3/10 @ 8:00pm & 10:15pm Blast Phemy! 2: Text Of Light (feat. Lee Ranaldo) & Parallel
Join Sonic Youth guitarist Lee Ranaldo, collaborating live with saxophonist Ulrich Krieger and guitarist Alan Licht, as he goes to the blasphemous extreme with live scores to the films of Stan Brakhage and other mid-century American cinema avant-gardists. According to Licht, Text of Light "does not perform soundtracks to the films of Stan Brakhage. Rather, it uses the films as a further element for improvisation, almost as [another] performer. While Brakhage intended for these films to be screened silently as films...[here] they are juxtaposed with the music, in a kind of real-time performance, mixed-media collage." But the evening doesn't stop there! The night also includes a screening of Parallel, an animation tour-de-force by mediamaker Huckleberry Lain, featuring music by Argentinean-born, L.A.-based electronic duo Languis.
Watch a Text Of Light performance w/ Lee Ranaldo and Alan Licht from 2008!
3/14 @ 8pm / Series: Comedy Death-Ray Michael Cera presents
Freebie And The Bean
For March's CDR night, we welcome one of the most instantly recognizable (and instantly funny) actors of his generation: Michael Cera, whose turns in Superbad, Juno and Youth In Revolt have bumped John Cusack out of the top slot of nerd girl crushes everywhere. His film pick for the evening is a left-field choice from someone so sweet: the mayhem-packed, filthy-mouthed comedy Freebie and The Bean. Michael says: "Filled with car crash sequences, guns, yelling, transvestites and Alan Arkin, Freebie and the Bean has got to be the best buddy-cop film of 1974." It's a veritable "who's who" of '70s film awesomeness, starring James Caan and Alan Arkin, directed by Richard Rush (The Stunt Man, Getting Straight), co-written by Floyd Mutrux (Dusty And Sweets McGee) and shot by Laszlo Kovacs (Easy Rider)! Caan and Arkin are a pair of racist, homophobic and misogynist San Francisco supercops who think nothing of plowing cars into pedestrians, plugging suspects full of lead in toilet stalls and demolishing half the city's free-standing structures in order to nab the bad guy, in this gleefully anarchic ode to kicking ass first, and takin' names later.
Dir. Richard Rush, 1974, 35mm, 113 min.
Watch the trailer for "Freebie And The Bean"!
Tickets - $14
3/21 @ 8:00pm Small Change (Brand-new 35mm print!)
One of Francois Truffaut's most endearing labors of love, Small Change is one of those rare films that strikes dead the cynicism in any hardened heart. Filmed entirely in Thiers, a small town in the French countryside, the film presents an interconnected series of vignettes featuring one of the most vibrant child casts ever gathered, as the kids (ages 0 to 14) go to school, horse around, go to the movies, fall out of windows, care for (and rebel against) their parents and explore each other; as Truffaut himself said, "Our idea really is 'From the first bottle to the first kiss.'" The film's schoolbound world is the antithesis of the dour oppressiveness Truffaut paints in The 400 Blows, and the joyousness of the proceedings clearly wore off on the director, for Small Change is as innocent, buzzing and wide-eyed as childhood itself. We're thrilled to present Small Change in a gorgeous, newly-struck 35mm print! Dir. Francois Truffaut, 1976, 35mm, 104 min.
Watch the trailer for "Small Change"!
Tickets - $12
3/23 @ 8:00pm Harmony & Me
"The most creative works of art often come from heartache. In a way, that’s all we can hope for and from Harmony, a sullen young lyricist, as he pines for a woman who broke his heart with seemingly little remorse. Harmony finds solace in song, yet fails to find compassion from those around him: pathetic friends who drive minivans convince him that love is a vaguely pedophilic letdown, and self-serving coworkers show him that life is generally sadistic. Meanwhile, chewy frozen chocolate serves as a reminder that at times everything can be too grievous to handle. Austin-based filmmaker Bob Byington’s homegrown style transcends the piece's budgetary limitations, and his scripted esprit results in colorful, chaotic characters brought to life by Justin Rice, Kevin Corrigan, Pat Healy, and Kristen Tucker. These characters don’t merely mimic reality; they heighten the hilarity of a traumatic post-breakup, which in truth is probably just about as ridiculous in life as it is onscreen." (CineVegas) Director Bob Byington and co-star Nick Offerman ("Parks And Recreation") will appear live for a post-screening Q&A! Dir. Bob Byington, 2009, HDCAM, 75 min.
Watch the trailer for "Harmony & Me"!
Tickets - $12
3/28 @ 8:00pm Like A Phoenix From The Ashes: "Pomegranates" Record Release Party
Join us as we inaugurate the release of "Pomegranates", a compilation of Persian folk, funk, and psychedelia on the Finders Keepers record label, in a night also celebrating Norooz (the Persian New Year!) This spring-equinox-special will boast a psychedelic visual feast of ultra-rare and never-before-screened vintage film and video clips from '60s/'70s Iran, collaged and curated by Cinefamily's Tom Fitzgerald, and soundtracked with a Middle Eastern mash-up mix done by Finders Keepers founder Andy Votel. A fun celebration of drinks, catered Persian dinner and pastries, and artwork along with special guest B-Music DJs will preview and follow the film presentation!
4/2 @ 8:00pm RoboCop-A-Thon!: RoboCop shown with RoboCop 2 and RoboCop 3
Description coming soon...
Watch the trailer for "RoboCop"!
Watch the trailer for "RoboCop 2"!
Watch the trailer for "RoboCop 3"!
Tickets - $12
4/6 @ 8:00pm / Series: Jerry Beck's Animation Tuesdays Jerry Beck's Animation Tuesdays: Cartoon Fight Club
We’re going twelve rounds with an all-star championship card that pits against each other the toughest dudes, buffest bears and most macho mice, with epic matches in the ring, around the garden and all over the house. Cartoon historian Jerry Beck has compiled the most barbaric battles in hand-drawn animation to satisfy your testosterone-pumped, frothing-at-the-mouth bloodlust: Tom vs. Jerry, Popeye vs. Bluto, and Duck vs Fudd. Get pumped for the kind of headbanging, eye-bulging entertainment they don’t show on TV anymore; with rare 35mm and 16mm film prints (including several in Technicolor), this show will bonk your head, bash your bones and bodyslam you into next week! And remember the first rule of Cartoon Fight Club -- tell everyone about Cartoon Fight Club on April 6th.
4/24 @ 7:30pm Celestial Navigations: The Short Films Of Al Jarnow
As we curled up on our couches in the early morning, with bowls of Sugar Pops at our feet, filmmaker Al Jarnow touched our lives and changed the way we look at the world without us ever knowing. Jarnow presented the world of secret mathematics, sacred geometries and life's scientific minutiae with such clarity and beauty that the child watching his works on Sesame Street could derive almost the same pleasure as the beatnik experimental film buff viewing them at New York's Anthology Film Archives -- for Jarnow's films played in both places! Coupling time-lapse, stop motion, and cel animation with simple found objects from everyday life, Jarnow deconstructed the world for an entire generation with his timeless shorts which, thirty years later, have lost none of their vitality or impact. Come celebrate with us this visionary artist, as we present a full program of his most astounding films, as well as the new documentary short Asymmetric Cycles, which details Al's entire creative process. Al Jarnow will be here at the Cinefamily in-person for a Q&A after the show!
Watch the trailer for "The Short Films of Al Jarnow"!
5/2 @ 8:00pm / Series: Jerry Beck's Animation Tuesdays Jerry Beck's Animation Tuesdays: Toons In Drag
From the days of Shakespeare through to the days of vaudeville, silent movies and beyond, cross-dressing has passed into the mainstream as a safe, well-worn comedy staple; think Milton Berle, Flip Wilson, the Kids In The Hall or Eddie Izzard. Whenever our beloved cartoon characters get into the act, however, it all starts to get a little nuttier, and dare we say -- hotter? Confused, are you? Then this special program, compiled by animation historian Jerry Beck, will certainly set you straight. Or gay. Or somewhere in-between! Come for clips of your favorite toon stars cavorting as members of the opposite sex, alongside historic depictions of "swishy" characters and complete shorts on 35mm and 16mm featuring classic moments of animated role reversal.
5/15 @ 10:30pm Jack Stevenson presents Movies With Roots In Hell: The Effects Of Drugs On American Cinema
Film collector and author Jack Stevenson ("Fleshpot", "Land of a Thousand Balconies: Discoveries and Confessions of a B-Movie Archaeologist") has presented programs of rare and cool vintage films throughout Europe and in America, at venues as diverse as the Warhol Museum in Pittsburg, the Yerba Buena in SF and at his cinema in Copenhagen, Denmark -- and we're thrilled to have him back at The Cinefamily for another round of picks from his personal archive of 16mm and 35mm prints, in a visit that coincides with the publication of his brand-new tome "Scandinavian Blue: The Erotic Cinema of Sweden and Denmark in the 1960s and 1970s!"
Experience sixty hair-raising years of sin and sensation in this substance-fueled retrospective, with clips spanning from the stoned Seventies all the way back to the totaled Teens! From the giddy silent-era cocaine slapstick of Mystery of the Leaping Fish to the ultra-bizarre early-'30s song performance Sweet Marijuana, from the preachy mid-50's invective of The Pusher to the psychedelic excess of the 1968 NYC scene report Rockflow and the '70s drug paranoia classics The People Next Door and Blue Sunshine, "Movies With Roots in Hell" samples every era via a selection of shorts, trailers and outtakes, all curated by legendary film archivist Jack Stevenson. Come see how preachers, educators, entertainers, fear-mongers and hippies used drugs to entertain, titillate, scare and celebrate the experience of mind alteration.
Watch Gertrude Michael sing "Sweet Marijuana", from "Murder At The Vanities" (1934)!
Tickets - $12
5/16 @ 8:00pm Jack Stevenson presents: Venom
Part of the tradition of Danish sex films that helped break down the barriers of censorship, Venom (aka Gift) is the lurid story of Per, a pompous young man who preaches the gospel of the flesh to his new girlfriend and her stuffy upper-class family. Having seduced the girl into taking part in his porny home movies, Per, in a haze of hash smoke and amoral philosophical rants, aims to provoke her bourgeois parents by showing them the smut and shaming them into oblivion. Originally intended as a a heated polemic against pornography and the looming wave of society's unbridled hedonism, Venom ironically helped pave the way for precisely the excesses it preached against -- and in an ultra-rare Los Angeles 35mm screening, now you can see the film that originally sent Danish authorities into apoplexy, and led to the abolishment of its country's film censorship in 1969. Largely forgotten today, Venom is an overlooked treasure from a moment in time when Denmark transformed from a isolated backwater into the most liberal society on the face of the earth. Film curator Jack Stevenson will also present a selection of sexy Scandinavian shorts before the feature! Dir. Knud Leif Thomsen, 1966, 35mm, 96 min.
Tickets - $12
5/26 @ 8:00pm Blast Phemy! 5 (feat. live film scores by Lucky Dragons)
Description coming soon...
Blast Phemy! 2:
Michael Cera presents
Small Change
Harmony & Me
Like A Phoenix From The Ashes:
Grindhouse Film Festival presents:
RoboCop-A-Thon!:
Jerry Beck's Animation Tuesdays:
Celestial Navigations:
Jerry Beck's Animation Tuesdays:
Jack Stevenson presents
Jack Stevenson presents:
