Just Announced: AFS January and February Programming
DON’T LOOK BACK As everyone who reads this must surely know by now, the AFS Cinema is closed for expansion and renovations through the end of 2016 and into the first few months of 2017. During this time there will be a number of off-site events, open to both AFS members and non-members. You can […]
Watch This: ARCADE ATTACK, Mind-Ripping 1982 Short that Pits Pinball vs. Video Games
This 1982 British short film created by Mike Wallington has long been a favorite. The other day I tried to explain what it was to someone and could not quite convey all its charms. Here it is, a film that is part doc, part pure fantasy, a hybrid film that manages to fit in actual […]
Watch This: Martin Scorsese Gets DEEP About Marlon Brando’s ONE-EYED JACKS
Brando directs Last month, at the New York Film Festival, Martin Scorsese introduced a screening of the new restoration, which he supervised, of Marlon Brando’s sole directorial credit ONE-EYED JACKS. This same restoration will be presented by AFS on Monday, December 5 at Stateside at the Paramount. Scorsese begins with a somewhat technical explanation of […]
AFS Welcomes Filmstruck as Sponsoring Partner of December Programming Slate
Here at the Austin Film Society, we have the benefit of a large and active member base, and a surrounding community that appreciates and supports film. What we do – and by that I mean what we all do together, from enjoying gems from film’s rich and diverse history to helping today’s and tomorrow’s filmmakers […]
Listen Here: A Martin Scorsese Radio Interview from 1970
Martin Scorsese, born on this date in 1942, is, of course, one of the most important filmmakers in the world. There’s very little we can add to his well deserved esteem as a director and technical innovator of the first order. In addition to all of this, he has become well known as an advocate […]
Listen Here: Actor Yaphet Kotto’s Bizarre 1968 Spoken Word Single
Actor Yaphet Kotto (born on this day in 1939) is perhaps best known to today’s audiences from his role in ALIEN (1979), or perhaps from THE RUNNING MAN (1987), or the long-running ’90s show HOMICIDE, LIFE ON THE STREET. He also has unforgettable turns in Paul Schrader’s BLUE COLLAR (1978), Johathan Kaplan’s TRUCK TURNER (1974), […]
“Unobtrusive Yet Powerful Simplicity” What Critics are Saying About the Breathtaking New Doc FIRE AT SEA
This Sunday and next Wednesday, AFS presents the new doc, FIRE AT SEA from filmmaker Gianfranco Rosi, who spent a year documenting the Mediterranean island of Lampedusa, home of Italian fishermen and their families and, increasingly, of African refugees rescued from rafts and makeshift boats in the Mediterranean. Kenneth Turan of the LA Times said, […]
Howard Hawks’ TWENTIETH CENTURY: The Most Modern 1934 Movie Ever Made?
Howard Hawks’ TWENTIETH CENTURY, newly restored by Sony, will be screened by AFS on Tuesday, November 15 at 7:30pm. Tickets are available here at at the event. Again and again throughout his career, producer, director and (uncredited) writer Howard Hawks shook up the whole medium of commercial film. His hyper-violent early gangster movie SCARFACE (1932) […]
Watch This: Excerpts from a 197-Hour Long Experimental Epic Starring Wertmuller, Godard, Fuller, etc.
Armenian master Sergei Parajanov in Gérard Courant’s 197-hour film CINÉMATON Experimental filmmaker Gérard Courant has made one of the world’s longest films, the 197-hour CINÉMATON, which was filmed over the course of 28 years and released in 2009. It consists of nearly 3,000 silent reels, each featuring its subject or subjects doing whatever they choose. Among […]
Criterion Nerds & Film Obsessives: Take Note of the New AFS Cinema Campaign
If you like having a wide variety of filmgoing options, Austin is one of the best places in the world to live. We have a lot. At the heart of it for the past few years has been a single screen, part-time pop-up theater called the AFS Cinema (formerly part of the Marchesa Hall & […]
Listen Here: Zach Clark Talks To John Waters about Fassbinder, Bieber, & Malick
“I used to clip the condemned list and read it over and over. I could recite it, practically.” John Waters has, of course, gone from being an obscure zero-budget filmmaker to one of the most highly visible filmmakers in the world, even though he has not directed a film in 12 years. The life of […]
Watch This: Burt Lancaster did a Foster’s Lager Commercial?
Burt Lancaster, born on this date in 1913, certainly had one of the best lives ever. As a young man he was a skilled athlete, excelling at basketball. He spent most of his 20s in the circus as an acrobat, picking up acting gigs on the side. During WWII he was stationed with the Army […]
