Drama

SF’s Noir City 6 hits Castro Jan 25 - Feb 3

by Chris   ⋅   December 11, 2007   ⋅   Comment now   ⋅    RSS

Press Release below:

NOIR CITY 6
January 25 - February 3, 2008
Castro Theatre, San Francisco

The most fabulous Film Noir festival on earth returns to darken the Bay City
and delight the most dedicated moviegoers in the world. Presented by the Film
Noir Foundation, whose mission is to “rescue and restore America’s noir
heritage,” this year’s festival continues its tradition of unearthing astounding
rarities not available in any “home entertainment” format. “Czar of Noir” Eddie
Muller will be back to chaperone the Castro’s packed houses through the
sinister, sexy, and sin-drenched streets of Noir City.

The 10-day festival kicks off Friday night, January 25, 2008, with a tribute
to one of Hollywood’s most versatile and enduring stars, Joan Leslie. In
classics such as High Sierra, Sergeant York and Yankee Doodle Dandy, Leslie made a
vivid impression as an irrepressible All-American ingénue. This being Noir
City, Joan will be honored with screenings of her two darkest dramas: the
ultra-rare Repeat Performance (1947) and the pitch-black show biz drama The Hard Way
(1943). Between films, the 82 year-old actress will engage in an onstage
interview with host Eddie Muller.

The following night, Saturday, January 26, the Film Noir Foundation proudly “
re-premieres” a nearly forgotten masterpiece, Joseph Losey’s The Prowler
(1951). Written by legendary blacklisted screenwriter Dalton Trumbo (though
uncredited), this magnificent noir has been fully restored to its original bleak
splendor by the Film Noir Foundation and the UCLA Film and Television Archive. The
evening screening will be introduced by author James Ellroy, who cites The
Prowler as his favorite film.

Saturday night will also feature a special literary event: the San Francisco
launch of the mostly eagerly anticipated crime fiction event of 2008, A Hell
of a Woman: An Anthology of Female Noir, edited by Megan Abbott. This
collection features 26 short stories by the crème de la crème of contemporary crime
writers-many of whom will be at the Castro to sign what’s already being hailed as
the best collection of noir fiction in years.

Also premiering that evening will be The Grand Inquisitor, a 20-minute film
by Eddie Muller adapted from his contribution to A Hell of a Woman. Legendary
blacklisted actress Marsha Hunt, 90, returns to the screen in what Muller calls
“a noir fairy tale, based on actual events.” A cache of used books leads an
intrepid young “investigator” to the home of a woman who may, or may not, be
the widow of America’s most notorious serial killer. Ms. Hunt, last year’s
Guest of Honor at Noir City 5, will be in attendance for the film’s World
Premiere.

Other highlights of NOIR CITY 6 include: a double bill (Tuesday, January 29)
of rarities from 20th Century-Fox-Hangover Square and Dangerous Crossing
-co-presented by Fox Home Entertainment in honor of its popular Fox Film Noir
Collection DVD series; the debut of three brand new 35mm prints (Night Has 1000 Eyes
, Woman In Hiding, and The Story of Molly X) struck by Universal Pictures
expressly for Noir City; the publication party for Alan Rode’s new book, Charles
McGraw: Biography of a Film Noir Tough Guy, featuring a double shot of McGraw:
Reign of Terror (1949) and Border Incident (1949); three rarely screened gems
starring the great Ida Lupino; a tribute to star-crossed beauty Gail Russell;
a night of “neo-noir” featuring the Coen Brother’s 2001 noir homage The Man
Who Wasn’t There (with a very special guest!), and a closing night double
feature (Road House and Night and the City) honoring “The Last Man Standing,”
Richard Widmark.

(See the attached full schedule of films)

In keeping with its commitment to provide the world’s most discerning
filmgoers with a unique and communal cinema experience, 12 of the 21 films shown this
year are not available in any home entertainment format.

As usual, the festival will also feature live performances by local
noir-influenced musicians and some as well as unannounced special guests-you never know
who’ll drop in unexpectedly for a dose of classic noir!

THE COMPLETE NOIR CITY 6 SCHEDULE

Friday, January 25-Opening Night Tribute to Joan Leslie

Repeat Performance
d. Alfred Werker, Eagle-Lion, 1947, 93 min. RARITY! NOT ON DVD
Think of it as the noir version of It’s a Wonderful Life. On New Year’s Eve,
a young woman (Leslie) is given the chance to relive the previous year,
leading up to the moment when she murdered her husband (Louis Hayward). Will there
be a “repeat performance?” This was Leslie’s breakout role, in which the
ingénue became a full-grown woman. Richard Basehart is stunning in his movie debut.
(There are no playable 35mm prints of this film; we are presenting it here in
16mm, courtesy of Films Around the World). 7:00

ONSTAGE INTERVIEW WITH JOAN LESLIE FOLLOWING THE FILM

The Hard Way
d. Vincent Sherman, Warner Bros., 1943, 109 min. NOT ON DVD
This backstage melodrama, featuring a blistering screenplay by Daniel Fuchs
and Peter Viertel, is so dark and nasty we’re granting it honorary “noir”
status so it can be appreciated on the big screen in all its mean-spirited glory.
Joan Leslie plays a young woman steered into a show biz career by the Big
Sister From Hell-Ida Lupino in an Oscar-nominated performance! Legendary producer
Jerry Wald gives it the full Warner Bros. “dark drama” treatment, including
stunning cinematography by the great James Wong Howe. 9:30

Saturday, January 26-Honoring Screenwriter Dalton Trumbo
The Prowler
d. Joseph Losey, United Artists, 1951, 92 min. NOT ON DVD
BRAND NEW RESTORED 35MM PRINT!
Don’t miss the “re-premiere” of a nearly forgotten masterpiece! Joseph
Losey’s greatest American-made film-written by legendary blacklisted screenwriter
Dalton Trumbo-has been fully restored to its original bleak splendor by the
Film Noir Foundation and the UCLA Film and Television Archive. Crazed cop Webb
Garwood (Van Heflin) stalks a lonely Los Angeles housewife (Evelyn Keyes) and
eventually decides to win her in time-honored noir tradition: by knocking off
her husband. 3:00, 7:00

Gun Crazy
d. Joseph H. Lewis, 1950, 86 min.
Dalton Trumbo was the uncredited screenwriter of this “B” masterwork. No
picture before or since has more deliriously used side arms as sexual symbols.
Loopy, corny, overheated-and one stunning adrenaline rush of creative
moviemaking from start to finish, highlighted by several of the most exciting action
sequences ever filmed. 1:00, 9:40

SPECIAL LITERARY EVENT
“A Hell of a Woman” Booksigning
6:00 - 7:00 on the mezzanine
Be here for the San Francisco launch of the mostly eagerly anticipated crime
fiction event of 2008! A Hell of a Woman: An Anthology of Female Noir, edited
by Megan Abbott, is a collection of 26 short stories (and a dazzling array of “
appreciations”) by the crème de la crème of contemporary crime writers-many
of whom will be at the Castro to sign what’s already being hailed as the best
noir anthology in years. Book sales and signing sponsored by M Is for Mystery
bookstore.

NOIR CITY EXTRA! WORLD PREMIERE SCREENING!
The Grand Inquisitor
scr/dir. Eddie Muller, 2008, 20 min.
Legendary blacklisted actress Marsha Hunt, 90, returns to the screen in “a
noir fairy tale, based on actual events.” A cache of used books leads an
intrepid young “investigator” to the home of a woman who may, or may not, be the
widow of America’s most notorious unapprehended serial killer. 9:00

Sunday, January 27-Remembering Gail Russell
Moonrise
d. Frank Borzage, Republic, 1948, 90 min. Archival Print! NOT ON DVD
Relentlessly romantic optimist Frank Borzage is the last director you’d
expect to turn out an effective film noir, but this brilliantly directed drama was
his sound era masterpiece. Dane Clark gives a bruised and brooding performance
as a young man convinced that his father’s “bad blood” has sealed his
miserable fate. Can he be saved by the love of “good girl” Gail Russell? Print
courtesy of UCLA Film and Television Archive. 1:40, 5:10, 8:50

Night Has a Thousand Eyes
d. John Farrow, 1948, 81 min. New 35mm Print! NOT ON DVD
A lost noir returns to the big screen! Edward G. Robinson stars as a man
cursed with the ability to predict the future. John Farrow, a director at his most
stylish in noir terrain, adapts from the novel by master of suspense Cornell
Woolrich. Co-starring Gail Russell and John Lund. Universal Pictures struck
this new print exclusively for Noir City! 3:30, 7:00

Monday, January 28-Dames Tough as Nails!
Woman in Hiding
d. Michael Gordon, Universal, 1950, 92 min.
Noir City favorite Ida Lupino gives another superb performance, playing a
successful career woman who marries Mr. Wrong (Steven McNally) and finds herself
desperately trying to evade his plans to dispose of her and take over the
business. A long-missing (and underrated) thriller, presented in a gloriously
pristine print from Universal Pictures! 7:30

Jeopardy
d. John Sturges, 1953, 69 min.
That’s right: 69 minutes. And it’s as simple and compelling as suspense films
get: a vacationing man (Barry Sullivan) is trapped beneath a pier in Mexico,
the tide steadily rising. His wife (Barbara Stanwyck) desperately seeks help.
It comes in the surly form of a fugitive (Ralph Meeker) who expects his
payment upfront (and in something more than cash) if he’s going to play hero.
Stanwyck and Meeker are electrifying as comrades and combatants. 9:00

Tuesday, January 29-20th Century Fox Film Noir
A special evening celebrating Fox Home Entertainment’s DVD Film Noir
Collection!

Hangover Square
d. John Brahm, 1945, 77 min.
Laird Cregar, one of the most memorable film actors of the forties, makes his
final screen appearance (he died at 29 years of age!) in this stark and
haunting tale of a Victorian era composer driven by the sounds in his head to
create masterful concertos-and beautiful corpses. New to DVD, but there’s nothing
like seeing Joseph LaShelle’s stunning cinematography on massive scale, or
hearing Bernard Herrmann’s thrilling “Concerto Macabre” through majestic theater
speakers. 7:30

Dangerous Crossing
d. Joseph M. Newman, 1953, 75 min.
Legendary “locked room” mystery writer John Dickson Carr (on whose novel
this film based) isn’t exactly the definition of noir-but we’re thrilled by any
chance to bring actress Jeanne Crain back to the big screen. Here she plays a
bride whose husband mysteriously vanishes from the ocean liner on which they’re
taking their honeymoon. Directed by Joe Newman (711 Ocean Drive, Abandoned,
The Human Jungle). 9:00

Wednesday, January 30-Tribute to Tough Guy Charles McGraw
6:00 - 7:00 Charles McGraw Booksigning!
Author Alan Rode will be signing copies of his book, Charles McGraw:
Biography of a Film Noir Tough Guy, on the mezzanine. Book sales and signing sponsored
by M Is for Mystery bookstore.

Reign of Terror
d. Anthony Mann, Eagle-Lion, 1949, 89 min.
Director Mann and cinematographer John Alton, using the full-bore noir
treatment, turn the French Revolution into a crime saga dripping with greed, deceit
and betrayal. With Robert Cummings as Charles D’Aubigny and Richard Basehart
as Robespierre. All of the elements are here-atmospheric camerawork, taut
script, a beautiful spy (Arlene Dahl), and fearsome Charles McGraw (looking like
the leader of French biker gang!) as Robespierre’s sadistic henchman. 7:00

Border Incident
d. Anthony Mann, MGM, 1949, 94 min.
Spectacular cinematography by noir master John Alton transforms this
procedural exposé of illegal farm workers on the Texas-Mexico border into a noir fever
dream, starring Ricardo Montalban and George Murphy as undercover agents
trying to break up an illegal labor racket. An intense and surprisingly violent
“docu-drama” written by crime specialist John C. Higgins and featuring Charles
McGraw at his most mercilessly cold-blooded. 9:00

Thursday, January 31-San Francisco Noir!
D.O.A.
d. Rudolph Mate, United Artists, 1950, 83 min.
Is it the greatest noir premise of all-time? Edmond O’Brien plays a man given
a slow-acting poison who has only hours to figure out who has killed him, and
why. Ernest Laszlo’s inventive camerawork gives viewers a breathless tour of
noir-era San Francisco before zooming to Los Angeles for the nail-biting
climax. A terrific supporting cast brings to life an insanely inspired script by
Russell Rouse and Clarence Greene. (16mm print courtesy of Wade Williams) 7:10

The Story of Molly X
d. Crane Wilbur, Universal, 1949, 82 min. NEW 35MM PRINT!
RARITY! NOT ON DVD
Writer-director Wilbur had an obsession with making prison movies, but this
ultra-rarity has a twist: the protagonist is a brass-knuckled dame (June Havoc)
who takes over her boyfriend’s Frisco gang after he’s killed. After murdering
the culprit in cold blood, she winds up in women’s prison-and you know what
happens in those places…
9:00

Friday, February 1-Murderous Husbands!
Conflict
d. Curtis Bernhardt, Warner Bros., 1945, 86 min.
RARITY! NOT ON DVD
One of Humphrey Bogart’s most rarely screened films features the legendary
actor playing a scheming wife-killer (Alexis Smith stands in for Bogart’s
real-life ball-and-chain, Mayo Methot) who gets into a cat-and-mouse game with
family friend Sidney Greenstreet-a psychiatrist with an expertise in the workings
of the criminal mind. Director Robert Siodmak wrote the original story, “The
Pentagram,” which he originally intended to direct. 7:00

The Suspect
d. Robert Siodmak, Universal, 1944, 85 min. RARITY! NOT ON DVD
Purists might argue that the Edwardian setting isn’t noir. Listen: whenever a
lovelorn sap murders his wife to pursue a feckless young filly-that’s noir,
whatever era provides the backdrop. Charles Laughton is trapped in the loveless
marriage, and gorgeous Ella Raines looks like his ticket out. This unjustly
overlooked suspense classic is comparable to the best of Hitchcock. 9:00

Saturday, February 2-Darkness In the Afternoon
The 3rd Voice
d. Hubert Cornfield, 20th Century-Fox, 1960, 80 min.
RARITY! NOT ON DVD
This sensational, brain-teasing murder yarn (based on the novel ‘All the Way”
by Charles Williams) features noir stalwart Edmond O’Brien as an anonymous
chump hired by scheming secretary Laraine Day to kill her boss/lover-and assume
his identity at a Mexican fishing resort. The appearance of sexy songbird
Julie London complicated matters, of course. Featuring breathtaking
black-and-white Cinemascope cinematography by Ernest Haller. 1:00, 4:10

The Face Behind the Mask
d. Robert Florey, Columbia, 1941, 69 min. RARITY! NOT ON DVD
Peter Lorre stars as an immigrant watchmaker, horribly disfigured in a fire,
whose despair and alienation lead him into a life of crime. A friendship with
a young blind woman (Evelyn Keyes) offers him a shot at love and redemption.
But … this is a noir film festival. Screenplay by Paul Jarrico. 2:40, 5:45

The Man Who Wasn’t There-Neo-Noir Classic
d. Joel Coen, Gramercy Pictures, 2001, 116 min.
Billy Bob Thornton stars as an existentially disengaged barber whose plans to
open a dry cleaning business involve blackmail and (unintentional) murder. A
brilliantly crafted homage to classic film noir and the novels of James M.
Cain, featuring vivid performance by Frances McDormand, James Gandolfini, John
Polito, Tony Shaloub, Michael Badalucco, and Scarlett Johansson. 7:30

ONSTAGE INTERVIEW FOLLOWING FILM WITH BILLY BOB THORNTON (schedule
permitting)

Sunday, February 3-Last Man Standing: Richard Widmark
Roadhouse
d. Jean Negulesco, 20th Century-Fox, 1948, 95 min. NOT ON DVD
A star-powered face-off between two film noir icons: sassy Ida Lupino and
psychotic Richard Widmark. Sparks fly when Ida takes a job crooning in Widmark’s
rural roadhouse, but when she throws him over for his boyhood chum (Cornel
Wilde) the joint really starts jumping. 3:00, 7:00

Night and the City
d. Jules Dassin, 20th Century-Fox, 1950, 96 min.
We close out Noir City 6 with a stunning print of the most baroque and bleak
film noir of them all. The greatness of this film-besides Richard Widmark’s
devastating portrayal of the maniacal and pathetic Harry Fabian-is its stubborn
refusal to allow even the tiniest ray of light into Harry’s headlong descent
in hell. Featuring Gene Tierney, Googie Withers, Herbert Lom, Francis X.
Sullivan-and perhaps the ultimate film noir finale. 1:00, 5:00, 9:10