THE SECOND COMING OF SOUND
Sound in film has come a long way since 1928, when the camera had to be encased in a tank in order to see and hear Richard Arlen. Fifty years later, most of the brightest Hollywood filmmakers seem preoccupied with sound. Aided by sophisticated equipment and brilliant technicians, they can make a cricket or a spaceship hum in our heads. Charles Schreger reports on this important trend and talks with the directors, sound editors, and technicians who have made it possible. In the past, not many people listened to movies, let alone devoted much thought to sound; Jonathan Rosenbaum has, and he surveys the literature on sound thinking. One director who has always considered sound a full partner in filmmaking is Alfred Hitchcock; Elisabeth Weis examines the sound effect of Hitchcock’s career with special attention to The Birds.
THREE AMERICAN DIRECTORS
Since the end of the studio system, it’s every man for himself. That may mean making five movies in a year, as Robert Altman is doing; or making one movie in five years, as Terry Malick has just done; or hustling, like Larry Cohen, to assure that your films ever get seen. Herewith, studies of three major directors in the New Hollywood.
ROBERT ALTMAN GOES TO A WEDDING
…and gets a mixed reception from Jonathan Rosenbaum, in the review on page 12.
Altman talks, with Charles Michener, about all his new projects.
THE PRIVATE FILMS OF LARRY COHEN
Have you even heard of God Told Me To, or Bone? Robin Wood has seen Larry Cohen’s films, and finds him the most underrated filmmaker of the decade.
TERRENCE MALICK’S DAYS OF HEAVEN
Terry Curtis Fox reviews the year’s most beautiful movie.
And cinematographer Nestor Almendros tells Brooks Riley how they made it beautiful.
JOURNALS
Mary Corliss from the Cannes Festival
Stuart Byron on LA’s greatest art form: the meeting
David Overbey loves Paris in the summer, when it revives
Alan Poul on the fragmented Japanese film scene
ERIC ROHMER’S PERCEVAL
The noted French filmmaker talks with Nadja Tesich-Savage about his dream to film this medieval poem.
THE MIRACLE WORKER
Elliott Stein on Raymond Bernard’s silent masterpiece
THE NEW MELODRAMA
For the New Woman, a new melodrama: Coming Home instead of Written on the Wind. David Ehrenstein examines this hip, old-fashioned genre.
SCORSESE’S GUILTY PLEASURES
The director of Mean Streets, Taxi Driver, and The Last Waltz picks some of his favorite films.
INDUSTRY
By Lee Beaupre
Four-walling, from Billy Jack to Beyond and Back.
INDEPENDENTS
Amos Vogel, at Cannes, unearths a masterpiece: Sayat Nova.
BACK TALK
By Stuart Byron
Wenders meets Hammett. Coppola meets Kurosawa.
BULLETIN BOARD
