ISSUE #46
BEAM FROM THE BOOTH | GRAND RAPIDS FILM SOCIETY
[EDITED BY: GRIFFIN SHERIDAN]
Hello and welcome back to an all-new installment of BEAM FROM THE BOOTH brought to you by GRAND RAPIDS FILM SOCIETY!
First, a huge thanks to the nearly 200 people who joined us for our second annual Twin Peaks Day celebration. While it feels bizarre to say we had a great time watching a film like Fire Walk With Me, the passion for the work and worlds of David Lynch was on full display and made for a very memorable evening. Let’s do it again next year!
With March’s arrival this Friday, we want to run down all the exciting events we have coming next month...
FRIDAY, MARCH 1st: NARRATIVE AGENCY: FILMS BY KATE LEVY (ARTIST SHOWCASE)
As we detailed in a previous issue, we’re thrilled about hosting the first event in our new ARTIST SHOWCASE series.
THIS FRIDAY (3/1) Michigan-born filmmaker KATE LEVY joins us for an evening as she presents a program of her short films in a showcase format with commentary for each work followed by a discussion and Q&A.
To ensure as many people as possible can attend the event, admission will simply be a pay-what-you-can donation. For more information about Levy and the event, head to the listing on our website.
SUNDAY, MARCH 3rd: CLARA SOLA (2021)
From Costa Rican director Nathalie Álvarez Mesén and presented by the CHIAROSCURO INTERNATIONAL FILM SERIES, Clara Sola follows a 36-year-old woman living in a remote Costa Rican village who takes off on a journey to break free from social and religious conventions and become the master of her sexuality and newfound powers.
Like all Chiaroscuro screenings, admission is FREE TO ALL, and the film will be followed by a panel discussion and reception with refreshments.
SUNDAY, MARCH 17th: THIS IS NOT A BURIAL, IT’S A RESURRECTION (2019)
Another selection from our friends at the CHIAROSCURO INTERNATIONAL FILM SERIES, this Lesothoian drama finds an 80-year-old widow standing up to a group of local officials who want to build a dam and resettle her village.
Again, this screening is FREE TO ALL and will also feature a panel discussion and reception with refreshments.
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 20th: OPEN PROJECTOR NIGHT
Our celebration of independent shorts and more with a Michigan connection returns! Enjoy a diverse range of screenings from animated narratives and commercial work to experimental pieces. After the event, participate in a question-and-answer discussion with the filmmakers and vote for your favorite short film.
SUNDAY, MARCH 24th: JEANNE DIELMAN, 23, QUAI DU COMMERCE, 1080 BRUXELLES
For our final event of the month, we’re very excited to have the opportunity to screen this French/Belgian classic from Chantal Akerman that recently topped the ten-yearly Sight and Sound poll as the Greatest Film of All Time.
In it, “Jeanne Dielman, the widowed mother of a teenage son, Sylvain, ekes out a drab, repetitive existence in her tiny Brussels apartment. Jeanne's days are divided between humdrum domestic chores — shopping, cooking, housework — and her job as an occasional prostitute, which keeps her financially afloat. She seems perfectly resigned to her situation until a series of slight interruptions in her routine leads to unexpected and dramatic changes.”
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We hope to see you at the Wealthy Theatre this month! As always, find links to purchase your tickets for these screenings in our ‘Upcoming Events’ section further down.
Now, check out the latest installment of our collaboration with Grand Rapids Public Library, Partner Picks…
PARTNER PICKS WITH GRAND RAPIDS PUBLIC LIBRARY
[FEAT. GRIFFIN SHERIDAN]
Inspired by series like Criterion’s Closet Picks and Letterboxd’s Four Favorites, GRAND RAPIDS FILM SOCIETY and our friends at the GRAND RAPIDS PUBLIC LIBRARY have teamed up to bring you all PARTNER PICKS: an ongoing series of brief videos featuring a member of the GRFS Board as they browse the vast and varied selection of films (and television!) available to check out at our local library.
In this latest installment, check out what our own Griffin Sheridan pulled off the shelves...
If you’re interested in reading more about Griffin’s full list of recommendations, check out GRPL’s curated list. Access these films and thousands more on shelves or online with your GRPL library card.
A very special thanks to GRPL’s HAILEY JANSSON for arranging, shooting, editing, and sharing this super fun series.
Stay tuned for another installment of Partner Picks very soon!
SPECIAL GUEST CONTRIBUTOR
CHARIOTS OF FIRE: IN PRAISE OF “OSCAR BAIT”
[BY: RYAN COPPING]
I hadn’t seen Chariots of Fire (1981) since my freshman year of college, now over twenty years ago. I remember thinking it was excellent (which is not a controversial opinion), and that single viewing stayed with me, the most obvious way in hearing Vangelis’ theme music while exercising, picturing myself running in slow motion. I am sure I’m not the only person who has done this.
Despite my good memories, when I watched it again last week, I was shocked at how good the movie is. It is one of the best films of the 1980s, one of the best British films, and possibly the best sports movie, or perhaps more accurately, the best film about sports. In a sense, it’s hard to argue the movie is underrated — after all, it won the Oscar for Best Picture of 1981. However, it’s rarely on lists of the greatest films ever made, has not gathered much scholarship, and I’ve never seen the film programmed in a festival or a cineaste club, although I am sure it has somewhere.
The reason for this, I gather, is that the movie appears in the dreaded class of “Oscar bait” — respectable cinema designed to win awards that are promptly forgotten afterwards while other more popular and quirky films live on in the public consciousness (think The Dark Knight as opposed to Frost/Nixon), as has been so wisely written about in this publication. Chariots of Fire has many traits of these films that are often maligned by cineastes and hipsters — it is a “respectable” historical film with high production values, takes a left-of-center but not radical position on social issues, is well-acted, and is made with a kind of cinematic restraint, shot in a Classical style accessible to all. The premise of the movie does also not really sound thrilling — a Jew and a Christian learn important lessons about success and themselves while competing in track races at the 1924 Olympics.
Though Chariots of Fire has many of the above traits, it is also a deeply moving experience and beautiful work of art. The movie’s appeal to the Academy in 1981 may have been due to its relatively serious subject matter near the dawn of the ‘Blockbuster Era’ and snob appeal, but upon my second viewing of this film, I found myself caught up in the characters’ yearning for success. It’s not about track and field, it’s about the drive within all of us to get 100% on that test, be Employee of the Year...or maybe win an Academy Award or be elected President.
For Harold Abrahams (Ben Cross), one of the few Jews admitted to Cambridge University, winning is about proving. We quickly gather that his motivation is certainly personal, but also socia: you built and designed barriers to keep me and people like me out, but despite that, I am going to be the best. I am going to win to show you I can, and you can’t stop me. For Eric Liddell (Ian Charlesom), a devout Scottish Quaker, the drive is nearly as strong but less rational. Though many around him are impressed by his celebrity, others (and the movie) are more skeptical — is this really about God, or just personal ego? Why would God care about who wins a track race? For someone who seems to have everything in his early 20s, what is the point of competing?
The movie manages to avoid many potential issues with this premise; it would be easy for Liddell to come off as an insufferably obtuse Bible thumper, for instance, but the film takes his personal beliefs seriously, and we see that he is a good and empathetic man who still cannot totally explain why he chooses to spend his time competing. The audience is surely invested in Abrahams’ success, but I found myself worried about him — the burden of running not only for himself but an entire social movement is heavy. In a great monologue, he reveals that he is more afraid of winning than losing, probably because he would not know what to do after he achieves the goal he has given so much for. His entire identity and life hangs on being the best, and how would he know what to do when he no longer has to prove it?
Unlike many “Oscar bait” films, which are often well-acted but emotionally blunted, this is one is well-acted and mesmerizing, not to mention insightful and wise. I questioned my own drive for success (having just turned 40 and having done nothing close to winning Olympic gold) while watching it, and I certainly found myself taking comfort in what both Abrahams and Liddell already know: the people who really matter in your life don’t care if you are the best, many of the finest things in life are not won in competition and can be enjoyed by all, and winning isn’t everything. But would anyone turn down standing on that pedestal while someone puts a medal around your neck as your national anthem plays?
Many people — Cross and Charlesom, the rest of the excellent cast, producer David Puttnam, screenwriter Colin Welland, and cinematographer David Watkin, among many others — deserve recognition, but the artistic achievement here is really from director Hugh Hudson, who died on February 10th of this year. Hudson’s choices provide layers of depth that I think most other directors would have missed — the aesthetically beautiful, postwar world that is nonetheless filled with bigotry and selfishness, the complex inner life of the two protagonists (something very difficult to put on screen), and the somewhat contradictory attitudes of the people who love them and root for them. The movie has maybe eleven or twelve races, and Hudson finds a way of filming each of them slightly differently so we never get bored and never lose the thrill of running, which to the director appears to be a spiritual experience.
Hudson’s best film is everything the Academy loves to recognize: a tasteful subject, high production values, great acting in the best British tradition, the Classical style. Sometimes these things combine to make a movie that is more impressive than good. There is no reason, however, that such a movie must inherently be forgettable material for snobs to demonstrate their superior tastes, as in say, The English Patient (1996). Sometimes the Academy gets it right, and they sure did here. Chariots of Fire is a bow of burning gold, brimming with arrows of desire.
ECHOES
[BY: SPENCER EVERHART]
Echoes is an exclusively-visual column based on the MUBI Notebook series of the same name - a fun way to find the repetitions, reverberations, and recapitulations in images throughout cinema history.
A Million Miles Away (Jennifer Reeder, 2014) [watch here]
88:88 (Isiah Medina, 2015) [watch here]
UPCOMING EVENTS
NARRATIVE AGENCY: FILMS BY KATE LEVY (ARTIST SHOWCASE)
WHAT: The first-ever event in our new 'Artist Showcase' series, " join us for an evening with filmmaker Kate Levy as she presents a program of her short films with commentary for each work followed by a discussion and Q&A.
WHEN: Friday, March 1st, 7:00pm
WHERE: The Wealthy Theatre
CLARA SOLA (presented by CHIAROSCURO INTERNATIONAL FILM SERIES)
WHAT: In a remote village in Costa Rica, a 36-year-old woman takes off on a journey to break free from social and religious conventions and become the master of her sexuality and newfound powers. (FREE screening followed by discussion and reception).
WHEN: Sunday, March 3rd, 2:00pm
WHERE: The Wealthy Theatre
THIS IS NOT A BURIAL, IT’S A RESURRECTION (presented by CHIAROSCURO INTERNATIONAL FILM SERIES)
WHAT: An 80-year-old widow stands up to a group of local officials who want to build a dam and resettle her village. (FREE screening followed by discussion and reception).
WHEN: Sunday, March 17th, 2:00pm
WHERE: The Wealthy Theatre
WHAT: A program of curated short films from independent filmmakers with a MI connection!
WHEN: Wednesday, March 20th, 7:00 pm.
WHERE: The Wealthy Theatre
JEANNE DIELMAN, 23, QUAI DU COMMERCE, 1080 BRUXELLES
WHAT: Jeanne Dielman days are divided between humdrum domestic chores, and her job as an occasional prostitute. She seems perfectly resigned to her situation until a series of slight interruptions in her routine leads to unexpected and dramatic changes.
WHEN: Sunday, March 24th, 4:00 pm.
WHERE: The Wealthy Theatre
And so we’ve arrived at the end of another BEAM FROM THE BOOTH! We appreciate you taking the time to read it and truly hope you’ll continue to do so. Be sure to SUBSCRIBE to get each issue in your inbox every MONDAY, and stay up-to-date on all things GRFS.
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Look for ISSUE #47 in your inbox on NEXT MONDAY, 03/04!
Until then, friends...
