Ray Pride

Facets has assembled a sturdy roster of twenty or so key cinematic souvenirs of the anti-Vietnam War movement that exploded in Chicago during the August 1968 Democratic Convention, including Haskell Wexler's famous metafiction, "Medium Cool," which, during a police tear gas attack has a camera operator's words left on the soundtrack, "Look out, Haskell, it's real!" The other reel attractions include "The Murder of Fred Hampton"; the Oscar-nominated "The War at Home"; "Berkeley in the Sixties"; two docs about Czechoslovakia's ferment in that year; the Chicago premiere of John Frankenheimer's half-hour official campaign film for Robert F. Kennedy; Tom Palazzolo's "Campaign"; the potent "Winter Solider"; youth revolt satire "Wild in the Streets"; Norman Mailer's rarely shown egomentary, "Maidstone"; and Louis Malle's fictional "Fools in May." Rarely shown shorts are among the attractions. It's an ambitious, heady stew. On Saturday, I'll moderate "Filming the Revolution," a panel discussion with filmmakers Jill Godmilow, Gordon Quinn, Judy Hoffman, Peter Kuttner, Bill Kottle and Mike James.

"40 Years After: Filming the '68 Revolution" plays all this week at Facets. The schedule is at www.facets.org. The panel discussion is August 23 at 10am.

(2008-08-19)

Also by Ray Pride

Candid Cameras
The light fires: four slow bursts to the eye, four shots. Corner of your eye, corner of the room, there's a couple dozen places this is commonplace in Chicago. But there's more ritual than with the now-ubiquitous self-portraits from cell phones and digital cameras: the photobooth is a foursquare, three-ring circus all its own. They're also an endangered product, created by a fragile mechanical contraption for the age of carnivals and midways, nothing so sleek you can slip in your pocket
(2008-08-13)

Tip of the Week
Opening the same week as "Frozen River," an American movie about trafficking in human souls, "The Unknown Woman," the first feature from Giuseppe Tornatore since 2000's "Malèna," is a heady, overproduced revenge tale about sex trafficking, and it's a heady eyeful
(2008-08-13)

Tip of the Week
For anyone who's ever rued the lack of febrile, singular movies in an indie scene dominated by timid themes and reticent filmmaking, times may be changing. Azazel Jacobs' painful, acute, so-darkly-funny-you-can't-breathe psychological study, "Mama's Man," is due this fall, and sometimes film projectionist Ronald Brownstein's shot-on-16mm "Frownland" is up to bat now
(2008-08-05)

Stealing Beauty
Even after seeing "Man on Wire" three times, at Sundance, as the triumphant closing night of the True/False Film Festival in Columbia, Missouri and back in Chicago, I'm ready to see it again: just about any place. It's far and away my favorite film commercially released in 2008 to date
(2008-08-05)

Dil Doings
(2008-07-29)

Tip of the Week
(2008-07-29)

I Am Curious, Yella
(2008-07-29)

Reality Bites
(2008-07-22)

Tip of the Week
(2008-07-22)

Scarlet Diva, Scarlet Empress
(2008-07-15)

Tip of the Week
(2008-07-15)

Tip of the Week
(2008-07-08)

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