The Incredibles 2

On Tuesday night I saw The Incredibles 2 at my local movie theater, with an audience mostly of adults. The show included the animated short Bao, touted as the first Pixar short directed by a woman. In this wordless film, clearly set in a North American city, a Chinese mother makes a dumpling that magically comes to life as a baby, which she then raises into an adult. The story builds to a discomfiting climax, while being cute & affectionate all the way. The realistically depicted food is instantly recognizable to anyone who has eaten home-cooked Chinese meals, & the whole thing is perhaps a gentle commentary on the ties of dependency in traditional families.

I was happy that The Incredibles 2 is pretty much the same as the first Incredibles, with its humorous take on family life with kids, mixed with cartoonish action scenes & catastrophes avoided by a hair's breadth. There are a couple of dialogue-heavy scenes making up the exposition that make a complex issue out of whether or not super heroes should be allowed to use their powers in a law-based society. I was frequently distracted by details of the visual design, which depicts a hyped-up version of the 1960s. We even get glimpses of Johnny Quest & The Twilight Zone appearing on TV sets.

Satirical scenes featuring Edna Mode with baby Jack-Jack are a highlight. The theater sound system made it seem at one point that Jack-Jack had leapt out of the screen & into the auditorium. The movie's stylish, symphonic score also sounded great. I was impressed by the visualization of falling through the wormholes in space created by one of the movie's supporting cast superheroes.


§ Bao (2018)
USA | 8min | Dir. Domee Shi

§ Incredibles 2 (2018)
USA | 1h 58min | Dir. Brad Bird

SF Silent Film Festival Opening Night

When I entered the bustling lobby of the Castro Theatre for opening night of the SF Silent Film Festival, I was almost face to face with Kevin Brownlow, the great champion of silent film from way before it was cool. Sporting a festival baseball cap, he amiably chatted with audience members as if he were just another attendee. There were many women in period costume, & the crowd filled both the auditorium & the balcony.

A gleeful Rob Byrne, president of the festival’s board of directors, introduced the event & remembered Frank Buxton, a long-time festival sponsor & board member, who passed away earlier this year. Mr. Byrne read out a spirited proclamation honoring Mr. Buxton & presented it to Mr. Buxton’s widow & daughter. Mike Daruty, a senior executive at NBCUniversal, announced his company’s plans to restore 10 silent films, in addition to 15 that were announced at a previous festival.

The opening night film was NBCUniversal’s very clean 4K restoration of the 1928 The Man Who Laughs. The movie is a big-budget entertainment & a mature product of the silent era. We get a hero to pity, a villain to boo, a sentimental love story, ghoulish horror, comedy & a climactic chase, complete with rioting mob, sword fighting & rooftop stunts. Conrad Veidt plays the title character with elegance & taste, even in distinctly weird scenes involving his reactions to other characters' reactions to his grotesque disfigurement.

The Berklee Silent Film Orchestra, a tight ensemble of twelve musicians, performed a score by seven students of the Berklee College of Music. The music was in the style of traditional symphonic film music & set a strong emotional tone for each scene. It used a lot of repeated melodic motifs, & at various times I was reminded of Wagner, Philip Glass, Leonard Bernstein & Danny Elfman. The composers took turns conducting, quickly & invisibly replacing one another at the podium. The orchestra played with precision, & live sound effects were perfectly timed to the movie.

The specialist audience is one of the best things about this festival, & it was a thrill when the theater spontaneously erupted into joyful cheers & applause for Homo the Wolf at the movie's racing climax. The excitement extended into a thunderous standing ovation for the student composers & orchestra.


§ The Man Who Laughs
111 minutes | USA | 1928 | d. Paul Leni
Live musical accompaniment by the Berklee Silent Film Orchestra

§ San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2018
May 30, 2018, 7:00 pm
Castro Theatre

SF Silent Film Festival 2018 Program

§ San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2018 Program
Castro Theatre

Wednesday, May 30, 2018

7:00 pm
THE MAN WHO LAUGHS
111 minutes | USA | 1928 | d. Paul Leni
Berklee Silent Film Orchestra

9:00 pm
Opening Night Party
McRoskey Mattress Company

Thursday, May 31, 2018

10:00 am
Amazing Tales from the Archives
100 minutes | Free
Live musical accompaniment by Donald Sosin

1:00 pm
SOFT SHOES
With short: Detained (1924, d. Scott Pembroke, starring Stan Laurel, 17 m.)
45 minutes / with short: 62 minutes | USA | 1925 | d. Lloyd Ingraham
Donald Sosin

2:45 pm
MASTER OF THE HOUSE (DU SKAL ÆRE DIN HUSTRU)
107 minutes | Denmark | 1925 | d. Carl Th. Dreyer
Stephen Horne

5:15 pm
AN INN IN TOKYO (TÔKYÔ NO YADO)
80 minutes | Japan | 1935 | d. Yasujirô Ozu
Guenter Buchwald and Frank Bockius

7:15 pm
PEOPLE ON SUNDAY (MENSCHEN AM SONNTAG)
73 minutes | Germany | 1930 | d. Robert Siodmak, Edgar G. Ulmer, Billy Wilder, Fred Zinnemann
Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra

9:15 pm
THE LIGHTHOUSE KEEPERS (GARDIENS DE PHARE)
83 minutes | France | 1929 | d. Jean Grémillon
Guenter Buchwald and Frank Bockius

Friday, June 1, 2018

10:00 am
GOOD REFERENCES
60 minutes | USA | 1920 | d. Roy William Neill
Donald Sosin

12:00 noon
THE OTHER WOMAN’S STORY
65 minutes | USA | 1925 | d. B.F. Stanley
Stephen Horne

2:00 pm
SILENT AVANT-GARDE
From the collection of Unseen Cinema: Early American Avant-Garde Films
70 minutes
Matti Bye Ensemble

4:15 pm
ROSITA
90 minutes | USA | 1923 | d. Ernst Lubitsch
Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra

6:30 pm
MOTHER KRAUSE’S JOURNEY TO HAPPINESS (MUTTER KRAUSENS FAHRT INS GLÜCK)
133 minutes | Germany | 1929 | d. Piel Jutzi
Sascha Jacobsen and the Musical Art Quintet

9:30 pm
POLICEMAN (KEISATSUKAN)
121 minutes | Japan | 1933 | d. Tomu Uchida
Stephen Horne

Saturday, June 2, 2018

10:00 am
NO MAN’S GOLD
65 minutes | USA | 1926 | d. Lewis Seiler
Donald Sosin and Frank Bockius

12:00 noon
MARE NOSTRUM
111 minutes | USA | 1926 | d. Rex Ingram
Kevin Brownlow Celebration
Stephen Horne and Frank Bockius

2:45 pm
TRAPPOLA
With short: San Francisco, 1906
52 minutes, with short: 62 minutes | Italy | 1922 | d. Eugenio Perego
Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra

4:30 pm
THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES (DER HUND VON BASKERVILLE)
65 minutes | Germany | 1929 | d. Richard Oswald
Guenter Buchwald Ensemble

7:00 pm
THE SAGA OF GÖSTA BERLING (GÖSTA BERLINGS SAGA)
200 minutes | Sweden | 1924 | d. Mauritz Stiller
There will be a 30-minute intermission at approximately 8:45 pm
Matti Bye Ensemble

Sunday, June 3, 2018

10:00 am
SERGE BROMBERG PRESENTS
65 minutes | A selection of short silents from Lobster Films
Donald Sosin

12:00 noon
A THROW OF DICE (PRAPANCHA PASH)
74 minutes | India | 1929 | d. Franz Osten
Guenter Buchwald and Frank Bockius

2:15 pm
THE ANCIENT LAW (DAS ALTE GESETZ)
129 minutes | Germany | 1923 | d. E.A. Dupont
Donald Sosin Ensemble with Alicia Svigals

5:30 pm
FRAGMENT OF AN EMPIRE (OBLOMOK IMPERII)
109 minutes | USSR | 1929 | d. Fridrikh Ermler
Stephen Horne and Frank Bockius

8:00 pm
BATTLING BUTLER
74 minutes | USA | 1926 | d. Buster Keaton
Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra

Up-Coming: San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2018

I'm looking forward to the San Francisco Silent Film Festival, which this year expands to 23 screenings over 5 days, from classics to rarities to recent discoveries, all with live musical accompaniment. It opens this Wednesday night at the Castro Theatre, with the grandiosely melodramatic The Man Who Laughs, starring Conrad Veidt as the grotesque title character. The Berklee Silent Film Orchestra will perform their original score, recreating the experience of top-class film-going in the 1920s.

The festival's offerings are so uncommon that it's frustrating not to be able to take in everything. I'm always fascinated by the informative Amazing Tales from the Archives, showcasing the work of film preservationists & historians, which is offered free on Thursday, May 31st, at 10am. The avant-garde program on Friday, June 1st at 2pm looks intriguing. It includes films by Marcel Duchamp & Sergei Eisenstein & is accompanied by the stark, eerie music of the Matti Bye Ensemble.

Photo of Kevin Brownlow taken by Pamela Gentile

Venerated film historian Kevin Brownlow, whose book The Parade's Gone By gave me my mental image of the competitive, pioneering silent era, will attend the festival & celebrate his 80th birthday at the screening of Mare Nostrum on Saturday, June 2nd, at noon. Newly discovered footage of the aftermath of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, probably shot in the last week of April 1906, will be shown at the Saturday, June 2nd, 2:45pm screening of the Italian comedy Trappola.

Greta Garbo fans should note that the version of The Saga of Gösta Berling playing on Saturday, June 2nd at 7p, is advertised as 200 minutes long. The Pacific Film Archive offers a supplementary program of Greta Garbo Rarities on Wednesday, May 30th at 3p. The delightful Serge Bromberg will present a program of early shorts from his Lobster Films archive on Sunday, June 3rd, at 10am. I'm excited to see that his list includes some of the startling "accidental 3D" films by Georges Méliès.

Klezmer violinist Alicia Svigals joins the Donald Sosin Ensemble to accompany The Ancient Law on Sunday, June 3rd at 2:25pm. This 1923 German film is apparently a source for The Jazz Singer. The salon-style Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra accompanies Battling Butler, starring Buster Keaton, to close out the festival on Sunday, June 3rd at 8p.

§ The San Francisco Silent Film Festival
May 30 - June 3, 2017
Castro Theatre

§ Festival Site | Schedule & Tickets | Festival Pass

Frameline 41 Festival Preview

The 41st Frameline Film Festival starts his week, running June 15-25 at the Castro, Roxie & Victoria Theatres, as well the Elmwood in Berkeley & the Piedmond in Oakland. Last month, I attended the festival's convivial launch party, as a friend's plus-one. Frances Wallace, Executive Director, announced that this year's festival has 147 films, 40% of them by women directors. Ms. Wallace & programmers Peter Stein, Des Buford, Harry Vaughn & Kevin Schaub were joyful as they presented a quick run-through of some festival highlights.

Opening night is the new documentary The Untold Tales of Armistead Maupin, with Mr. Maupin in attendance. Closing night is the drama After Louie, starring Alan Cumming, who will be present to receive the festival's Frameline Award. The centerpiece film in world cinema is I Dream in Another Language (Sueño en Otrea Idioma), an art film about a linguist who tracks down the last 2 speakers of a dying language, only to find that they won't talk to each other. I was intrigued by mention of Apricot Groves, a film in Armenian & Farsi, about a young Armenian-Iranian man, raised in the US, who travels to Armenia to make a marriage proposal.

One of the programmers was genuinely enthusiastic about My Friend Dahmer, a movie portrait of the teenage Jeffrey Dahmer. Ross Lynch, who portrays Dahmer, is expected to attend the screening. The programmers also touted the festival's Episodic category, comprising multi-part series originally intended for on-line or TV viewing.

The event attendees were a friendly crowd, & I enjoyed learning about Gay Days at Disneyland & chatting briefly with one of the programmers, who discussed the trickiness of making selections for a San Francisco audience.

§ Frameline 41 Festival Launch Party 
Tuesday, May 23, 5:30PM
The Oasis

§ Frameline 41
San Francisco International
LGBTQ Film Festival
June 15-25, 2017
Castro Theatre, Roxie Theater, Victoria Theatre
Rialto Cinemas Elmwood, Landmark Theatres Piedmond

SF Silent Film Festival - Day 3 - Continued

The afternoon of the 3rd day of the San Francisco Silent Film Festival, I stuck around for Tod Browning's 1920 Outside the Law, a film noir with a touch of domestic comedy. The demotic Eddie Muller, a last-minute replacement for Leonard Maltin, introduced the program. He expressed his admiration for the film's female lead, Priscilla Dean. Called "The Queen of Crookdom", she was supposedly as tough in real life as on-screen. The story is set in San Francisco's Chinatown, & Mr. Muller speculated that Dashiell Hammett must have seen it.

The suspenseful plot involves double-crossing mobsters & changes of heart, & I was easily caught up in the story. Ms. Dean's gutsy character comes across vividly, as does a scene-stealing child who remains irresistibly cute whether bawling his eyes out or toting an ax. Even though the Chinese are the good guys, I did not appreciate seeing white actors in yellowface, especially Lon Chaney grotesquely made up as a slit-eyed Chinaman. It was fun to spot Old St. Mary's in an exterior shot. It's a pity that the film image is badly deteriorated in the climactic fight sequence.

Pianist Stephen Horne & percussionist Frank Bockius accompanied with music that evoked the period & underscored the action. I enjoyed the sultry jazz theme they played for Ms. Dean's character. The duo resorted to oriental motifs & a gong for the Chinatown scenes. Somehow Mr. Horne also played the zither, flute or accordion at the same time as the piano. The audience laughed at an intertitle referring to San Francisco's "Knob Hill."

I came back at night for A Page of Madness, a 1926 avant-garde film from Japan that I'd been wanting to see for years. It is famously set in a madhouse & infamously lacks intertitles & a definitive scenario. The film has also not survived complete. Serge Bromberg got us in the mood for bafflement by beginning his introduction to the film in French. He admitted that he's seen it many times but never understands anything.

The director Teinosuke Kinugasa makes dazzling use of multiple exposure, rapid-fire montage & tracking shots, & every shot forms a striking composition. The actors are intense without being overly hysterical. I was impressed by the staging of the mob scenes. The movie triggered a lot of primal emotions, & I was especially freaked out by a scene in which the inmates put on masks.

The show was accompanied by the three-man Alloy Orchestra, playing electronic instruments and a large array of percussion. They made creepy use of harp, clarinet & theremin. The score was often loud & punishing & matched the movie's atmosphere of frenzy & menace.

During the breaks it was fun to catch up with Patrick, who I believe saw all 6 programs that day, & to see The Civic Center, who was a man on the go.

§ Outside the Law
Directed by Tod Browning | 1920 | USA | 76 min
Live musical accompaniment by Stephen Horne & Frank Bockius
San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2017
Saturday, June 3, 5:00pm
Castro Theatre

§ A Page of Madness (Kurutta Ichipeiji)
Directed by Teinosuke Kinugasa | 1926 | Japan | 70 min
Live musical accompaniment by Alloy Orchestra
San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2017
Saturday, June 3, 9:30pm
Castro Theatre

SF Silent Film Festival - Day 3

I started my 3rd day at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival at a program of shorts, dedicated to the memory of film preservationist David Shepard, who died this year. Festival board member Russell Merritt offered us personal remembrances of Mr. Shepard, & we saw a sweet home movie from 1942, in color, showing Mr. Shepard as a curious toddler.

Serge Bromberg, a friend & business associate of Mr. Shepard, selected the program of 10 shorts & introduced each with anecdotes & bits of movie history. The films were mostly from the 1st decade of the 20th century, & an ebullient Mr. Bromberg evoked the novelty & playfulness of early cinema. There was a lot of laughter. I especially enjoyed seeing Pathé's 1907 First Prize for Cello Playing, which parodies concert audiences in a neat 2 minutes, & Émile Cohl's discombobulating 1908 Fantasmagorie, considered to be the 1st animated cartoon. A few of the films had stenciled or hand-painted color & were lovely to watch.

The Dancing Pig records a disconcerting vaudeville act featuring a performer in an enormous pig costume & was a hit with tweeting festival-goers. Mr. Bromberg provided a live narration to Méliès's 1906 The Witch, as would have been done back in the day, though the original narrators were presumably a lot less cheeky than Mr. Bromberg. Pianist Donald Sosin & percussionist Frank Bockius played bounding, jazzy accompaniments to the films.

After lunch, I attended the showing of Filibus, an unashamedly silly Italian crime caper from 1915. At the screening, board president Robert Byrne presented the Festival Award to  archivists Elif Rongen-Kaynakçi & Frank Roumen of the EYE Filmmuseum in Amsterdam. Mr. Roumen complimented the festival's keen audiences, & Ms. Rongen-Kaynakçi introduced the film. The title character of Filibus travels around in a sort of stealth airship, & Ms. Rongen-Kaynakçi posited a connection between early cinema & aviation. As a prelude, she presented a brief documentary film about the launching of a balloon. She admitted that she knew almost nothing about it, other than that it likely records a Germany military operation. She has yet to discover the meaning of the initials DAZD, which can be barely glimpsed on the balloon.

The festival audience got into the spirit of the cat-and-mouse high jinks of Filibus & clearly approved when the cross-dressing villainess's male persona seems to court another female character. They also applauded a rescue scene in which she is hoisted out of a window & into the sky. The Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, consisting of piano, violin, cello, trumpet & clarinet, provided a pleasant accompaniment to the film, vamping on a series of light, often waltzing, themes.

§ Magic and Mirth
Those Awful Hats | USA | 1909 | D.W. Griffith
Cartoon Factory | USA | 1924 | Fleischer Studios
The Masquerader | USA | 1914 | Charlie Chaplin
First Prize For Cello Playing | France | 1907 | Pathé Frères
Fantasmagorie | France | 1908 | Émile Cohl
Tit For Tat | France | 1906 | Gaston Velle
When The Devil Drives | UK | 1907 | Walter Booth
Down In The Deep | France | 1906 | Ferdinand Zecca
The Dancing Pig | France | 1907 | Pathé Frères
The Witch | France | 1906 | Georges Méliès

Presented by Serge Bromberg
Live musical accompaniment by Donald Sosin and Frank Bockius
San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2017
Saturday, June 3, 10:00am
Castro Theatre

§ Filibus
Directed by Mario Roncoroni | Italy | 1915 | 71 m.
Live musical accompaniment by Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra
San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2017
Saturday, June 3, 2:30pm
Castro Theatre

SF Silent Film Festival Day 2

The afternoon of the 2nd day of the San Francisco Silent Film Festival, I attended the screening of The Dumb Girl of Portici, an historical epic from 1915, directed by Lois Weber. The movie is derived from Auber's opera La muette de Portici & is notable for the casting of Anna Pavlova. Shelley Stamp, author of a book on Lois Weber, provided us with some background to the film's production & told us to watch for the use of camera movement. George Willevan, who participated in the film's restoration, related how footage for the film's ending was initially overlooked & told us that he had yet to see the movie on a big screen.

Pavlova dances in the opening & closing scenes, & she moves as if electrified & stretching every part of her body as far as possible. I felt like I got some idea of the intensity of her stage presence, but her acting did not fit well with the brash Hollywood style of the movie. Lois Weber was clearly given a lot of resources for costumes, locations & extras. I wondered where a scene showing an enormous domed building in the background was shot. There is a great deal of carnage in the mob scenes. At one point, Pavlova's character confronts severed heads on pikes. The plot is sometimes laborious, & a man in the row in front of me gently snored through the middle portion of the show.

Pianist Donald Sosin & percussionist Frank Bockius performed an improvisatory accompaniment with repeated riffs & a much forward momentum. They matched the pacing & mood of each scene & played continuously for nearly 2 hours without tiring. Despite the weekday afternoon show time, attendance was large. The musicians received an approving ovation.

I returned in the evening to see Body and Soul, a 1925 film starring Paul Robeson. Anita Monga, the festival's artistic director, introduced the evening's accompanist, DJ Spooky & highlighted his many collaborations. DJ Spooky praised director Oscar Micheaux's independence & was proud that his own DVD release of Body and Soul was self-financed. He described his score for the the film as an "art mix" of jazz & blues.

The film itself has low production values, but it is interesting to see Paul Robeson's boldly charismatic presence as well as the director's cynical view of the church. The film makes frequent use of flashbacks, & I was struck by how the rape of Isabelle is depicted through close-ups of the Reverend's footsteps.

DJ Spooky's live mix for the screening was eerie & slow-paced, using a lot of piano, saxophone & percussion tracks. Guenter Buchwald on the violin added to the harmonies with drawn-out notes & double-stops. The relationship between the images and the music was never clear to me, & I ended up feeling distanced from the story. The sound system belched jarringly a couple of times during the show. The audience gave the musicians an eager & respectful ovation.

§ The Dumb Girl of Portici
dir. Lois Weber | 1912 | USA | 112 min
Music by Donald Sosin & Frank Bockius

San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2017
Friday June 2 2017, 3:30p
Castro Theatre

§ Body and Soul
dir.  Oscar Micheaux | 1925 | USA | 93 min
Music by DJ Spooky & Guenter Buchwald

San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2017
Friday June 2 2017, 7p
Castro Theatre

SF Silent Film Festival: Tales from the Archives

Jack's Joke. 1913.
Edison Kinetophone.

I started my 2nd day at the SF Silent Film Festival with Amazing Tales from the Archives, a free program of highly informative presentations by film preservationists. A chipper George Willeman, from the Library of Congress, talked us through one of his pet projects: resurrecting Edison Kinetophone films. The technology involved synchronizing phonograph cylinders with projectors via a mechanical cable & pulley system. Mr. Willeman summed it up as "too damned complicated," & it failed in the market. He showed us his discovery of the 1st microphone accidentally appearing in a shot, & we saw absurd single-take films of singing blacksmiths & shouty actors.

Elif Rongen-Kaynakçi, of EYE Filmmuseum in Amsterdam, gave a slide lecture about the life of Jean Desmet, an early 20th century serial entrepreneur & film exhibitor, whose archive of films, movie posters, photographs & documents form the EYE's Desmet Collection. Ms. Rongen-Kaynakçi is especially interested in his business correspondence, which provides details like the cost of a Bechstein piano for his cinema. She is also interested in his investment in a patented "cloud projector," which would have projected giant ads onto clouds, in the manner of the Bat-Signal.

Lastly, Heather Linville, of the Academy Film Archive, told us the astonishing story of Idris Welsh, who, as a 6-foot tall teenager, joined up with a certain Captain Wanderwell in 1922, adopted the moniker Aloha Wanderwell, & led a fleet of Model T's on a round-the-world tour. Along the way, she shot, edited & appeared in a series of travel films & eventually ending up in Hollywood. The Captain himself was charged with the enslavement of a minor, which he resolved by marrying Aloha. She went on to continue shooting travelogues & presenting her films to audiences in person. I could not understand why I had never heard of her & why no one has yet made her biopic. She even had a pet monkey called Chango.

Ms. Linville ran many excerpts of the travel films as she spoke. One alarming clip showed a motorcade of Model T's driving straight up the stairs of the Great Wall of China. Pianist Donald Sosin provided gentle, unobtrusive accompaniment to the films. Even though this was weekday morning, there was an impressive audience turnout.

§ Amazing Tales from the Archives
George Willeman, Library of Congress
Elif Rongen-Kaynakçi, EYE Filmmuseum
Heather Linville, Academy Film Archive
Music by Donald Sosin, piano

San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2017
Friday June 2 2017, 10a
Castro Theatre

Opening Night of SF Silent Film Festival

The San Francisco Silent Film Festival had a packed house for their opening night on Thursday. The event started about 10 minutes late due to ticket holders still waiting to get into the Castro Theatre. The program featured the 12-piece Berklee Silent Film Orchestra performing their original score for The Freshman, Harold Lloyd's effortlessly endearing comedy about social humiliation.

Festival President Robert Byrne thanked sponsors & introduced Suzanne Lloyd, Harold Lloyd's granddaughter, & Sheldon Mirowitz of the Berklee School of Music. Ms. Lloyd expressed her excitement to hear the new music, & Mr. Mirowitz explained that the score was composed by 7 of his students, who were each assigned one reel of the film to orchestrate. He individually introduced the student composers, who come from the United States, Switzerland & Mexico.

The score begins boldly, with a peppy march that recurs throughout. The music generally sounds 19th century classical, plus marches & jazz dances that evoke the film's period. It's synchronized with the on-screen action tightly, & every musical mood is stated clearly. The band was amplified, & I sometimes felt bullied by the score. The musicians were technically very secure, & all gave strong, boldhearted performances that fit the fearlessly optimistic personality of Lloyd's character.

The opening night audience was enthused, even applauding the restoration credits preceding the film. I'd never seen The Freshman before, & I found it simply plotted & thoroughly enjoyable. Intertitles sometimes carry the jokes, & I wish I knew what was meant by calling someone a "radio liar." I was impressed by the performances of 2 cats & by the string of gags involving Lloyd in a disintegrating dinner jacket at the Fall Frolic. The audience applauded the smooth choreography of a scene in which Lloyd takes advantage of temporarily having 3 arms. The show ended with a long & happy standing ovation for the composers & musicians. For those just getting started, there was an opening night party at the McRoskey Mattress Company down the street, apparently with more live music.

§ The Freshman
dirs. Fred C. Newmeyer &  Sam Taylor | 1925 | USA | 76 min
Live musical accompaniment by Berklee Silent Film Orchestra

San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2017
Thursday June 1 2017, 7p
Castro Threatre

SF Silent Film Festival 2017 at a Glance

§ San Francisco Silent Film Festival 2017
Castro Threatre

Thursday June 1 2017

7:00 PM
THE FRESHMAN
1925 | USA | 76 min | Fred C. Newmeyer, Sam Taylor, Harold Lloyd
Music by Berklee Silent Film Orchestra

Friday June 2 2017

10:00 AM (Free screening)
AMAZING TALES FROM THE ARCHIVES
George Willeman, Library of Congress
Elif Rongen-Kaynakçi, EYE Filmmuseum
Heather Linville, Academy Film Archive
100 min
Music by Donald Sosin

1:00 PM
GET YOUR MAN
1927 | USA | 76 min | Dorothy Arzner, Clara Bow, Buddy Rogers
Footage from NOW WE'RE IN THE AIR
Music by Stephen Horne

3:30 PM
THE DUMB GIRL OF PORTICI
1912 | USA | 112 min | Lois Weber, Anna Pavlova
Music by Donald Sosin & Frank Bockius

7:00 PM
BODY AND SOUL
1925 | USA | 93 min | Oscar Micheaux, Paul Robeson
Music by DJ Spooky

9:30 PM
THE INFORMER
1929 | UK | 99 min | Arthur Robison
Music by Stephen Horne, Guenter Buchwald & Frank Bockius

Saturday June 3 2017

10:00 AM
MAGIC AND MIRTH: A Collection of Enchanting Short Films, 1906–1924
60 min
Music by Donald Sosin

12:00 PM
A STRONG MAN
1929 | Poland | 80 min | Henryk Szaro
Music by Guenter Buchwald & Sascha Jacobsen

2:30 PM
FILIBUS
1915 | Italy | 71 min | Mario Roncoroni
Music by Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra

5:00 PM
OUTSIDE THE LAW
1920 | USA | 76 min | Tod Browning, Lon Chaney
Music by Stephen Horne & Frank Bockius

7:15 PM
BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN (Bronenosets Potyomkin)
1925 | USSR | 72 min | Sergei Eisenstein
Music by the Matti Bye Ensemble

9:30 PM
A PAGE OF MADNESS (Kurutta Ichipeiji)
1926 | Japan | 70 min | Teinosuke Kinugasa
Music by Alloy Orchestra

Sunday June 4 2017

10:00 AM
THE DOLL (Die Puppe)
1919 | Germany | 60 min | Ernst Lubitsch
Music by Guenter Buchwald & Frank Bockius

12:00 PM
SILENCE
1926 | USA | 70 min | Rupert Julian
Music by Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra

2:00 PM
A MAN THERE WAS (Terje Vigen)
1917 | Sweden | 60 min | Victor Sjöström
Music by the Matti Bye Ensemble

4:00 PM
THE LOST WORLD
1925 | USA | 100 min | Harry O. Hoyt, Willis O'Brien, Wallace Beery, Bessie Love
Music by Alloy Orchestra

6:30 PM
TWO DAYS (Dva Dni)
1927 | USSR | 60 min | Heorhii Stabovyi
Music by Stephen Horne

8:15 PM
THE THREE MUSKETEERS
1921 | USA |  146 min | Fred Niblo, Douglas Fairbanks
Music by Guenter Buchwald Ensemble

22nd San Francisco Silent Film Festival

Thursday is the 1st night of the SF Silent Film Festival, running June 1 - 4 at the Castro Theatre. This year's festival presents 36 musicians providing live accompaniment for 18 films from 9 countries. DJ Spooky is new to the festival this year, & on Friday night he accompanies Body and Soul, a 1925 feature by African-American director Oscar Micheaux, starring Paul Robeson. On opening night the Berklee Silent Film Orchestra performs their original score for Harold Lloyd's The Freshman, & Sunday at noon the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra accompanies Silence, a 1926 American crime drama based on a stage play, restored with recently discovered footage from the Cinémathèque Française.

The festival has 2 films directed by women, including The Dumb Girl of Portici, a high-budget epic directed by Lois Weber & starring Anna Pavlova in her only screen role. Dorothy Arzner is the director of Get Your Man, a comedy with Clara Bow & Buddy Rogers. It plays with a fragment of Now We're in the Air, a lost comedy with Louise Brooks & Wallace Beery.

I am told that the Saturday afternoon showing of Filibus, an Italian adventure film featuring sky pirates, is a must-see. Preceding the screening, the festival will present an award to the the Dutch EYE Filmmuseum, for its commitment to the preservation of silent film. Films from the EYE's Desmet Collection will be shown in the free, & always fascinating, Amazing Tales from the Archives presentation on Friday morning.

The festival will also honor David Shepard, a film preservationist who died this year, with a Saturday morning program of shorts selected by the delightful Serge Bromberg. The classic Battleship Potemkin is on the schedule, as well as the the avant-garde A Page of Madness, which I have always wanted to see. Two Days, a Soviet film set during the Civil War in the Ukraine, looks intriguing.

I got to attend the festival's informal media preview event last month & had a chat with a fellow who does the sound for the Silent Film Festival, which sounds like an oxymoron, but isn't. He said The Freshmen is one of his favorites & assured me that The Three Musketeers show that closes the festival would be the most fun.

§ The 22nd San Francisco Silent Film Festival
June 1 - 4, 2017
Castro Theatre

§ Festival Site | Schedule & Tickets | Festival Pass 

The Salesman

A couple of weeks ago I got to see a preview screening of The Salesman, Asghar Farhadi's taut new film about personal revenge. It plays at the Mill Valley Film Festival next week & then in Bay Area theaters in January. The story presents us with a cultured, well-educated husband & wife living in Tehran. They are about to star opposite each other in a production of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman. In the gripping opening scene, which is in one long take & appears to be an over-stated MacGuffin, they are forced to evacuate their apartment building. They move to another apartment, previously inhabited by an elusive woman who may be a prostitute. When the wife is alone in the apartment one evening, she is assaulted by an intruder. The specific details of attack are never made explicit, but the wife is too traumatized to talk to the police, & the husband, out of a chivalrous instinct, sets out to track down the assailant himself.

Though the plot is calculated & takes many contrived side trips, the movie has an immediacy & sense of urgency. I was never sure where scenes were headed, & I liked the way that things left unsaid or unseen loomed large. In the subplot involving Death of a Salesman, it's nice seeing realistic glimpses of the production, which appears quite faithful.

Farhadi often trails the characters with a hand-held camera, & always felt like I was right in the middle of the action. Shahab Hosseini as the husband Emad is a likable & charismatic actor. It is easy to keep identifying with Emad even as his behavior becomes increasingly disappointing. There's a stage-like quality to the tension underlying every scene, & the film is unsettling. Right through its last moments, I kept re-evaluating what I thought about its moral dilemmas.

§ Forushande (The Salesman) (2016)
Asghar Farhadi, dir.
Iran, France, 125 mins.

§ Mill Valley Film Festival 39
Rafael 1, Fri, Oct 7, 7:30 PM
Rafael 2, Wed, Oct 12, 12:00 PM

SFMOMA Modern Cinema Schedule

WEEK ONE: HAUNTED BY CINEMA

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 7
6:00 pm - Rashomon (Akira Kurosawa, Japan, 1950, 88 min.) with an introduction by Philip Kaufman
8:30 pm - The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant (Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Germany, 1972, 125 min.)

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 8
1:00 pm - Agnès Varda in California: Documenteur / Black Panthers / Uncle Yanco (Agnès Varda, France, 112 min.)
3:45 pm - Mysterious Object at Noon (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand, 2000, 89 min.)
5:45 pm - The Seventh Seal (Ingmar Bergman, Sweden, 1957, 96 min.)
8:00 pm - L'Avventura (Michelangelo Antonioni, Italy, 1960, 143 min.)

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 9
2:00 pm - Sans Soleil with La Jetée (Chris Marker, France, 1983/1962, 132 min.)
5:00 pm - Black Girl with Borom Sarret (Ousmane Sembène, Senegal, 1966/1963, 85 min.)
7:15 pm - Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (Chantal Akerman, Belgium/France, 1975, 201 min.) with an introduction by Wayne Wang

WEEK TWO: APICHATPONG WEERASETHAKUL

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 13
7:00 pm - An Evening with Apichatpong Weerasthakul

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 14
6:00 pm - Mekong Hotel (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand, 2012, 61 min.)
8:00 pm - Viridiana (Luis Buñuel, Spain, 1961, 90 min.)

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 15
1:00 pm - The River (Jean Renoir, France, 1951, 99 min.)
3:30 pm - Shorts by Apichatpong Weerasthakul
6:00 pm - Syndromes and a Century (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand/France, 2006, 105 min.)
8:30 pm - Knife in the Water (Roman Polanski, Poland, 1962, 94 min.)

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 16
2:00 pm - Tropical Malady (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand/France, 2004, 118 min.)
4:30 pm - The Spirit of the Beehive (Victor Erice, Spain, 1973, 99 min.)
7:00 pm - Cemetery of Splendor (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand, 2015, 122 min.)

WEEK THREE: HAUNTED CINEMA

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 21
6:00 pm - Pitfall (Hiroshi Teshigahara, Japan, 1962 97 min.)
8:30 pm - Carnival of Souls (Herk Harvey, USA, 1962, 78 min.)

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 22
3:00 pm - Picnic at Hanging Rock (Peter Weir, Australia, 1975, 107 min.)
6:00 pm - Grey Gardens (Albert Maysles and David Maysles, USA, 1976, 94 min.)
8:00 pm - Ugetsu (Kenji Mizoguchi, Japan, 1953, 97 min.)

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 23
3:00 pm - Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, UK/Thailand/Germany/France/Spain, 2010, 113 min.)
6:00 pm - A Touch of Zen (King Hu, Taiwan, 1971, 180 min.)

Phyllis Wattis Theater at SFMOMA
Please use entrance at Minna Street, near Third Street.

Modern Cinema Series at SFMOMA

Last week the SFMOMA held a press briefing in their newly renovated Phyllis Wattis Theater to announce their up-coming Modern Cinema series, taking place on 3 packed weekends in October. Dominic Willsdon, SFMOMA's Curator of Education and Public Practice, & Frank Smigiel, Associate Curator, Performance and Film, discussed the program's themes, along with Noah Cowan, Executive Director of the San Francisco Film Society, who was actually at the Toronto International Film Festival but appeared via a choppy Skype call.

With Halloween deliberately in mind, the curators chose many films on the subject of haunting. Their selections reminded me of what would play at an art house cinema in the days before video rentals. The schedule includes art film classics Rashomon & The Seventh Seal, the cult classics Carnival of Souls & Grey Gardens, & notorious experimental works like Sans Soleil & Jean Deilman. The 2nd weekend focuses on Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul, who will attend all weekend to introduce the screenings. Philip Kaufman & Wayne Wang are also expected as guest presenters. Tickets are available online for individual shows, but as far as I know there are no series passes.

The renovated theater seats 270 & is equipped with film & digital projectors & a Meyer Sound system. The staff made sure we noted the new cupholders. The theater has its own entrance & box office on Minna Street, so that screenings can take place outside of museum hours. The stage has been deepened so that the space is also suitable for live performances.

A couple of the attendees had very specific questions about the versions of the films being shown. When Mr. Cowan was asked what was the best thing he'd seen at TIFF so far, he was eager to name Barry Jenkins's Moonlight & the biopic Jackie.

§ Modern Cinema Press Briefing

Tuesday, September 13, 10:00 am

Phyllis Wattis Theater, SFMOMA

§ Modern Cinema: Criterion Collection and Apichatpong Weerasethakul

Week 1: Haunted by Cinema | Friday, October 7 - Sunday, October 9

Week 2: Apichatpong Weerasethakul | Thursday, October 13 - Saturday, October 16

Week 3: Haunted Cinema | Friday, October 21, - Sunday October 32

Phyllis Wattis Theater, SFMOMA

The Eagle Huntress

Last week I got to see a preview screening of The Eagle Huntress, a beautifully photographed documentary set in Mongolia which will play at the up-coming Mill Valley Festival. The film introduces us to Aisholpan, a joyful 13-year old Kazakh girl who is learning to hunt with eagles, a traditional tribal skill customarily practiced only by men.

In the film's 3 parts, we see her training her eagle, competing as the only female in the region's annual Golden Eagle Festival, & finally testing her ability out in the wild, fox hunting in a tough winter landscape. Aisholpan is wonderfully confident, & the relationship between her & her father tremendously trusting. In a sequence that will frighten any parent, she rappels down a cliff to an eagle's nest & steals the eaglet she will train for the competition.

The imagery is gorgeous, with soaring crane shots & spectacular aerial views shot with a drone. No doubt the stark beauty of the mountains & snowy landscapes belies the difficulty of filming, as well as the arduousness of actually living there. The inhabitants' clothing & homes are depicted in sumptuous detail. I enjoyed seeing glimpses of Aisholpan at school, where the atmosphere seems surprisingly cozy.

The storytelling is basic. I liked the film's prologue, which shows the father freeing an eagle after its 7-year service. A recurring montage of skeptical tribal elders provides a touch of humor. The filmmaker does not get too personal with his subjects, & I did not feel that anything was at stake, but I was grateful to see a family film not in the Pixar/Disney mode. The movie is in Kazakh, apart from the minimal narration delivered by Daisy Ridley.

§ The Eagle Huntress (2016)
Otto Bell, dir. UK, Mongolia, USA. 87 mins. 

§ Mill Valley Film Festival 39
Sun, Oct 9 11:15 AM, Sequoia 1 
Mon, Oct 10 12:45 PM, Rafael 1

Mill Valley Film Festival 39 Press Announcement

Last week I attended the press announcement for the 39th Mill Valley Film Festival, which takes place October 6-16 at venues in Mill Valley, Larkspur, Corte Madera & San Rafael. Founder & Executive Director Mark Fishkin, Director of Programming Zoe Elton & Senior Programmer Janis Plotkin gave an informal rundown of the program & showed trailers for some of the films.

This year's guests include actors Nicole Kidman, Ewan McGregor, Gael García Bernal & Aaron Eckhart, as well as filmmaker Julie Dash, the 1st African American woman to direct a theatrically released feature film. Each appears in a special event featuring a screening & an onstage conversation. The closing night film is Loving, based on the story of Richard & Mildred Loving, the interracial couple who fought Virginia's anti-miscegenation law all the way to the Supreme Court. Director Jeff Nichols & stars Joel Edgerton & Ruth Negga are scheduled to attend. James Franco is expected at the premiere of his film In Dubious Battle. In commemoration of the closing of the Century Cinema in Corte Madera, the festival will show the original Star Wars trilogy there on October 8th.

There will be a film focus on Culinary Cinema, as well as clusters of films from Germany & Latin America. The mention of a 1-day schedule of films & events about cannabis caused the press conference audience to laugh. As part of the Mind the Gap series, a panel discussion will feature women technologists from the Disney animation studio. Other films highlighted at the press announcement include the German comedy Toni Erdmann, which apparently caused a sensation at Cannes, Aquarius, starring Sônia Braga, & the animated feature The Red Turtle. The trailer for Do Not Resist, a documentary about the militarization of the police, was frightening all on its own. California Typewriter, a documentary about devotees of the typewriter, sounds sweet. The slapstick Lost in Paris was intriguingly compared to a Jacques Tati film.

Times for Fire at Sea in the printed program have been changed, & a screening of Moulin Rouge! has been added on October 7th at the Century Cinema, Corte Madera.

§ Mill Valley Film Festival Press Conference 
Monday, September 12, 2016 at 6:00PM
Dolby Laboratories, San Francisco, CA

§ Mill Valley Film Festival 39
October 6 - 16, 2016
Century Cinema, Corte Madera
Century Larkspur, Larkspur
Cinearts Sequoia, Mill Valley
Lark Theater, Larkspur
San Rafael Film Center, San Rafael