SFIFF52 Blogs: Keeping scores

Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid changed my perception of the West, of good and bad guys, and taught me one of the many proper adult slang usages of the word "shit." I first saw it as a seven year old with my two older sisters sitting in the balcony at the Castro Theatre at a Saturday matinee in 1969.

Revisiting the film in a gorgeous new print I realized just how strange and wonderful a film it really is. Conrad Hall’s cinematography has odd surprising points of focus and non-focus throughout. The music feels often like Burt Bacharach may have banjoed up some cues originally intended for Casino Royale, and the incongruity of the Newman and Ross bicycle ride to "Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head" feels particularly bizarre and new, coming as it does, moments after a faux rape scene with Redford and Ross.

When I saw Laurie Anderson speak a week or so ago she told a great story of writing a letter to the not-yet-elected JFK asking him for advice as to how to win the class presidency at her high school. She was surprised when she received a telegram back. His advice was simple: Find out what the students want and promise it to them. She went on to win the election. JFK, again sent a telegram, as well as roses.

topics: castro theatre, cinematography, film history, music, san francisco international film festival, westerns

Experience

SFMOMA's "Nonwestern Westerns" series

Until they started falling out of fashion in the 1960s, Westerns were pretty much the bedrock of the American movie industry. Whole studios had been created to churn ‘em out like “Bronco Billy” Anderson’s in the East Bay. (Fremont’s Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum still shows silent films year-round in his honor.) The Great Train Robbery, considered the first real narrative movie using cross-cuts, close-ups and other then-innovative techniques, was a Western.

topics: asian cinema, genre films, italian cinema, reviews, san francisco museum of modern art, westerns