All Cinematheque Programs August 29-December 14

THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL

  • Thu., Aug. 29 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

An aspiring actor with severe facial disfigurement, Edward is resigned to a dreary day-to-day of infomercial gigs and pining for his next-door neighbor (Renate Reinsve of The Worst Person in the World). Things start to turn around when he undergoes a radical medical procedure (leaving him looking like star Sebastian Stan) and wins the role he was literally born to play, only to be foiled by his suave opposite number (Under the Skin’s Adam Pearson). Hinging on a transformative lead performance from Stan, this incisive, hilarious, and totally original dark comedy takes a scalpel to contemporary questions of identity. (MK)

  • Fri., Aug. 30 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Sometime in the first half of the 20th Century, in an unspecified European country on the brink of war, a luxury hotel concierge (Fiennes) and his bellboy protégé (Revolori) are wrapped up in a plot that involves an art theft, a large family inheritance, and romance!  Winner of four Academy Awards, Anderson’s most celebrated feature is one of the grandest entertainments in recent memory. The director’s distinct visual style is explored in a video essay by David Bordwell that will be shown after the feature.

  • Sat., Aug. 31 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Life during wartime gets rather deadly for a group of British doctors and nurses stalked by a serial killer in this delightfully daft WWII-era comedy-thriller. Amidst frequent air-raids and enough romantic entanglements to power a season’s worth of soap opera plotlines, the murders pile up, and no one is above suspicion in the eyes of bomb-shy Inspector Cockrill (played to perfection by the incomparable Alastair Sim). Loaded with delicious period details, sharp, dark humor, and a bomb shelter’s worth of twists and turns, Green for Danger is a crackerjack entertainment, featuring crisp black and white cinematography and stylish direction from Sidney Gilliat. (BR)

  • Thu., Sep. 5 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

ME, the latest short animated film from two-time Academy Award nominee Hertzfeldt, is an all-new musical odyssey. ME (2024, 22 min.) will be followed by It’s Such a Beautiful Day (2012, 71 min.), the feature-length tale of a man named Bill who, faced with dark and troubling events, confronts the meaning of life. #12 on Vulture’s list of “Best Movies of the Decade,” It’s Such a Beautiful Day is a masterful hybrid of hand-drawn animation and experimental optical effects that was six years in the making! The program will begin with a special filmed introduction from Don Hertzfeldt.

  • Fri., Sep. 6 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

In an Italian-American neighborhood in the Bronx, Donna and Michael (remarkable breakout performances from Sciorra and Eldard) are about to get married, but Michael would much rather be hanging out with his friends than settling down with Donna. With echoes of early Scorsese and Barry Levinson, this clear-eyed, utterly charming, yet totally unsentimental comedy-drama ushered in the American-Indie boom of the 1990s. Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at the 1989 Sundance Film Festival, director Nancy Savoca’s feature debut is a fresh-faced, foul-mouthed slice of life. 35mm print courtesy of the Sundance Collection at the UCLA Film & Television Archive. (BR)

  • Sat., Sep. 7 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Pulled from a plummeting plane moments before impact, professional prizefighter, part-time-saxophonist, and hobbyist pilot Joe Pendleton (Montgomery, in an Oscar-nominated performance), finds himself at the gates of heaven fifty years before schedule. Complications ensue when the celestial Mr. Jordan (a debonair Rains) tries to set things right by temporarily placing Joe within the body of a millionaire. With a brilliantly funny, Oscar-winning screenplay from Sidney Buchman and Seton I. Miller and stellar supporting turns from Edward Everett Horton and a sublime James Gleason, Jordan (adapted from the play Heaven Can Wait and remade with that title decades later starring Warren Beatty) is a screwball fantasy delight. (BR)

  • Thu., Sep. 12 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

This marvelously entertaining essay/memoir film by Emmy-winning television and film director Richard Shepard chronicles his youthful obsession with moviegoing in New York City of the 1970s and 1980s at beloved, now-vanished theaters. Constructed from over 200 film clips, including Shepard's early Super 8mm creations, Shepard’s story of his development as a cinephile and cineaste is interwoven with a poignant exploration of his enigmatic father. Shepard will appear in person to introduce Film Geek and participate in a post-screening discussion.

  • Fri., Sep. 13 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

The third chapter in the hugely successful horror franchise continues the exploits of Jason Voorhees, the phantom of Camp Crystal Lake. Jason, here donning the hockey mask for the first time, slices and dices his way through another assemblage of not-so happy campers. The terrific 3-D effects, including a vast number of jutting blades, never looked better than in this new digital restoration. Filmmaker Richard Shepard (Film Geek) will be on hand to introduce this genre classic.

  • Sat., Sep. 14 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

One of the most acclaimed Chinese films of all time spans 50 years from the beginning of the 20th Century to the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s. At the Peking Opera Academy Cheng Dieyi (Leslie Cheung) and Duan Xiaolou (Zhang Fengyi) endure harsh training, developing complementary talents as they mature, with Dieyi playing female roles and Xiaolou playing male warlords. Dieyi's unreciprocated love for Xiaolou, who marries a courtesan named Juxian (Gong Li), creates a perilous, jealousy-filled romantic triangle. This recently restored version brings back 20 minutes never before seen by North American movie audiences. Presented with the support of the Center for East Asian Studies at UW-Madison.

  • Thu., Sep. 19 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Sit in with seven psychics as they conduct intimate readings for their fellow New Yorkers in this fascinating documentary. Acclaimed filmmaker Lana Wilson takes us all the way behind the curtain, following the clairvoyants home and probing their individual personalities. Refreshingly uncynical, Look Into My Eyes mirrors the compassionate openness of its subjects, all of whom seek unknowable answers to life’s largest questions. Whether or not you personally believe in the authenticity of the readings becomes beside the point, as Look Into My Eyes convinces us that, either way, these people have something very real and profound to offer their clients. (MK)

  • Fri., Sep. 20 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

San Francisco, 1963. About to be shipped off to Vietnam, Eddie Birdlace (Phoenix) participates in a cruel game with his fellow marines: whoever brings the “ugliest date” to a party on their final night of liberty wins. Birdlace settles on Rose (Taylor), a sensitive aspiring poet and folk singer, and while their time together begins unpleasantly, the evening eventually leads to a genuine and tender connection between the young couple. In director Nancy Savoca’s first movie for a major studio, “The jolt is in the intricate expressivity Savoca brings to the story, with a repertoire of precise and painterly images that highlight performances of assertive yet graceful physicality” (Richard Brody, The New Yorker).

  • Sat., Sep. 21 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Dreyer’s haunting allegory, made during Germany’s occupation of Denmark, is a tale of witch hunts set in a small village in 1623. Powerfully ambiguous, Dreyer uses black costumes, images of fire and death, and dark, moody cinematography to conjure up an unforgettably oppressive atmosphere, a world where persecuted people could easily convince themselves of being inspired by the Devil. “Day of Wrath illustrates how a film may fascinate us not by its clarity but by its obscurity, not by fixed certainties but by teasing questions” (David Bordwell).

  • Sun., Sep. 22 | 2:00 PM
    Chazen

In mid-90s Beverly Hills, rich and popular Cher (Silverstone) rules her high school. When she gives klutzy new student Tai (Brittany Murphy) a makeover, Tai becomes more popular. Funny, stylish, and driven by its own memorable vernacular, this box-office hit was Heckerling’s second successful tour of California teendom after Fast Times at Ridgemont High. “Still the best Jane Austen adaptation” (Jane Hu, The Ringer), Clueless is loosely based on Austen’s 1815 novel, Emma.

  • Thu., Sep. 26 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Two former classmates reconnect in this perceptive and engaging portrait of a friendship that teeters on the edge of something more. Poetry teacher Mara’s settled down with a comfortable family life and steady job when her old college pal Matt (BlackBerry’s Matt Johnson, naturally funny as always) abruptly bursts back into her life and awakens part of her personality that’s gone dormant. Anyone can see these two have chemistry—strangers mistake them for a couple—and an impromptu road trip will test the depth of their connection. Matt and Mara perfectly captures the particular tensions and ambiguities of undefined relationships. (MK)

  • Fri., Sep. 27 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Deep in the heart of Italo-American NYC, butcher Joseph Santangelo (D’Onofrio) brings home his wife Catherine (Ullman) after “winning” her in a pinochle game, only to be confronted by his mother's religiously superstitious objections. Years later, Joe and Catherine’s daughter Teresa (Taylor), dedicatedly dreams of serving God. The third feature from co-writer/director Nancy Savoca was adapted from a novel by Francine Prose into a movie that is Transcendent...without a second that isn't blessed by the grace of its special humor and tenderness" (Roger Ebert). Savoca will appear in person for a special introduction and a post-screening discussion!

  • Sat., Sep. 28 | 2:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Alone in her apartment, a desperate, nameless woman (Magnani) engages in a final phone conversation with her ex-lover. An adaptation of a one-act, one-character play by Jean Cocteau (later remade by Pedro Almodovar and Tilda Swinton), La voce umana is the first part of a two-part anthology and showcase for the great Magnani. The short film was selected for screening by filmmaker Nancy Savoca, who will introduce La voce umana and discuss how it provided inspiration for her own work.

  • Sat., Sep. 28 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

In this irreverent black comedy that’s frequently compared to The Ladykillers, the inimitable Sim plays Hawkins, a timid watchmaker and professional assassin, whose target, a pompous Member of Parliament, is accidentally protected by a bumbling vacuum cleaner salesman (Cole). The farcical action leads to a tense and hilarious climax at a dilapidated seaside hotel called…The Green Man.

  • Thu., Oct. 3 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

In rural Georgia, retired schoolteacher Lia sets off on a quest to bring her long-missing trans niece back home. A young neighbor informs Lia that he’s heard the runaway has landed in Istanbul, and then surprises her by tagging along for the search. The odd couple of stoic retiree and restless teen join forces to scour a foreign city’s subculture. Levan Akin’s moving followup to the acclaimed And Then We Danced boasts a pair of fantastic lead performances, and doubles as a rich portrait of contemporary Istanbul. (MK)

  • Fri., Oct. 4 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

16-year-old Hayoung (Ji-young Yoo, star of Amazon Prime Video’s Expats) seeks distraction from her complicated family life by trying to fit in with her more affluent cram school peers. With the delicate exploration of generational conflict, class, and the model minority myth in LA’s Korean American community, it is clear why writer-director So Young Shelly Yo earned the Tribeca Festival’s Untold Stories award to finance this feature debut. Presented as part of the 2024 Asian American Spotlight, with the support of Asian American Studies at UW-Madison. (ZF)

  • Sat., Oct. 5 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Chaperone offers a character-driven portrait of complacent loner Misha (Mitzi Akaha), who is approaching her 30th birthday with few prospects in life. When a local high school senior unknowingly invites the older woman to a beach hangout, Misha chooses not to disclose the large age gap. Set in picturesque Hilo, Hawaii, Eisenberg's solo directorial debut captures the nuances of a flawed protagonist thanks to a dynamic visual style and Akaha’s fearless lead performance. Presented as part of the 2024 Asian American Spotlight, with the support of Asian American Studies at UW-Madison. The screening will be presented with open English captions. (ZF)

  • Thu., Oct. 10 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Roxy Music member; ambient music pioneer; producer of iconic records by David Bowie, Talking Heads, Devo, and more; composer of the Windows startup tone: Brian Eno’s resume rivals anyone in contemporary music. Drawing on Eno’s personal archives and conversations with the man himself, Gary Hustwit’s innovative profile emulates the artist’s forward-thinking creativity by using software to generate a different version of the movie every time it’s shown—the Eno screened at the Cinematheque will never be seen again. “There’s a pure joy to this documentary, a sense that creativity is miraculous and we ought to be grateful that we get to participate in it” (The New York Times). (MK)

  • Fri., Oct. 11 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Turkish immigrant Husseyin (Sayyad) endures a monotonous existence as a "guest worker" in '70s West Berlin, sharing a cramped apartment and toiling in a factory. Despite saving diligently with dreams of returning to Turkey, he faces relentless racism and failed romances, finding solace only in his immigrant housemates. Directed by Shahid-Saless during his own pivotal transition from Iran to Berlin, Far from Home is a masterful, poignant depiction of the immigrant experience, rich in restraint and deeply resonant in its portrayal of everyday life. Largely unseen for decades, a newly restored 4K DCP will be screened. Presented with the support of the Kemal H. Karpat Center for Turkish Studies at UW-Madison.

  • Sat., Oct. 12 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Still considered the finest movie adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s tale of horror, Mamoulian’s version features an Oscar-winning Fredric March in the title roles of a kindly doctor transformed by experimental drugs into his alter ego: a sadistic and amoral beast. Hopkins’ sexually-charged performance as bar singer Ivy is just one of many aspects of this production that demonstrate the freedoms Hollywood enjoyed in the era before the Production Code was enforced.  A recently restored 4K DCP of the uncensored, original release version will be shown.

  • Thu., Oct. 17 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Iconic surrealist Salvador Dalí gets a “real fake biopic” worthy of his mischievous legacy. Five actors swap in and out of the tiiiiitle role as the film anarchically stacks dreams within dreams, trips us up with false starts and fakeout endings, and generally has a blast thumbing its nose at every rule of conventional biopics. This daffy caricature comes courtesy of contemporary cinema’s clearest Dalí descendent, Quentin Dupieux, who proclaims it a “declaration of love to this man.” “Giddy, glitchy, and altogether delightful… a film that Buñuel surely would have appreciated” (Variety). (MK)

  • Fri., Oct. 18 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Bresson’s spare, visionary take on the Arthurian legend centers on Lancelot's adulterous affair with Guinevere during the decline of Camelot. Unmistakably Bressonian, especially in its depiction of violent battles and a dramatic jousting tournament, Bresson's minimalist style and elliptical imagery create a haunting tapestry of love, betrayal, and spiritual conflict. A new 4K DCP will be screened.

  • Sat., Oct. 19 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Tensions arise between a sophisticated wife and her simple husband when their strong-willed, modern niece enters their Tokyo household, exposing years of secrets between the middle-aged couple. Ozu’s quietly poignant depiction of an unraveling marriage is “a generous comedy that gives the main characters, no matter their failings, moments of warmth and dignity” (David Bordwell). The screening of a restored 4K DCP will be followed by David Bordwell’s video essay on The Flavor of Green Tea Over Rice. Presented with the support of the Center for East Asian Studies at UW-Madison.

  • Thu., Oct. 24 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

In rural China in the 1990s, a woman’s body washes ashore on a riverbank. Setting up shop in an abandoned cinema, the chief of police begins an investigation that only grows more mysterious with each suspect, clue—and additional body. Drenched in thick neo noir atmosphere and shot on tactile 16mm, this enveloping procedural justly earned comparisons to Bong Joon-ho’s classic Memories of Murder, and became one of China’s highest grossing independent films. (MK)

  • Fri., Oct. 25 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Employing a “found footage” device that predates The Blair Witch Project by 20 years, Cannibal Holocaust tells of four documentary filmmakers who meet a brutal end at the hands of a savage South American tribe of cannibals. Director Deodato’s approach to this material is so intensely graphic and realistic that he and the film’s producer were arrested upon its release, and the film was seized. Film scholar Nathan Wardinski, author of Dissecting Cannibal Holocaust, will join us for a post-screening discussion and Q&A. Viewer discretion advised.

  • Sat., Oct. 26 | 6:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

In 1962, teenage boys in a small, Midwestern farm town compete to defeat Sawtooth Jack, a deadly, candy-filled demon who annually rises from a corn patch on Halloween to wreak havoc. But the parents know more about this creepy tradition than they’re letting on and it’s up to rebellious teens Richie and Kelly to uncover the truth. Adapting a novel by Norman Partridge, director Slade (30 Days of Night, Hard Candy) and screenwriter Michael Gilio (Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves) have conjured up an imaginative, allegorical horror tale that combines elements of Halloween III: Season of the Witch and Shirley Jackson’s short story, “The Lottery.” “Buckets of gore and exceptional creature design - Dark Harvest delivers October ickiness with a crooked smile” (Matt Donato, Paste Magazine). Michael Gilio will be on hand to introduce and talk about Dark Harvest after the screening.

  • Sat., Oct. 26 | 8:30 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

A cadaverous toy manufacturer (O’Herlihy) hatches an evil plot to destroy trick-or-treating children through the manufacturing of diabolical rubber masks. It’s up to our divorced doctor hero (Atkins) to stop the madman’s plan. This is the one film in the Halloween franchise that does not feature the stalking killer Michael Myers, though series creator John Carpenter did return as producer and co-composer of the cool synth score. Original and creepy, this cult favorite will be introduced by one of its superfans, screenwriter Michael Gilio (Dark Harvest).

  • Sun., Oct. 27 | 2:00 PM
    Chazen

Based on a story by co-screenwriter Yusanari Kawabata, this silent film milestone has been hailed as the Japanese equivalent of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. A Page of Madness focuses on a husband struggling to connect with his insane wife amidst the harrowing asylum where she lives and he works as a janitor. Disturbing and daring, the film was considered lost for over 40 years until director Kinugasa discovered a single 35mm print hidden in his home. The digital version that will be shown features a score by the Alloy Orchestra.

  • Thu., Oct. 31 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

The self-professed World’s Greatest Assassin prepares to take on his biggest hit: a demonic crime lord lurking in a garish vision of Miami Beach. Shot entirely with infrared cameras and run through VFX that shift its color palette into a pulsing fluorescent rainbow, Aggro Dr1ft boasts a look like no narrative feature that’s come before. Still cinema’s unmatched enfant terrible at 50, Harmony Korine’s latest provocation is a fluid, wildly psychedelic dose of experiential moviemaking that must be seen to be believed. “I have seen the future of cinema, and it is Aggro Dr1ft. A hard-reset on filmmaking rules” (Variety). (MK)

  • Fri., Nov. 1 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Told as a flashback from a news account of a young man’s suicide, the great Bresson’s penultimate feature is a rigorous depiction of a modern world that’s not fit to live in. Centered around a group of youths (all played, in Bresson’s inimitable style, by nonactors), the story eventually focuses on Charles (Monnier), who finds little happiness in chasing women, pursuing religion, furthering his education, and taking drugs. When psychoanalysis fails and some environmental documentary footage deepens his despair, everything seems pointless to Charles. “Even though Bresson has painted a dark picture of wasted youth and beauty, one comes out of the film with a sense of exultation. When a civilization can produce a work of art as perfectly achieved as this, it is hard to believe that there is no hope for it” (Richard Roud).

  • Sat., Nov. 2 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

The oddest of all 80s cult classics, Buckaroo Banzai follows the exploits of the title character (Robocop’s Weller), a nuclear scientist and rock star. Buckaroo and his team of brainiac musicians use their Oscillation Overthruster to thwart madman Dr. Emilio Lizardo (Lithgow at his most wonderfully strange) and hostile Red Lectoids from the Planet 10. This smart sendup of sci-fi is kept afloat by a straight-faced cast that also includes Jeff Goldblum and Christopher Lloyd. A newly restored 4K DCP will be screened.

  • Thu., Nov. 7 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

In the dead of night in the Himalayas, a pair of scientists are studying moths in the wild. Standing before an illuminated sheet teeming with hundreds of specimens, their job is to make sense of an awe-inspiring array of sizes and colorings. Their lifespans may be less than a week, but moths have existed for millennia, and this documentary is a humbling reminder of humanity’s comparatively small place—yet large impact—in our planet’s history. Its subjects may fit in the palm of your hand, but the astonishing natural beauty and immersive soundscape of tiny fluttering wings make Nocturnes a definite big-screen experience. Presented with the support of the Center for South Asia at UW Madison. (MK)

  • Fri., Nov. 8 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

In a mystical forest, a cycle of insatiable consumption begins to change the ecology of the wooded area. A visionary, dark masterpiece of stop-motion animation, The Garden Sees Fire (2024, 15 min.) is the latest work from the gifted filmmaker Kiera Faber. The artist will join us in person for the World Premiere of The Garden Sees Fire and offer a retrospective that begins with her experimental short films man-i-fest (2005, 3 min.), Children of God (2006, 4 min.), Evils (2006, 6 min.), T is for Turnip (2015, 3 min.), and her other highly accomplished stop-motion gems Living Organics (2009, 10 min.) and Obscurer (2018, 19 min.).

  • Sat., Nov. 9 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Kind-hearted Mija (Yun Jung-hee) is raising her troubled teenage grandson Jong-wook while coping with the early stages of Alzheimer's and studying poetry at a local cultural center. Initially inspired by nature, Mija's journey takes a darker turn when Jong-wook becomes embroiled in a shocking scandal. Winner of two prizes at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival, Lee Chang-Dong’s most acclaimed effort presents an “extraordinary vision of human empathy” (The New York Times). Presented with the support of the Center for East Asian Studies at UW-Madison.

  • Thu., Nov. 14 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

The surprising link between American jazz and the fate of the Congo is brought to light in this riveting essay film. In the early 1960s, the US sent well-intentioned legends like Louis Armstrong to Africa as diplomatic ambassadors—and to act as a smokescreen for the coup against Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba. Soon after, drummer Max Roach crashed the United Nations assembly in protest. Propelled by a killer jazz soundtrack, this invigorating montage will open both your eyes and ears. “Crackling with energy, ideas, and formal daring. Political history has never felt so energizing and dynamically alive as it does here.” (Screen Daily). (MK)

  • Fri., Nov. 15 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Brian Sweeney Fitzgerald (Kinski) is a music lover determined to bring opera to the jungles of Peru. His plan includes hauling a huge riverboat over a mountain with the help of the natives. Director Herzog, who actually did haul a boat over a mountain for this epic masterpiece, proves the perfect filmmaker to tell the story of Fitzgerald’s grand folly. The legendary Cardinale co-stars as Fitzgerald’s girlfriend, Molly.

  • Sat., Nov. 16 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

In a gender-bending version of Hecht and MacArthur’s comedy The Front Page, Russell plays a whiz of a reporter determined to give up her typewriter for a wedding ring from Bellamy. But her editor and ex-husband Grant makes it hard for her to leave. The breathlessly delivered gags and dialogue are a signature of master comedy director Hawks. David Bordwell’s personal 35mm print will be screened, courtesy of the Wisconsin Center for Film & Theater Research. Of His Girl Friday, Bordwell wrote, “I fell in love with its heedless energy. It seemed to me a perfect example of what Hollywood could do.” The fill screening will be followed by David Bordwell's video essay on His Girl Friday (2017, 25 min.), originally produced for the Criterion Collection.

  • Sun., Nov. 17 | 2:00 PM
    Chazen

In this haunting adaptation of Joyce Carol Oates' celebrated short story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?", a teenage girl experiences an unsettling awakening. In her breakout lead performance, Laura Dern personifies the thrill and terror of adolescence as Connie, whose carefree summer is shattered by a menacing encounter with a mysterious stranger (Williams).

  • Thu., Nov. 21 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

After a century in France, 26 royal treasures plundered from the Kingdom of Dahomey return to their African home in present-day Benin. Atlantics director Mati Diop’s visionary documentary considers this act of repatriation from myriad perspectives, including, in a surreal touch, that of the statues themselves. Dahomey’s captivating centerpiece is a wide-ranging debate among Beninese university students about whether the return of a handful of thousands of stolen artifacts constitutes progress or an insult. Diop’s uniquely inquisitive and instructive film won the Golden Bear at the 2024 Berlin Film Festival. (MK)

  • Fri., Nov. 22 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

The chaotic history of the making of Werner Herzog’s Fitzcarraldo is the subject of Blank’s acclaimed documentary. The extremely revealing footage of Herzog shows an obsessed artist constantly battling to capture his vision on film. Burden of Dreams also includes a glimpse at the ultimately discarded performances of Jason Robards and Mick Jagger, actors who were eventually replaced by the unhinged Klaus Kinski. This new 4K restoration will be preceded by Blank’s short film, Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe (1980, 22 min.).

  • Sat., Nov. 23 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

Fiorentino gives the performance of her career as one of the cinema’s most memorably merciless femme fatales in this devilishly twisty neo noir. Wrapping every man in sight around her finger and playing them against one another, she stops at nothing in her quest to be rich and rid of them. Director Dahl’s followup to his cult favorite Red Rock West is another wicked blast. “Four stars. Not only ingenious and entertaining, but liberating, because we can sense the story isn't going to be twisted into conformity with some stupid formula” (Roger Ebert). 35mm print courtesy of the Sundance Collection at the UCLA Film & Television Archive.

  • Thu., Dec. 5 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

This sharp, witty exploration of Manhattan's fading debutante society, follows the romantic misadventures of a young outsider who finds himself entangled with a group of privileged Park Avenue socialites during the holiday season. As they gather nightly to debate love, honor, and their class’s looming decline, writer/director Whit Stillman’s debut film offers a satirical yet tender portrait of adolescent anxiety and self-discovery amid the rituals of the elite. With its deft, literate dialogue and comically highbrow observations, Metropolitan became a surprise hit of the 1990s and earned Stillman an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay. Whit Stillman will join us in person for a post-screening discussion!

  • Fri., Dec. 6 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

In his stark final film, master filmmaker Bresson intensifies his austere blend of spiritual contemplation and formal precision. Inspired by a Tolstoy novella and re-set in contemporary Paris, L’argent tracks a counterfeit bill used in a schoolboy prank that ultimately is given to a young truck driver, leading to imprisonment and violence. Working in his 80s, Bresson crafts a compelling, yet unforgiving vision of a cold, dehumanizing world.

  • Sat., Dec. 7 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

In the most British of the cinematic Carols, the power of Sim compels as Charles Dickens’ iconic miser, Ebenezer Scrooge. Prodded to rediscover his humanity during a harrowing series of ghostly visits on Christmas Eve, Scrooge must find out if he still has the capacity for love and generosity, or if it is, in fact, too late. With less emphasis on Tiny Tim and more on Scrooge’s relentless rise through the world of business, this version is perhaps darker, more adult than most, nonetheless it is a first-rate holiday entertainment. Featuring excellent support from Mervyn Johns as the long-suffering Bob Cratchit. 35mm print from the Chicago Film Society collection at the University of Chicago Film Studies Center. (BR)

  • Sun., Dec. 8 | 2:00 PM
    Chazen

In contemporary Los Angeles, a failed actress (Weld), descends into madness after the dissolution of her marriage to a self-obsessed director (Perkins). Writer Joan Didion, known for her exploration of California landscapes and mythologies, wrote the screenplay, an adaptation of her own novel about the dark side of tinseltown. Never released on home video in any format, an excellent archival 35mm print will be shown.

  • Fri., Dec. 13 | 7:00 PM
    4070 Vilas Hall

CINEVERSE LOGOAfter experiencing a tragedy on December 31, Broadway actress Sheila Page (Leslie) is magically allowed to relive the previous year of her life, but will she be able to avoid the fateful mistakes that led to the disastrous New Year’s Eve? Repeat Performance was singled out by David Bordwell as “one of the few time-travel dramas of the forties” and part of a cycle of movies that “become fascinating, surprising variants of changes that were rippling through Hollywood cinema.” 35mm print Preserved by UCLA Film & Television Archive. Preservation funding provided by the Film Noir Foundation and the Packard Humanities Institute.

  • Sat., Dec. 14 | 7:00 PM
    Marquee

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.