Films of the week: Oskar Fischinger shorts

This Thursday, the International House will show a program of short films by animation pioneer Oskar Fischinger. Fischinger, a German filmmaker, emigrated during the Nazi years but never quite finding a welcome home in the American studio system. Coming out of the avant-garde practice of the abstract film, he developed a visual-music animation approach that became influential in animation, including most famously in Disney's 1940s use of abstract animation (Fantasia, et al). The result is a sumptious play of color, shape, and movement, definitely worth seeing on the big screen. All the films will be screened on 35mm, with some newly restored prints. The full program is available here.

Optical Poetry: Oskar Fischinger Retrospective
International House
Thursday, Oct. 2
7:00pm

Screening Roundup Week of Sept 27

Showing this week
Saturday, September 27 – Friday, October 3

The International House
Sat Sept 27 2:00pm Black Stallion (Carroll Ballard) 1979. 118m. DCP.
Sat Sept 27 8:00pm Le Révélateur (Philippe Garrel) 1968. 67 min. video. Live music accompaniment by Mary Lattimore and Jeff Zeigler.
Tue Sept 30 7:00pm Purple Rain (Albert Magnoli) 1984. 111 min. DCP.
Thurs Oct 2 7:00pm Oskar Fischinger Retrospective 1926-1947. 35mm
Fri Oct 3 7:00pm Backbone: Vancouver Experimental Cinema 1967-1981 (Richard Martin) 2013. 58m. digital.

Prince Music Theater (Philadelphia Film Society)
Wed Oct 1 7:00pm Dune (David Lynch) 1984. 137m.

Ritz Bourse Theater
Fri Oct 3 midnight Nightmare on Elm Street (Wes Craven) 1984. 91m.

Colonial Theatre
Sun Sept 28 2:00pm All The President's Men (Alan Pakula) 1976. 138m. 35mm.

Cinemark University City Penn
Sun Sept 28 2:00pm, 7:00pm Gone With the Wind (Victor Fleming) 238m. DCP.

Galleries

Fabric Workshop and Museum
Question Bridge: Black Males
transmedia video installation [exhibition description]
ongoing: September 13, 2014–November 9, 2014

Film of the Week: The Conformist

The Ritz theaters do not show repertory films all that regularly, but the plus side when they do, there are multiple screenings for the week. That gives plenty of opportunity to go see The Conformist (1970) this week. It's one of Berolucci's most famous films and justifiably so: it's a work which achieves a remarkable balance of the modernist currents of 1960s art cinema with a literary-thematic storytelling centered around Italian war and postwar history. And, if anything, seeing it on a big screen is an opportunity to enjoy cinematographer Vittorio Storaro's work.

The Conformist

Ritz Bourse

Friday, September  19 - Thursday, September 25

showtimes: 1:20 4:05 7:00 9:30

Screening Roundup Week of Sept 20

Showing this week
Saturday, September 20 – Friday, September 26

The International House
Sat Sept 20 7:00pm Sunset Boulevard (Billy Wilder) 1950. 110 min. DCP.
Mon Sept 22 7:00pm Filmmaker Visit: Xiaolu Guo - UFO In Her Eyes (Xiaolu Gou) 2011. 110 min. digi-beta.  Q and A with filmmaker
Fri Sept 26 7:00pm Holy Ghost People (Peter Adair). 1967. 56 min. 16mm./ Aquarian Rushes (Jud Yalkut) 1969. 47 min. 16mm.

Prince Music Theater (Philadelphia Film Society)
Wed Sept 24 7:00pm Inland Empire (David Lynch), with director. 2006. 179m.

Ritz Bourse Theater
every day through Sept 25, multiple showings The Conformist (Bernardo Bertolucci) 1970. 111m. DCP.
Fri Sept 26 midnight Young Frankenstein (Mel Brooks) 1974. 106m.

Ambler Theater
Wed Sept 24 7:30pm Rome, Open City (Roberto Rossellini) 1945. 103m. DCP.
Fri Sept 26 11:00pm Akira (Katsuhiro Ohtomo) 1988. 124m. DCP.

County Theater
Wed Sept 24 7:30pm The Man Who Knew Too Much (Alfred Hitchcock) 1934. 75m. DCP.

Colonial Theatre
Sun Sept 21 2:00pm Girl Shy (Fred C. Newmeyer /Harold Lloyd) 1924. 87m. live organ accompaniment

Cinemark University City Penn
Sun Sept 21 2:00pm Dr. Strangelove (Stanley Kubrick) 1964. 93m. DCP

Galleries

Fabric Workshop and Museum
Question Bridge: Black Males
transmedia video installation [exhibition description]
ongoing: September 13, 2014–November 9, 2014

Film of the Week: Rare Markopoulos screening

Next Wednesday, The International House will be screening Gregory Markopoulos's Illiac Passion. Those familiar with Markopolous will know how rare screenings of his work are. A key figure in the postwar American avant-garde, he removed his films form circulation during his lifetime. Since then, his partner Robert Beavers has been giving limited screenings.  So we're getting a chance of seeing 16mm prints that for a long time were not screened in the US.

On one hand, Markopolous's style is not the most immediately accessible. He has a fondness for rigorous formal montage, cutting as often as every second in regular repetitions. And while his films involve narratives of sorts, they are highly oblique and mythological. (Illiac Passion retells the story of Prometheus.) On the other hand, he had a lush hand with color, equal to Kenneth Anger's. 

The Illiac Passion

International House

Wednesday 9/17

7:00 pm

dir. Gregory Markopoulos, US, 1967, 16mm, 92 min.

Introduced by Robert Beavers and Mark Webber 

Co-presented with Cinema Studies at the University of Pennsylvania 

Screening Roundup Week of Sept 13

Showing this week

Saturday, September 13 – Friday, September 19

The International House

Sat Sept 13 2:00pm Fly Away Home (Carroll Ballard) 1996. 107m. 35mm.

Sat Sept 13 7:00pm City Lights (Charlie Chaplin) 1931. 86m. 35mm.

Wed Sept 17 7:00pm The Illiac Passion (Gregory Markopoulos) 1967. 92m. 16mm.

Fri Sept 19 8:00pm Aliens (James Cameron) 1986. 137m. 35mm / Critters (Stephen Herek) 1986. 82m. 35mm.

Roxy (Philadelphia Film Society)

Tues Sept 16 7:30pm Top Secret Rosies: The Female Computers of WWII (LeAnn Erickson) 2010. 57m.

Prince Music Theater (Philadelphia Film Society)

Wed Sept 17 7:00pm Fire Walk With Me (David Lynch), with director. 1992. 135m.

Bryn Mawr Film Institute
Tues Sept 16 7:00pm  Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (Pedro Almodovar)1988. 90m.
Wed Sept 17 7:00pm Mulholland Drive (David Lynch) 2001. 147m.

Ambler Theater
Thurs Sept 4 The Man Who Knew Too Much (Alfred Hitchcock) 1934. 75m. DCP.

Ritz 5 Theater
Fri Sept 19 midnight Rocky Horror Picture Show

Colonial Theatre
Sun Sept 14 2:00pm Three Days of the Condor (Sydney Pollack) 1975. 117m. DCP.

Cinemark University City Penn
Sun Sept 14 2:00pm The Nutty Professor (Jerry Lewis) 1963. 107m. DCP


Galleries

Fabric Workshop and Museum
Question Bridge: Black Males
transmedia video installation [exhibition description]
ongoing: September 13, 2014–November 9, 2014

Three One Nine Gallery (319 N. 11th Street)

Time Lens: Bioscope (Michael Kuetemeyer) part of New Sight exhibition

Screening Roundup Week of Sept 6

Showing this week

Saturday, September 6 – Friday, September 12

The International House

Tues Sept 9 7:00pm Lordville (Rea Tajiri) 2014. 67m.

Wed Sept 10 7:00pm L’eclisse (Michelangelo Antonioni) 1962. 126m. 16mm / La Ciudad de los Signos (Samuel Alarcón) 2009. 63m. DCP.

Fri Sept 12 7:00pm White Elephant (Pablo Trapero) 2012. 105m. DCP.

Roxy (Philadelphia Film Society)

Fri Sept 12 midnight Videodrome (David Cronenberg) 1983. 84m. 35mm.

Prince Music Theater (Philadelphia Film Society)

Wed Sept 10 7:00pm Lost Highway (David Lynch), with director. 1997. 135m. 35mm.

Scribe Video Center (at the African American Museum in Philadelphia)

Sat Sept 6 3:00pm Muslim Voices of Philadelphia program. video

Ritz Theater (Bourse)

every day multiple showings Summer's Tale (Eric Rohmer) 1996. 113m. DCP.

Colonial Theatre

Sun Sept 7 2:00pm Seven Days in May (John Frankenheimer) 1964. 118m. 35mm.

Cinemark University City Penn

Sun Sept 7 2:00pm Scarface (Brian De Palma) 1983. 170m. DCP.

Galleries

Three One Nine Gallery (319 N. 11th Street)
New Sight exhibition
artwork from Dot Vile, Katie Dillon Low, EJ Herczyk, Michael Kuetemeyer, Joseph Opshinsky, Daniel Petraitis, Gerri Spilka, Sabina Tichindelaneau, and Joan Wadleigh Curran
opening Friday Sept 5