New Restorations and Special Presentations

FRI., 8/28, 7 p.m.
ALLEGRO NON TROPPO
Italy | 1976 | DCP | 75 min. | Italian with English subtitles
Director: Bruno Bozzeto
Cast: Maurizio Nichetti, Maurizio Micheli, Marialuisa Giovannini
An enterprising movie producer believes he has hit upon a winning concept: a program of original animated shorts set to classical music. Undeterred by warnings that this has already been done, he rallies an orchestra of geriatric women, a hapless conductor, and an animator that he keeps locked in the dungeon. Both a parody of and homage to Disney’s Fantasia, Allegro Non Tropo blends live-action slapstick with sublime animation set to the music of Vivaldi, Debussy, Stravinsky, Dvorak, Ravel, and Sibelius. A new 4K restoration will be screened, preceded by the WB/Merrie Melodies short, A Corny Concerto (1943, 8 min.).

SAT., 8/29, 7 p.m.
SMORGASBORD (CRACKING UP)
USA | 1983 | 35mm | 83 mins.
Director: Jerry Lewis
Cast: Jerry Lewis, Foster Brooks, Milton Berle
Jerry Lewis’ last vehicle as director and star is a gleefully chaotic collection of sketches packed with inspired physical antics and absurd situations. From a hilariously over-waxed doctor’s office to a restaurant nightmare to a wildly digressive scene depicting surgery without anesthetic, the film delivers one inventive gag after another with the fearless energy of Lewis’ early comedies. Long overlooked because of poor distribution, Smorgasbord is proudly presented by the Cinematheque in honor of the comedy legend’s centennial.

FRI., 9/4, 7 p.m.
AMERICAN JOB
USA | 1996 | DCP | 90 min.
Director: Chris Smith
Cast: Randy Russell, Matt Collier, Tom Wheeler
The Cinematheque celebrates Labor Day weekend with a new DCP restoration of the filmed-in-Wisconsin American Job, one of the funniest and most authentic depictions of working-class life ever committed to celluloid. A few years before he broke out with American Movie, director Chris Smith devised this deadpan work of cinematic fiction that follows around Randy Russell in a series of minimum wage jobs: plastic factory worker, fast food server, hotel room cleaner and more. Smith and co-writer/star Russell uncover one mundane absurdity after another in an ingenious gem that “rivals comedies such as Mike Judge’s Office Space as a workplace classic” (Nicholas Rapold, NY Sun).

SAT., 9/5, 7 p.m.
SERPENT’S PATH
Japan | 1998 | DCP | 85 min. | Japanese with English subtitles
Director: Kiyoshi Kurosawa
Cast: Sho Aikawa, Teruyuki Kagawa, Yurei Yanagi
Immediately following his hypnotic 1997 horror film Cure, legendary Japanese filmmaker Kiyoshi Kurosawa continued to explore the nature of violence with Serpent’s Path. Miyashita (Kagawa) believes he has found the man responsible for his daughter’s horrific death. Yet as he kidnaps and tortures the purported culprit in a dilapidated warehouse alongside his accomplice Nijima (Aikawa), Miyashita’s quest for vengeance steadily begets more carnage — and the discovery of uncomfortable truths about himself. Bleakly humorous and endlessly disturbing, Kurosawa’s film complicates the simple pleasures of revenge. A newly restored 4K DCP will be screened. (JM)

FRI., 9/11, 7 p.m.
AMORES PERROS
Mexico | 2000 | DCP | 153 min. | Spanish with English subtitles
Director: Alejandro González Iñárritu
Cast: Emilio Echevarria, Gael Garcia Bernal, Goya Toledo
Before he wowed moviegoers with Hollywood productions like Birdman and The Revenant, Alejandro González Iñárritu made his feature debut with this highly acclaimed triptych of stories all linked by a disastrous car crash. As the tales unfold, cruelty, chaos, and compassion are revealed. A new 4K restoration will be screened,
presented with the support of Latin American, Caribbean, and Iberian Studies at UW-Madison (UWLACIS).

SAT., 9/12, 7 p.m.
BELL, BOOK AND CANDLE
USA | 1958 | DCP | 103 min.
Director: Richard Quine
Cast: James Stewart, Kim Novak, Jack Lemmon
In the same year that they co-starred in Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpiece Vertigo, James Stewart and Kim Novak were paired again for this underrated and wickedly amusing comedy. During the Christmas season in Greenwich Village, lonely young witch Gillian (Novak), who lives with her beloved cat Pyewacket and runs an art gallery, casts a romantic spell on her dashing publisher neighbor (Stewart). With a deep bench of supporting players, including Jack Lemmon, Elsa Lanchester, and Ernie Kovacs, and a light directorial touch from the versatile Quine, Bell, Book and Candle is a magical holiday delight. (JM)

FRI., 9/18, 7 p.m.
BELLISSIMA
Italy | 1951 | DCP | 115 mins. | Italian with English subtitles
Director: Luchino Visconti
Cast: Anna Magnani, Tina Apicella, Walter Chiari
Screen legend Magnani gives a powerhouse comedic turn as a mother who crashes Cinecittà studios, hell-bent on turning her sweet, but ordinary seven-year-old girl into a child star. One of the few comedies from cinematic maestro Visconti, Bellissima takes a sardonic attitude towards the Italian film industry and the many fans who are caught up in the illusions of the dream factory. A new 4K restoration will be screened!

SAT., 9/19, 6 p.m.
THE PRODUCERS
USA | 1968 | DCP | 88 min.
Director: Mel Brooks
Cast: Zero Mostel, Gene Wilder, Kenneth Mars
From the masterful comic mind of Brooks comes the original film farce that inspired the smash Broadway musical. Wilder plays Leo Bloom, a meek accountant dragged into a scheme by money-hungry producer Max Bialystock (Zero Mostel). In their attempts to find a play guaranteed to flop, they create a musical monument to bad taste: Springtime for Hitler.

SAT., 9/19, 8 p.m.
THE TWELVE CHAIRS
USA | 1970 | DCP | 94 min.
Director: Mel Brooks
Cast: Ron Moody, Frank Langella, Dom DeLuise
Brooks’s second feature is set in Russia shortly after the Bolshevik uprising, where a former aristocrat turned hapless clerk (Moody) and a slick con man (Langella) search the country for a set of 12 heirloom chairs, one of which contains a fortune in hidden jewels. As in The Producers, the protagonists, along with their chief rival (DeLuise), are greedy treasure hunters, forever outwitted by their own inept plans. “The Twelve Chairs is more than merely funny. It brings to a full flowering the Brooks attitude” (Roger Ebert).

FRI., 9/25, 7 p.m.
CRY-BABY
USA | 1990 | 35mm | 85 mins.
Director: John Waters
Cast: Johnny Depp, Amy Locane, Ricki Lake
1950s Baltimore gets torn apart when preppy Allison (Locane) falls hard for juvenile delinquent Wade “Cry-Baby” Walker (Depp, already subverting his heartthrob image in his first major film role). A tongue-in-cheek musical delivered at the hopped-up pitch of its rockabilly soundtrack, this wildly entertaining romp both satirizes and embraces teen movie tropes. Featuring a supporting cast stacked with enough showbiz weirdos to rival Marty Supreme, Waters’s first movie for a major Hollywood studio is a perfect fusion of his outsider attitude and pure pop cinema. (MK)

SAT., 9/26, 7 p.m.
THE THIRD MAN
UK | 1949 | 35mm | 104 min.
Director: Carol Reed
Cast: Joseph Cotten, Alida Valli, Orson Welles
In the ruins of postwar Vienna, American writer Holly Martins (Cotten) arrives to visit old friend Harry Lime (Welles). However, Holly discovers that Lime is supposedly dead and under investigation for his role in the city’s lawless black market. Working from a screenplay by novelist Graham Greene, director Reed inventively directs this classic noir with a wealth of angled compositions and sinister shadows. Aided by its singular zither score and vivid location shooting, The Third Man is a masterfully off-kilter mystery, plunging deep into a morally murky world. A brand new 35mm print, courtesy of Rialto Pictures, will be screened. (JM)

FRI., 10/2, 7 p.m.
MIKEY AND NICKY
USA | 1976 | DCP| 106 mins.
Director: Elaine May
Cast: Peter Falk, John Cassavetes, Ned Beatty
Nicky (Cassavetes) is in trouble. Hiding from the mob in a Philadelphia hotel room, the frantic gangster calls Mikey (Falk) for help. Little does Nicky know that his old pal is in cahoots with the exasperated hitman (Beatty) hunting him down. As Mikey and Nicky roam the city, director May applies her keen eye for flawed male characters to this deteriorating friendship, one that seems destined to end in a harrowing betrayal. Featuring career-best work from longtime collaborators Falk and Cassavetes, this darkly funny, anxiety-inducing crime story is one of the great American films of the 1970s. (JM)

FRI., 10/9, 7 p.m.
ISHTAR
USA | 1987 | DCP| 107 mins.
Director: Elaine May
Cast: Warren Beatty, Dustin Hoffman, Isabelle Adjani
Hoffman and Beatty are inept songwriters who find themselves embroiled in a C.I.A.-engineered spy plot in the Middle East. Before this terrific satire on Reagan-era foreign policy had been seen by anyone, audiences had their minds made up for them by the “info-tainment” press corps who relentlessly reported the high production costs and portrayed the gifted May as a filmmaker-out-of-control. She sadly hasn’t directed a film since.

FRI., 10/16, 6 p.m.
LETTY LYNTON
USA | 1932 | DCP | 84 min.
Director: Clarence Brown
Cast: Joan Crawford, Robert Montgomery, Nils Asther
This terrific MGM pre-code melodrama was inspired by the notorious 19th-century Madeleine Smith murder trial. Crawford stars as the title character, a glamorous socialite fleeing a destructive affair in South America and seeking a fresh start with a wealthy suitor (Montgomery). When her former lover (Asther) attempts to blackmail her, Letty is driven to desperate measures. A major critical and box-office success in 1932, the film became equally famous for the lavish gowns designed by Adrian, including Crawford’s iconic white organdy dress that sparked a nationwide fashion craze. Despite its acclaim, copyright litigation forced Letty Lynton out of circulation in 1936, leaving it largely unseen for more than 90 years until its long-awaited 4K DCP restoration and return to the big screen this year!

FRI., 10/16, 8 p.m.
THE WILD PARTY
USA | 1929 | DCP | 77 min.
Director: Dorothy Arzner
Cast: Clara Bow, Fredric March, Jack Oakie
The prototypical flapper Bow crackles with rebellious energy as Stella Ames, the ringleader of a clique of hard-partying college women whose carefree antics collide with the strict rules of campus life. When Stella falls for a handsome young professor played by UW-Madison legend and Racine native Fredric March, the story shifts from wild comedy to a romantically-charged thrill ride. The first talkie for Bow, Paramount Pictures, and pioneering director Arzner, The Wild Party captures the daring spirit of the pre-Code era with sharp humor and complex characters. A new 4K restoration will be screened! Preceded by Betty Boop’s first appearance in Dizzy Dishes (1930, 7 min.).

SAT., 10/17, 7 p.m.
DER FAN
West Germany | 1982 | DCP | 92 min.
Director: Eckhart Schmidt
Cast: Désirée Nosbusch, Bodo Steiger, Simone Brahmann
Teenager Simone (Nosbusch) has developed a bordering-on-unhealthy obsession with pop singer R (Steiger). Abandoning school and her family to pursue her fantasy, Simone encounters her idol at a TV taping and the stage is set for a coolly enacted nightmare of seduction, rejection, and revenge. Eerily directed in a clinically detached style, this hypnotic thriller was never given an official theatrical release in the U.S. until now. The 4K DCP restoration of the original German language version is provided by Fun City Editions.

FRI., 10/23, 7 p.m.
THE TASTE OF TEA
Japan | 2004 | DCP | 143 min. | Japanese with English subtitles
Director: Katsuhito Ishii
Cast: Takahiro Sato, Maya Sakano, Tadanobu Asano
In the quiet Japanese countryside, a series of surreal and comic episodes explore a wildly unconventional family: an artist mother obsessed with animation, a hypnotherapist father, a lovestruck teenage son, a daughter haunted by a double, and an uncle troubled by ghosts of the past. Director Katsuhito Ishii, who contributed the anime sequence to Kill Bill, crafts an eccentric portrait of domestic life that blends deadpan humor, musical interludes, animated flourishes, and dreamlike imagery. Both playful and deeply odd, The Taste of Tea is “the most charming comedy in town,” (Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune).

SAT., 10/24, 7 p.m.
AFTER DARK, MY SWEET
USA | 1990 | 35mm | 114 mins.
Director: James Foley
Cast: Jason Patric, Rachel Ward, Bruce Dern
In this sun-baked neo-noir, a former boxer/escapee from a mental hospital (Patric) hooks up with a lonely widow (Ward) and a ne’er-do-well ex-cop (Dern) to hatch a kidnapping plot that goes wrong from the start. Filled with a cavalcade of noir archetypes, After Dark, My Sweet is, along with Sam Peckinpah’s The Getaway and Stephen Frears’s The Grifters, among the best adaptations of Jim Thompson novels. “One of the purest and most uncompromising of modern film noir. It captures above all the lonely, exhausted lives of its characters” (Roger Ebert). 35mm print courtesy North Carolina School of the Arts. (BR)

FRI., 10/30, 7 p.m.
THE HOLE
Taiwan, France | 1998 | 35mm | 95 min. | Mandarin with English subtitles
Director: Tsai Ming-Liang
Cast: Yang Kuei-Mei, Lee Kang-Sheng, Miao Tien
In The Hole, unusual interactions between two residents (Lee and Yang) of an apartment building in an apocalyptic, virus-ridden Taipei become the foundation for a one-of-a-kind movie musical. Goodbye, Dragon Inn filmmaker Tsai Ming-Liang’s work is often harsh and excruciatingly sad. Yet amid the static long takes and palpable loneliness, Tsai always finds clever ways to complicate the grimness of his subjects, tinkering with genre and bone-dry humor. One of Tsai’s finest films, The Hole will screen on a brand new 35mm print courtesy of Big World Pictures. (JM)

SAT., 10/31, 7 p.m.
CARRIE
USA | 1976 | 35mm | 97 min.
Director: Brian De Palma
Cast: Sissy Spacek, Piper Laurie, John Travolta
In the ultra-stylish first screen adaptation of Stephen King’s pop novel, Spacek gives an Oscar-nominated performance as the much-abused adolescent who uses her telekinetic powers to exact revenge on her tormentors. De Palma elevates teen-horror movies to operatic levels with an arsenal of visual tricks including split-screen and slow-motion photography. A beautiful 35mm print from the Wisconsin Center for Film & Theater Research, will screen in honor of Carrie’s 50th anniversary.

FRI., 11/6, 6 p.m.
LET THERE BE LIGHT
USA | 1946 | DCP | 58 min.
Director: John Huston
Suppressed and unseen for decades, Huston’s powerful documentary chronicles the rehabilitation of psychologically traumatized World War II veterans, revealing the human cost of war with uncommon empathy. Presented in conjunction with the exhibition Craft/Work: A History of Occupational and Art Therapies, open in the Ebling Library Historical Reading Room from September 8 through December 17.

FRI., 11/6, 7:15 p.m.
BRIGHT VICTORY
USA | 1951 | 35mm | 97 min.
Director: Mark Robson
Cast: Arthur Kennedy, James Edwards, Peggy Dow
After he gets blinded by a German sniper’s bullet in 1943, Sergeant Larry Nevins (Kennedy, in an Oscar-nominated lead performance) begins the long and painful road to recovery. Landing in a military hospital, Larry pursues a romance with attending nurse Judy (Dow), while his casual racism affects his growing friendship with an African-American soldier, Joe (Edwards). This powerful, somewhat neglected postwar drama about a veteran’s redemption through courage and love will be screened in an excellent 35mm archival print.

SAT., 11/7, 7 p.m.
JOSIE AND THE PUSSYCATS
USA | 2001 | 35mm | 98 min.
Director: Harry Elfont, Deborah Kaplan
Cast: Rachael Leigh Cook, Rosario Dawson, Parker Posey
When an evil record label implants subliminal messaging in pop music to brainwash the youth, rock trio Josie and the Pussycats become their unwitting Trojan Horse. Josie‘s buoyant spoof of consumerism gamely extends the gag to the film itself, which is an unparalleled parody of product placement. Simultaneously subversive and escapist, this underrated comedy features a memorable batch of mall-punk cuts by alt-rock ringers like Adam Schlesinger. (MK)

FRI., 11/20, 7 p.m.
PARAMOUNT ON PARADE
USA | 1930 | 35mm | 102 min.
Director: Ernst Lubitsch, Edmund Goulding, Dorothy Arzner and 8 others
Cast: Gary Cooper, Clara Bow, Fredric March
A great burst of pre-code fun, Paramount on Parade was Paramount Pictures’ contribution to the all-star studio musical revue movie cycle of the early talkie years. Featuring 20 individual segments from 11 directors, the movie is literally a showcase for the incredible talents under contract: Gary Cooper, Clara Bow, Fredric March, Maurice Chavalier, Jean Arthur, Kay Francis, Jack Oakie, William Powell, Fay Wray, and lots, lots more stars. Hard to see for many years, a few sequences have been lost or partially lost. This 35mm preservation print from the UCLA Film & Television Archive restores the two-color Technicolor to several sequences and is the most complete version available.

SAT., 11/21, 7 p.m.
MICHAEL MANN’S MANHUNTER: THE FINAL CUT
USA | 1986 | DCP | 120 min.
Director: Michael Mann
Cast: William Petersen, Brian Cox, Tom Noonan
Before Jonathan Demme’s The Silence of the Lambs, writer/director Michael Mann first brought Thomas Harris’ popular series of crime novels to the screen with this alluring adaptation of Red Dragon. Retreating to a quiet life with his family after taking down the infamous Hannibal Lecktor (Cox), FBI “manhunter” Will Graham (Petersen) returns to work following the emergence of an enigmatic new killer. An extraordinarily stylish modern thriller, Manhunter is an immersive portrait of Graham’s obsessive pursuit. Mann has declared this new 4K restoration to be the final, definitive version of his landmark procedural. (JM)

FRI., 12/11, 7 p.m.
12 MONKEYS
USA | 1995 | 35mm | 95 min.
Director: Terry Gilliam
Cast: Bruce Willis, Brad Pitt, Madeleine Stowe
Willis stars as a hapless “volunteer” from the future, sent to 20th century Baltimore by the post-apocalyptic-powers-that-be to try and figure out who or what triggered a pandemic that killed 99% of the earth’s human population. Director Gilliam’s Hollywood-blockbuster riff on Chris Marker’s La Jetee teems with details that bring to life his visions of a dystopian future and the almost-as-dystopian present. 12 Monkeys masterfully combines mordant humor, surreal lunacy, big screen sci-fi action set pieces, and an achingly vulnerable, melancholic heart. (BR)

SAT., 12/12, 2 p.m.
FANNY AND ALEXANDER
Sweden | 1982 | 35mm | 188 min. | Swedish with English subtitles
Director: Ingmar Bergman
Cast: Pernilla Allwin, Bertil Guve, Jan Malmsjö
At the twilight of his illustrious career, Bergman mined his own childhood memories for this moving family drama told on a grand scale. When the patriarch of the Ekdahls, a Swedish family of actors in the early twentieth century, dies suddenly, the children (Allwin and Guve) must adjust to life under Bishop Edvard (Malmsjö), their mother’s cruel new husband. Bergman’s austere mood and signature existential meditations here exist in tandem with moments of warmth and joy, including an extended sequence chronicling the family’s annual Christmas party. A 35mm print of the film’s theatrical version will be screened. (JM)

Marquee Theater at Union South
SAT., 12/12, 7 p.m.
COMMUNICATION ARTS SHOWCASE – Fall 2026
USA | 2026 | 90 min.
Highlighting works produced in Communication Arts Media Production courses at UW Madison, this program is curated by the instructors of documentary and narrative production courses and gives new filmmakers the opportunity to present their films on screen for the first time.