The late Harry Dean Stanton is perhaps one of the most revered character actors of the past half-century; you’ve almost certainly seen at least one of his scene-stealing roles, from “Cool Hand Luke” (1967) to “Alien” (1979) to “The Avengers” (2012) and under such world-class filmmakers as David Lynch, Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola. Yet, apart from his 2017 career-end victory lap “Lucky,” Stanton appeared in only one starring role: Wim Wenders’ “Paris, Texas” (1984), which screens in a new 4K restoration Friday and Saturday at The Brattle Theatre. As taciturn drifter Travis Henderson, Stanton is almost impossibly raw, almost entirely silent for the first half of the movie as he reconnects with his estranged brother (Dean Stockwell) and son (Hunter Carson). Slowly, Travis regains his bearings, building up to a heart-rending, Sam Shepard-penned monologue delivered via two-way mirror to his ex-wife (a radiant Nastassja Kinski). Even in his silence, though, Stanton’s weathered, expressive face conveys more oceans of feelings than a lesser actor could through a screenplay full of dialogue. It is perhaps the greatest performance from one of my very favorite actors, and should be considered essential viewing.
The Somerville Theatre on Saturday presents a special 35 mm double feature starring two of classic Hollywood’s most enduring icons of cool. There isn’t much to be said about “Casablanca” (1942) that hasn’t already been written, but it’s worth reinforcing just how radical and elemental Humphrey Bogart’s Rick Blaine was and remains. In an era when the Hays Office demanded squeaky-clean protagonists, Rick was a proud scoundrel, thumbing his nose at both the Gestapo and the local police while never losing grip of his own moral core. In both his antiauthoritarian deadpan and his ultimate decision to “stick his neck out” in the fight against fascism, it’s easy to see how Rick became rediscovered as an unlikely mascot in the countercultural ’60s (and remains resonant today). Bogart’s heavy-lidded cool was perhaps matched only by Robert Mitchum, who fills out the double bill in Jacques Tourneur’s jet-noir classic “Out of the Past” (1947). While Cambridge Day in no way endorses the use of tobacco products, the image of Bogart or Mitchum with a cigarette dangling from their lips remains one of cinema’s greatest special effects.
In celebration of the new reissue of her beloved debut novel “The Poppy War,” The Brattle welcomes acclaimed author R.F. Kuang on Sunday to introduce three films whose influence can be felt on her own work. In Ang Lee’s “Lust, Caution” (2007), Tang Wei and Tony Leung star as an actor and a corrupt politician drawn into a web of intrigue. Leung stars again in “The Grandmaster” (2013), Wong Kar-wai’s biopic of the legendary martial artist Ip Man. The series concludes with Quentin Tarantino’s roaring antifascist classic “Inglourious Basterds” (2009); while this series was announced late last month, it should go without saying that this last film in particular will undoubtedly play with even greater resonance in the wake of the election. All three films screen Sunday, with Kuang in attendance for a signing following “Grandmaster”; that film and “Lust” screens again Monday, with an encore presentation of “Basterds” on Tuesday.
Of all the masters of the French New Wave, the great Chris Marker is perhaps the most resistant to easy categorization. Though he is best known for his massively influential 1962 science fiction short “La Jetée” (remade and expanded upon by Terry Gilliam in 1996 as “12 Monkeys”), Marker was also a prolific photographer and essayist, having masterminded the beloved “Petite Planète” series of travelogues. One of Marker’s greatest nonfilm works was “Le Dépays,” a gorgeous long-form photo essay built around images he captured in and around Tokyo. To celebrate a gorgeous new hardcover reprinting of this masterwork, the Harvard Film Archive screens a rare 35 mm print of Marker’s impressionistic documentary “Sans Soleil” (1983), which he shot in Japan around the same time, with copies of “Le Dépays” for sale in the lobby. Houghton Library archivist Max Goldberg attends to further contextualize this remarkable artist.
Even someone completely unfamiliar with Akira Kurosawa’s “Seven Samurai” (1954) will likely at least be familiar with the fruits of its legacy. Most famously, it was remade and westernized in 1960 as “The Magnificent Seven,” but its shockwaves can be felt in just about every contemporary action film in which a ragtag group of misfits is assembled to topple a seemingly unstoppable enemy; not for nothing is George Lucas an avowed Kurosawa acolyte. To ring in the film’s 70th anniversary, The Brattle hosts it in a new 4K restoration from Wednesday through Dec. 2. It is perhaps ideal viewing for the week of Thanksgiving – and, even at his most feral, Toshiro Mifune’s drunken ronin is still probably preferable to any number of extended family members.
Oscar Goff is a writer and film critic based in Somerville. He is film editor and senior critic for the Boston Hassle and his work has appeared in the monthly Boston Compass newspaper and publications such as WBUR’s The ARTery and iHeartNoise. He is a member of the Boston Society of Film Critics, the Boston Online Film Critics Association, and the Online Film Critics Society.
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