For Immediate Release Contact: Carol O’Sullivan

November 21, 2008 412-681-5449

Pittsburgh Filmmakers Announces

December Programming

(Pittsburgh, PA) – The following are descriptions of Pittsburgh Filmmakers Film Exhibition program for December 2008. The films are screened at Harris Theater, 809 Liberty Avenue (Downtown), the Melwood Screening Room, 477 Melwood Avenue (in North Oakland) and the Regent Square Theater, 1035 S. Braddock Avenue (in Edgewood). For admission prices and current showtimes call 412-682-4111. All titles and dates are subject to change, due to film availability.

The Harris Theater – 809 Liberty Ave.

Special Family Holiday Saturday Matinees:

Nov. 29: A Christmas Story

Dec. 6: Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas

Dec. 13: Elf

Dec. 20: White Christmas

Co-presented with the Cultural Trust. (Admission: $6; showtimes @ 2:00 and 4:15)

Opens Nov. 28: Patti Smith: Dream of Life

This impressionistic portrait of punk rock icon Patti Smith – eleven years in the making – will have you chanting "Glo-ri-a!" Most everyone knows that Smith's music and politics are fearless, funny, raw and original. But this lyrical doc also tallies up the highs and lows, the births and deaths, that helped shape her life. At 60, she still holds onto a physical beauty and a flirtatious, self-effacing style. She seems at peace with herself and her ghosts. And she still burns white-hot onstage, thrashing and raging (against the war, mostly) with the same propulsive energy and purpose that first drove this one-time poet to turn up the volume. (Steven Sebring; USA; 2008; 109 min)

Opens Dec. 12: Ashes of Time - Redux

“For the love of all things sensual and mysterious, see this one

on a big screen.” – Entertainment Weekly

Wong Kar-Wai's 1994 swordsman film, Ashes of Time, a delirious swirl of color (shot by the great Christopher Doyle) and star wattage – both Tony Leungs, Brigitte Lin, Maggie Cheung, Carina Lau and Leslie Cheung – was two years in the making, and never released in the U.S. Now with this opulently re-edited and re-scored (with solos by Yo Yo Ma) version, the film is closer to a 14-year labor of love. It combines a martial-arts background with a fatalistic meditation on lost loves, as we follow a broken-hearted hit man who moves to the desert where he finds skilled swordsmen to carry out his contract killings. “One feels the passionate intensity of the filmmaker in every strand of his luminously intricate narrative.” – Andrew Sarris. With subtitles. (Wong Kar-Wai; Hong Kong; 2008; 93 min)

Opens Dec. 26: Let The Right One In

“This film is terrific.” – Chicago Tribune

Winner of best narrative feature at this year’s Tribeca Film Fest, this hauntingly beautiful Swedish indie, set in 1982, is a sweet coming-of-age tale and a gory vampire story. We meet Oskar, a serious, solitary 12- year-old who’s constantly picked on at school. He retreats into fantasies of revenge. Then one day he sees Eli, an unkempt, raven-haired girl walking barefoot in the snow. "I'm not a girl," she warns him. Hailed by critics everywhere for its fresh script, chilling suspense, and heart-breaking acting from its young leads, it’s both a masterful exploration of pre-teen alienation and a much-needed redo of the genre. Directed with imagination and promise, the film’s been compared to Del Toro’s The Devil’s Backbone, and Hallstrom’s My Life As a Dog. With subtitles. (Tomas Alfredson; Sweden; 2008; 114 min)

Dec. 31: First Night

This annual event features movie trailers from our archives. Free w/ First Night Button.

Regent Square Theater – 1035 South Braddock Ave.

Opens Nov. 28: A Girl Cut in Two

"A rich, textured divertissement from a sinister master of the art… an erotically charged, beautifully directed story." – NY Times.

Claude Chabrol is back with another Hitchcockian tale with a sexy twist. A Girl takes as its starting point the famous Gilded Age crime of passion – the murder of architect and notorious womanizer Stanford White. Here, a jaded novelist and ladies man seduces a pretty TV weathergirl. At once naïve and unstoppable, Gabrielle doesn’t need to be convinced to enter into a sordid relationship with this distinguished (and married, of course) author several decades her senior. But when a headstrong young suitor falls for her, things go awry. An unspoken past between the two men heightens tensions, and the see-saw demands and whims of both men keep confusing – and darkening – her choices. This is trademark Chabrol: foreboding, fiendishly entertaining, impossible to shake. With subtitles. (Claude Chabrol; France/Germany; 2008; 110 min)

Dec. 19 – 22: It's a Wonderful Life - FREE!

Bring your family to see the Christmas classic on the BIG screen! Everyone is familiar with the story of George Bailey, a small town guy with big dreams. George (Jimmy Stewart) has spent most of his life helping others, sometimes at the cost of his own happiness. A guardian angel shows George what life in his hometown would've been like if he had never been born. This was Stewart's favorite film. (Frank Capra; USA; 1946; 129 min)

Opens Dec. 26: Monsieur Verdoux – new print!

Chaplin turns his traditionally sunny sensibilities from the silent days upside down with this sublime black comedy, made just after World War II. He plays a dapper gent named Henri Verdoux (but assumes a number of identities), who marries wealthy American women then murders them for their money. There's little of the immortal Tramp character in Verdoux, yet this fastidious dandy still exudes wry, comic grace. But it’s Martha Raye who steals the show in her famous rowboat scene. Audiences of the day did not get the dark humor, but today Monsieur Verdoux ranks among Chaplin's best-loved works. (Charlie Chaplin; USA; 1947; 123 min)

Opens Dec. 26: Neighborhood Narratives

This collage of short films celebrates Pittsburgh. Each is made by a filmmaker with a connection to the neighborhood featured. Produced for the Pittsburgh 250 Community Connections project. (100 min)

Melwood Screening Room – 477 Melwood Ave.

Dec. 4: The Yes Men

This documentary is about two anti-corporate activist-pranksters as they impersonate World Trade Organization spokesmen on TV and at business conferences around the world. We follow Andy and Mike - the brains behind the satire - from their beginnings with GWBush.com, to their tasteless parody of the WTO's website. Some visitors don't notice the site is a fake, and send speaking invitations meant for the real WTO. Mike and Andy play along with the ruse and occasionally attend important functions as WTO representatives. (Dan Ollman & Sarah Price; USA; 2003; 80 min)

Dec. 6: Bill Daniel Performance

To coincide with Daniel’s gallery show, The Great Depression, this event features multiple projected 16mm films with live musical accompaniment. 8:00pm.

Dec. 9: Film Kitchen

This monthly series highlights local independent film and video work. It is presented on the 2^nd Tuesday of every month. Co-sponsored by City Paper, WYEP-FM, Chipolte Mexican Grill, DH Creative, and Rock Light.

Dec. 12 -14: Last Year at Marienbad – new print!

One of the most iconic and influential art films of all time, Marienbad is a cinematic exploration of the function of emotion and memory. And fittingly, the film’s dreamlike imagery unspools like a Mobius strip. Set in a sumptuous resort, a man tells a beautiful woman that they met the previous year, while another man (who or may not be the woman’s lover or husband) hovers in the background. Shots, scenes and dialogue repeat in a swirling array. Alain Resnais (Hiroshima, Mon Amour) and screenwriter Alain Robbe-Grillet sustain a hypnotic mood, reinforced by the dazzling widescreen cinematography. The film’s geometric gardens and rococo interiors are stunning, as are the costumes – designed by Coco Chanel herself. With subtitles. (Alain Resnais; France/Italy/Germany; 1961; 94 min)

Dec. 19 & 20: Christmas on Mars

"Looks like Eraserhead via John Carpenter’s Dark Star…” -Village Voice

In 2001, Flaming Lips frontman Wayne Coyne conceived Christmas on Mars as a hallucinogenic sci-fi fable. Their touring and recording schedule delayed the production, but this lo-budg comedy is finally released. In the story a vital part of a space station has malfunctioned, and its inhabitants fear that their days are numbered. Flaming Lips member Steven Drozd is arranging a Christmas pageant to celebrate the impending birth of the first baby on the planet. But the sudden appearance of a green-skinned alien, played by Coyne, changes everything. Sharp audience members will spot the influence of Luis Bunuel and David Lynch, but it ultimately harkens back to the kind of surrealist midnight movies from the 1970s, such as Alejandro Jodorowsky's The Holy Mountain. Look for cameos from Fred Armisen and Adam Goldberg. (Bradley Beesley & George Salisbury; 2008; USA; 82 min) Co-presented by WYEP.

###