Petri’s last entry in his “Trilogy of Neuroses” is a darkly comic tale of a bank teller (Flavio Bucci) with a literal allergy to money – and a figurative allergy to how it corrupts human souls.

The director merges Marxism with psychology, humanism with social commentary, and class-consciousness with sophistication. Just as money gives the teller a rash, so does it – and property, by extension – give society a warped sense of what matters. Petri offers no solutions: he merely draws attention to the insidious problem. Score by Ennio Morricone.

35mm print courtesy of Cinecittà Luce.

CTEQ Annotation:
‘Property is No Longer a Theft’ by Gino Moliterno.

9.10 . I GIORNI CONTATI
Elio Petri (1962) 93 mins

When ageing widower Cesare (Salvo Randone) witnesses the death of a stranger on the street, he is compelled to take his life in a new direction.

Although one of his least seen films, Petri’s second feature is still considered to be a worthy precursor to his subsequent career successes. Cesare’s return to his youthful dreams is translated to the ruminative wandering of the camera.

This masterful take on the hopelessness and dispiriting reality of capitalist society was co-written by Petri and Tonino Guerra.

CTEQ Annotation:
‘I giorni contati’ by Federico Passi.

35mm print courtesy of Cinecittà Luce.

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A cunning Roman antiques dealer is investigated by the police in relation to the killing of a former lover, without being specifically accused. This game of cat-and-mouse suggests the moral decay, claustrophobia and corruption of modern Italian society.

A post-Antonioni investigation of social identity, guilt and law enforcement, Petri’s still potent debut feature was co-written by Tonino Guerra, and features outstanding performances by Salvo Randone and Marcello Mastroianni.

It is also distinguished by Carlo Di Palma’s stunning black-and-white cinematography.

CTEQ Annotation:
L’assassino by Pasquale Iannone

35mm print courtesy of Cinecittà Luce.

Trailer:

8.55 . THE TENTH VICTIM
Elio Petri (1965) 92 mins PG

A heady mix of ennui, boredom and a seething hatred for his ex-wife sees a playboy (Marcello Mastroianni) sign up for “The Big Hunt” – a social blood sport in which human hunts are used for population control and TV entertainment.

Petri’s gorgeously dystopian vision sizzles with colour and punch as the playboy rises quickly up the ranks until he meets reigning champ Caroline (Ursula Andress), armed with a wardrobe as deadly as she is. Gianni Di Venanzo’s images andPiero Picciono’s striking score provides even more jazz-pop sparkle to this mod gem.

35mm print courtesy of Cinecitti Luce.

CTEQ Annotation:
‘La decima vittima’ by Wheeler Winston Dixon.

Trailer:

The post May 15 appeared first on The Melbourne Cinémathèque.

His work often varied in style but was always visually innovative and provocative, and consistently staged the doubts of the individual against a controlling society. Not always loved by critics due to the anti-aristocratic “flashiness” of his directorial style, and often considered “inopportune” by the main political parties, he can be seen today, along with Pier Paolo Pasolini, as the most modern of 1960s Italian directors.

This season of imported 35mm prints includes many of the key touchstones of Petri’s career, ranging from his important, incendiary first feature (The Assassin) to the controversial Todo Modo. It also highlights his various collaborations with such figures as actors Marcello Mastroianni, Salvo Randone and Gian Maria Volont., composer Ennio Morricone, and writers Tonino Guerra and Ugo Pirro.

Presented in conjunction with:

The post ELIO PETRI: A FILMMAKER ABOVE SUSPICION appeared first on The Melbourne Cinémathèque.

An episode from the long-running French TV series, Cinema, de notre temps, this brief biography of Preminger, directed by noted critic André S. Labarthe, examines the shifting fortunes of this oft-overlooked filmmaker amidst the political landscape of Hollywood in the ’50s and ’60s.

Rising to prominence in the ’40s as a genre director for 20th Century Fox, Preminger’s initial promise, reputation and legacy as an auteur was compromised by a campaign to discredit him for his continual defiance of the MPAA Production Code and flagrant disregard for the Hollywood Blacklist.

8.10 . ANATOMY OF A MURDER
Otto Preminger (1959) 160 mins M

Now widely regarded as Preminger’s masterpiece, this in turns leisurely, intense and questioningly ethical study of a rape and murder trial in northern Michigan abounds in geographical, conversational and societal detail. Not just a great courtroom drama but also a piercing character study and portrait of midcentury American life.

James Stewart gives one of his greatest performances as the laconic, cagey, fishing loving, but razor-witted defence lawyer.

The brilliant ensemble cast includes Lee Remick, George C. Scott, Ben Gazzara, Eve Arden and the remarkable Duke Ellington, who also provides one of the cinema’s great, swaying film scores.

CTEQ Annotation:
‘Anatomy of a Murder’ by John Fiddler.

Trailer:

The post May 8 appeared first on The Melbourne Cinémathèque.

A detective (Dana Andrews) finds himself becoming obsessed with the life and fate of a woman (Gene Tierney) whose supposed murder he is investigating. A paragon of the film noir genre, Preminger’s first major Hollywood film was also amongst his most successful, earning him an Oscar nomination and paving the way for the spate of noirs that define his late 1940s career.

Featuring a haunting score and theme song by David Raksin, Preminger’s at times soulful but sardonic film is a spellbindingly oneiric masterpiece. Co-starring Vincent Price, Clifton Webb and Judith Anderson.

Print courtesy of The British Film Institute.

CTEQ Annotation:
‘Laura: Noir of Identity and Illusion’ by Matthew Sorrento.

Trailer:

8.40 . ADVISE & CONSENT
Otto Preminger (1962) 139 mins PG

Blackmail, demagoguery and political chicanery come to the fore as Preminger takes his interest in institutional machinations to Washington. Based on a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Allen Drury, the film pushed censorship boundaries with its depiction of a senator being blackmailed over a homosexual affair. The film “grips like a vice thanks to the skill with which Preminger’s stunning mise-en-sc.ne absorbs documentary detail”, says critic Tom Milne.

With Henry Fonda, Charles Laughton, Franchot Tone, Peter Lawford and Gene Tierney; titles by Saul Bass.

35mm print courtesy of the Academy Film Archive.

Restored by the Academy Film Archive with funding from the Andrew J. Kuehn Jr. Foundation.

Trailer:

The post May 1 appeared first on The Melbourne Cinémathèque.

This is perhaps the boldest filmic adaptation of Bizet’s Carmen. Shifting the setting to the American South and featuring an all African-American cast – innovations of Oscar Hammerstein II’s wartime stage adaptation – Preminger’s dynamic screen version stars Dorothy Dandridge in her greatest screen role.

Capturing its grandiose essence within the equally operatic CinemaScope frame, Carmen’s passionate, volatile personality is visualised as a deep palette of warm saturated colours, photographed by Sam Leavitt. Saul Bass’ now-famous fiery credits sequence was his first in a long collaboration with Preminger.

With Harry Belafonte, Pearl Bailey and Diahann Carroll.

CTEQ Annotation:
‘“Kissin’ the Breeze Goodbye”: Otto Preminger and Carmen Jones’
by David Melville

35mm print courtesy of The British Film Institute.

Trailer:

8.55 . THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN ARM
Otto Preminger (1955) 119 mins M

Brazenly released without the all-important Production Code seal of approval, Preminger’s tale of addiction and disgrace, adapted by Walter Newman and Lewis Meltzer from the novel by Nelson Algren, is a notable departure from the usual “dope fiend” films. Frank Sinatra’s heroin-addicted jazz musician is trapped not only by the drug, but also by a loveless marriage, a criminal record and the vicious cycle of poverty in inner city Chicago.

Preminger summarised and expanded on the film’s theme: “I think there’s a great tragedy in any human being who gets hooked on something, whether it’s heroin or love or a woman or whatever.”

Features one of the great jazz film scores by Elmer Bernstein. With Kim Novak.

35mm print courtesy of the Academy Film Archive.

CTEQ Annotation:
‘The Man with the Golden Arm’ by Rachel Brown.

Trailer:

The post April 24 appeared first on The Melbourne Cinémathèque.

Born into a powerful Jewish family in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Preminger had an early career as a theatre director and actor but also pleased his father by completing a law degree, something that would later show in films such as Anatomy of a Murder and Advise & Consent. Discovered in Vienna by Joseph Schenck of the newly formed 20th Century-Fox, he journeyed to Los Angeles where he quickly fell out with Darryl F. Zanuck. Despite inveigling his way back into work at Fox, he eventually left and made his mark as one of the first independent producer-directors. In doing so he also rewrote the rules of studio Hollywood, bucking censorship rules, addressing taboo social phenomena (rape, homosexuality, drug addiction) and eventually breaking the Blacklist by openly crediting screenwriter Dalton Trumbo on Exodus (1960).

This season covers many of Preminger’s major films, from the breakthrough of Laura in 1944 to the run of significant films he made in the 1950s and early 1960s at the peak of his independent career.

The post RESTLESS OBJECTIVITY – THE CINEMA OF OTTO PREMINGER appeared first on The Melbourne Cinémathèque.

10.05 . APRIL 17

THE OLD PLACE
Jean-Luc Godard and Anne-Marie Miéville (1999) 49 mins.
This MOMA commission to examine the role of fine arts at the end of the 20th century is, according to Colin MacCabe, “the finest of all the Miéville/Godard essays”.

ORIGINS OF THE 21st CENTURY
Jean-Luc Godard (2000) 16 mins.
A thought-provoking montage of 20th century artefacts.

JE VOUS SALUE SARAJEVO
Jean-Luc Godard (1993) 2 mins.
A timely, tragic and poetic mediation on a single, devastating image from the Bosnian war

The post Program Change: Wednesday April 17 appeared first on The Melbourne Cinémathèque.

This work of urgent reflection, postulation and foreboding is the most accessible and best of Godard’s recent features. Each of Godard’s stylistic strategies are incorporated; demarcated according to the tripartite afterworld of Dante’s The Divine Comedy.

“Hell” evokes the horror of modern warfare through visceral montage. “Purgatory” casts writers playing themselves – including Godard – alongside dramatic actors and deadpan Bressonian models contemplating art and politics in postwar Sarajevo. It culminates in a brief allegorical vision of “Paradise” that recalls Godard’s late ’60s work.

CTEQ Annotations:
‘Notre musique: Godard’s Shot/Reverse Shot Ruminations on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict’ by Christopher Weedman

Trailer:

8.30 . PRÉNOM CARMEN
Jean-Luc Godard (1983) 85 mins

Whereas his previous feature Passion had used film to address painting, Godard here made music a central subject. A contemporary, sexually frank take on Bizet’s famous opera; this sonically adventurous film cuts between the heroine’s love for a security guard she seduces mid-bank robbery, her relationship with her uncle (a washed-up film director played by Godard himself), and a group of musicians rehearsing Beethoven.

Written by Anne-Marie Mieville and winner of the Golden Lion at the 1983 Venice Film Festival.

CTEQ Annotation:
‘Prénom Carmen’ by Lee Hill

35mm print courtesy of L’Institut Français.

Trailer:

Followed by

The Old Place
Jean-Luc Godard and Anne-Marie Mieville (1999) 49 mins.
This MOMA commission to examine the role of fine arts at the end of the 20th century is, according to Colin MacCabe, “the finest of all the Mieville/Godard essays”.

The post April 17 appeared first on The Melbourne Cinémathèque.

B-grade legend and private eye Lemmy Caution (the iconic Eddie Constantine) is rocketed to a futuristic city by dictator-scientist Von Braun. In this genre hybrid fusing sci-fi and film noir, Godard appropriates the trappings of American pulp fiction to make personalised statements about depersonalised life in a “futuristic” metropolis firmly grounded in mid-’60s Paris. Co-stars Anna Karina, Akim Tamiroff and Howard Vernon.

35mm print courtesy of L’Institut Français.

Preceded by

Lettre à Freddy Buache
Jean-Luc Godard (1982) 11 mins.
A very Godardian refusal to make a film about the 500th anniversary of Lausanne. First screened as part of Un Certain Regard at Cannes.

35mm print courtesy of L’Institut Français.

9.00 . NUMÉRO DEUX
Jean-Luc Godard (1975) 88 mins

An acerbic look at the everyday existence and love life of a young working class family living in a high-rise apartment.

Godard’s key film heralds a turning point in his career, away from overtly Maoist influenced cinema and towards a more quotidian form of politics and formally daring manner of filmmaking. Godard brilliantly mixes film and video, essay and narrative, and features an ingeniously analogue split-screen effect born out of necessity but revolutionising cinema in the process.

Preceded by 2 short works:

Origins of the 21st Century
Jean-Luc Godard (2000) 16 mins.
A thought-provoking montage of 20th century artefacts.

Je vous salue Sarajevo
Jean-Luc Godard (1993) 2 mins.
A timely, tragic and poetic mediation on a single, devastating image from the Bosnian war.

The post April 10 appeared first on The Melbourne Cinémathèque.