The Silver Screen Oasis

jdb1 wrote:Dew-Dew, I'm so sorry I can't be there, the whole concept sounds so inviting. When will you come to NYC to make us a film festival?

Yeah, or Boston ??
Dewmeister, I just know that shows like those would Rox the sox off o' Beantown!
Jiminy, even I, the infamous Frugal MacDougall, would fill the tank & drive south!

Hey Judith - Doesn't the FILM FORUM in NY put on shows like this any more? Regardless, I would love to take this show on the road! And Klondike, yes I think Beantown would be a great place for a show like this! Perhaps one day (night)...

Dewey1960 wrote:Hey Judith - Doesn't the FILM FORUM in NY put on shows like this any more? Regardless, I would love to take this show on the road! And Klondike, yes I think Beantown would be a great place for a show like this! Perhaps one day (night)...

They do, though it's been a while since they did a strictly film noir event. They just
finished up a festival of Jules Dassin movies, so there were a couple included in that.

I'm finding that a lot of the FF programs are also geared to the "Sex in the City" set; the same is true of the film catalog at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. You have to wait a long time in between the chaff to get at some wheat. In general, the offerings at TCM are far more satisfying.

Hey all...it's been a while since I've been able to update you on my FILM NOIR series at the ROXIE -- I WAKE UP DREAMING : THE HAUNTED WORLD OF THE B FILM NOIR! This is the busiest I've been in a while!

We've been securing a great deal of advance print publicity for the show, most of which will begin appearing later this week. Our press screenings, which we held back on April 20 & 21 were well-attended and well-received. The films screened in advance for the press were THE DEVIL THUMBS A RIDE, THE GUILTY, REPEAT PERFORMANCE and THE PRETENDER.

This morning the on-line site SF360 (an organ of the San Francisco International Film Festival) ran this piece on their home page:
http://www.sf360.org/features/elliot-la ... old-haunts

Wow, Dewey, what a great article. Wish I was going to be there ( I DID leave my heart in San Francisco). Best of luck (or is that break a leg?) either way, Cheers, Slainte, Mazel tov!

Your envious friend
Nancy

Geeez, I wish I could Priceline or Travelocity my way for a quickie trip to San Francisco. This noir-fest sounds fierce.

Awwww. Congrats Dewey. Good luck with this. Publicity, crowds, films.

Five days and counting.

I'll to sure to wear dead flowers in my hair.

And what a great interview!

Will someone also please take some photos of the event and its SSO/TCM participants? It will be almost like being there for the rest of us.

All of the pictures will be in shadows.

Hi Deweeeeeee.

Tell us, how is the festival coming along. Big turnouts? Enthusiastic cinephiles??

Give us a report on how our films in the shadows are doing. Thanx!

Hey Maven! The first four days of the program have been simply terrific! On Thursday night we had a "pre-opening" shindig with live jazz, free champagne and the great 1961 Brit noir ALL NIGHT LONG. Near capacity crowd and great vibes all around!
Friday night: A colossal double bill of THE DEVIL THUMBS A RIDE and THE GUILTY. The show was a massive SOLD OUT affair! We were fortunate enough to have TWO special guests on board: Barry Gifford, the fine novelist and screenwriter (WILD AT HEART, LONESOME HIGHWAY, etc.) Back in 1988 Barry published a book called "The Devil Thumbs A Ride" which was a collection of wonderful essays about B noir films. It's a terrific book (and was recently reprinted under its new title "Out of the Past.") Barry gave a short intro to DEVIL THUMBS A RIDE. Our other special guest was Fritzi Feist, the daughter of Felix Feist, the director of THE DEVIL THUMBS A RIDE. She contacted me the evening before (she lives here in the Bay Area) to let me know she'd be attending the show. She also let me know that she had never seen THE DEVIL THUMBS A RIDE (it's never been available on VHS or DVD) and this was a particularly thrilling night for her. What made it additionally so was the fact that we had such a huge, enthusiastic crowd. She was very warmly received to say the very least! Also on the program that night was a short noir film that I made back in 1981 called BLIND ALLEY. It too was warmly received. All in all a fantastic night!
Saturday: A great Anthony Mann double bill of RAW DEAL and RAILROADED! Another fat crowd and a wildly enthusiastic reception to these great noir classics. Despite the fact that both of these films are available through commercial DVDs (and the temperature topped out at almost 90 degrees) we had a terrific turnout!
Sunday: Another hot double bill: CANON CITY (a tense prison picture starring Lawrence Tierney's real-like brother Scott Brady and photographed by the legendary John Alton) and FRAMED, an exciting Columbia B noir starring Glenn Ford and Janis Carter. Great crowd and they really loved both films! Sunday also marked the arrival of SSO's very own ChiO, who has travelled all the way from Chicago to be with us for this great series! Meeting ChiO and hanging out with him has been a tremendous treat, especially in the context of a film noir festival!
I'll be back tomorrow with another report!
Meanwhile here's a tasty little piece that appeared on SF360.org:
http://www.sf360.org/seen/black-and-white-all-over

Another fine crowd last night on hand at the Roxie for the ultra-rare 1944 Republic B noir THE PORT OF 40 THIEVES featuring a stand-out femme-fatale performance by Stephanie Bachelor. A somewhat simplistic but sharply written script is one of the highlights of this swiftly paced programmer (it clocks in at just sixty minutes) which really delivers the goods, and how! The co-feature was THE STORY OF MOLLY X, a somewhat more elaborate production with a fine central performance by June Havoc as a dame who goes up the river after taking over control of her gunned-down hubby's mob. Perhaps more noir-ish than noir, it is nevertheless a well-made, exciting film and the crowd was into it from the get go.
Tonight's double bill is a dandy: the OTHER great Ann Savage B noir, THE LAST CROOKED MILE from 1946 and VIOLENCE, the 1947 follow-up to DECOY from director Jack Bernhard. Both of these outstanding B films are pretty rare and will no doubt go a long way in satisfying the cravings of a noir-hungry town!

Tell me Mr. D., is there a possibility that the interest you are generating could translate into releases for any of these works?

Hey there Mr. Ark! You asked: Is there a possibility that the interest you are generating could translate into releases for any of these works?
The chances of that, I believe, are pretty slim. Most of these films are in the public domain and their availability in usable 35mm prints is, at best, nearly non-existent. Some of the more interesting studio-held titles (like the Warner-owned Monogram titles) are so far below the radar that it would take a sizable earthquake to pry them loose from their respective vaults. The most likely candidates for DVD release would be the Sony (Columbia) owned titles (THE BURGLAR and CITY OF FEAR); the company has already announced its plans to begin releasing film noir box sets to compete directly with Warner Home Video and Fox, so if there is money to be made in the business of recycling, then Sony will no doubt start dusting some of these babies off. But don't hold your breath for films like PORT OF FORTY THIEVES, THE HOODLUM, THE LAST CROOKED MILE or THE MADONNA'S SECRET. You'll have to content yourself with the sub-par boots that seem to circulate through the internet.