Hell on Frisco Bay (2005-2008 archive)

1. This Saturday is Home Movie Day! If you're not convinced that home movies are relevant to film culture as a whole, perhaps you should watch Following Sean or Capturing the Friedmans. Better yet, track down Life in a Box or Bum's Paradise (pictured). Best of all, come to the events happening at the San Francisco Media Archive at 275 Capp Street in the heart of Frisco for 12 hours this Saturday, August 13. If you call ahead, you can get your own home movies inspected, screened, and even transferred to video from noon until 6PM. The evening events include screenings of particularly noteworthy home movies and a reception.

2. Landmark's new repertory calendar for screenings at the Opera Plaza and Lumiere Theatres has hit the streets. It looks like some nice selections; in each case these "calendared" films play for a week and often cannot be held over like other bookings, due to limited numbers of circulating prints. The schedule begins August 19-25 with Louis Malle's Elevator to the Gallows and its Miles Davis score; sometimes the 1958 thriller is called the first French New Wave film. I haven't seen it yet but I will. The other bookend is also a classic: Michelangelo Antonioni's 1975 The Passenger (Nov. 11-17), starring Jack Nicholson, another one I haven't seen.

In between are more contemporary films, like Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance which I can recommend as the most artistic of the "Extreme" (as in, extremely violent) films I've seen come out of South Korea recently. It plays August 26 through September 1, probably at the Lumiere. Others of potential interest include Crimen Ferpecto (Sep. 9-15) and the Lars Von Trier-scripted Dear Wendy (Sep. 23-29). Many of these films will most likely also play at the Act 1/2 in Berkeley. Elevator to the Gallows certainly will.

3. Barbara Bel Geddes died Monday at the age of 82. Her best film, Vertigo, is playing the Castro in 70mm four times today. I'll be there at one of the evening shows.

4. The Four Star and the Presidio host the Asian Film Festival starting tonight and lasting through the 21st of August. I expect to write more on that soon, but just thought I'd add one last tidbit: In the midst of all the pop and cult cinema from Asia, the Presidio has also booked the Hollywood film trilogy with perhaps the biggest current cult: all three Lord of the Rings films play back to back on August 18th. It's for charity.