February 8 - February 22
ELIA KAZAN: THE OUTSIDER
Elia Kazan (1909-2003) is one of the most controversial & emblematic figures of postwar American cinema & theatre. Born in Turkey to Greek parents he came to America when he was 4 years old, his early experiences of family, emigration & outsiderness profoundly marking his often intense & emotionally wrenching work.
Kazan’s activities in the 1930s stretched from socially engaged leftist documentary to stints with the Group Theater. This background influenced his groundbreaking work on Broadway (directing the original productions of such iconic plays as All My Sons, A Streetcar Named Desire & Death of a Salesman), his co-founding of the Actors Studio, & his initial, often beautifully crafted films for Fox. Kazan’s lauded sense of place, atmosphere & character, & uncanny ability to coax revealing & emotionally intense performances from such iconic actors as Marlon Brando, Vivien Leigh, Natalie Wood, Warren Beatty, James Dean & Montgomery Clift (all featured here), fully emerges in the early 1950s with such key films as Panic in the Streets (1950), On the Waterfront (1954) & East of Eden. Despite Kazan’s now notorious testimony before the House Committee on Un-American Activities in 1952, his work of the following 10 or so years remains one of the most important & vital contributions to modern American cinema.
This season focuses on this key decade & stretches from the hothouse theatrics of A Streetcar Named Desire to the deeply personal, profoundly grounded & epic America America, the director’s account of his uncle’s dogged journey to the United States. It incorporates several of Kazan’s most extraordinary adaptations of theatrical & literary properties, & emphasises the emotional intensity & vulnerability that mark his greatest work. Highlighting several of Kazan’s most soulful & underrated works, such as the poetic & deeply revealing Wild River, this season also premieres Martin Scorsese & Kent Jones’ recent personal tribute A Letter to Elia.
February 8
7:00 – A LETTER TO ELIA
Kent Jones & Martin Scorsese (2010) 60 mins
This collaborative portrait of the life & career of Elia Kazan takes the form of a cine-letter directly addressed from Scorsese to Kazan himself.
Extending upon the semi-biographical project begun with A Personal Journey… Through American Movies, Scorsese’s intimate, personal account invites us to re-evaluate the emotive formal prowess of Kazan’s film direction, whilst also bringing to light the filmmaker’s fraught personal & professional experiences, including his notorious testimony to the House Committee on Un-American Activities in 1952. Features illuminating & evocative accounts of such key Scorsese influences as East of Eden, Wild River & America America.
8:10 - AMERICA AMERICA
Elia Kazan (1963) 168 mins
Kazan’s monumental & intimate account of one immigrant’s journey to America in the late 19th century, is a passionate, sometimes brutal, poetic & deeply felt homage to the often fanciful dream of America. Full of fascinating insights into Greek-Turkish cultural life & breathtakingly shot on location by Haskell Wexler, it stands as Kazan’s crowning achievement, a gestalt masterpiece that draws together key elements of the director’s dramatic contribution to the cinema & his family biography. An often undervalued landmark of American cinema, it was a major influence on New Hollywood. Starring the remarkable Stathis Giallelis.
35mm preservation print courtesy of the UCLA Film & Television Archive.
Preservation funding provided by Warner Bros. in association with The Film Foundation & the Hollywood Foreign Press Association.
Cteq Annotation:
“People are waiting”: Elia Kazan and America America by Adrian Danks
February 15
7:00 – WILD RIVER
Elia Kazan (1960) 110 mins PG
Montgomery Clift stars as a New Deal administrator sent by Washington to persuade a stubborn, elderly Tennessee woman (Jo Van Fleet) to sell her land before it is flooded for a hydroelectric project. Filmed in ’Scope, this careful period reconstruction was shot on location not far from where Kazan had worked as co-director on his 1st film, the pro-union short People of the Cumberland. Lee Remick reunites with the director to play the love interest, the old woman’s granddaughter. While the film was not initially a critical or box office success its stature has grown over time & it was added to the US National Film Registry in 2002.
9:00 – SPLENDOR IN THE GRASS
Elia Kazan (1961) 124 mins M
The relationship of 2 teenage lovers is ripped apart by the repressive mentality of their 1920s Kansas town in Kazan’s dramatic coming-of-age tale. Starring Natalie Wood, whose fragile & ultimately tragic portrayal of Wilma Dean Loomis earned her an Oscar nomination, & Warren Beatty (in his screen debut) as the handsome, well-to-do Bud Stamper. William Inge won an Oscar for his original screenplay. With Sandy Dennis, Barbara Loden & Phyllis Diller. Cinematography by Boris Kaufman. 35mm print courtesy of the National Film & Sound Archive of Australia.
CTEQ Annotation:
‘Identity in Elia Kazan’s Splendor in the Grass‘ by Arthur Rankin
February 22
7:00 – A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE
Elia Kazan (1951) 122 mins M
Kazan’s 7th feature is a brooding theatrical paean to poetic heroism & ruin in which Blanche DuBois (Vivien Leigh), a delusional, faded southern belle who has “fallen” in various ways, comes to live with her pregnant sister Stella (Kim Hunter) & brutish, working-class husband Stanley (Marlon Brando) in the roughest part of New Orleans. Blanche & Stanley instantly spark a toxic rapport, & begin a perverse fascination with one another in which fear & desire dangerously merge. The film was nominated for 12 Academy Awards in 1952, winning 4. Tennessee Williams adapted the script from his own groundbreaking play.
Co-starring Karl Malden & music by Alex North.
9:15 – EAST OF EDEN
Elia Kazan (1955) 115 mins PG
Starring James Dean in his 1st major film role, Kazan’s landmark work helped to define the young actor as the indelible “hero of adolescence” (Edgar Morin). Concerns of youth, the resistance against conservative domesticity, & the poetic simplicity of love are all beautifully rendered in a screenplay sensitively adapted from John Steinbeck’s novel. With Kazan’s atmospheric mise en scène & Ted McCord’s masterful use of CinemaScope, this is one of the defining films of its decade.
With Jo Van Fleet, Raymond Massey, Burl Ives, Julie Harris & Richard Davalos. Music by Leonard Rosenman.
CTEQ Annotation:
‘East of Eden‘ by Michael Da Silva
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBCoTr79810
Backdrops:
Elia Kazan on set
AMERICA AMERICA
WILD RIVER
SPLENDOUR IN THE GRASS
EAST OF EDEN
A STREETCARE NAMED DESIRE