NOTE ON SCREENINGS 2008

In 2008 The Melbourne Cinémathèque makes a diverse range of international cinematic landmarks and rarities, including cult, experimental, documentary, silent and short films accessible to the Melbourne public.

Opening night on February 13 continues our horror theme from 2007 with a trio of short Melies' thrillers and a restored 35mm print of Terrence Fisher's classic rendition of Dracula, courtesy of the British Film Instistute, followed by a screening of Sidney Hayer's brooding horror, in the tradition of Carl Dreyer and Val Lewton, Night of the Eagle (Burn, Witch, Burn).

This year we have a number of sessions featuring collections of experimental works, including films from James Benning, Péter Forgács, Corinne & Arthur Canrtill, Marie Menken, Kenneth Anger, Stan Brakhage (see Experimental Landscapes) and as part of our "Cinema '68" retrospective, Paul Sharits, Bruce Baillie, Will Hindle and Jan Švankmajer.

To mark it's release on DVD by Gaumont at the end of 2007, we will be screening the complete version of Godard's Histoire(s) Du Cinema.

In the way of documentary, two works by Australian film-maker Nigel Buesst will be screened with an introduction by the film-maker. We will also screen State Legislature, the latest work by the pioneering observational film-maker Frederick Wiseman.

A number of classic Hollywood works feature as part of our Howard Hawk's retrospective, however we will also be screening Charlie Chaplin's A Woman of Paris, alongside Cecil B. Demille's final silent drama The Godless Girl, as well as a session of Buster Keaton and Fatty Arbuckle shorts alongside Preston Sturges' Palm Beach Story and Remember The Night(scripted by Sturges).

As usual we feature a number of seasons dedicated to internationally renowned auteurs, however this year we also turn our attention toward Cathay, a major Hong Kong studio operating from the fifties through to the mid-seventies, renowned for their melodramas and female leads. These naturalistic, socially engaged and star-based melodramas feature in this season alongside some of Cathay's notable contributions to the martials arts genre which dominated film-making in Hong Kong. Likewise, our season "Cinema '68" takes the political upheaval of 1968 as its cue to bring together a number of films which interrogate, directly or indirectly, the events, issues and concerns that were globally reaching boiling point in this period.

In the way of auteur special seasons, we begin the year with the contraversial early career of Roman Polanski, opening with his debut film, Dance of The Vampires a comedy horror which features Polanski alongside future wife Sharon Tate. The season features the paranoid thrillers Polanski is perhaps most famous for, Rosemary's Baby and Knife in The Water. Also we will screen two of Polanski's most compelling screen-adaptations; his notoriously bleak and violent realisation of Shakespeare's Macbeth, and his Academy award winning take on Thomas Hardy's tale of repression and sacrifice, Tess.

In April we revisit the cinema of revered French New Wave film-maker, François Truffaut. As well as screening his two most famous works, The 400 Blows and Jules et Jim, which already highlight the range of his rhythmic, dramatic energy, we show a number of lesser known works which further demonstrate his lyrically emotive cinematic sensibilities. These include his reflexive drama on the intense, emotional labor of film-making, Day for Night, two energetic and somewhat zany works of homage The Bride Wore Black and Mississippi Mermaid, and finally his sensual second take on Henri-Pierre Roche's novel Jules et Jim, Les Deux Anglaises et le continent.

The overtly political cinema of Polish film-maker Andrzej Wajda is the subject of our third retrospective, which includes three films that reflect on the Polish experience of World War 2 (Kanal and Ashes and Diamonds - 2 films from a war trilogy - and Lanscape After Battle), an ode the the Polish workers movement (Man of Marble), and his intense studies of personal relationships in Demoiselles de wilko, and The Wedding.

We see out the end of the first half of the year with a comprehensive overview of Carl Dreyer's cinematic work, moving across his career from his debut, The President, through a subsequent succession of masterpieces (Vampyr, The Passion of Joan of Arc, Ordet) to his emotionally heart-wrenching finale, Gertrud, and return from our break in August with a Fritz Lang retrospective that eschews the obvious masterpieces to highlight some of the lesser-known, key films his career (Moonfleet), his work in American cinema (Scarlett Street, Fury, You Only Live Once).

Before our December focus on the 1930's output of the Hollywood master, Howard Hawks, and his gift for building concise action scenes and working artistically within strict narrative and studio conventions, we have two retrospectives showcasing the relatively recent work of two quite distinct, yet passionately productive and well-established auteurs, Arnaud Desplechin and Pedro Costa. More information about each of these compelling contemporary film-makers can be found on the corresponding film pages.

The Melbourne Cinémathèque hopes you enjoy our programme for 2008!

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