the celluloid circus presented with the big apple circus nov 26--dec 4, 1997 scene from LA STRADA

Ladies and gentleman, boys and girls of all ages--welcome to The Celluloid Circus! It's the 20th Birthday of the Big Apple Circus and you're invited to join the celebration. While the Circus is at Lincoln Center, extraordinary Big Top movies will be running at the Walter Reade Theater. See amazing circus films from other countries! Enjoy astounding circus movies from the USA! See two fabulous silent film classics with live piano accompaniment! Join us on November 29 for Reel to Real for Kids, which will feature W.C. Fields in YOU CAN'T CHEAT AN HONEST MAN with a live performance by the Big Apple Circus Circus To Go! ™ And best of all, the movies (except for Reel to Real and the silent films) are double- featured so you get two consecutive films for the price of one! Attention Film Society and Big Apple Circus members! Here's even more good news! Film Society members are invited to join Big Apple Circus members under the Big Top for their new production, "Big Apple Circus 20 Years" (10/23/97-1/11/98) and at our "Happy Hat Hoopla" members-only parties! The "hooplas" will take place on three dates: Sunday, November 30; Sunday, December 21; and Saturday, January 10. Film Society members can also take advantage of the Circus members-only $5.00 discount on Center Mezzanine and Grandstand seats for all performances. Please call Elizabeth Fallon, the Big Apple Circus's Manager of Individual Giving, at 212.268.2500 x128 for information. Big Apple Circus members have the opportunity to lose themselves in the world of celluloid fantasy at the Film Society's upcoming screenings from October 1, 1997 through January 11, 1998! Circus members can enjoy the Film Society's members-only $5.00 admission (non-member price: $8.50). Just present your BAC membership card at the box office of the Walter Reade Theater for a discount for two. What a deal! What a show! Program co-curated and film descriptions compiled by Sayre Maxfield and Isa Cucinotta Note: All foreign-language films are subtitled in English. calendar program notes and times

a scene from TRAPEZE

TRAPEZE Carol Reed, USA, 1956, 105 min, 35mm Here in a beautiful Scope print, the former real-life circus man Burt Lancaster teams up with Tony Curtis as a trapeze act working on achieving the elusive "triple." Enter the gorgeous Gina Lollobrigida as the scheming, ambitious femme fatale who wants the fame and glory of the high wire act for herself. The brilliant color and wide-screen photography do justice to the thrills of the circus spectacle as few other films do. Filmed at the legendary Cirque d'Hiver, the oldest existing circus building in the world. Among the many circus acts appearing are: triple-somersaulter Fay Alexander, the Codreanos, Michel Zavetta, Zizine Frediani, the Bouglione Family, the Gimma Boys, Sampion Zurani, and clowns: Mylos & E.P. Loyal, Lulu& Tonio, Despard & Charly, Hopp & Picraft, Loriot; and Ringmaster George Loyal. Wednesday, November 26: 2 and 6:15 pm Saturday, November 29: 4 and 8:10 pm SAWDUST AND TINSEL Ingmar Bergman, Sweden, 1953, 92 minutes, 35mm Played out against the backdrop of a traveling circus, the aging owner Albert; Anne, a young bareback rider; Albert's bourgeois wife; and Anne's one-night stand, Frans all engage in emotional and sexual power struggles, each looking for some kind of fulfillment in their bleak lives. Liaisons form and dissolve leaving nothing but crushing humiliation and despair in their wake. This is the first Bergman film to use Sven Nykvist as cinematographer. With Ake Grönberg and Harriet Andersson. Wednesday, November 26: 4:10 and 8:20 pm Saturday, November 29: 6:15 and 10:15 pm JUMBO Charles Walter, USA, 1962, 123 minutes, 35mm JUMBO brings to the screen Billy Rose's 1935 spectacular circus-musical show held at New York's Hippodrome. Jimmy Durante is Pop Wonder, owner of the ailing "Wonder Circus." Along with his daughter Kitty (Doris Day) and a new hired hand (Stephen Boyd), he tries to bring the show back to its glory. Unbeknownst to him, Boyd, who has caught Kitty's eye, is the son of a rival circus owner. The circus-act sequences were conceived by Busby Berkeley and feature the famous equestrian act of Poodle Hanneford (who appeared in the stage version), equestrienne Corky Cristiani, Victor Julian's chimpanzees, clowns Pat Anthony and Adolph Dubsky and an aerial ballet staged by the legendary Barbette! Thursday, November 27: 2 and 6:15 pm PARADE Jacques Tati, France, 1973, 83 minutes, 35mm Written, directed by and starring Tati, PARADE is set in a great circus in which Monsieur Loyal performs some of his best-known pantomimes, alternating with other marvelous music-hall acts. Audience, children, clowns, performance artists and Tati bond together to create a festival of the imagination. A good opportunity to see Karl Kossmayer and his mules, the Veterans (acrobatics) Hal, Norman & Ladd (musicians), the Williams (jugglers) and Pierre Brahma (magician)--all excellent comedy acts much admired by Tati. Also featuring Paris' Cirque d'Hiver Ringmaster Michel Francini. Bring the kids! Thursday, November 27: 4:20 and 8:35 pm I'M NO ANGEL Wesley Ruggles, 1933, 87 minutes, 16mm Written by and starring Mae West, this pre-code film contains some of her bawdiest lines, not to mention a few good songs. Tira is a sexy circus performer and talk of the town. Away from the tents and her boyfriend Slick Willy, she keeps a private apartment for entertaining. A romance with Cary Grant has her rethinking her career as both beguiler of beasts and men, but the romance goes awry and West takes him to court to sue for breach of promise. A parade of her lovers is presented by Grant, but she, acting as her own lawyer and never at a loss for words, turns the scene to her own advantage. "Beulah, peel me a grape." Friday, November 28: 2 and 6:40 pm

a scene from HE WHO GETS SLAPPED

LOLA MONTES Max Ophuls, France, 1955, 140 minutes, 35mm Ophuls' exhilaratingly composed color CinemaScope screen enlarges the true story of legendary courtesan Lola Montes (Martine Carol), including her romances with King Ludwig (Anton Walbrook), Liszt, and a student (Oskar Werner). Montes is reduced to circus appearances, and ringmaster Peter Ustinov acts as a director who both exploits and adores his muse: the tabula rasa of Carol's mannequin-like face and the turntable vignettes of her rich past are the stuff that movie magic is mined from. In the inexorable circularity of Ophuls' direction lies both the tragedy and transcendence of human existence. Also appearing are aerialists Aimée Fontenay and Yves Rozec. Friday, November 28: 4 and 8:30 pm VARIETY and HE WHO GETS SLAPPED will be accompanied by the ever-versatile Curtis Salke on the piano. The silent film program at the Walter Reade Theater is made possible through the generosity of The Ira M. Resnick Foundation. VARIETY E.A. Dupont, Germany, 1925; 82 minutes, 16mm If there's one lesson to be learned from circus films, it is to never cross the catcher in a trapeze act. In this silent masterpiece, the great Emil Jannings plays the aging catcher who has formed a sensational aerial act with his young mistress (Lya de Putti) and a slimy but talented interloper (Warwick Ward). When Ward seduces de Putti, there is hell to pay. Variety is a visual tour de force with swirling light and movement and spectacular camera effects from the celebrated Karl Freund. The film also features juggling legend Enrico Rastelli as well as famed aerialist Alfredo Codona. Sunday, November 30: 4 pm HE WHO GETS SLAPPED Victor Sjostrom, USA, 1924; 84 minutes, 35mm Lon Chaney and director Sjostrom made a great team in this rarely seen tale of tragedy and horror in the circus. Chaney plays a dedicated scientist whose life is destroyed by an evil Baron. Stripped of wife and career, he becomes a clown whose act is predicated on being slapped over and over. Slowly and painfully he builds a new life and falls in love with a beautiful bareback rider (Norma Shearer). Tragedy strikes again with the reappearance of the Baron. This is one of Chaney's most passionate roles --his raw emotion is often painful to watch. George Davis, the great European clown, coached Chaney and has a bit part in the film. This was the first film produced by the fledgling M-G-M. Sunday, November 30: 7 pm THE BIG CIRCUS Joseph Newman, USA, 1959; 108 minutes, 16mm A family-owned circus starts off a new tour on the brink of financial ruin. The smooth-talking owner (Victor Mature) has to do his own juggling act with a number-crunching banker, a pesky yet attractive PR woman, a willful young daughter and the demands of the Ringmaster (Vincent Price) and despondent clown (Peter Lorre). Several "accidents," including one with a lion, soon have everyone casting suspicious glances at each other. With real-life circus acts Hugo Zacchini (human cannonball), Gene Mendez (high-wire), The Flying Alexanders (trapeze), Dick Walker (cat trainer) Tex Carr's chimpanzees, Dick Berg's sea lions and Big Apple Circus's star elephant, Anna May. Monday, December 1: 2 pm Tuesday, December 2: 4:15 and 8:45 pm BYE BYE BRAZIL Carlos Diegues, Brazil, 1980; 100 minutes, 35mm A small carnival, comprised of a magician, a dancing beauty and a strongman, tours every corner of Brazil, from Rio to Brasilia to the hidden reaches of the Amazon. Along the way they are joined by a young man and his pregnant wife, who is convinced that he can make his fortune in show biz despite the battle against the omnipresent television for an audience. A funny, touching look at a diverse country and a vanishing way of life. Monday, December 1: 4:10 pm Tuesday, December 2: 2 and 6:30 pm MAN ON A TIGHTROPE Elia Kazan, USA, 1953; 105 minutes, 16mm As the Communists take over Czechoslovakia, a small family-owned circus becomes another casualty of the new regime and a tool for propaganda. The onetime owner, now manager (Frederic March), struggles with the rules curtailing personal and artistic freedoms while he watches much-needed repair and salary money dwindle away. Dogged by a Communist cop (Adolphe Menjou) and the suspicion of a spy in the circus family, March devises a desperate plan to save them all by making a daring run across the border into Germany. A superb, suspenseful story, flawlessly directed by Kazan and shot on location in Bavaria with the Circus Brumbach. Wednesday, December 3: 2 and 6:20 pm Thursday, December 4: 4:15 pm LA STRADA Federico Fellini, Italy, 1956; 115 minutes, 35mm A simple, beautiful movie about a traveling strongman (Anthony Quinn) who "purchases" an assistant (the incomparably adorable Giulietta Masina), a slow-witted girl whom he teachers to play a trumpet. Although he shows her no kindness and uses her without affection, she remains devotedly at his side. Rivalry and murder rear their ugly heads after the pair joins up with a small circus. Quinn eventually rejects the only true friendship he has known and only when it is lost does he realize what he had. Wednesday, December 3: 4:05 and 8:30 pm Thursday, December 4: 2 pm