A Grand ‘Marie Antoinette’ at Bing Theater

“Marie Antoinette” (1938), which screens tonight at 8 at the County Museum of Art’s Bing Theater as part of its “Hollywood and History: Costume Design in Film” series, is a revelation. It offers a superb studio re-creation of the grandeur and decadence of the court of Versailles and remarkably shaded portrayals by Norma Shearer as Marie Antoinette--frustrated, frivolous but finally gallant and brave--and Robert Morley as the homely, pathologically shy Louis XVI.

As photographed in glorious black and white by William Daniels, the stars are wonderful and real as two people who grope toward an eventual mutual adoration; there’s more intimacy here than in the not dissimilar “Last Emperor.” At the same time, the film is so overwritten (by many hands, including an uncredited F. Scott Fitzgerald) from Stefan Zweig’s book that normally breezy director W. S. (Woody) Van Dyke II can’t keep the saga from seeming drawn out. The film also suffers from an overly fictionalized and syrupy treatment of the queen’s purported romance with the Swedish Count de Fersen (Tyrone Power). Adrian’s gossamer gowns and Gile Steele’s dashing uniforms are surely among the most exquisite and elaborate in film history. One of Shearer’s gowns from “Marie Antoinette” is among the 50 Hollywood costumes in an accompanying exhibition. (213) 857-6010.

The UCLA Film Archive is marking the 20th anniversary of Newsreel, a coalition of independent film makers who focus on social issues, with a series of panel discussions and a five-week retrospective beginning Thursday at 7:30 p.m. with Norman Fruchter and John Douglas’ 60-minute “Summer ‘68” (1969); Christine Choy, Worth Long and Allan Siegal’s 75-minute “Mississippi Triangle” (1986) and Karen Mason’s 10-minute “Panic Is the Enemy” (1986)--which is far, far too brief a time to deal with the complex issues raised by subway gunman Bernhard Goetz.

“Summer ‘68” is a terse, measured and altogether invaluable account of the events surrounding the tumultuous Democratic party convention in Chicago, focusing on the enormous challenge of organizing draft resistance and the equally difficult problem of getting the mainstream media to pay serious attention to the anti-war movement. “Mississippi Triangle” gives us a captivatingly clear idea of what life is like in the Mississippi Delta--especially for a small, long established but virtually unknown Chinese-American community, whose senior members tell of enduring discrimination and exploitation so familiar to blacks. The most isolated individuals are those few with both African and Chinese ancestry. Screening Saturday at 1 p.m. is Lamar Williams and Hugh King’s “The Black and the Blue” (1987), a blunt, vigorous and thorough account of police brutality directed toward blacks over the last two decades in Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love. For full schedule of films and panel discussions: (213) 825-2581.

The 10th annual Black Talkies on Parade, which this year offers a special salute to Billy Dee Williams, begins Friday at the Four Star, and among its opening-day offerings are “Hearts in Dixie” (1929), the first major studio all-black talkie, introduced with a brotherhood speech by a self-conscious William Fox, and the legendary Oscar Micheaux’s “The Exile” (1931), the first talkie made by a black film company.

Seen today, “Hearts in Dixie” seems an inescapable if not intended indictment of the chronic oppression and poverty of Southern blacks. Set in the immediate post-Civil War era, the film has a kind of pastoral charm as an illiterate tenant farmer (Clarence Muse) begins to grasp that it is essential for his ailing daughter and grandchild to be treated by a doctor rather than by a voodoo woman. Another part of the story deals with the farmer’s realization that a second grandchild should go North if the boy is to have any kind of future. Directed by Paul Sloane and written by veteran minstrel man Walter Weems, “Hearts in Dixie” marks the first major appearance of Stepin Fetchit as Muse’s son-in-law.

“The Exile” is awkward and amateurish in every aspect and suffers from a poor sound track, yet communicates the genuine pain of an upright young man (Stanley Torrence) who tries to reject a beautiful young woman so that she might pass for white. There’s a forthright grappling with modern-day black values and aspirations rarely dealt with in Hollywood films. For more information and full schedule: (213) 731-0323.