The Reagan era gets remixed by Richard Linklater and AFS
What is the “Wasteland” in question? It doesn’t have anything to do with T.S. Eliot, but it does have a lot to do with the decade of yuppies and leg warmers. While the Eighties has a reputation for studio hits of varying quality, there’s more to the story.
The “Jewels” are selections from local auteur Richard Linklater, films from that piece of our past that exceed expectations. This was a time that was personally important to him: He moved to Austin, started the Austin Film Society, and finished the decade with Slacker. He knows of what he speaks.
In an ongoing series, Linklater will screen half a dozen movies at the AFS Cinema, complete with an introduction before and a conversation after. Any of the six will be worth a watch, a great way to spend a night in May.
LOCAL HERO
May 8
In Bill Forsyth’s sly comedy of manners, Burt Lancaster plays an American oil billionaire who dispatches a young underling (Peter Riegert) to Scotland to buy up a small village so that it can be destroyed and make way for an oil refinery.
VAGABOND
May 13
This year, the world of cinema lost Agnès Varda, a treasure whose films have been challenging and delighting audiences for half a century. In Vagabond, she tells the tale of a young woman who finds herself homeless and on the road. This is a filmmaker at the height of her powers.
LOST IN AMERICA
May 15
Albert Brooks’ curveball of a road movie features a yuppie couple, played by Brooks and Julie Hagerty, who ditch all their possessions and hit the road in an RV in search of a dimly understood “Easy Rider” ideal. Very funny, with comic situations that brew up out of small details. In many ways Brooks’ style was a precursor of comic trends that took hold decades later.
CHAN IS MISSING
May 20
Wayne Wang appeared on my radar with his 1995 double play of Smoke and Blue in the Face. These NYC meanders were solid indie fare, following up on his hit The Joy Luck Club. Chan Is Missing is a “black-and-white neo-noir puzzle set in San Francisco’s Chinatown” and promises to expose an early work that presages later success.
RETURN OF THE SECAUCUS SEVEN
May 22
Ever since I moved to Austin in the late 90’s, I’ve heard about the connection of John Sayles to Austin, specifically of his friendship with for Austin Chronicle editor Louis Black. In Return of the Secaucus Seven, we have his seminal work, on the big screen. This will be a great one to hear Linklater discuss.
CHOOSE ME
May 29
Alan Rudolph’s neon roundelay of deception, love, and sex among the night people of Los Angeles stars Keith Carradine as a newly-released mental patient with a mysterious past who finds himself in a love triangle with bar owner Lesley-Anne Warren and late-night radio sex advice host Genevieve Bujold.
You had me at Lesley-Anne Warren.
For more showtimes and more information visit:
https://www.austinfilm.org/series/jewels-in-the-wasteland-2019/.