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Press Room
4 by 4 Film Forums
Four FILMS
Four MONTHS
Four FABULOUS DISCUSSIONS
Coolidge Corner Theatre
290 Harvard
Brookline MA 02446
Another great semester of free films and fantastic conversation is planned at the Coolidge Corner Theater. All films screen at 4 PM, are open to the public for no charge.
January 15
Join "At the Coolidge" host Tim Jackson for a screening of "Night of the Hunter," the only film directed by Charles Laughton, one of the greatest actors in Hollywood history. Tim will discuss the film's audacious depiction of good and evil, and its subtle blend of horror and comedy. Now considered a classic, the film has been called a "Mother Goose story told by the Brothers Grimm." It was overlooked in 1955 as being too strange, but Laughton carefully put together a film that keeps the viewer off balance, defying all expectations. We'll talk about the visual and performance styles of the film, which is said to have influenced later directors such as David Lynch, Martin Scorsese, and the Coen Brothers. We'll also talk about the amazing performances, particularly from Robert Mitchum, as a psychotic preacher and about the adaptation from the pulp novel by Davis Grubb.
February 19
Join legendary radio personality, Jerry Goodwin, Boston's own "Duke of Madness" for a screening of the documentary "Standing in the Shadows of Motown." There's no person better to explore this movie then Jerry, who was the brilliantly-funny early-afternoon deejay on Detroit's WKNR radio and who established a close relationship with the musicians of "Hitsville USA" who are featured in the film. He was even given the honor in 1967 of introducing the world to the Temptations' new song, "You're My Everything." Find out what it was like to sit with the fabled musicians in that house in Detroit, where they created a sound that turned the Motown artists into stars.
March 18
Professors Debra Leahy and Steve Grossman screen Erich Von Stroheim's "Greed." Adapted from the Frank Norris novel "McTeague," the film was MGM's first feature. The studio trimmed Von Stroheim's original nine-hour cut into this released version, recycling the unused negative for the silver. Considered legendary and one of Hollywood's lost masterpieces, this film represents one of the first casualties of Hollywood's war between art and commerce.
April 15
Join professor and poet Tom Yuill for a screening of "Gimme Shelter." A film about confusion, it is edited so that the story--what happens--is not the same as the plot--the arrangement of incidents. When the film focuses on the good vibes, we see an almost irresistible mixture of Apollonian precision and Dionysian rhythm. The plot alternates between the Stones' performance before ecstatic audiences and the planning by ecstatic fans and advisors of another, bigger and hopefully more exciting performance, made more exciting still, because it would suit the etiquette of the counter-culture of the moment. The footage from the Madison Square Garden concerts shows an upswing so pleasurable to so many, it is hard to imagine anybody predicting something would spoil it. The violence and death at Altamont, then, constitute Aristotelian recognition and reversal, which is experienced by the fans, the Angels, the film makers, the Rolling Stones and those of us watching the film. The achievement is dramatic literature of the highest order.
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