audiences happy in a way only a few films in each era can do... the ANNIE HALL of its day." -- Pauline Kael.
Sun 1:30, 5:20, 9:10 Mon 2:50
BOMBSHELL
(1933, Victor Fleming) Jean Harlow's Lola Burns -- the infamous If Girl -- supports sponging family, endless entourage and a major Hollywood studio, while fending off stop-at-nothing press agent Lee Tracy and romantic con artist Franchot Tone. "A masterpiece of comic engineering." -- Michael Sragow.
Sun 3:30, 7:20 Mon 1:00, 4:50
February 24 Tue (3 Films for 1 Admission)
FEMALE
(1933, Michchael Curtiz) Tycoon Ruth Chatterton runs her auto company by day and dips into the junior executive pool by night, until George Brent shows who's wearing the pants. "Startlingly bold in its sexual themes." -- Dave Kehr, NY Times.
2:20, 6:15, 10:20
EX-LADY
(1933, Robert Florey) Bohemian artist Bette Davis shacks up with Gene Raymond, but after their "oh, why not?" marriage, things go sour. Daring scenes in a High Deco boudoir kept censors steaming.
1:00, 4:55, 9:00
MILLS OF THE GODS -- New 35mm Print!
(1934, Roy William Neill) With the family plow factory on the verge of going belly up, matriarch May Robson finds her trust fund kids just don't give a darn, but as rioting workers battle police, granddaughter Fay Wray finds solidarity and love with union leader Victor Jory.
3:35, 7:30
*BANK NITE DRAWING! (6:15 & 7:30 ticketholders only)
February 25 Wed
LITTLE CAESAR
(1931, Mervyn LeRoy) "Mother of Mercy, is this the end of Rico?" moans Edward G. Robinson at the climax of his star-making incarnation of an Al Capone type's rise and fall. Adapted from the hard-boiled classic by W.R. Burnett.
1:30, 4:40, 7:50
TWO SECONDS
(1932, Mervrvyn LeRoy) That's how long it takes Edward G. Robinson to die once they turn on the juice, with flashbacks to a drunken marriage, death on the high iron, and murder. "Luridly expressionist. A tawdry gem." -- J. Hoberman.
3:15, 6:25, 9:35
February 26 Thu
NO GREATER GLORY
(1934, Frank Borzage) Two groups of Budapest boys, imitating their elders' hero worship of militarism, go to literal -- and eventually mortal -- battle over a lumber yard, in this powerful, rarely-seen anti-war allegory, adapted from Ferenc (Lilliom / Carousel) Molnar's The Boys of Saint Paul.
1:30, 4:40, 7:50
THIS DAY AND AGE
(1933, Cecil B. DeMille) A vigilante fantasy -- some say an incitement to fascism -- with schoolboys finding new ways to rid their town of rampant gangsterism, including grilling mobster Charles Bickford over a pit of rats.
3:00, 6:10, 9:20
February 27 Fri
MR. DEEDS GOES TO TOWN
(1936, Frank Capra) Gary Cooper's greeting-card-versifying Vermonter Longfellow Deeds inherits 20 million from an uncle he's never known -- and then he's whisked to Park Avenue before he knows what hit him. With Jean Arthur as a cynical newsgal. "A comedy quite unmatched on the screen." -- Graham Greene.
3:25, 7:30
THEODORA GOES WILD - New 35mm Print!
(1936, Richard Boleslawski) When smalltown librarian Irene Dunne (in her first screwball role, pre-THE AWFUL TRUTH) is exposed as a racy bestseller's author, she escapes to Manhattan, where urban sophisticate Melvyn Douglas falls for her. "The best light comedy since MR. DEEDS." -- Graham Greene.
1:30, 5:35, 9:40
February 28 Sat
KING KONG
(1933, Merian C. Cooper & Ernest B. Schchoedsack) "Bring-'em-back-alive" filmmaker Robert Armstrong, with scream queen (and Film Forum member) Fay Wray in tow, sets out in search of the Ultimate Attraction: The Greatest Ape of Them All. Released the week of FDR's bank holiday, the Mighty Kong still smashed box office records.
2:45, 6:25, 10:10
42ND STREET
(1933, Lloyd Bacon) "A New Deal in Entertainment!" Landmark paean to "The Deuce," as running-on-nerves director Warner Baxter gives the pep talk to understudy Ruby Keeler after temperamental star Bebe Daniels breaks that ankle. Three must-be-seen-to-be-believed Busby Berkeley numbers provide the finale.
1:00, 4:40, 8:25
March 1 Sun
GOLD DIGGERS OF 1933
(1933, Mervyn LeRoy) Coin-clad Ginger Rogers warbles "We're In The Money," while Ruby Keeler and Joan Blondell pursue rich admirers Warren William and Dick Powell. The Pre-Code Busby Berkeley musical features the wrenching Depression anthem "Remember My Forgotten Man" and the downright smutty "Pettin' in the Park" number. "Sums up what is meant by the phrase 'pure thirties'." -- The New Yorker.
1:30, 5:30, 9:30
FOOTLIGHT PARADE
(1933, Lloyd Bacon) Busbyberkeleython climaxed by three of his most elaborate numbers: Jimmy Cagney's high-steppin' search through the opium dens for "Shanghai Lil" Ruby Keeler, aquatic ballet "By a Waterfall" ("truly delirious" -- David Thomson), and a stop at the hot and horny Honeymoon Hotel. "One of the greatest of the Depression era musicals." -- Elliott Stein.
3:30, 7:30
March 2 Mon
ME AND MY GAL
(1932, Raoul Walsh) Cop Spencer Tracy's slanging matches with hash-slinger Joan Bennett, spiced with a hilarious parody of O'Neill's Strange Interlude, are interrupted when director Walsh's brother George blasts his way into a bank. "The quintessential gum-chewing, fast-talking romance comedy of the period." -- Elliott Stein.
2:15, 5:15, 8:15
CENTRAL PARK
(1932, John G. Adolfi) Equally unemployed Joan Blondell and Wallace Ford "meet cute" over stolen hot dogs, then contend with crooked cops, a going-blind park policeman, an insane zoo keeper, an escaped lion, and a shootout during a beauty contest -- in other words, just another day in the park. "Exhibits [the park] as a battlefield of crime and dissipation... Thoroughly diverting." -- Time.
1:00, 4:00, 7:00, 10:00
March 3 Tue
TAXI!
(1932, Roy Del Ruth) Amid city sounds in lieu of music, cocky Yiddish redndiker cabby Jimmy Cagney ("a deese, dem and dose on-the-make example of young America" -- Variety) can't keep his hands off bride Loretta Young at their wedding supper, then bucks a rival taxi outfit in two-fisted union war.
1:00, 5:25, 10:05
LAWYER MAN
(1932, William Dieterle) Fast-talking William Powell, with ever-loyal secretary Joan Blondell in tow, moves from schlmiely Second Ave. mouthpiece to natty Park Ave. assistant D.A. "Its active libido is resolutely Pre-Code." -- William K. Everson.
2:25, 6:50
BLONDE CRAZY
(1931, Roy Del Ruth) Hustling bellboy James Cagney moves from gin procurement to the shakedown racket, aided and abetted by chambermaid Joan Blondell.
3:50, 8:30
*BANK NITE DRAWING! (5:25 & 6:50 ticketholders only)
March 4 Wed
COUNSELLOR AT LAW
(1933, William Wyler) Posh lawyer John Barrymore finds that, as his personal and professional crises loom, he can't escape his Lower East Side background. Wyler directs this adaptation of Elmer Rice's play at vintage '30s breakneck pace. "One of the first cinematic intimations of melting pot politics and anti-Semitic snobbery." -- Andrew Sarris. 3:00, 6:15, 9:40
THE MOUTHPIECE
(1932, Elliott Nugent & James Flood) Assistant D.A. Warren William, devastated by his railroading of an innocent man, decides to go for the buck as a gangland front man, with dazzling success. "One of the most immoral of these many moral tales." -- David Shipman.
1:20, 4:35, 8:00
*Catherine Wyler, daughter of the director, will introduce the 6:15 show
March 5 Thu
UPPERWORLD
(1934, Roy Del Ruth) Double trouble for millionaire Warren William: beating two murder raps, and choosing between friendly chorus girl Ginger Rogers and neglectful wife Mary Astor. Based on a story by Ben Hecht. "AMERICAN TRAGEDY in reverse. A surprisingly mature sex drama." -- William K. Everson.
1:00, 3:55, 6:50, 9:50
NIGHT WORLD
(1932, Hobart Hensley) GRAND HOTEL in a seedy night club, complete with Busby Berkeley number, as boozing playboy Lew Ayres and dancer Mae Clarke (Cagney's grapefruit recipient) are befriended by surprisingly sympathetic owner Boris Karloff.
2:30, 5:25, 8:25
