kathy

Sir James Matthew Barrie wrote numerous books and plays, but he is best remembered for Peter Pan. Born in Kirriemuir, Scotland, on May 9, 1860, he began his writing career as a journalist, and, by the turn of the century he was a well-known playwright. Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Would Not Grow Up, … [Read more...] about Peter Pan

I always remind people culture is like a tree,” writer Curt Siodmak told an interviewer in Gerald Koll’s Weekend am Wannsee (2000). “It always blooms one last time before it dies.” “Berlin was like that.” When Siodmak said this, he was looking back at the city from more than a half-century’s … [Read more...] about People on Sunday

In or out of makeup, the face of Lon Chaney is one of the silent screen’s most compelling. Unique among film personalities, Chaney was a character actor who used his physical dexterity and mastery of makeup not to conceal, but to add depth to his powerful performances. In doing so, he became one of … [Read more...] about The Penalty

Ruan Lingyu, the ill-fated star of The Peach Girl, lived a life that could have been lifted from one of her films. Born into an impoverished family from Guangdong province, she is a native of Shanghai, a city that promised jobs to China’s rural poor and later became known as the Hollywood of the … [Read more...] about The Peach Girl

You can read the program essay for our 2013 screening of The Patsy here Ever since Orson Welles made Citizen Kane in 1941, Marion Davies has been persistently and erroneously identified with the character of Susan Alexander, Charles Foster Kane’s shrill second wife. In fact, Marion Davies and … [Read more...] about The Patsy

You can read the program essay for our 2008 screening of The Patsy here A channel through which a motion picture reaches the screen. With The Patsy, Vidor was tuned just right. It is a perfect film. There is not a scene, gesture, joke, intertitle, gag, bit of detail, or character out of place. … [Read more...] about The Patsy