This Thursday marks the beginning of an exciting Luis Buñuel tribute weekend at the American Cinematheque. Six of the director's films, including his groundbreaking collaboration with Salvador Dali, the surrealist short "Un Chien Andalou," will be featured at both the Egyptian and Aero theaters. more ›

The Desert of Forbidden Art marked its Los Angeles premiere on Thursday night at the Aero Theatre in Santa Monica. The doc tells the story of Igor Savitsky's quest to save avant-garde Russian art from Soviet censors and build a now legendary museum to house it in backwater Nukus, Uzbekistan. Celebrity narrators include Sally Field, Ben Kingsely, and Ed Asner, who ably portray the story's principals. more ›

When considering the pioneers of fantastic film-making within the thriller genre, there is but one name that undoubtedly comes to mind first: Hitchcock. The name alone conjures up some of the most classic images of horrific suspense ever to hit the silver screen. From shadows on shower curtains to crazed black crows, he was a master in exploring the depths of psychological terror. more ›

Unlike its unsubtle brother, the Grauman's Chinese, The Egyptian is set back from the street. You just might miss it if you aren't paying attention. It's a delicate place, a secret from the roar of Hollywood. Instead of being taken over by some mall, it has been carefully restored. It was designed by architects Meyer & Holler for Sid Grauman. It was example of the Egyptian Revival Style. The original emergence of the style was in the 1850s but it became a fad in the 20s, inspired by the discovery of King Tut's tomb in 1922. In fact, originally, the plans were for a Spanish style theater, but the plans were changed, to keep up with the cultural zeitgeist. more ›

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Tonight is the perfect night to cozy up inside a darkened theater and to go on a journey into the unknown. A really cool piece of LA history and lore comes to life on screen tonight at the Egyptian The American Cinematheque "presents a rare screening of six short films by the enigmatic Dutch/LA artist Bas Jan Ader (1942-1975) and the Los Angeles premiere of Here Is Always Somewhere Else, Rene Daalder's critically acclaimed documentary about the artist's life." more ›

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As part of their Golden Globe Foreign Language Nominee series, American Cinematheque is screening tonight at the Aero Theater. Director and noted artist Julian Schnabel will be on-hand to introduce the film. It tells the wrenching story of Jean-Dominique Bauby, the former editor of ELLE magazine who suffered a stroke at the age of 43 and spent the rest of his life able to move only one eyelid. more ›

Photo by Tom Andrews via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr
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Who has been the most potent force in filmmaking over the last twenty years? Steven Spielberg? Tom Hanks? Tom Cruise? Joel Silver? How about John Lasseter? His Pixar films have enjoyed unparalleled critical and commercial success since the debut of Toy Story in 1995. Tonight at the Egyptian you can see the whole story of Pixar unfold when the American Cinematheque screens The Pixar Story. Featuring never-before-seen material from the Pixar library, archival animation... more ›

MUSIC: Machine Project is back with an evening of experimental folk music mix. The evening features the sounds of Ryan Fuller, Julie Carpenter, Laura Steenberge, Ruthann Friedman, rickyricky, Pilar Diaz, Pawko and Marshweed. more ›

BOO-ya! There's still time to check out some Halloween events, including the Hollywood Hell House and Bordello's Voodoo Vixens Burlesque show tonight at 10p. This accident on the 5 may tie up traffic until tomorrow: authorities are still counting only 3 casualties, but who knows how drivers will react to the construction and clean-up now taking place. First the water, then the power, now the phones? Mayor Villaraigosa is proposing a 9-percent phone tax.... more ›

Yesterday I attended American Cinematheque's tiki festival at the Egyptian. The television clips segment was an episode of Hawaiian Eye, a cheesy wanna-be Hawaii 5-0 with some of the most camp moments imaginable. Interspersed between the "commercial breaks" were B-movie coming attractions and hilarious ads ("Salem makes your taste fresher!"). There were a variety of vendors selling tiki wares, and after the movie, King Kukelele and his Friki Tikis got the courtyard hoppin' to the sounds of The Hawaiian War Chant and Tiny Bubbles. The Polynesian Paradise Dancers put on a fantastic show in spite of the jet lag from their recent flight from Japan. I didn't partake in the luau, but snapped a few pics of the food anyways. Tonight they wrap up the festival with Miss Sadie Thompson at 7:30 pm. more ›

American Cinematheque heats up the Egyptian this weekend when they expand their annual Tiki Sunday to fill three days with films and events. Friday night the festivities were kicked off with a screening of George Roy Hill’s epic film, Hawaii, starring Julie Andrews. more ›

It's another crazy 1970s double feature. Directed by Frank Perry Diary Of A Mad Housewife stars Carrie Snodgress (rocker Neil Young's girlfriend for a time in the 70s) and Richard Benjamin as a young, well-to-do Manhattan couple whose marriage hits the skids thanks to obnoxious, self-absorbed hubby. The film feels dated, but Snodgress' Oscar-nominated performance still rings true. more ›

Big Bad Mama, a 1974, Roger Corman-produced breasts-and-bullets flick, features the brilliant tagline, "The family that slays together, stays together." This B-movie version of Bonnie & Clyde is set in 1932 Texas and stars Angie Dickinson as a bootlegging, bank-robbing mom who joins up with Tom Skerritt and William Shatner to bilk society for all they can get. In between the robbing and killing are numerous sexy romps. more ›

The 2007 Silverlake Film Festival heads into its second and final week. Highlights include… more ›

Grindhouse Monday and Tuesday it's The Muthers, a combination blaxploitation and women-in-prison flick that stars Janine Bell and Rosanne Katon as a pirate duo who must rescue Bells sister from the private jail of an evil coffee plantation owner, followed by Fight for Your Life, a revenge thriller about a pacifist black minister whose family is taken hostage and tortured by a trio of convicts, until he finally snaps and wreaks his vengeance. Wednesday and... more ›

Grindhouse The week kicks off with a pair of rarely screened gems of black 1970s cinema, Brotherhood of Death about a group of black Vietnam vets who fight back against the Ku Klux Klan, and Johnny Tough, a coming-of-age movie about a troublesome teenager. That's followed by a dose of Italian horror, Autopsy and Eyeball. Then it's a trio of bizarre wonders: Coonskin, a Ralph Bakshi-directed animated blaxploitation spoof about a trio of animals (Philip... more ›

Curated by… Guy Maddin Bizarro Canadian filmmaker Guy Maddin (Tales From The Gimli Hospital, Careful, The Saddest Music In The World) has been invited to curate a program of films culled from the extensive collection of the UCLA Film Archive. His choices include On Dangerous Ground, Make Way for Tomorrow, Ministry of Fear and a slew of his own short films, all of which will screen over the next couple of weeks. But tonight Maddin... more ›

written by Bill Krohn for LAist The American Cinematheque honors Dutch-born filmmaker Paul Verhoeven this weekend (Marc 2-4) with a slate of Verhoeven films from the Netherlands and from Hollywood, where he spent the 80s and the 90s making big-budget studio pictures like Total Recall, Robocop and Basic Instinct. Although he's best known for the latter, Verhoeven was a renowned European filmmaker before he joined the Hollywood ranks, and this weekend is a good... more ›

Why woo your sweetheart with such tediously traditional notions as flowers, teddy bears and edible panties when you could watch Matthew Barney and his inamorata Bjork going at each other with flensing knives on the deck of a Japanese whaling vessel in Drawing Restraint 9? And if that's not enough Barney for you, there's the making-of documentary Matthew Barney: No Restraint. His work has sometimes been described as a "hauntingly dreamlike fantasy and surrealist odyssey," but I think Vern of Aint It Cool has the best take on Matthew Barney. more ›

RSVP: Go to the Creative Screenwriting website and sign up to receive information about future events. You should then receive an email with further instructions about how to sign up for this event. more ›

That film the Beastie Boys adoringly spoofed for this video is the campy 1968 Euro spy movie Danger Diabolik, and it's playing at The New Beverly tonight and tomorrow. Danger Diabolik - If being a super villain really was all about dashing around the globe in the coolest mod clothes and sleekest sports cars while staging elaborate jewel heists before returning to your posh, super-secret lair to shag your blonde accomplice, this movie is... more ›

Special Screenings & Limited Releases Jean-Luc Godard's Two or Three Things I Know About Her opens for a week-long run at the Nuart in West L.A. Saturday at 7:30pm The American Cinematheque screens a real, live 70mm print of Lawrence of Arabia at the Aero in Santa Monica. See this movie on the big screen the way it was meant to be seen! Major Releases The Good Shepherd & The Good German -- I... more ›

Before the current tyrannical rule of Tony Pierce, Carolyn Kellogg was the editor of LAist, in a time many yearn for. But she decamped for the University of Pittsburgh, where she's getting an MFA in creative writing. In between bouts of homesickness, she blogs about books and podcasts interviews with writers who rock at pinkyspaperhaus.com. Top 10 LA Things You Don't Realize You'll Miss, Until It's Too Late 10. Beaches. I hardly went to... more ›

-- Weep softly that you didn't get into tonight's sold-out, special screening of Dreamgirls at LACMA. Now dry your tears and pick up the pieces. If you're desperate to pay $25 to see a movie, you can catch Dreamgirls at the Arclight in its "Pre-Release Exclusive Engagement," which runs Dec. 15-24. Your "event-priced ticket" includes a "souvenir program" and a commemorative Dreamgirls' lithograph available only during this 10-day engagement (and forever after on eBay).... more ›

What can I say about a film where images of Shirley Temple are juxtaposed with swastikas? Where Fairuza Balk's voice comes wailing through a snail? Where there's a scene of a naked man with cerebral palsy lying in a giant clam as he appears to be masturbated by a woman who's wearing a rubber monkey mask while a racist folk song plays on an old record player? I'm not totally sure I didn't hallucinate... more ›

Last month the American Cinematheque screened the ultra-rare early '80s classic "Urgh! A Music War", a collection of new wave and punk groups (Devo, The Cramps, X, Dead Kennedys, The Police, etc.) that were bubbling under and destined to make it big. more ›