The Bright Bulb Screening Series

TONITE!
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BRIGHT BULB SCREENINGS, Free Screening Series @ The Rotunda (4014 Walnut, Philly)
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Thursday, June 11th, 7pm, FREE SCREENING
Two Masterworks From Two Award-Winning Iranian Directors!
BEAUTIFUL CITY (2004, dir. Asghar Farhadi, 101 min., Iran)
3 FACES (2018, dir. Jafar Panhi. 100 min. Iran)
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BEAUTIFUL CITY is the masterful second film from Oscar-winning director Asghar Farhadi (A SEPARATION, THE SALESMAN). The basic premise is quickly established: an imprisoned young man has just turned 18 years old and is now eligible to be executed for the murder of which he was convicted at age 16. Can his best friend and his sister convince the victim's father to forgive him and spare his life?

Although the quest to save a young man's life seems noble and just, each step the crusading couple takes unveils the moral complexity of what they are asking, challenging the friend and inmate's sister on just what they're willing to sacrifice to win the convicted man's release.

The Oscar-nominated director/screenwriter's gifts are on full display, giving each character a depth and humanity that refuses to flatten its characters into heroes and villains as the plotline ingeniously tightens around them. While offering a fascinating look at the Iranian society and their legal system, BEAUTIFUL CITY also delivers some classic movie pleasures, including a forbidden romance, spot-on performances and a number of dramatic plot twists.

“Cross-pollinate an archetypal plotline and a problematic romance and what you get is BEAUTIFUL CITY, a film in which the world is made immediate and kinetic."
- John Anderson, Newsday
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Jafar Panahi's fourth film made under his 20 year government ban, again finds himself in docufiction mode, blurring the truth and storytelling within its narrative.

Playing themselves, Panahi and popular Iranian TV actress Behnaz Jafari receive a video from a small town woman determined to pursue a career as an actress but thwarted by her family. Despondent, she films her own hanging, but is this real? Panahi and Jafar travel to her town near the Turkish border to undercover the truth.

Part detective tale, part road movie, part anthropological study of village life in rural Iran, all bound together by Panahi's curiosity and humanism. Underlined along the way are the sad realities of living under the patriarchal oppression demanded by the State. Another enthralling chapter from one of the greats of World Cinema, 3 FACES won “Best Screenplay” at the Cannes Film Festival.

“Panahi can’t help but flaunt optimism wherever he sees it—he lets it rise above it all despite the odds.”
- Tomris Laffly, RogerEbert.com

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www.therotunda.org

!TONITE! Thursday May 14th!

BRIGHT BULB SCREENINGS, Free Screening Series @ The Rotunda (4014 Walnut, Philly)
Follow Bright Bulb Screenings on Facebook, Instagram

Thursday, May 14th, 7pm, FREE SCREENING!
LITTLE DARLINGS (1980, dir. Ronald F. Maxwell, 113 min., 95 US)
OVER THE EDGE (1979, dir. Jonathan Kaplan. 106 min. U.S.)
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Starring Emmy Award-winning teen actress Kristy McNichol and Oscar-winning actress Tatum O'Neal, LITTLE DARLINGS was a massive hit in the spring of 1980. The provocative plot involves a cabin of young girls at a summer sleepover camp placing bets on whether Tatum or Kristy's characters would be the first to lose their virginity.

Directed by Ronald F. Maxwell (later writer & director of the GETTYSBURG series) but more importantly screen-written by Kimi Peck and Dalene Young, LITTLE DARLINGS stands out as one of the few mainstream Hollywood films to take seriously the s*xual lives of young women, a subject perhaps even more taboo today.
Director Maxwell was making his big screen debut after learning his craft on the predecessor of PBS' "Great Performances" program. While Peck and Young's sensitive script took s*x more seriously than your typical male-centric "coming of age" film, LITTLE DARLINGS pairing of two of the era's most popular teenage actresses had Paramount was very optimistic about the film's commercial promise.

But when the studio screened Maxwell's first edit they were vocally unhappy. "We want MEATBALLS (Bill Murray's recent summer camp comedy) not some European art film!" Maxwell re-edited, conceding a few more comic moments but he didn't budge on the dramatic core of the film. A particularly receptive teenage preview audience finally changed the studio's perspective and Paramount went ahead with major promotion and a big nationwide opening.

Filling the soundtrack with hit pop needle-drops is part of the film's charm but the pricey music licensing later meant that the film would be mostly unavailable for four decades, only recently being restored to its widescreen glory. The new transfer shows off the beautiful camerawork of Beda Botka, cinematographer of the Czech classic MARKETA LAZAROVA. But front and center is the able cast, including Kristi McNichol, then seen in the critically-acclaimed ABC series FAMILY, Tatum O'Neal, the star of the hit films PAPER MOON and THE BAD NEW BEARS, Matt Dillon in just his second film role and in her feature debut young Cynthia Nixon, years before S*X & THE CITY.

“A delightful and refreshingly real look at life among today's teenage girls''
- Eleanor Ringel, Atlanta Constitution
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Jonathan Kaplan's OVER THE EDGE did not have LITTLE DARLINGS success at the box-office yet it remains one of the era's best-remembered youth films. It was the debut of screenwriter Tim Hunter, who would go on to write and direct the similarly-themed RIVER'S EDGE in 1986.

Inspired by a news article on vandalism in the planned community of Foster City, California, OVER THE EDGE sets the action “New Granada” Colorado, where the transplanted kids rebel against their boring suburban lives. Despite the adults best intentions, their heavy-handed discipline makes matters worse, leading to death and destruction across this suburban paradise gone wrong.

OVER THE EDGE fits neatly into the juvenile delinquent genre that began in earnest with REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE, reliably stirring up societal fears of reckless youth mindlessly skidding towards disaster. Giving the film its distinction is the cast of real teenagers from the New York suburbs, not polished 20-something L.A. actors. Standing out from the cast is first-timer Matt Dillon, oozing rowdy charisma as the doomed bad boy Richie. Director Jonathan Kaplan, who learned his exploitation chops in the school of Roger Corman, sticks our face into the world of drunk and drugged out kids, riding their spider bikes through the nihilistic teenage wasteland.

OVER THE EDGE features a dramatic score from the director's once-Blacklisted father Sol Kaplan but is best remembered for its fantastic rock soundtrack, including tunes from Cheap Trick, Ramones, Van Halen and Jimi Hendrix.

“(OVER THE EDGE) is staged with such vivid efficiency and concern that, as you watch it, you are frequently caught halfway between a giggle and a gasp.“
- Vincent Canby, New York Times