Wednesday, June 4 - 7:30 PM

Blake Edwards In Person! Personal Choice Double Feature:

In a career that has spanned over 50 years as a writer, producer and director, Blake Edwards has provided audiences with classics in nearly every genre of the cinema. Though known primarily for comedies such as THE PARTY, the PINK PANTHER series and 10, Edwards has exhibited mastery of the western (the beautiful and tragic WILD ROVERS), the thriller (EXPERIMENT IN TERROR) and the musical (DARLING LILI). In the best tradition of studio-era auteurs like Howard Hawks, Edwards has managed to inject distinctly personal ideas and styles into popular forms. Regardless of genre, all of his films share a profound interest in close relationships (between friends, lovers or colleagues) and their pitfalls. No director is more finely attuned to the wide spectrum of emotions that characterize the human experience, and his best films - films like BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S, 10 and S.O.B. - veer from humiliation and anxiety to giddy romance and celebration all within the space of a couple of hours. Join us at the Aero for a double feature of two of Edwards's most entertaining films.

WHAT DID YOU DO IN THE WAR, DADDY?, 1966, MGM Repertory, 116 min. Director Blake Edwards is at his most raucous in this classic service comedy, a perfect complement to his earlier OPERATION PETTICOAT. James Coburn and Dick Shawn play soldiers determined to have fun in an Italian village during the final days of World War II, regardless of irritating interruptions by the Nazis. Working with his SHOT IN THE DARK co-writer William Peter Blatty, Edwards crafts a consistently amusing farce that makes high art out of low comedy.

A SHOT IN THE DARK, 1964, MGM Repertory, 101 min. Blake Edwards’ follow-up to THE PINK PANTHER gave both director and star free reign to unleash a non-stop barrage of pratfalls, sight gags and linguistic nonsense. Everything seems freshly minted, from Herbert Lom’s hysterics as Chief Inspector Dreyfus to Burt Kwouk’s first appearance as Cato. What makes Peter Sellers’ Inspector Clouseau so endearing is the resolution of a thousand years of cross-channel rivalry in the form of a Brit impersonating an irresistibly clumsy Frenchman. With Elke Sommer, George Sanders. Director Blake Edwards will introduce the screening and appear for discussion between the films, schedule permitting.

Sunday, June 15 – 4:00 PM

Family Matinee:

NAVIGATING THE FILM FESTIVAL WORLD (180 min.) For most emerging filmmakers, the goal of launching a film on the film festival circuit begins with one singular dream: SUNDANCE! But what lies beyond Sundance for you and your film? In this informative seminar, presented just in time for the fall festival season, film festival programmer/film consultant Thomas Ethan Harris (former Director Of Programming Los Angeles Film Festival and Palm Springs International ShortFest) offers filmmakers practical skills to navigating the world of film festivals to maximum effect.

Thursday, June 19 – 7:30 PM

Dance Camera West

BALLERINA, 2007, 77 min. Dir. Bertrand Normand. Fans of Ballets Russes will enjoy this intimate, resplendent documentary about the training and unique skills of five dancers from the Mariinsky Theater, formerly known as the Kirov Ballet of St. Petersburg. Rich with ravishing performances, it focuses on some of Russia's preeminent ballerinas. Their lives weave together to tell the story of the Russian ballerina of today; from her beginnings as a child in dance school to the peak of her glory on the world stages.

Friday, June 20 – 7:30 PM

Double Feature:

BETTER OFF DEAD, 1985, Hollywood Classics, 97 min. Savage Steve Holland's directorial debut is an inventive, hilarious comedy that features the first noteworthy performance by a then-unknown John Cusack. Cusack plays Lane Meyer, a teenager who becomes despondent when his girlfriend dumps him for a jock. Convinced he has nothing to lose, he embarks on a suicidal ski run, but finds a reason to live in the form of French foreign exchange student Diane Franklin (a sort of icon of 80s teen comedies, having starred in THE LAST AMERICAN VIRGIN and BILL AND TED'S EXCELLENT ADVENTURE as well as this cult classic).

Saturday, June 21 – 7:30 PM

Sneak Preview! THE UNKNOWN WOMAN (LA SCONOSCIUTA), 2006, Outsider Pictures, 118 min. Director Giuseppe Tornatore reunites with composer Ennio Morricone and actress Xenia Rappoport for this suspenseful film noir. Rappoport plays Irena, a Ukrainian immigrant with a tortured past who gets a cleaning job in a bustling Italian city. She develops a pathological fixation on the Adachers, the family for whom she goes to work as maid and nanny, and before long it becomes clear that something isn't quite right about the devoted housekeeper. As Irena's violent past reveals itself, shocking connections between her and the Adachers come out in a manner that threatens to destroy them all. "Bears all the marks of excellence in every department of filmmaking, and the haunting terror it evinces will keep you glued to your seat." - Entertainment Today. www.theunknownwoman.com

20^th Anniversary! CINEMA PARADISO (NUOVO CINEMA PARADISO), 1988, Miramax, 123 min. Only twenty years after its release, Giuseppe Tornatore's beloved 1988 celebration of the cinema has already become an established classic. A young Sicilian boy who loses his father to war strikes up a friendship with an aging projectionist; eventually the boy takes over his mentor's job and becomes a filmmaker himself, but he loses the love of his life along the way. A gloriously romantic and unabashedly sentimental love letter to the romance of the movies. With Philippe Noiret, Jacques Perrin.

Sunday, June 22 – 5:30 PM

Dance Camera West

ACROSS THE UNIVERSE, 2007, Columbia, 133 min. Director Julie Taymor uses the songs of the Beatles to propel this audacious musical, a film that is at once a rich period evocation and a completely modern approach to the genre. Jim Sturgess plays Jude, a working-class lad from Liverpool who travels to America and falls in love with Lucy, a privileged girl who gains political consciousness when she moves to New York. Taymor uses the lovers' fable as a springboard for a series of elaborate musical setpieces, chock-full of in-jokes for Beatles fans and cameos by present-day icons for younger audiences. Discussion following with L.A. choreographer Daniel Ezralow.

Thursday, June 26 – 7:30 PM

Sneak Preview!

DIMINISHED CAPACITY, 2008, IFC Films, 124 min. Director Terry Kinney's delightfully poignant and bittersweet comedy poses the question: How much is a good memory worth? That's the question that faces newspaper editor Cooper (Matthew Broderick) after a debilitating concussion takes him from the political pages to comic strip detail. Looking for answers, he travels home to Missouri, where his now-senile Uncle Rollie (Alan Alda) is on the verge of losing his home. When a valuable baseball card is thrown into the mix, these two men, along with a motley group of hometown friends, including Cooper's high school sweetheart, Charlotte (Virginia Madsen), head to a memorabilia expo to make the deal of the century. They dive headfirst into a snake pit of slick salesmen, crooked dealers and rabid fans, revealing that there are some things in life that you can't put a price on. Co-starring Dylan Baker, Louis C.K. and Bobby Cannavale in hilarious supporting roles.

Sunday, June 29– 5:30 PM

Art Director Society Tribute Screening to Ted Haworth:

Ted Haworth made an impressive debut as an art director with Alfred Hitchcock’s psychological noir thriller STRANGERS ON A TRAIN in 1951. Haworth had been employed as an assistant art director and draftsman at Warner Bros. for a number of years before his debut screen credit for Hitchcock’s classic. Oddly, he would not receive another film credit for five years, but it was for another classic, the science-fiction/horror thriller INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS directed by Don Siegel. This was the real beginning of Haworth’s film career as a full-fledged art director and over the next decade and-a-half he would prove to be one of the best art directors working in Hollywood in the immediate post-Golden Age era. As demonstrated in Siegel and Hitchcock’s films, Haworth was a master of monochrome photography: I WANT TO LIVE!, Billy Wilder’s SOME LIKE IT HOT in which Haworth was nominated for an Academy Award and John Frankenheimer’s SECONDS. He was also the art director for several interesting color films. Joshua Logan’s SAYONARA for which Haworth won an Academy Award. Even more interesting is Richard Brooks’ epic Western adventure THE PROFESSIONALS, a colorful extravaganza that is part John Ford and part Sergio Leone action. The film’s success led to a three-film collaboration with the modern master of violent action Sam Peckinpah: THE GETAWAY, PAT GARRETT & BILLY THE KID and THE KILLER ELITE. The latter Peckinpah collaboration was Haworth’s final film before retiring in 1975. He was also Oscar-nominated for MARTY, PEPE, THE LONGEST DAY and WHAT A WAY TO GO!