<<< March 2005 >>>

Please check this page before coming to the theatre to make sure that scheduled events will take place as planned. Tickets are only available at the door, the day of an event. Some events will repeat at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood.

Wednesday, March 2 – 7:30 PM

Los Angeles Premiere!

GOOBYE DRAGON INN (BU JIAN BU SAN), 2003, Wellspring, 82 min. The latest from Taiwanese director Tsai Ming-Liang - one of the island’s most internationally acclaimed directors – this may be his most brilliant metaphor yet: "a lament for the death of feelings framed as a valediction to an entire era of Chinese cinema and an obituary to film-going in general." Poised between comedy and horror, Tsai’s films portray the loneliness and emptiness of modern urban life. With his trilogy exploring the decay of society -- REBELS OF A NEON GOD, VIVE L’AMOUR and THE RIVER -- Tsai offered a heartbreaking portrait of Taiwan in transition. On a rainy day, a broken-down old cinema theatre in Taipei is screening a martial arts classic, King Hu's 1967 movie DRAGON INN. The last night before the theatre shuts down, the few paying customers seem more interested in meeting strangers in the dark than watching what's on the screen. The crippled, female ticket clerk and a young projectionist are chasing each other though the labyrinthine theater. And is the place haunted? Two of the men in the auditorium look suspiciously like Shih Chun and Miao Tien, leading actors in DRAGON INN itself. "A masterpiece!" - Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader An Aero Theatre Exclusive!

Thursday, March 3 – 7:30 PM

Celebrating 75 Years of THE MALTESE FALCON!!

Since 1930, when writer Dashiell Hammett first published his classic novel "The Maltese Falcon," his hard-luck detective hero Sam Spade and the hunt for that certain "Black Bird" has held an almost-mystical grip on the public imagination. Warner Bros. Studio immediately seized on the book’s potential, quickly turning out three adaptations in the space of a decade: THE MALTESE FALCON (aka DANGEROUS FEMALE) in 1931, SATAN MET A LADY (1936), and finally the definitive FALCON in 1941. To celebrate the 75^th publication of the book, join us for a special double feature screening of the first and third versions:

THE MALTESE FALCON (aka DANGEROUS FEMALE), 1931, Warner Bros., 80 min. Dir. Roy Del Ruth. This first take on Dashiell Hammett’s classic detective noir, subsequently overshadowed by the later Bogie version, is surprisingly good and deserves a much wider audience. Ricardo Cortez holds his own as a somewhat more unscrupulous Sam Spade while Duddley Digges and Otto Matieson as Gutman and Cairo match the chemsitry of the later Greenstreet/Lorre villain team. With Bebe Daniels, Thelma Todd.

THE MALTESE FALCON, 1941, Warner Bros., 101 min. Dir. John Huston. The most-justly famed of "Falcon" adaptations, this classic film noir gives definitive life to Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) and a masterfully drawn group of characters involved in a dangerous and double-crossing hunt for a bejeweled golden falcon statue. The first-rate cast includes Mary Astor, Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet and Elisha Cook Jr.

>> Both films also playing at the Egyptian on February 19.

Sunday, March 6 – 5:00 PM

Family Matinee

Harry Langdon – The Forgotten Comedy Genius of Silent Cinema

Film Historian Kevin Brownlow once pointed out "He is the comedian who has fallen furthest from fashion of all of them. Believe it or not, there used to be FOUR, not three, great comedians, and the fourth was always Langdon." The details of Harry "the sad clown" Langdon’s life are not well known. Born in 1884 in Council Bluffs Iowa, he began his career as a successful vaudeville comedian when he was very young. By 1906 he had his own show (which he performed with his wife Rose Musolff) and by 1923 he was quite familiar to both the public and the industry. He signed with Mack Sennett later that year and became immediately successful, primarily because Sennett and a tight group of collaborators (among them the director Harry Edwards) realized that Langdon’s power on screen was not his fast-rhythmic-slapstick, but rather his reserve, his naïve characterizations and his lovable bashfulness towards the women he secretly loves.

Langdon’s career did not end when the silent era ended. He appeared in many comic-talkie-shorts, some of them produced by big studios. His voice was recognizable for he acted in a very high tone, but these films definitely are not as notable as some of his silent masterpieces. Unlike Keaton (to whom Langdon has been often compared career-wise), Langdon’s legacy has not been properly rediscovered. The Landgon society on line (http://www.silent-movies.com/Langdon/) cites: "Buster lived long enough to be rediscovered by a new audience, escaping obscurity. Like a fairytale prince under a spell, awaiting the kiss of wakefulness, Harry still waits for his time to come round again… One indisputable fact about Harry Langdon is that he died much too early for his own good." Today cinema lovers have been slowly re-considering Langdon’s importance and impact on film history.

The American Cinematheque is proud to present two of Langdon’s best-known films: TRAMP, TRAMP, TRAMP and LONG PANTS. Both prints have been provided by the Douris Corporation/The Rohauer Collection. We thank Tim Lanza for his help and support.

Double Feature:

TRAMP, TRAMP TRAMP, 1926, 65 min. (24fps) Director Harry Edwards. In a story co-written by Frank Capra, Harry (Harry Langdon)decides to compete in a cross country walking/hiking contest to impress his sweetheart Betty. After a number of adventurous circumstances where the quintessential Langdon emerges ("his best routines: throwing small stones at a tornado to scare it away, he spits at it in victory only to look down and have to wipe his spit off his lapel…he gets hung up on the a fence nail, unaware that it is all that keeps him from dropping several hundred feet to the highway below" -- from the Rohauer Collection USA), our hero managers to pay his debts and marry the woman he loves. Also starring Joan Crawford. Edward Davis, Alec B Franklin.

LONG PANTS, 1927, 54 minutes (24fps). Directed by Frank Capra. A tale of coming of age. Harry (Harry Langdon) is finally given the chance, by his over protective mother, to wear a pair of long pants. Growing up also means thinking of having a family. His marriage to childhood sweetheart Priscilla is taken for granted, even though he naively is secretly in love with independent Bebe Blair. Langdon is a master in picturing the innocent and touching juvenile lover. Indeed, his power as a comic is traceable to these fantastic moments of sweetness and sadness and not to slapstick gags. With Gladys Brockwwell, Al Roscoe, Priscilla Bonner.

>> Also playing at the Egyptian on March 13.

Sunday, March 13 – 4:00 PM

Family Matinee - Dr. Seuss Birthday Celebration!

Born on March 2, 1904, in Springfield, Massachusetts, Dr. Seuss was not an official doctor, but his prescription for fun has delighted readers for more than 60 years. Join us for a special celebration starting at 2 PM with a reading of Dr. Seuss’ books at Every Picture Tells a Story and an exhibit of orginal Dr. Seuss artwork and continuing at the Aero Theatre for a screening of 5000 FINGERS OF DR. T. and some shorts:

THE 5,000 FINGERS OF DR. T, 1953, Columbia, 89 min. Dir. Roy Rowland. The only live-action film written by Dr. Seuss, THE 5,000 FINGERS OF DR. T is a riotous Technicolor fantasia about a young boy (Tommy Rettig) trying to escape the nefarious clutches of his mad music teacher Dr. Terwilliker (Hans Conried) – who is bent on capturing 500 boys and forcing them to play his evil concerto on the world’s largest piano! Astounding color photography by veteran d.p. Franz Planer (20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA). Plus the short "Gerald Mcboingboing," 1950, Columbia, 8 min, Dir. Robert Cannon.

Tuesday, March 15 – 7:30 PM:

New from Agnes Varda!

CINÉVARDAPHOTO, 2004, Ciné-Tamaris, 96 minutes. With originality and consummate artistry, director Agnès Varda has produced dramatic features, quasi-musicals, cine-poems, essay films and documentaries. Her concern with the import of images resonates throughout all of her films, but in the shorts that she brings together in the trilogy CINÉVARDAPHOTO, we find a direct engagement with photographs and their meanings in different contexts over a period of forty years:

"Ydessa, les ours et etc..." documents Toronto art collector Ydessa Hendeles's Teddy Bear Project, an exhibition of thousands of photographs featuring teddy bears. The daughter of Holocaust survivors who had lost all family memorabilia, Hendeles bought the photos - metaphorical traces of childhood, security and loving relations - over a period of ten years, finally exhibiting them as a contemporary art experience that addresses the history of the twentieth century. Through this groundbreaking curatorial approach, the exhibition questions the way personal and national identity are formed in the context of history; the parallel course of idyllic and civil life is just as present as atrocity, war, persecution and expulsion. Personal and original, documentary presents a fascinating portrait of a gifted Canadian figure. In "Ulysse", Varda revisits an enigmatic photograph taken in Egypt twenty-eight years earlier. The film is a thoughtful and imaginative analysis of the meanings of images - mythological, allegorical, historical and personal. "Salut les Cubains" animates fifteen hundred of the more than four thousand photographs Varda took while vacationing in Cuba. Through montage, she makes the subjects of the photos sing and dance. She calls it Socialism and cha-cha-cha.

In French and English, with English Subtitles.
>> Also playing at the Egyptian on March 8.

Tuesday, March 22 – 7: 30 PM

Ain’t It Cool News/American Cinematheque Sneak Preview Showcase:

The groundbreaking Internet website Ain’t It Cool News and the American Cinematheque are joining forces once again to present a special Sneak Preview of an upcoming movie that we think is really exceptional and exciting:

OLDBOY, 2004, Tartan Films, 120 min. Winner of the 2004 Grand Prix at Cannes, the latest from white-hot Korean director Park Chan-Wook (SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE.) Oh Dae-su (Min-sik Choi) is an ordinary Seoul businessman with a wife and little daughter who, after a drunken nocturnal rampage, is locked up in a strange, private "prison". No one will tell him why he's there or who his jailer is. Through a TV news broadcast, he discovers he has been framed for his wife's murder. After 15 years (!), Dae-su finds himself unexpectedly deposited on a grass-covered high-rise roof. Determined to discover who had him locked up, the search will lead down dark corridors of the mind and soul, and into spectacularly violent confrontations. Also an official selection of the 2005 Sundance Film Festival, it will be released in the U.S. by Tartan Films in late March.

>> Also playing on March 15 at the Egyptian.

March 23- 24 at the Aero Theatre only.

Wednesday, March 23 - 7:30 PM

Todd Solondz in Person!

New Jersey native Todd Solondz originally wanted to be a rabbi, but soon sublimated his energy into screenwriting and finally directing. His funny, almost unknown first feature, FEAR, ANXIETY & DEPRESSION was released in 1989. By 1995, his second feature, WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE, was winning awards at Sundance, Berlin, and many other festivals. He has gone on to helm such provocative films as HAPPINESS and STORYTELLING. We're delighted to present this mini-tribute, including a sneak preview of his new film PALINDROMES, starring Ellen Barkin and Jennifer Jason Leigh.

Double Feature:

WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE, 1995, Sony Classic Pictures, 88 min. Director Todd Solondz’s second feature film is one of the flat-out funniest, most painful recreations of what it’s like growing up ever committed to film, all told through the eyes of smart, bespectacled, lovably clueless teen Heather Matarazzo. With Brendon Sexton, Jr.

HAPPINESS, 1998, Strand Releasing, 134 min. Director Todd Solondz’s controversial, simultaneously compassionate and pitch black comedy explores loneliness, self-obsession and aberrant sexuality through the microcosm of the blissfully dysfunctional Jordan family (Ben Gazarra, Louise Lasser, Lara Flynn Boyle, Jane Adams & Cynthia Stevenson). A catalogue of amazing performances, with more standout portrayals by Dylan Baker, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Camryn Manheim and Jon Lovitz. Discussion in between films with director Todd Solondz.

An Aero Theatre Exclusive!

Thursday, March 24 - 7: 30 PM

SNEAK PREVIEW ! Todd Solondz In Person!

PALINDROMES, 2005, Wellspring, 100 min. A fable of innocence: 13-year-old Aviva Victor wants to be a Mom. She does all she can to make this happen, and comes very close to succeeding, but in the end her plan is thwarted by her sensible parents (Ellen Barkin and Richard Masur). So she runs away, still determined to get pregnant one way or another, but instead finds herself lost in another world, a less sensible one, but one pregnant itself with all sorts of strange possibilities. Barkin, who hasn't seemed so eerily at home as a mother since THIS BOY’S LIFE, gives an unyielding performance as a suburban woman trying to protect her daughter. The film also features stand-out performances from Debra Monk, Stephen Adly-Guirgis, Jennifer Jason Leigh and seven different and equally brilliant, risk-taking actors of varying ages, races and sizes to play our young heroine Aviva. Solondz' most political and philosophical film yet, but in many ways it is also his most tender. An official selection at the 2004 Telluride, Toronto, Venice and New York Film Festivals, the film will be released by Wellspring on April 13, 2005. Discussion following with director Todd Solondz and actress Ellen Barkin. An Aero Theatre Exclusive!

For this event only, advance tickets will be sold. Click here for a printable fax/mail order form.