NIGHT OF THE HUNTER / THE HUNGER – Chauvel, Fri 14th Aug, 7:PM
COME DRINK WITH ME (King Hu, 1967) – SBS, Sat 15th Aug, 1:05AM
THE BAMBOO BLONDE (Anthony Mann, 1946) – ABC, Fri 14th Aug, 2:15AM
There was a lot of commotion earlier this year when Brett Garten was told his duties as the curator of Chauvel’s cinematheque were no longer needed – where else would Sydneysiders go to see loony 50’s educational films, paranoid UFO documentaries, as well as genre obscurities and lost auteur classics? It seemed for a moment that the Chauvel had sold out or something, but Samuel Fielder has been doing a bang-up job at picking up the slack. Leaning more towards the canonical (Dreyer, Bresson, Fassbinder, Herzog and other have already been represented so far) rather than Garten’s proclivity for zany dust-gatherers, Fielder is nonetheless no highbrow purist, as some of his upcoming selections should attest. This week’s screening is of Jacques Torneur’s Night of the Demon is a must; it’s often regarded as Torneur’s best among his illustrious horror efforts (Cat People, I Walked With a Zombie and The Leopard Man among them), and the film has never had a DVD or VHS release in this country. With Torneur’s unbeatable noir Out of the Past fresh in the memories of Cinematheque attendees after being screened on Monday, Night of the Demon should hold up as an interesting point of comparison and proof of the malleability of Torneur’s expressionistic mastery across different genres. Don't forget to watch Chris Fujiwara's video essay on the film afterwards.
On Friday at the Chauvel is a double header as part of the ‘Savage Psychedelic Nights’ series: one of the scant justifications for Tony Scott’s existence, 1983’s The Hunger, followed by Charles Laughton’s towering Night of the Hunter. The latter usually invites snickers from cynical modern audiences, so be ready with something to throw at ‘em.
TV
On SBS, don’t miss King Hu’s wildly entertaining Come Drink With Me (1:05am, Fri/Sat)– a classic of the wuxia genre, with spry pacing, a strong – nay, badass – female lead, and the requisite virtuoso martial arts scenes, as one would expect from Hu (or at least, you should expect now).
On the ol’ ABC, Anthony Mann’s largely unseen screwball comedy The Bamboo Blonde is showing at 2:15AM Thursday/Friday. From the ABC TV guide synopsis: “A nightclub singer is promoted when a likeness of her face is painted on a WWII bomber that goes on to sink Japanese battleships and down several enemy planes”.
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