The official blog of Laemmle Theatres
STEVIE D opens this Friday at the Music Hall. Here’s the Q&A schedule:
Friday, after 7pm showing: Director/Writer/Actor Chris Cordone, Actor Spencer Garrett, Actor John Aprea;
Saturday, after 7pm showing: Director/Writer/Actor Chris Cordone, Actor Phil Idrissi, Actor John Aprea;
Sunday, after 7pm showing, Director/Writer/Actor Chris Cordone, Actor Hal Linden.
Adapted from Larry McMurtry’s acclaimed novel, The Last Picture Show was nominated for eight Academy Awards in 1971, including Best Picture and Best Director Peter Bogdanovich. The film earned two Oscars—Best Supporting Actor Ben Johnson and Best Supporting Actress Cloris Leachman.
This loving and acute portrait of a dying Texas town in the early 1950s is notable for its beautifully rendered atmosphere and for the warmth and compassion of its characterizations.
Bogdanovich, a film critic and historian, had directed one earlier movie—a low-budget indie called Targets. His second feature catapulted him to the front ranks of American directors of the 1970s. Newsweek’s Paul Zimmerman went so far as to call the film “the most impressive work by a young American director since Citizen Kane.”
Four decades later, in 2011, Stephen Holden of The New York Times called The Last Picture Show “an American classic—a perfect film, if you will, whose cosmic sadness makes it feel timeless.”
In addition to Johnson and Leachman, the cast includes Timothy Bottoms, Cybill Shepherd, Jeff Bridges, Ellen Burstyn, and Clu Gulager.
At a time when color had become the norm in Hollywood, Bogdanovich chose to shoot the film in black-and-white and collaborated with master cinematographer Robert Surtees. The Hank Williams songs on the soundtrack also help to intensify the film’s mournful atmosphere.
The screening will be followed by a conversation with Peter Bogdanovich, whose other films include What’s Up, Doc?, Paper Moon, Daisy Miller, Saint Jack, They All Laughed, Mask, and The Cat’s Meow.
Bogdanovich has also acted in many films and TV shows (including the landmark series, The Sopranos) and is the author of several important books on film.
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SOPHIE AND THE RISING SUN director Maggie Greenwald and cast members Lorraine Toussaint, Joel Murray, Takashi Yamaguchi and Diane Ladd will participate in a Q&A after the 7:20 PM screening at the Music Hall on Friday, January 27. Jim Hemphill will moderate.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qdu1lR0vpjY
FREE SCREENING – SUNDAY, DECEMBER 11 at 10 am. Director MARIA SCHRADER in person. RSVP: [email protected].
STEFAN ZWEIG: FAREWELL TO EUROPE, Austria’s Official Entry for the Best Foreign Language Film – 89th Academy Awards®, was written and directed by Maria Schrader (one of Germany’s most acclaimed actresses, best known for her award-winning lead role in “Aimee & Jaguar” and for her lead role in the Emmy-winning TV series “Deutschland 83”).
The film episodically tells the story of the Austrian Jewish writer Stefan Zweig and his life while in exile from 1936 to 1942. Best known in the U.S. for his novellas “The Royal Game” and “Letter from an Unknown Woman,” that was later adapted into a film directed by Max Ophüls, starring Joan Fontaine. His writings have also inspired Wes Anderson’s “Grand Budapest Hotel.”
Stefan Zweig (next to Thomas Mann) was the most-translated German-speaking writer of his time, but having been driven into emigration at the peak of his worldwide fame, Zweig falls into despair at the sight of Europe’s downfall, which he had anticipated early on. Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, New York, Petrópolis are four stations in Stefan Zweig’s exile, which despite offering him safe refuge and overwhelming tropical nature, won’t help him find peace and won’t be able to replace his home.
STEFAN ZWEIG: FAREWELL TO EUROPE is the story of a refugee, a tale of losing one’s home and of the search for a new one. It is a visually stunning historic picture about a great artist and, at the same time, a film about a time in which Europe was coming apart.
Special Q&A Event after the Thursday 12/15 7:30PM SINS OF OUR YOUTH screening featuring Cast & Crew including Director & Writer Gary & Edmund Entin as well as stars Mitchel Musso, Joel Courtney, Bridger Zadina & Dani Knights.
We are pleased to present a special series of screenings of the critically acclaimed new film SEASONS followed by in-person Q&A’s with Andy Lipkis, founder and president of TreePeople: December 6 – Monica Film Center, Santa Monica. Daniel Hinerfeld of the National Resources Defense Council will moderate; December 7 – NoHo 7, North Hollywood. Elissa Barrett of TreePeople will moderate; and December 8 – Laemmle’s Playhouse 7, Pasadena) after the 7:30 pm showings. A portion of the ticket sale proceeds will benefit TreePeople.
SEASONS from Jacques Perrin, the director of Winged Migration and Oceans, is a poetic chronicle of animals and their habitats over the past 15,000 years, and a natural symphony on the mysteries of the forests. Robert Abele of the Los Angeles Times calls SEASONS “another testament to the breathtaking wonders of the natural world.”
Andy Lipkis is a practical visionary who has dedicated his life to healing the environment while improving the lives of individuals and communities. TreePeople has engaged over two million people in planting and caring for trees to revitalize the pollution and drought-damaged forests and watersheds of Southern California. “The timing couldn’t be better to see this film,” says Lipkis. “SEASONS is a delicious and intimate immersion with the animals, birds, and trees of the forest ecosystem that will open your heart and heal your spirit. With tens of millions of trees dying in California’s mountain and city forests, SEASONS informs us without words or politics, about the extraordinary life support system we’re losing, that we can and must come together to save.”
77 MINUTES filmmaker Charlie Minn will participate in Q&A’s after all screenings: 12/6 at the Playhouse, 12/7 at the NoHo and 12/8 at the Monica Film Center.