Jason Reitman to show six favorites at New Beverly Cinema
Filmmaker Jason Reitman took some time out of his hectic award season schedule (for his Oscar-nominated “Up in the Air”) to take over programming at the New Beverly Cinema beginning Friday. The writer-director is also on tap to appear at the revival theater -- schedule permitting -- to introduce his faves.
Screening Friday and Saturday is a Matthew Broderick double bill: John Hughes’ “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” from 1986 and Alexander Payne’s razor-sharp 1999 satire, “Election.”
Scheduled for Sunday and Monday are two classic flicks set in Los Angeles and environs: Hal Ashby’s 1975 R-rated satire “Shampoo,” starring Warren Beatty, Julie Christie and Goldie Hawn, and Paul Thomas Anderson’s seminal 1997 ensemble drama “Boogie Nights.”
Rounding out Reitman’s programming Wednesday and Feb. 25 is the charming 1979 comedy “Breaking Away,” for which Steve Tesich won an Oscar for his original screenplay, and Wes Anderson’s first feature, 1996’s “Bottle Rocket.” www.newbevcinema.com.
‘Fantasia 2000’
The El Capitan Theatre is celebrating the 10th anniversary of Disney’s animated “Fantasia 2000” through Feb. 27. The engagement is also a celebration of the life and career of the late Roy Disney, who was executive producer of “Fantasia 2000” and the head of Disney Animation at the time of its production. Also screening is “Destino,” the short film collaboration between Walt Disney and Salvador Dalí that began in 1946 but was abandoned with only 18 seconds of the film completed until Roy Disney got the project back on track. It was completed in 2003. www.disney.go.com/Disney Pictures/el_capitan
Marsha Hunt event
The Hollywood Heritage Museum presents the 50th- anniversary screening of “A Call From the Stars” Thursday evening. The one-hour TV documentary was produced by actress Marsha Hunt to raise funds and awareness for the U.S. Committee for Refugees. The film has not been shown since it aired in 1960. Hunt will be a special guest at the screening, which is a fundraiser to help filmmakers complete a feature documentary on the 92-year-old actress who was a victim of the Hollywood blacklist. www.hollywood heritage.org
Craven tribute
Wes Craven first made audiences scream in 1972 with his horror film “Last House on the Left,” and over the next 38 years he’s kept the terror coming with such films as “Nightmare on Elm Street” and the aptly titled “Scream” trilogy.
The American Cinematheque’s Aero Theatre pays tribute to the “Merchant of Nightmare” Sunday and Monday with a mini-retrospective. “Last House on the Left” and 1977’s “The Hills Have Eyes” screen Saturday. Craven will be on hand to discuss his films Sunday in between the screening of 1991’s “The People Under the Stairs” and 1988’s “The Serpent and the Rainbow.”www.aerotheatre.com
