Fall 2020

Fall 2020

UNLADYLIKE2020
UNLADYLIKE2020
Illuminating the stories of extraordinary American heroines from the early years of feminism, Unladylike2020 is an essential series consisting of 26 episodes, between 9 and 12 minutes in length, that profile courageous, little-known and diverse female trailblazers. The series utilizes original artwork and animation, rare archival footage, and interviews with descendants, historians and accomplished modern women who reflect upon the influence of these pioneers.
HYSTERICAL GIRL
HYSTERICAL GIRL
In 1900, Sigmund Freud began treating a 17-year old girl he called "Dora." Her parents brought her to therapy after she accused a family friend of sexual assault. Freud's account of his sessions with Dora was the only major case history he published of a female patient. Intercutting his published text with a scripted version told from Dora's point of view, Hysterical Girl, from the acclaimed director of The Gospel According to André, revisits this landmark case.
THE MOUTH OF THE WOLF
THE MOUTH OF THE WOLF
This haunting documentary from acclaimed filmmaker Pietro Marcello, director of Martin Eden and Lost and Beautiful is a sui generis love story, following the 20-year relationship between a Sicilian heavy named Vincenzo and a trans convict named Mary after their meet-cute in prison. But Marcello isn’t merely content to render their romance in all its love and complexity: The Mouth of the Wolf is also a lyrical, sensuous, and melancholy tribute to the port city of Genoa, capturing its singular aura and its intoxicating air of eternity. 
IN THE ABSENCE
IN THE ABSENCE
2020 Academy Award Nominee Best Documentary Short Subject. When the passenger ferry MV Sewol sank off the coast of South Korea in 2014, over three hundred people lost their lives, most of them schoolchildren. Years later, the victims’ families and survivors are still demanding justice. This acclaimed documentary combines intimate interviews with archival footage and audio recordings for an investigation into a tragic incident which ultimately led to the impeachment and imprisonment of the country's president.
THE PAGEANT
THE PAGEANT
The Miss Holocaust Survivor Beauty Pageant takes place every year to the delight of its participants and audience. To take part in this unique contest, sponsored by an Evangelical Christian organization, the female survivors have to retell their traumatic stories one more time. The Pageant is a fascinating and important documentary about how memory, politics and spectacle are interconnected.
A SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME
A SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME
Sundog lives out in the Sonora Desert on the Mexican border. He is an elderly gentleman, who lives off anything that the brutal nature gives him, be it a wild boar or the psychedelic poison of a toad. With the desert as the ultimate existential (and cinematic) setting, A Shape of Things to Come from directors Lisa Marie Malloy and J.P. Sniadecki shows the relationship between humanity and nature at a critical time, when civil disobedience is the provocative answer to the most pressing questions.
FRANCISCA
FRANCISCA
Based on Agustina Bessa-Luís’ acclaimed novel, itself inspired by a true story that occurred in the 19th century, Manoel de Oliveira's Francisca recounts the life of a young man, a son of an English officer, who lets himself become a prisoner of love resulting in fatalism and disgrace. With its gorgeous cinematography, gloomy interiors, and show-stopping gala set-pieces, Francisca (The Strange Case of Angelica, I'm Going Home) is one of the legendary director’s crowning achievements.


HENRY GLASSIE: FIELD WORK
HENRY GLASSIE: FIELD WORK
The worldwide travels and unique cultural finds of renowned American folklorist Henry Glassie are enthrallingly chronicled in this portrait. Field Work allows us to witness the walling up of a massive kiln in Piedmont, North California, and features archival recordings of Glassie's encounters with carpet weavers and ceramicists in Western Turkey, and storytellers in Collins and Hogan's home country of Ireland, where Glassie's subjects reflect on their troubled present by talking about the past.
SWEETGRASS
SWEETGRASS
NEW DIGITAL RESTORATION. An unsentimental elegy to the American West, Sweetgrass follows the last modern-day cowboys to lead their flocks of sheep up into Montana’s breathtaking and often dangerous Absaroka-Beartooth mountains for summer pasture. This astonishingly beautiful yet unsparing film reveals a world in which nature and culture, animals and humans, vulnerability and violence are all intimately meshed. 
CHANGE OF LIFE
CHANGE OF LIFE
Paulo Rocha’s haunting second feature, Change of Life, is a beautifully-told story of a young man who returns from abroad to his small fishing village to discover that much has changed. Inspired by his work with Manoel de Oliveira, Rocha “cast” the local villagers as themselves, interspersed with experienced actors led by the great Isabel Ruth. The film was a critical and commercial success upon release, though it would effectively be the last film Rocha made for nearly two decades.
THE GREEN YEARS
THE GREEN YEARS
Never before released in the US, Paulo Rocha’s debut feature The Green Years, gloriously shot in black and white, is an extraordinary and haunting coming-of-age tale. Nineteen-year-old Julio heads to Lisbon from the provinces and gets a job as a shoemaker for his uncle Raul. But when he meets Ilda, a confident young housemaid who becomes a regular shop visitor, the two begin a tentative romance until the realities of the outside world come crashing through.
BARBS WASTELANDS
BARBS WASTELANDS
At the end of the 19th century the peasants in Portugal started a courageous struggle for better work conditions. After generations of starving misery, the Carnation Revolution sowed the promise of an Agrarian Reform. Mostly in the Alentejo region, these rural workers occupied the huge properties where they were once submitted to the power of their Masters. The protagonists of this film, resistants of this struggle, tell their story to the youngsters of today, in their own words.
FOURTEEN
FOURTEEN
In this critically-acclaimed film, director Dan Sallitt charts a friendship between two young women. Mara and Jo, in their twenties, have been close friends since middle school. It soon becomes apparent that Jo, despite her intellectual gifts, is unreliable in her professional life, losing and acquiring jobs at a troubling rate. Substance abuse may be responsible for Jo’s instability… but some observers suspect a deeper problem. 
ALL THE SHIPS AT SEA
ALL THE SHIPS AT SEA
Evelyn Bell, a Catholic professor of theology, and her younger sister Virginia are reunited after many years when Virginia returns home in a depression after being ejected from a religious cult. At a lakeside retreat in Northeastern Pennsylvania, the sisters try to reestablish their relationship, talking about their very different systems of belief, and about the oppressive childhood that still hangs over them. From filmmaker Dan Sallitt.
HONEYMOON
HONEYMOON
Mimi and Michael, in their thirties, marry suddenly after years of friendship and go on their honeymoon without having had a physical relationship. The honeymoon turns into a nightmare of sexual failure and conflict, fueled by Mimi's anxiety. With the marriage hanging by a thread, the couple try to resolve their problems against all odds. From filmmaker Dan Sallitt.
STEVENSON: LOST AND FOUND
STEVENSON: LOST AND FOUND
As one of the New Yorker’s most prolific cartoonists, James Stevenson’s body of work spans five decades, countless drawings and innumerable laughs. Featuring delightful animated interludes and interviews from colleagues, editors and his nine children, this wonderful look at Stevenson’s life - who also wrote a column for The New York Times and  is a noted writer of children's books - is a testament to observing the world from an original perspective.
WOMAN ON THE BEACH
WOMAN ON THE BEACH
Filmmaker Joong-rae, suffering from writer’s block, takes a trip to the coast with his production designer Chang-wook, who brings along the vivacious Moon-sook. Soon after their arrival, Moon-sook falls for Joong-rae’s advances; however, the fickle hero can’t commit and he awkwardly parts with her. What had been a sardonic Jules and Jim turns into a burlesque Vertigo when Joong-rae returns to the coastal resort and attempts to recreate the original romance with a woman who resembles Moon-sook, until his jilted lover shows up…
HILL OF FREEDOM
HILL OF FREEDOM
Shot in the narrow alleys, petite cafes and beautiful hanok inns of Seoul’s historic Jong-ro district, a favorite Hong location, Hill of Freedom is a masterful, alternately funny and haunting, tale of love and longing from the great director. Kwon (Seo Young-hwa) returns to Seoul from a restorative stay in the mountains. She is given a packet of letters left by Mori (Ryo Kase, Like Someone In Love), who has come back from Japan to propose to her. As she walks down a flight of stairs, Kwon drops and scatters the letters, all of which are undated. When she reads them, she has to make sense of the chronology… and so must we. 
BUNGALOW
BUNGALOW
A major work of the celebrated Berlin School, the debut of Ulrich Köhler (In My Room) is a mesmerizing portrait of a young German soldier named Paul who goes AWOL and returns to his childhood home in the countryside. With Köhler’s penchant for deadpan humor and subtle performances, Bungalow becomes a quiet mockery of militarism, familial estrangement, and youthful ennui. New 4K Restoration.
PAJU
PAJU
“A masterpiece. With this film, Park Chan-ok revealed herself as one of Korean cinema’s smartest and most stylish talents. Complex and enigmatic.” (The Guardian) Delicately unveiled through an anachronistic period of eight years, director Park Chan-Ok (Jealousy is My Middle Name) leaves no controversial stone unturned by exploring the dialectical forces at work within of a community that simultaneously resists and accepts change.
SACAVÉM: THE FILMS OF PEDRO COSTA
SACAVÉM: THE FILMS OF PEDRO COSTA
A journey through the films of Pedro Costa, focusing on such works as Casa de Lava, Colossal Youth, In Vanda's Room and Horse Money. Incorporating clips from his films, and emphasizing the unique visual and aural landscapes he creates, along with his own reflections, Sacavem provides unique insight into one of the most powerful and singular bodies of work in contemporary cinema.
CINEMA, MANOEL DE OLIVEIRA AND ME
CINEMA, MANOEL DE OLIVEIRA AND ME
The great filmmaker Manoel de Oliveira lived for over a century, directing films like The Strange Case of Angelica, I'm Going Home, Francisca and many more. In this affectionate documentary, João Botelho guides us through the beloved filmmaker's career, exploring his ideas, methods and his extraordinary cinematographic inventions.
INFLUENZA
INFLUENZA
From the Academy Award winning director of Parasite, Bong Joon-Ho's Influenza is a startling short film that marks a singular achievement in the filmmaker’s thrilling body of work. Bong's disturbingly humorous film traces the downward spiral of an unemployed 31 year-old man as he is captured on Seoul’s omnipresent CCTVs and cameras. Completed between Memories of Murder and The Host but never before released, it demonstrates a young filmmaker reaching the height of his powers.
HERE FOR LIFE
HERE FOR LIFE
“A film of great compassion and political and aesthetic ambition in which the idea of a collective is prioritised for a change, but without sacrificing or downplaying the individual voices and idiosyncrasies that it comprises... Beautifully exuberant and optimistic" (Sight & Sound), Andrea Luka Zimmerman and Adrian Jackson's documentary, Here for Life, follows ten unruly Londoners as they navigate their wild and wayward way towards a co-existence far stronger than 'community'.
SICILIA!
SICILIA!
Something as simple as a herring roasting on a hearth, or a meal of bread, wine and winter melon, takes on the humble aura of a Caravaggio painting in Straub-Huillet's masterful tragicomedy about Sicilians who are poor of means but rich in spirit. “A passionate and wide-ranging masterwork by Straub and Huillet." (The New Yorker). New 20th anniversary digital restoration.