DKA and Visiting Filmmakers Series Present Monday Movies: Classic Film Screenings 3/24 and 3/31 at 4:30pm in JCC

DKA and Visiting Filmmakers Series Present Monday Movies: Classic Film Screenings 3/24 and 3/31 at 4:30pm in JCC
GMU’s Cinematic Arts Fraternity, Delta Kappa Alpha, and Film & Media Studies are cosponsoring Monday Movies, a miniseries of classic films screenings and discussions, on Monday, March 24 and Monday, March 31 at 4:30pm in the Johnson Center Cinema. 
 

Screening on 24March at 4:30pm, Night of the Living Dead (1968) might be considered the precursor of all sorts of zombie sagas, from 28 Days Later and The Walking Dead to Warm Bodies and World War Z. George Romero's remarkable film -- made for a legendary $114,000 and initially delivered to theaters out of the trunk of the filmmaker's car -- follows five individuals who come together in a farmhouse when they're attacked by an increasingly large crowd of zombies. The movie's innovations include clever handheld camerawork, disturbing low-budget makeup effects, and, in its focus on the stoically heroic Ben (Duane Jones), incisive commentary on race and racism in the US. As the BBC's Almar Haflidason puts it, "[The] lack of a cosy conclusion and the unpredictable nature of this film shook up horror film-making, and allowed fresh talent to explore a whole new chilling level of terror."

The discussion following the screening will be co-hosted by FAMS Director Cynthia Fuchs and Film & Video Studies' Global Horror Film instructor Tommy Britt.

 Bike ImageOn 31 March, we will screen and discuss the Italian neorealist landmark, Bicycle Thieves (Ladri di Biciclette) (1948), with FAVS Fiction Film Directing professor Ben Steger. "Given an honorary Oscar in 1949, routinely voted one of the greatest films of all time, revered as one of the foundation stones of Italian neorealism, it is a simple, powerful film about a man who needs a job," writes Roger Ebert. Resourceful camerawork, Cesare Zavattini's screenplay, and a cast of non-professional actors -- including Lamberto Maggiorani as the impoverished father Antonio and Enzo Staiola as his young son Bruno -- all contribute to the film's sense of urgency, its investment in everyday experience.