Cities & Cinema: Los Angeles

September 6–October 3, 2024

From Chinatown to La La Land to restored independent films, this series considers a diverse selection of works that foreground the history, architecture, and neighborhoods of Los Angeles. Special guests include May HaDuong, Director of the UCLA Film & Television Archive, and Los Angeles–based Italian journalist Luca Celeda.

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  • Smog

  • La La Land

  • Killer of Sheep

  • Chinatown

  • Upcoming
    Films
  • Past
    Films
  • Past
    Events

Past Films

  • Chinatown

    Roman Polanski
    United States, 1974
    Friday, September 6 7:00 PM

    Roman Polanski remakes Los Angeles history as noir fiction, placing hard-boiled PI Jack Nicholson in the rotten middle of a public waterworks scam orchestrated by gentleman farmer John Huston. “Undoubtedly one of the great films of the seventies” (Time Out). Preceded by three Hearst Metrotone News Reels from the 1930s.

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  • Model Shop

    Jacques Demy
    France, United States, 1969
    Sunday, September 8 5:00 PM

    This sequel to Lola finds Anouk Aimée, now a little older and sadder, in Los Angeles, working in a “model shop,” where lonely men go to snap photos of beautiful women. “One of the great movies about L.A.” (Time Out).

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  • The Exiles

    Kent Mackenzie
    United States, 1961

    35mm Archival Print

    Friday, September 13 7:00 PM
    Introduction by May HaDuong

    A semidocumentary film about American Indians living in Los Angeles, The Exiles is “a wrenching document of cultural dislocation” (Thom Andersen). Preceded by four Hearst Metrotone Newsreels from the 1930s–1960s.

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  • Smog

    Franco Rossi
    United States, 1962

    Digital Restoration

    May HaDuong and Luca Celada will give a twenty-five-minute lecture prior to the film.

    Saturday, September 14 6:30 PM
    Lecture by May HaDuong and Luca Celada

    Intended to address the identity crisis facing postwar Italians, and Europeans generally, Smog has become a key touchstone for contemporary Angelinos to connect with the past of their ever-evolving city.

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  • Passing Through

    Larry Clark
    United States, 1977

    16mm Archival Print

    Passing Through was named to the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress in 2023.

    Sunday, September 15 4:30 PM
    Larry Clark and May HaDuong in Conversation

    Passing Through theorizes that jazz is one of the purest expressions of African American culture, now hijacked by a white culture that brutally exploits musicians for profit. “An invaluable film-outcry” (Albert Johnson).

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  • La La Land

    Damien Chazelle
    United States, 2016

    Audio Description
    Closed Captioned

    Friday, September 20 7:00 PM

    “[Damien] Chazelle has crafted that rare thing, a genuinely romantic comedy, and as well, a rhapsody in blue, red, yellow and green” (Sight & Sound).

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  • Killer of Sheep

    Charles Burnett
    United States, 1977

    BAMPFA Collection

    Sunday, September 22 5:15 PM

    A poetic evocation of working-class Watts, “a great—the greatest—cinematic tone poem of American urban life” (New York Magazine), Killer of Sheep’s “single most-recalled moment” is “the slow-dance scene between the . . . alienated Stan and his wife” (Adrian Martin).

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  • Water and Power

    Pat O’Neill
    United States, 1989
    Wednesday, September 25 7:00 PM

    A moving meditation on industrialization, Water and Power is an ingenious merging of optical printing and time-lapse cinematography. Screening with By the Sea (1963) and Horizontal Boundaries (2008).

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  • Lions Love ( . . . and Lies)

    Agnès Varda
    United States, France, 1969
    Friday, September 27 7:00 PM

    Agnès Varda’s experimental feature, shot in Hollywood in 1968 and starring Andy Warhol superstar Viva, is a deliberately decadent riff on fantasy, immaturity, and violence. “More than a time capsule of events and moods—it’s a living aesthetic model for revolutionary times” (Richard Brody). Preceded by four short Hearst Metrotone News Reels from the 1960s.

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  • Hito Hata: Raise the Banner

    Robert A. Nakamura, Duane Kubo
    United States, 1980

    Digital Restoration

    Sunday, September 29 4:00 PM

    An epic Japanese American drama, Hito Hata: Raise the Banner draws on the talents and support of Asian American filmmakers, writers, and theater professionals, as well as literally hundreds of people from the Asian Pacific American community.

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  • Free Screening: Real Women Have Curves

    Patricia Cardoso
    United States, 2002

    Free Admission

    Thursday, October 3 7:00 PM

    Filmed on location in the predominantly Latino community of East Los Angeles, this nuanced portrayal of an intergenerational family centers around Ana, a high school senior who navigates what is expected of her with pride as a talented and compassionate woman.

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