The “Restored and beautiful” program is an opportunity to rediscover on a big screen classic films but also forgotten or lost films. Among them, two early silent films directed by Germaine Dulac and Musidora – La fête espagnole (1920) and Soleil et ombre (1924)– demonstrate that women’s filmmaking was present in France in the 1920s. Both personalities were independent in their production and they could introduce complex female characters in their films, marked by a common taste for Spanish culture. The great Lina Wertmüller, who passed away recently, is also part of the women filmmaker’s section. Pasqualino Settebelleze (1975) offers a critical gaze on Italian society, with talent and humor.
Kummaty (1979) by the Indian filmmaker Govindan Aravindan and Chess of the wind (1976) by the Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Reza Aslani, considered lost for many years, have been recently restored. Painters and poets as well, Aravindan and Aslani had a high creative approach as filmmakers, experimenting a lot with the form and the storytelling. The surviving elements, endangered by decomposition or destruction, have been rediscovered, after thorough research made by the Film Heritage Foundation in India and by Aslani’s children.
Buster Keaton’s The Navigator (1924) is indeed a great classic comedy from the 1920’s, but the different versions existing so far were either incomplete or very “dupy”:
the image was degraded by too many duplicates. This new 4K restoration used the best surviving nitrate element directly made from the original negative, deposited in the MoMA vaults. It will be played with a new score composed by Antonio Coppola.
The great Ettore Scola is also part of this program, developing a poetics of melancholy and nostalgia with a harsh criticism of the post-war society with We all loved each other so much (1974), while Brian De Palma and his baroque Phantom of the Paradise (1974) will be shown with the director’s cut version. Last but not least, Skinoussa (1982) is a tribute to the beauty of the Greek Island in the 1980s through the perception of a French visitor, Jean Baronnet. These new restorations offer the opportunity to be as close as possible to the original experience of cinema.
Curation, programming, introduction: Céline Ruivo (independent expert on film restoration)
