Showing posts with label Berkeley. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Berkeley. Show all posts

Friday, April 26, 2019

Another Review Round-up: the Louise Brooks inspired film, 'The Chaperone'

As The Chaperone continues to open around the United States, reviews continue to trickle in. The Chaperone has also opened in Australia, and star Elizabeth McGovern was on-hand to introduces the film. An earlier LBS blog on the Australian opening can be found HERE.

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Today, the films opens in Ann Arbor, Michigan where it will show at the historic Michigan Theater. I wrote an article to mark the occasion. My piece, titled "Louise Brooks Returns to Ann Arbor," looks at the shared history of the actress and the well known Midwest college town. The piece appears in the Ann Arbor Observer and can be found HERE.

I have written another similar article, "The Chaperone marks Louise Brooks return to Berkeley," which has yet to appear. Like my previous piece, it too looks at the shared history of another well known college town, which is far more extensive than most realize. (Louise Brooks made a film in Berkeley!) I expect my article will appear in a Bay Area publication sometime soon. And, I will update this blog post when it does.

If you haven't already done so, please check out my full review of The Chaperone, which is titled "Never the Victim: Louise Brooks and The Chaperone." It was published by Film International. [It was pointed out that my piece contains an error, the fact that actress Julia Roberts is not from Kansas, but from Georgia.]

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For a hyperlinked list of some of the earlier reviews and articles, please check out this earlier LBS blog HERE. Otherwise, here are a few more of the interesting reviews and articles so far. I will start with a couple pieces from college towns.

The Chaperone Should’ve Left Its Bland Story In the Past
by Hope Y. Kudo / Harvard Crimson

The Chaperone is tepid, vaguely charming period piece from Downton Abbey creator
by Camryn Bell / Daily Californian

Movie based on Lawrence author’s best-selling novel The Chaperone will have sneak preview at Liberty Hall
by Kathy Hanks / Lawrence Journal World

Lawrence author’s tale of famous Kansan is now a movie, with Downton Abbey pedigree
by Jon Niccum / Kansas City Star
Actress captures allure of Louise Brooks: Haley Lu Richardson dominates The Chaperone as future cult figure
by Tim Miller / Cape Cod Times

The Chaperone review: Youth takes on experience in portrait of two ladies
by Paul Byrnes / The Age

Why Elizabeth McGovern Found Louise Brooks And Her Chaperone So Alluring
by Jeryl Brunner / Forbes

Increasingly, more and more pieces are expressing their frustration that The Chaperone is not a full fledged Louise Brooks bio-pic (which it was never intended to be), and that such a film has yet to be made. IMHO: Haley Lu Richardson deserves an #Oscar nomination for best supporting actress for her role as Louise Brooks in #TheChaperone.

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The film is in limited release - so you will need to check the thechaperonefilm.com website for locations where it is showing. So far, it is not listed as showing in Wichita, Kansas, which is more than a little bit strange. It is not listed as opening in the town where I live - Sacramento, California. Despite the tepid reviews, go see it if you can. Haley Lu Richardson is terrific. I like The Chaperone and think most fans of Louise Brooks will as well.

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Thursday, February 21, 2013

Bay Area Becoming Mecca for Silent Film

The San Francisco Bay Area is becoming a Mecca for silent film. 

In its near 20 year history, the San Francisco Silent Film Festival has grown to become the leading and largest such event in the Western Hemisphere. Last year, it sponsored an epic, even historic screening of Napoleon that made news around the United States. And in June, it is putting on a three day event at which all nine of Alfred Hitchcock's silent films will be shown. 

Over in the east bay, the Niles Essanany Silent Film Museum has been showing silent movies every weekend for nearly 10 years. They also put on an annual Charlie Chaplin Days event and Broncho Billy Film Festival.

Silent films are also occasionally shown in the north bay, at the Rafael Film Center, in the south bay at the Stanford Theater, and in Berkeley at the Pacific Film Archive. And don't forget the Berkeley Underground Film Society, an all ages club for collectors, researchers, and film enthusiasts whose weekly programs of rarely projected, or otherwise obscure 8mm, Super 8, and 16mm prints includes a fair number of early and silent cinema.

Another east bay contribution to the local scene is The Second International Berkeley Conference on Silent Cinema, which this year will be held from February 21-23 at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive. Following the successful first Berkeley Conference on Silent Cinema in 2011 (which had the theme "Cinema Across Media: The 1920s"), this year's conference similarly explores an aspect of film and film culture in the silent era. 

Each of the conferences is designed to advance research and promote public interest in silent cinema by combining a three-day academic conference (free and open to the public) with an evening series of screenings at the Pacific Film Archive related to the topic under discussion.

This year the conference focuses on the theme "On Location." Four plenary speakers, thirty invited presenters, and six introduced screenings will explore the ways in which films in the silent era created new possibilities for experiencing place in a cinematic way. 

This year's plenary speakers are Jennifer Bean (University of Washington), Donald Crafton (Notre Dame), Aaron Gerow (Yale), and Scott Simmon (University of California, Davis). Among the other speaks are Janet Bergstrom (UCLA), Mary Ann Doane (University of California-Berkeley), Anton Kaes (University of California-Berkeley), and Shelley Stamp (University of California, Santa Cruz). Each is the author of a notable book in the field of film studies. Doane, in particular, is the author of a 1991 book likely familiar to readers of this blog, Femmes Fatales: Feminism, Film Theory, Psychoanalysis (Routledge).

More info: Click here to see the conference schedule. Click here to see a list of speakers. Or click here to see a list of films to be shown as part of the conference.

Unfortunately, the one Louise Brooks film made on location in Berkeley, Rolled Stockings (1927), is lost. Parts of this college comedy romance were filmed on the campus of the University of California, Berkeley. Other scenes from the film, which featured rowing competition, were shot on the San Francisco Bay.



Thursday, January 5, 2012

A Girl in Every Port screens in Berkeley

The Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley, California has announced that it will host a major Howard Hawks retrospective, "Howard Hawks: The Measure of Man." The series runs January 13th through April 17th. 

The series spans Hawks' entire career. Films date from Fig Leaves (1926) through El Dorado (1967). Four silent era films are on the bill, including A Girl in Every Port (1928), which stars Louise Brooks. It will screen January 24th at 7 pm. Live piano accompaniment will be provided by Judy Rosenberg. (64 mins, Silent, B&W, 35mm, From the collection of George Eastman House, permission 20th Century Fox) More info at http://www.bampfa.berkeley.edu/film/FN19308


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