Old Pasadena Film Festival kicks off July 8

Old Pasadena Management presents the third annual Old Pasadena Film Festival, a four-week, free movie series that unites film with urban settings, happening on Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings, July 8-31, 2010. The Festival will celebrate motion picture in all its forms showcasing a variety of audience pleasing movie titles and genres. With nineteen screenings, the Old Pasadena Film Festival is the largest outdoor film festival in California and is expected to draw upwards of 8,000 attendees.

This year Old Pasadena pays tribute to Women in Film by offering a myriad of films highlighting the impact women have had on the motion picture. The festival begins with a special “Leading Ladies” series at One Colorado featuring eight films starring esteemed actresses including Marilyn Monroe in How to Marry a Millionaire, Meryl Streep in Death Becomes Her, Barbara Streisand in The Way We Were, Mae West in She Done Him Wrong, Joan Crawford in The Women, Katherine Hepburn in Bringing Up Baby and Bette Davis in All About Eve, among others.

Other highlights include the Woody Allen classic Annie Hall, the dark comedy Harold and Maude and the fun loving Troop Beverly Hills. This year’s program also includes a very special showing of recently restored classic Mary Pickford silent shorts, with members of the Malibu Coast Chamber Orchestra performing the score to the films live. The orchestra comprised of internationally recognized chamber musicians and soloists will perform the dynamic musical score by Maria Newman to films that coined Mary Pickford as “America’s Sweetheart” and one of the most beloved actresses in history.

Distant Lands, the specialty travel bookstore in Old Pasadena will once again host travel films, and the four week film series will conclude with a very rare outdoor screening of the George Romero 1968 zombie classic, Night of the Living Dead. All screenings are free and open to the public.

Old Pasadena Film Festival schedule

Thursday, July 8th
Annie Hall (1977) - One Colorado Courtyard, 41 Hugus Alley
Winner of four Academy Awards including Best Picture, Best Actress (Diane Keaton), and Best Director, as well as another 24 film awards worldwide, Annie Hall is considered one of Woody Allen’s finest films. Annie Hall is on the American Film Institute’s list of 100 Greatest Love Stories, 100 Greatest Comedies, 10 Best Romantic Comedies, and 100 Best Movies of All Time.

Friday, July 9th
Chocolat (2000) - Distant Lands, 56 S. Raymond Ave.
Nominated for five Academy Awards, Johnny Depp and Juliette Binoche star in this romantic drama based on the novel of the same name. Chocolat tells the story of a young mother who arrives at the French village of Lansquenet-sous-Tannes and opens a small chocolate shop. Her chocolate quickly begins to affect the lives of the traditional townspeople.

Mary Pickford silent short films with live orchestra One Colorado Courtyard, 41 Hugus Alley
Mary Pickford, also known as "America's Sweetheart”, was one of the most important performers and producers of the silent film era. Featuring her short films “What Daisy Said”, “Ramona”, “The Gibson Goddess”, and “Willful Peggy,” members of the Malibu Coast Orchestra will be on hand to play the score live, conducted by the composer Maria Newman.

Saturday, July 10th
The Women (1939) - One Colorado Courtyard, 41 Hugus Alley
The original “Sex & the City”, this award-winning film directed by George Cukor features exquisite writing, perfected performances, and some of the top leading ladies of the day in an all-star all-female cast including Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford, Rosalind Russell, Joan Fontaine and Marjorie Main. Following the lives of a handful of wealthy Manhattan women, this dramatic comedy winds its way through cheating husbands, back-stabbing friends, gossiping manicurists, and of course…fashion.

Thursday, July 15th
Harold and Maude (1971) - One Colorado Courtyard, 41 Hugus Alley
This classic dark comedy starring a young Bud Cort and an ageless Ruth Gordon, follows Harold, a 19-year-old boy obsessed with death who is forever changed when he meets Maude, a 79-year-old woman who clings to a passionate zest for life. Harold and Maude is on the American Film Institute’s list of 100 Greatest Comedies, 100 Most Inspiring Movies, 100 Greatest Love Stories (creepy I know, but watch and you’ll get it), and 10 Most Romantic Comedies. Ruth Gordon’s award-winning performance is a treasure, and not to be missed.

Friday, July 16th
Seven Years in Tibet (1997) - Distant Lands, 56 S. Raymond Ave.
Brad Pitt stars as Austrian mountaineer Heinrich Harrer who leaves Nazi-occupied Austria in 1939 to climb the Himalayas, and after being placed in a POW camp becomes one of two foreigners in the Tibetan Holy City of Lhasa. There his life changes forever as he becomes a close confidant to the Dalai Lama.

How to Marry a Millionaire (1953) - One Colorado Courtyard, 41 Hugus Alley
Before there was Carrie and Samantha, Lauren Bacall, Betty Grable and Marilyn Monroe starred as three New York models whose scheme to move into a Manhattan penthouse apartment and find eligible millionaire bachelors to marry, doesn’t quite work out as planned. Great performances, Marilyn at her best, and filmed in CinemaScope – the color positively gleams on the screen.

Saturday, July 17th
The Way We Were (1973) - One Colorado Courtyard, 41 Hugus Alley
Winner of two Academy Awards, written by Arthur Laurents and directed by Sydney Pollack, this romantic drama stars Barbra Streisand and a stunning 37 year old Robert Redford in a timeless story of opposites attracting. The Way We Were is #6 on the American Film Institute’s list of Greatest Love Stories and the film’s closing scene is #2 on their list of Greatest Love Scenes, second only to the goodbye scene of Casablanca.

Jurassic Park (1993) - Mills Alley, 22 Mills Place
Winner of three Academy Awards, this Steven Spielberg directed thriller centers on a fictional island where billionaire philanthropist John Hammond and a team of genetic scientists from his company have created an amusement park of cloned dinosaurs. Groundbreaking special effects make Jurassic Park one of the great adventure films of all time. It is on the American Film Institute’s list of 100 Most Thrilling Movies.

Thursday, July 22nd
Sorry Wrong Number (1948) - One Colorado Courtyard, 41 Hugus Alley
Barbara Stanwyck received an Oscar nomination for her role alongside Burt Lancaster in this classic suspense film noir in which a crossed phone connection causes a millionaire’s bedridden daughter to overhear two men plotting a woman's murder. As the details unravel and the suspense builds, she becomes convinced the murder is to be her own.

Friday, July 23rd
Before Sunrise (1995) - Distant Lands, 56 S. Raymond Ave.
This film follows Jesse (Ethan Hawke), a young American, and Céline (Julie Delpy), a young French woman, who meet on a train and spend Jesse’s last night in Europe walking around the city and getting to know each other, each aware of the limited amount of time they have before Jesse catches a flight the following morning. A surprisingly touching film.


Death Becomes Her (1992) - One Colorado Courtyard, 41 Hugus Alley
This Academy Award-winning dark comedy starring Meryl Streep, Goldie Hawn, Bruce Willis and Isabella Rossellini, tells the story of life-long rivals Helen and Madeline, both obsessed with retaining their youth and outdoing the other…with gruesome results. A masterpiece of special effects.

Saturday, July 24th
Bringing up Baby (1938) - One Colorado Courtyard, 41 Hugus Alley
Katherine Hepburn, Cary Grant, and a leopard named Baby star in this mad-cap romantic-comedy classic. Mayhem ensues when mild-mannered paleontologist David Huxley meets heiress Susan Vance and all semblance of logic and reason goes out the window. Bringing Up Baby is on the American Film Institute’s list of 100 Greatest Love Stories, 100 Greatest Comedies, and 100 Greatest Movies of All Time.

Troop Beverly Hills (1989) - Central Park, 260 S. Raymond Ave.
Shelley Long stars as Phyllis Nefler, a Beverly Hills wife who decides to deal with her divorce by becoming the leader of her daughter’s troop, the Wilderness Girls. In order to get the group of socialites’ children more interested in the program, she must rely her Beverly Hills sensibilities. With a camp out at a Beverly Hills Hotel and a whole new approach to merit badges, Troop Beverly Hills is a classic 80’s comedy.

Thursday, July 29th
Labyrinth (1986) - One Colorado, 41 Hugus Alley
Directed by Jim Henson and produced by George Lucas, this fantasy musical tells the story of Sarah’s (a young Jennifer Connelly) quest to rescue her baby brother from the Goblin King, portrayed by David Bowie. Sarah has until midnight to retrieve her brother from the center of a massive maze, or else the he will be transformed into a goblin. Great imagery and effects highlight this wonderfully dark tale.

Friday, July 30th
Before Sunset (2004) - Distant Lands, 56 S. Raymond Ave.
This Academy Award-nominated sequel to Before Sunrise picks up nine years later, when Jesse and Celine’s paths intersect again. With original stars Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy, Before Sunset plays out in real time as they spend one afternoon together in Paris.

Double Feature with She Done Him Wrong (1933) and I’m No Angel (1933) - One Colorado Courtyard, 41 Hugus Alley

Starring Mae West and Cary Grant, She Done Him Wrong follows New York singer and nightclub owner Lady Lou after her former boyfriend escapes from jail convinced that she has been unfaithful. Written by Ms. West about the story of famed Diamond Lil, She Done Him Wrong is on the American Film Institute’s list of 100 Greatest Comedies, and contains some of Mae’s most famous lines, pushing the censors of the time to their limits!

Again starring Mae West and Cary Grant, carnival dancer Tia devises a shocking new act which gets her to New York and into the company of a bevy of rich young socialite men in I’m No Angel. Written by Mae West, I’m No Angel maintained her reputation with cinematic censors.

Saturday, July 31st
All About Eve (1950) - One Colorado Courtyard, 41 Hugus Alley
Winner of six academy awards including Best Picture and nominated for eight more, All About Eve stars Bette Davis in one of her most infamous roles, alongside Anne Baxter, Celeste Holm, George Sanders, Gary Merrill, Thelma Ritter, and an early bit-part by Marilyn Monroe. One of the American Film Institute’s 100 Greatest Movies of All Time, this drama is a classic tale of fame, ego and ambition, with iconic performances -especially from Davis; a cinematic treasure.

Night of the Living Dead (1968) - TBD location
The first of six “Dead” films directed by George Romero, this 1968 black-and-white zombie movie is considered groundbreaking. It tells the story of Ben and Barbara’s efforts, along with five other people, to survive the night trapped in a rural Pennsylvania farmhouse avoiding the mysterious reanimation of the recently dead. Arguably the classic horror film, Night of the Living Dead is on American Film Institute’s list of 100 Most Thrilling Movies.

General Public: All screenings are free and open to the public, for more information including a complete schedule visit www.oldpasadena.org