CU Cinema hosts alumni and professors in two film series

As part of Cornell Cinema's yearlong series "Cornell Alums Make Movies," the January/February calendar features four guest events with former Cornell students in attendance to present their work. Admission prices for the series are $6 general, $5 for students and seniors, and $4 for Cornell graduate students, except where noted. All screenings will be held in Willard Straight Theatre except where noted.

The first event, "Cornell Club of LA Presents 8 Short Films," will take place Friday, Jan. 31, at 7 p.m. This program of short films and sketches made by Cornell alumni working or studying in some area of the film/media/entertainment world in Los Angeles was such a success when it screened last spring that the organizers, Nick Muccini '87 and Jim Tavares '92, decided to take it on the road. The two of them will present "Cats Can Be Quite Satisfying" by Rachel Ann Pearl '80; "Keeping the Faith With Morrie" by Angel Harper '74; "Door to Door" by Mike Foodman '00; "Analog" by Keith Adler '96; "Merry Christmas" by Paul Marashlian '92; "Ornaments" by Aaron James Erimez '00; "Repossessed" by Philip D. Schwartz '70; Muccini's "Last Writes"; and three sketches by Tavares. The event is co-sponsored with the Cornell Club of Los Angeles.

Part of "Reflections on War and Its Aftermath" series, "The Battle of Algiers" screens Wednesday, Feb. 5, at 7 p.m. in Willard Straight, with an introduction by faculty members Natalie Melas and Brett de Bary.

The following week Catherine Tingey '96, a native of Ithaca and a graduate of Cornell's College of Architecture, Art and Planning, will come to campus for a screening Thursday, Feb. 6, at 7:15 p.m. Last spring her short film "A Girl's Guide to the Galaxy," which she wrote, directed and co-produced, landed her one of 10 semifinalist slots, from more than 1,500 entries, in the Chrysler Million Dollar Film Festival. As a semifinalist, she was flown to the Cannes Film Festival, where she scripted, cast, shot and edited a five-minute short film, "Tunnel of Love," in just 12 days. The evening program will include these two films, as well as two shorts Tingey made while attending Cornell. She currently is a student in the MFA Film Program at Columbia University.

On Saturday, Feb. 15, at 7:15 p.m., Scott Ferguson '82 will present a sneak preview of writer/director Lisa Cholodenko's "Laurel Canyon," a film he executive produced. The film stars Frances McDormand as a hip, fun-loving Los Angeles record producer, whose uptight son (Christian Bale) and seemingly straight-laced fiancée (Kate Beckinsale) come to live with her while she's cutting a new record with a 20-something singer, who also happens to be her new lover. Special ticket prices for this event will be $10 general, $8 for students and seniors. On Sunday, Feb. 16, at 4:30 p.m. (schedule permitting), Ferguson also will introduce "Palookaville," the hilarious, low-budget independent film he co-produced in the mid-1990s. Admission will be just $4.

On a more serious note, the series, "Reflections on War and Its Aftermath" begins Wednesday, Feb. 5, at 7 p.m., when Professors Natalie Melas (comparative literature) and Brett de Bary (Asian studies) introduce Gillo Pontecorvo's classic film "The Battle of Algiers" (1966), voted one of the top 100 films of all time by the Time Out Film Guide. The following week, Feb. 12 at 7:15 p.m., Professor John Weiss (history) will introduce "No Man's Land" (2001), a harrowing satire on the absurdity of war, made by former Bosnian Army cameraman Danis Tanovic. The series continues with the Ithaca premiere of Timothy Linh Bui's "Green Dragon" (2001), which distinguishes itself in the vast genre of Vietnam war movies by focusing not on the battlefield but on the plight of Vietnamese refugees driven from their homes and onto American soil following the fall of Saigon in 1975. It will screen Friday, Feb. 14, at 7 p.m. and Saturday, Feb. 15, at 7:15 p.m. in Uris Auditorium.

The highly acclaimed "Prisoner of the Mountains" (1997), in which director Sergei Bodrov skillfully updates Tolstoy's short story, transposing the original's setting to the recent Chechen-Russian conflict, will screen Wednesday, Feb. 19, at 7:15 p.m. The series concludes with "The Thin Red Line" (1998), Terrence Malick's shattering meditation on human beings, nature and violence. It will screen Wednesday, Feb. 26, at 6:45 p.m. and Friday, Feb. 28, at 9:20 p.m.

"Cornell Alums Make Movies" is co-sponsored with the Department of Theatre, Film and Dance. "Reflections on War and Its Aftermath" is co-sponsored with the Cornell Anti-War Coalition and the Cornell Forum for Justice and Peace. For more information visit http://cinema.cornell.edu.