"Buffalo Film Seminars" Sets Fall Schedule

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- "The General," one of the all-time great film comedies, and "Il Conformista/The Conformist," considered by many to be Italian director Bernardo Bertolucci's best film, head the lineup for the Fall 2001 edition of "Buffalo Film Seminars: Conversations about Great Films with Bruce Jackson & Diane Christian," the 14-week series of screenings and discussions sponsored by the University at Buffalo and the Market Arcade Film and Arts Center.

The screenings will take place at 7 p.m. on Tuesdays in the Market Arcade theater, 639 Main St.

Each film will be introduced by Jackson, SUNY Distinguished Professor and Samuel P. Capen Professor of American Culture in the UB Department of English, and Christian, SUNY Distinguished Teaching Professor, also in the UB English department.

Following a short break at the end of each film, Jackson and Christian will lead a discussion of the film with members of the audience.

The screenings are part of "Contemporary Cinema" (ENG 441), an undergraduate course being taught by the pair. The screenings also will be open to the general public.

Admission to each film will be $6.50 for the general public and $4.50 for students and senior citizens.

The films will be free for those enrolled in the three-credit "Contemporary Cinema" course. Those wishing to earn credit in relation to the series should register for the course.

Free monitored parking will be available in the M&T lot opposite the theater's Washington Street entrance.

At UB, the film seminars are sponsored by the Capen Chair in American Culture, the College of Arts and Sciences, the Department of English and WBFO 88.7 FM, UB's National Public Radio affiliate.

The series will begin on Aug. 28 with a screening of the Buster Keaton classic "The General" (1927), considered by many to be one of the all-time great film comedies with a train chase that has never been surpassed and stunts by Keaton that would make Jackie Chan envious.

This silent-screen gem, selected for the National Film Registry, will feature piano accompaniment by Jonathan Benjamin.

The rest of the semester's lineup, with film descriptions culled from the seminars' Web site, http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~bjackson/schedfall2001links.html, include:

o Sept. 4: "Die Büchse der Pandora/Pandora's Box," 1929, directed by Georg Pabst. Few films come close to "Pandora's Box" for psychological and erotic depth. Louise Brooks is magnificent as Lulu in this film based on two plays by Franz Wedekind. Her look led to a comic strip -- "Dixie Dugan" -- and a social craze -- flappers. Philip Carli will provide piano accompaniment.

o Sept 11: "Little Caesar," 1930, directed by Mervyn LeRoy. Edward G. Robinson is superb as Rico Bandello, a fictionalized blend of Chicago's Al Capone and Brooklyn's Buggsy Goldstein, in the first great gangster film. This film also has been selected for the National Film Registry.

o Sept 25: "Trouble in Paradise," 1932, directed by Ernst Lubitsch. Considered by many critics to be the great Lubitsch's best film, "It is about people who are almost impossibly adult," wrote critic Roger Ebert. "So suave, cynical, sophisticated, smooth and sure that a lifetime is hardly long enough to achieve such polish. They glide." Herbert Marshall and Miriam Hopkins aren't just suave; they're also crooks who fall in love. And Kay Francis is a rich widow who would like to buy a piece of the action and, failing at that, is content to rent it for a night or two. Selected for the National Film Registry.

o Oct 2: "Sullivan's Travels," 1942, directed by Preston Sturges. This is a movie about a Hollywood director who goes out into the world to find meaning when he finds himself blocked on his new movie, "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?" "'Sullivan's Travels,'" wrote critic Tim Dirks, "is generally considered one of writer/director Preston Sturges' greatest dramatic comedies -- and a satirical statement of his own director's creed. Selected for the National Film Registry.

o Oct 9: "Sunset Boulevard," 1950, directed by Billy Wilder. "All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up," says Gloria Swanson as faded film star Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard's unforgettable final scene. The film received 11 Oscar nominations and three Academy Awards, and was selected for the National Film Registry.

o Oct 16: "Le Salaire de la Peur/Wages of Fear," 1953, directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot. William Friedkin remade this in 1977 as "Sorcerer," with hugely expensive special effects and Roy Scheider for his star, but he didn't come close to the astonishing tension created by Clouzot's direction and editing, Armand Thirard's electrifying cinematography and Yves Montand's brilliant first film performance. Seminar participants will see the restored version, which is 20 percent longer than the film Americans were permitted to see when it was released here nearly 50 years ago.

o Oct 23: "The Night of the Hunter," 1955, directed by Charles Laughton. Roger Ebert calls this "one of the greatest of all American films." Leonard Maltin describes it as an "atmospheric allegory of innocence, evil and hypocrisy." The film credits writer James Agee with the script, but it really was written by Laughton days before shooting began. It is his only film behind the camera. Selected for the National Film Registry.

o Oct 30: "Sweet Smell of Success," 1957, directed by Alexander Mackendrick. "'Sweet Smell of Success' is one of those rare films," wrote Roger Ebert, "where you remember the names of characters because you remember them -- as people, as types, as benchmarks." Selected for the National Film Registry.

o Nov 6: "Il Gattopardo/The Leopard," 1963, directed by Luchino Visconti. The version of this film released in the United States 40 years ago was badly cut and mangled. This restored print of Visconti's magnificent epic, based on Lampedusa's novel and set in Sicily in 1860, shows why the film has long been so highly regarded by European critics. Burt Lancaster is superb as the prince coming to terms with Garbaldi's unification of Italy, and Alain Delon and Claudia Cardinale are one of film's great romantic couples.

o Nov 13: "Il Conformista/The Conformist," 1970, directed by Bernardo Bertolucci. This film is considered by many to be Bertolucci's best effort. Jean-Louis Trintignant is superb as Marcello Clerici, the central character of Alberto Moravia's novel about a man who so wants to belong he manages to betray everything and everyone except the fascists, for whom he is merely an instrument.

o Nov 20: "Don't Look Now," 1973, directed by Nicolas Roeg. Roeg, cinematographer for François Truffaut's "Fahrenheit 451" and David Lean's "Dr. Zhivago," directed 20 films, three of them memorable: "The Man Who Fell to Earth" (1976), "Walkabout" (1971) and "Don't Look Now." This horrific and erotic film, almost perfectly misunderstood by critics when it was released, now is regarded as a masterpiece.

o Nov 27: "Days of Heaven," 1978, directed by Terrence Malick. Malick has directed only two other feature films: "Badlands" 1973 and "Thin Red Line" 1998. All three are haunting, resonant and beautiful. Roger Ebert describes "Days of Heaven" as "one of the most beautiful films ever made. Malick's purpose is not to tell a story of melodrama, but one of loss. His tone is elegiac."

o Dec 4: "The Adventure of Baron Munchausen," 1988, directed by Terry Gilliam. Gilliam, the American member of Monty Python's Flying Circus, has woven a delightful rambling narrative about the fantastic baron, and he has populated it with grand characters played by, among others, John Neville, Eric Idle, Robin Williams, Uma Thurman, Sting and Jonathan Pryce. This is a grand and hilarious movie, a rollicking and imaginative end to the fourth in this series of terrific movies.