Author: Doug Cummings

Negative Space (1999)

Film review

The news that one of America’s greatest film critics, Manny Farber, has passed away is triggering deserved tributes (well-documented by David Hudson at GreenCine Daily), so I feel it’s a good a time as any to remember Christopher Petit’s 1999 essay film/meditation on Farber, itself titled Negative Space (the title of Farber’s reissued and expanded compendium).

Petit has a history of biographical tributes to filmmakers, and given the dearth of films about the critical process or its practitioners, Negative Space is a welcome 39-minute tribute. For the same reason, it’s also a bit frustrating–given the privileged occasion, does Petit …

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The Exiles (1961)

Film review, Special event

Forty-seven years after its premiere, Kent Mackenzie’s The Exiles (1961) has finally returned to its iconic setting of Los Angeles; a newly restored print begins a week-long run at the UCLA film archive tomorrow and is being used to promote at least one historical tour of Bunker Hill. Although the new print premiered in Marseilles and New York City, you’ll have to pardon Angelenos like myself if we act proprietary about the movie, rebirthed in the wider cinephiliac consciousness by CalArt’s Thom Andersen, whose Los Angeles Plays Itself (2003) claims, “better than any other movie, [The Exiles] proves …

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LACMA in October

Special event


The Round-Up (1966)

Just as I was grumbling that the Los Angeles County Museum of Art’s recent announcement of a Rohmer retrospective in September includes less than a dozen films–all of them readily available on DVD (not even The Tree, the Mayor and the Mediatheque?)–LACMA has unveiled its October line-up, which more than makes up for it:

• October 3
Happy-Go-Lucky, a preview screening of Mike Leigh’s new comedy

• October 4 through 25
Four Masterpieces by Edward Yang (That Day On the Beach, Taipei Story, A Brighter Summer Day, Yi Yi)

• October 7…

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Normand Roger and Frédéric Back

Film review, Special event


Michael Giacchino and Normand Roger

I sometimes complain about events at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (mostly for its industry-heavy programming, security procedures, and scary metal detectors), but the Academy provides more interesting fare than you might imagine. Last Sunday, they completely outdid themselves: for $5, the public was treated to catered wine and Asian food, a conversation with Canada’s National Film Board composer/sound designer Normand Roger (interviewed by Ratatouille composer Michael Giacchino), a pristine 35mm screening of four animated masterpieces, an interview with NFB animation legend Frédéric Back plus an exhibition of his artwork, and a …

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Charles Laughton Directs The Night of the Hunter

Special event

Updated 8/18/10: Criterion has just announced an upcoming two-disc DVD edition, which will thankfully feature several contributions from Robert Gitt, including a two-and-a-half-hour version of the following presentation.

A few weeks ago, e-tailers announced a long-awaited two-disc DVD collector’s edition of The Night of the Hunter (1955), Charles Laughton’s expressionist masterpiece about the resiliency of children in a nightmarish adult world, but as quickly as cinephiles could get excited, the release was abruptly postponed. The movie is well-deserving of special edition treatment, not only because its original barebones DVD is incorrectly formatted as 1.33×1 open matte (the film …

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Coming Up

Site news

Patient Filmjourney.org readers will be happy to know that my series of life changing events over the past 11 months–including getting married, having a fussy, colicky (but adorable!) child, moving across town, etc–seem to be leveling off and I expect to resume blogging with more regularity shortly.  But if any of my subsequent posts are convoluted or otherwise incomprehensible in any way, simply chalk it up to sleep deprivation.

As a matter of fact, I’m attending a press screening of Kent Mackenzie’s The Exiles later today, and very much looking forward to it.  As you might imagine, the rediscovered film …

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