SECRET MOVIE CLUB presents
Part of our THE HEART WANTS Series, Thursday, February 9, 2023
LOCATION: The Secret Movie Club Theater, 1917 Bay Street, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, CA 90021
*Please note entrance/parking is actually in the back of the building. Make a right on Wilson Street, then a right behind the building. We’re the first set of black steps after the big gate.
7:30pm DOUBLE INDEMNITY (1944, dir. Billy Wilder, Universal, USA, 105mns, 35mm)
9:40pm BREATHLESS (1960, dir. Jean-Luc Godard, Rialto, France, 90mns, 35mm)
Rotten and doomed relationships in noir classics are the “through the looking glass” reflections of romantic comedies. Whereas most romantic comedies end (as Orson Welles astutely observed) at the wedding and don’t follow the couple into the day to day hard work in the salt mines of child-rearing, work, providing, crisis management, noir movies often examine amour fou (“crazy love” in French)-that kind of all-consuming passion, sexual desire, obsession that often leads to mental breakdowns, emotional devastation, bad decisions, and. . .murder!
First up, we screen the noir banger, Billy Wilder’s Double Indemnity (co-written with Raymond Chandler!) about insurance salesman Walter Neff (an amazing Fred MacMurray) who falls for Barbara Stanwyck’s femme fatale Phyllis Dietrichson. Phyllis knows how to turn it up and on and soon Walter finds himself agreeing to kill Phyllis’s husband so they can collect money and roll around in the hay unencumbered by pesky problems like a “marriage”.
Double Indemnity is one of Wilder’s earliest classics, putting on full department store display Wilder’s acidic talent at reveling in the hypocrisies and nastiness of human nature. The movie has so much great dialogue, it’s almost embarrassing to all other movies. And it never once flinches from its fatalistic and dark comedic tone.
We follow this up with another cinema-changing/defining work of noir and doomed love, Jean Luc Godard’s debut feature Breathless. Godard went to great lengths to point out that his revolutionary jump cutting style (cutting out parts of the same shot so the shot appears to “jump” from moment to moment) had more to do with necessity than creative experimentation. Godard just felt that many of his shots went on too long. So he took out the bad parts and a new cinematic technique was born.
Breathless follows petty criminal Michel (Jean Paul Belmondo) as he hides out and romances American journalist Patricia (Jean Seberg) who is both fascinated and conflicted with Michel’s criminality.
The movie had a sexual frankness and commitment to rule-breaking in its style that was a paradigm shift to modernity from the “classic” style that had predominated the last 30 years of movie-making.
Breathless not only defined the French New Wave but it excited filmmakers all around the world with filmic techniques nobody had ever dared to try.
Godard had a bravery and imagination that dared to try things with film nobody had even thought to do (mixing an unrelated soundtrack to a strange image, cutting to slugs of black, cutting to inter-titles, playing bits of music for only a few seconds before hard cutting out). His style would lay the groundwork for Bertolucci, Scorsese, even Tarantino.
But Godard also remembered to ground his stylistic experimentation in a very relatable romantic relationship.
So come check out two noir bangers. And see the other side of love. On 35mm!
Best always,
Craig Hammill
Secret Movie Club Founder.Programmer
*Please note that though we strive to always show titles on 35mm film if advertised, we may have to screen digitally if the print we receive is in such bad shape or if we don't receive the print in time because of a shipping delay. We will do our best to alert the audience. When this does occur, we will offer each ticket holder who chooses not to attend a complimentary ticket to a future event in exchange. (Disclaimer: Good for 90 days – Future screening must have available tickets, cannot be a fundraiser, and must be comparably priced)
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
REFUNDS:
We can offer refunds up to 24 hours before showtime. Please request a refund through Eventbrite and we will process ASAP. After that, no refunds. Sorry.
However if something last minute comes up and you can’t make the screening, for whatever reason, just write to us before showtime: community@secretmovieclub.com and we’ll offer you complimentary tickets to a future screening, good for 90 days. (Disclaimer: Future screening must have available tickets, cannot be a fundraiser, and must be comparably priced)
HELPFUL SECRET MOVIE CLUB (1917 Bay Street, 2nd Floor, LA, CA 90021) THEATER PARKING TIPS:
We recommend that you park just outside our theater. Remember our theater is actually in a beautiful street art alleyway in the back of the 1917 Bay Street building. You get to our entrance by taking a right on Wilson, then a right behind the building. We are the first set of black steps on the right after the big gate.
There is also a parking lot at the corner of Mateo and Violet Street, just 2 blocks from our theater, which costs $7 per car.
HOW CAN WE STAY ON TOP OF NEWLY ANNOUNCED 35MM SCREENINGS, EVENTS, ETC?
You can follow us on Instagram/Twitter: @secretmovieclub or Facebook: @secretmovieclub35mm
You can also subscribe to our weekly email newsletter at secretmovieclub.com or by writing to us at community@secretmovieclub.com and using the header “SUBSCRIBE ME TO NEWSLETTER”.
HOW CAN I CONTACT YOU IF I HAVE OTHER QUESTIONS/RECOMMENDATIONS:
You can always email us at community@secretmovieclub.com with any other questions, concerns, thoughts, recommendations.