February 26, 2009
Young Mr. Lincoln
With post-show discussion with Bob Jackson and Gary Gallagher
Newcomb Hall Theater, 7pm
(John Ford 1939) Though Abraham Lincoln was a perpetual favorite for director John Ford, he was never more brilliantly imagined than in this 1939 feature, which chronicles the development of the would-be President in his early years in Springfield, Illinois. Henry Fonda in one of his earliest starring roles, delivers one of his greatest performances as Lincoln. Combined with Ford’s direction, here is at its grandest and most lyrical, the result is an undeniable masterpiece on America’s history. Chicago Reader critic Dave Kehr notes: “the film stirs feelings about the American past that most of us, I suppose, have missed since childhood.” The film will be introduced with a post-show discussion by Bob Jackson from UVa’s Department of Media Studies and UVa Civil War historian and author Gary Gallagher.
March 5, 2009
King Corn
With post-show discussion with Steve Macko
Vinegar Hill Theater, 7pm
(Aaron Woolf, 2006) Writer-producers Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis move to the Iowa heartland to learn where their food comes from. With the help of friendly neighbors, genetically modified seeds, and powerful herbicides, they plant and grow a bumper crop of America’s most productive, most-subsidized grain on one acre of soil. But when they try to follow their pile of corn into the food system, what they find raises troubling questions about how we eat—and how we farm. Deftly balancing black humour and insight, King Corn is a feature documentary about two friends, one acre of corn, and the subsidized crop that drives our fast-food nation. The film will be introduced with a post-show discussion by film participant Steve Macko from UVa’s department of Environmental Sciences.
This screening is presented in association with the Virginia Festival of the Book. For full details about this year’s Festival of the Book, please visit www.vabook.org.
March 18, 2009
Black Maria Film and Video Festival
With John Columbus
Vinegar Hill Theatre, 7pm
The Black Maria Film Festival is an international juried competition and award tour, with a mission to exhibit and reward cutting edge works from independent film and video makers. Each program is custom tailored for an accessible and meaningful experience for varied audiences from city to city. From animation to experimental, satire to documentary, the range of selection is nearly boundless.
April 8, 2009
Hamlet
With Colleen Kelly and Clare Kinney
Vinegar Hill Theatre, 7pm
(Michael Almereyda, 2000) Updating the classic revenge drama to present day New York City, and substituting corporation politics for the country of Denmark, Michael’s Almereyda’s 2000 feature is among the most inventive of recent Shakespeare adaptations. Bolstered by an all star cast which includes Ethan Hawke, Bill Murray, Julia Stiles, Kyle MacLachlan, and Sam Shephard, the film recontextualizes Shakespeare’s preoccupations into a world defined by its media. Viewers are asked to consider not only those questions of morality posed by Shakespeare, but the relation of those questions to our world today. The film will be introduced with a post-show discussion and demonstrations by the English Dept of UVa’s Clare Kinney and Colleen Kelly from the American Shakespeare Center in Staunton, who is also a trained stage combat teacher and directing this semester’s production of Two Gentlemen of Verona for the Drama Dept of UVa.
This screening is presented in association with the American Shakespeare Center. For full details about their Spring Season at the Blackfriar’s Theater in Staunton, visit www.americanshakespearecenter.com.
April 29, 2009
House of Usher
With guests
Vinegar Hill Theatre, 7pm
(Roger Corman, 1960) The Spring Season concludes on April 29th by celebrating the bicentennial birthday of one of America’s greatest literary talents, Edgar Allen Poe, with a screening of Roger Corman’s 1960 classic, House of Usher. The first in a series of seven landmark Poe adaptations directed by Corman and starring the delightfully creepy Vincent Price, House of Usher is among the pair’s best work together – and indeed, of the cinema’s finest Poe adaptations. Boasting deliriously colored ‘Scope photography, Corman’s film conveys Poe’s brilliant sense of the gothic with a fervor which few films can match. Presented to coincide with the University’s ongoing Poe exhibition From Out That Shadow, the screening will be followed by a discussion with a special guest to be announced.
