A Private Life | New York Film Festival 2025

“I’m not crying, it’s my eyes.”

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While it may be a slight stretch to claim that A PRIVATE LIFE is the kind of film that Truffaut would’ve loved to have made, it’s not unreasonable in the least to speculate that he would’ve loved watching it. After all, Rebecca Zlotowski’s engaging quasi-noir has all the hallmarks of a classic French thriller—it’s super smart, full of mystery and humor, and everything is executed with a light yet highly skilled touch. The fact that A PRIVATE LIFE is somewhat “Hitchockian” would, of course, have been an extra bonus for Truffaut. The obvious touchstone in this respect is REAR WINDOW: while Jimmy Stewart’s photojournalist character suspects murder as a result of casual voyeurism, Jodie Foster’s psychoanalyst character suspects murder because her profession relies on, as she puts it, “knowing the secrets and lies” of her clients. As in REAR WINDOW, the protagonist must enlist the efforts of a love interest—in this case, a somewhat unlikely one—to investigate a crime that no one else is sure has even taken place. Come to think of it, given its psychoanalytic bent and dialogue that interprets some creative mindscreen sequences, this is a film that the director of SPELLBOUND himself would have enjoyed.

That is, with the possible exception of the characters’ unrepressed sexuality and the film’s ultimate critique of reason alone—remember, Hitchcock never made supernatural or paranormal genre fare. In these aspects, Zlotowski’s script, co-written with Anne Berest and Gaëlle Macé, is at its Frenchiest. On the other hand, the presence/aura of Foster, who’s playing a longtime expat, and the way that the story wraps up in an upbeat fashion (which is one reason A PRIVATE LIFE isn’t a true noir) point to an American side of the film’s lineage. Indeed, for some the way that Foster’s arc cleanly dovetails with the solution to the central mystery, the transformation of her own fiercely held epistemologies, and the resolution to her sidebar family conflicts will be a bit too much—it’s too pat and too Hollywood, achieved with little ambiguity and earned at little cost. 

There’s some validity to such an argument, but I’m choosing mostly to ignore it. Granted, A PRIVATE LIFE may be too ambitious for its own good, attempting to say too much about too many things, but in a way that’s part of its charm. It’s like one of the wine-filled evenings it depicts—too much may be said, and some of it not even clearly recalled later, but no one can say that the time spent in its company isn’t full of life and truth. Once upon a time critics called such a film a “confection,” but A PRIVATE LIFE is a little too dark and too serious under its veils of wit and style to be dismissed as something sweet. 

Curtain Raiser: BAMcinématek presents The Vertigo Effect

This week: BAMcinématek (in lovely Brooklyn, New York) kicks off The Vertigo Effect, a two-week full slate mini-festival devoted to Alfred Hitchcock's 1958 classic Vertigo, plus the many films inspired or influenced by it. And that's a lot of movies, ranging from Brian De Palma's Obsession (scored by Vertigo composer Bernard Herrmann), David Lynch's cult favorite modern noir Mulholland Dr.. Paul Verhoeven plays peekaboo (Basic Instinct), Terry Gilliam sends us time-traveling with Twelve Monkeys, and Tony Scott Déjà Vu is well worth re-seeing. Of course no salute to Vertigo would be complete without Mel Brook's loony, loony parody High Anxiety! The original classic kicks off the series: catch Jimmy Stewart and Kim Novak in a rare IB Technicolor print of Vertigo on April 16.

Among the several other films on show for The Vertigo Effect: Mississippi Mermaid, Perversion Story, Sugar Cookies, Last Embrace, Special Effects, and the proverbial many, many more. You can also view films that inspired Vertigo like Laura and Unfaithfully Yours, plus other movies starring Kim Novak (Bell, Book and Candle, Pal Joey). Also screening are a series of related shorts, and the festival will conclude on April 30 with a sneak preview of Christian Petzold’s 2014 Phoenix.

In the words of the great Jimmy Stewart: "Well, I think that explains it. Anyone could become obsessed with the past with a background like that!" Don't get dizzy, get busy and head on down to BAMcinématek's The Vertigo Effect!

The Vertigo Effect runs April 16-30 at BAMcinématek in Brooklyn; see the full schedule and details at the BAM website.

Nightcap: Revisiting Ultimate Christian Wrestling and some words on Hitchcock's Elstree Calling

As you know I recently got a copy of Jae Ho Chang's Ultimate Christian Wrestling on DVD because I had contributed to the Kickstarter campaign to get the film really finished. We here at Unseen had connected to the film when in played the Korean American Film Festival New York in 2012. We ran multiple reviews (here and here ).and Mondocurry did an interview with the directors.

Watching the film again I was struck by how much better it played a second and third time. Say what you will this is a super little film that is even better than I first took it to be. To be perfectly honest when I saw the film the first time it had two things going against it, first it was as an on line screener which is not always the way to go since it meant I had to watch it on my laptop. That's not the best way to see the film. The other thing it had going against it is the notion going in that it's about wrestling or Christianity. I know the film  quickly shakes you of that feeling, but at the same time not being able to instantly click with the film, having to wait until about a half hour in before the so that's what this film is feeling kicked in lessened the enjoyment.

Seeing the film again, kind of for the first time I was delighted to see just how good it it. The film which is about a bunch of guys who try to wrestle as a means of spreading the word of God is amazing. This is a marvelous portrait of a bunch of guys who want to use their passion to do God's work. Actually it's just a great portrait of a really cool bunch of guys.

I don't want to re-review the film. Largely because I can't say much more than I did the first time other than to say it's better than I first thought. I did however want to take this time out and say that this is one to put on your track down lists. I've had some conversations with Jae-ho Chang and right now the film's only available to the Kickstarter supporters, but it will soon be available to everyone. Jae-ho has promised to let me know when that happens so that you can get copies when they become available.

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Tuesday at the Film Forum they are running the rarely screened Elstree Calling. The film is one of those all singing all dancing all sound film reviews that studios cranked out to bring people in to the early sound films. Its more a curio than anything and for completeists.

I'm not a fan of the film and I never reviewed it here at Unseen however I did at IMDB. My IMDB review reads as follows:

Hitchcock's WTF movie. He's co-director of a static early sound film that is the British version of the all singing and all dancing review films that Hollywood do in the late 20's early 30's. Only it's less opulent and it has a real feeling of being a filmed stage play. It also suffers from weak music and dancing and unfunny comedy bits.

I know the surviving prints are shorter than then what it once was which is probably better that way. Since some of the bits seem to go on way too long.

You're either going to love this or hate it.

For me once was enough.

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For those curious as to where Unseen is going over the next few weeks here’s the major marching orders:
-This week we end the Month of Zatoichi
-The first week in March is a look at nine titles playing at Rendezvous with French Cinema.
-This is followed by a week of films that played the first week end of the New York International Children’s Film Festival (even more reviews will be appearing all through the month)
- Then a long time in coming (ie. It’s been moved around numerous times since October) look at semi-recent animated films.
-This will be followed by three weeks of “random titles” some of which will hopefully get bumped for coverage of New Directors New Films.
-Mid April to the first week of May will be three weeks of Tribeca coverage.(with perhaps a stop by Subway Cinema’s Old School Kung Fu series Easter weekend)
-In May we step away from the modern day with a step back with three classic film series- Lash La Rue, Dr Kildare and Kirby Grant and Chinook. And we finish things out with some classic adventure films
-After that I’m lining up some random titles to see how they shake out- but look for reports on some Cinerama titles, Ghibli Shorts and horror films.- which takes us into mid-June and will put us on the cusp of the New York Asian Film Festival and Japan Cuts.

Of course expect reviews of new films -with a new DeNiro film called The Bag Man and the Russian 3D IMAX war film Stalingrad being reviewed this week- and more coverage of film festivals including more Film Comment Selects titles, some SXSW titles and who knows what else. I’m also talking with Randi about reviving her Secret Cinema as a regular weekend feature. So there is tons of stuff coming.

And now as we near the end , a look at some links ala Randi.
A reference to know to appreciate True Detective
Old Films that fall into Public Domain
50 works of video art (Including the Cremaster films)
The fate of one Godzilla suit
Illustrated battle of farts
Classic Movies in miniature style

And finally because I Bully asked what I did with the third birthday picture, I close with that.

Notorious (1946)

I am not Hitchcock fan as such. I like some of his films, don’t care for others. I like films like Psycho, Frenzy, and The Lady Vanishes while I love To Catch a Thief, Foreign Correspondent, Saboteur (until its abrupt end) and of course Notorious. Notorious is one of the most complex films in all of Hitchcock’s body of work as well as one of the most subversive films to come out of Hollywood at the time it was made.

The film has secret agent Cary Grant using former lover Ingrid Bergman to find out about of runaway Nazi’s in South America. He convinces her to marry Claude Raines in the hope of finding out what they are doing with some uranium. Of course Grant and Bergman still have the hots for each other and some of the Nazi’s (Raines protective mother included) suspect something is up, but the game is afoot Hitchcock is controlling the pieces.

While on the surface the film is a great little thriller the film has a great deal going on below the surface- chief amongst it is the use of sex for both pleasure and as a weapon. Few films in Hollywood were so blatantly sexual- how could the Hayes Office not catch on as to what was going on.

The easiest thing to see where the sex is being used is the sequence where Grant and Bergman kiss each other for several minutes. The rule in Hollywood was that no kiss could last past a certain length of time. Hitchcock went way beyond that by have the pair carry on a conversation in between kisses. Hitchcock understood that no one kisses and holds it for any length of time, instead people kiss and talk and look and kiss and look and kiss… By breaking up the kiss he made a sequence that played much realer and much sexier than had they just kissed.

The films interrelationships are much more complex than we normally see in films of the time. First off the relationship between Raines and his mother is really weird. There is something just wrong about it. You see why Hitchcock drifted toward Robert Bloch’s Psycho.

As for the Grant/Bergman relationship this too is messed up. Grant is clearly a scumbag that is loved by Bergman. He send her pretty much forcibly (ie. prostitutes her)to be the wife of Raines. There is a whole twisted sexual element going on between the two. Yea there is romance, but there are other levels that cross over into abuse. Once I had it pointed out to me it’s very hard to ever not see it after that. I keep trying to work out what the back story between the two is- and what their future might be.

Actually I keep revisiting the film again and again (in a really cool out of print Criterion edition) partly because it’s a good film, but also because I want to work out what is going on past the edges of the frame. Stuff is going on and I want to see if there are clues….

On the other hand you don’t have to do that because even on the face of it the film is taut romantic thriller and one of the best films Hitchcock ever made so just make some popcorn get a copy of the film and settle in for a good night on the couch

DVD Picks: Sublime Design

Something’s Gonna Live (Docurama/New Video) How Much Does Your Building Weigh, Mr. Foster? (First Run Features)

Here’s a confession: want to know the real reason why I enjoy cinematic fare as disparate as Hong Kong-set action movies, superhero flicks, and glossy urban crime thrillers? Actually, maybe that’s not such a disparate group after all, so I’ll throw a wild card into the mix: documentaries such as Norberto Lopez Amado and Carlos Carcas’s dazzling How Much Does Your Building Weigh, Mr. Foster?

Have you guessed yet?

Well, it concerns the visions of cities such films present—they’re simply the kind of eye candy I can never say no to. You can keep your lavish costume dramas and beautiful actors and outer space vistas. Give me those shimmering towers of reflective glass, especially when they’re shot at night… The result, even in a mediocre film: I’m transported.

And not to a location so much as a state of mind—there’s a lit-match flare of beauty that, even if lasting for just a moment, stands apart from the actual narrative, and it's these tangential flights of the sublime that I happen to find both calming and exhilarating at the same time. Moreover, I’m guessing I’m not alone in my enjoyment of such architectural spectacle, given how leisurely aerial fly-overs have become nearly ubiquitous.

Sometimes these are mere establishing shots, apparently meant to convey all the bold glitz that a modern vertical city holds: invitingly jewel-like and yet, somehow, recalling stalactites (although stalagmites is more accurate)—pretty, but pointy, and therefore dangerous. Sometimes we’re treated to these moving shots during the title sequence, a kind of establishing shot on a grand scale in that it establishes the metaphysical/psychological setting of the entire film. Sometimes these are used as points of visual high drama, as in Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy: to see a lone figure on a rooftop or impossibly high ledge is meant to convey character or theme, but I must admit that on such occasions I often care far less about those things than the privileged glimpse of the cityscape these shots represent.

And by “privileged” I mean that we can see architecture and urban design in a way that in real life we simply can’t unless we’re window-washers or helicopter pilots. Which is one of the main reasons I find How Much Does Your Building Weigh, Mr. Foster? so glorious: we’re treated to endless, luxuriant, and perfectly lensed and scored shots of some of the most breathtaking contemporary structures in the world (all in the service of showcasing architect Norman Foster's achievements). This kind of ultimate bird’s-eye view is commonplace now, and in some big budget genre movies it’s de rigueur because, after all, how else is one to show the destruction of civilization without alien ships or monsters (or combinations thereof) sideswiping skyscrapers?

But when is the first time we saw this sort of thing? Or rather, when was the first time we saw recognizable landmarks used as a form of thrilling symbol? Wait, I'm not finished yet: I’d go so far as saying that this strategy transforms reality—actual places—into a kind of fantasy setting because the audience is positioned into a state of childlike daydreaming as in ...wow, I wonder what it would be like to fight someone up there, or hang on for dear life...?

In any case, I’d argue that it was Hitchcock who consistently pioneered this approach as a specific aesthetic. Of course the 1933 King Kong predates Hitch's monumental gestures in this respect, and lesser known efforts such as the Burgess Meredith gem The Man on the Eiffel Tower (1949) probably don't receive the attention they deserve. By the same token, international cinema in the ‘50s and ‘60s, including noir and the sort of genres I mentioned at the outset, gave us memorable skylines and a tremendously expanded sense of expressionism's focus on the emotional design of urban landscapes, but it was Hitchcock who most memorably furthered the movies' fascination with bigger-than-life locations. Think of the bridge scene in The 39 Steps or, more spectacularly, Saboteur, with its Statue of Liberty climax.

Yet in films like that one, and The Birds (from whose pre-production the above art is taken) the director alone was not responsible for the onscreen realization of the quasi-magical settings that he and his screenwriters envisioned: collaborators such as production designer Robert Boyle, the central figure among the classic film artists justifiably celebrated in Something's Gonna Live, was beyond crucial to these efforts. Yes, Hitchcock understood the power in giving the audience a privileged vantage point, but he himself was not responsible for, say, the exquisite modernist design of James Mason's mountainside retreat in North by Northwest, the one that allowed Cary Grant to be so cat-like as he climbed its exterior. (By the way, the DVD of Something's Gonna Live includes director Daniel Raim's fascinating, Oscar-nominated short, "The Man in Lincoln's Nose," which, as you can probably surmise without my help, concerns the making of NXNW.)

So if you're all blockbustered-out after this summer but not quite ready to lose the sense of wonder such films inspire, I'd queue up these two docs in a hurry. They provide slowed-down spectacle and, as a happy byproduct, enduring beauty.