The Lodger : A Story of the London Fog
UK 1927. Dir Alfred Hitchcock.
With Ivor Novello, June. 98 min. 35mm.

Tuesday 13 May, 18.30
BFI Southbank NFT1

Introduced by Alice Rawsthorn, Design Critic of the International Herald Tribune.

With live musical accompaniment.

The Lodger was Hitchcock’s first critical and commercial success, and inspired several subsequent remakes. This Jack the Ripper-type story of a serial killer who, like Hitchcock himself, has a thing for blondes. Audaciously photographed, the film combines sinister scenes of London streets and interiors with equally urban and modern images of media hysteria and mannequin dressing-room thrills.

Don't miss another gem of British silent cinema "The Rat".

Leave Her to Heaven
USA 1945. Dir John M. Stahl.
With Gene Tierney. 105 min. 35mm .

Monday 19 May, 18.20
BFI Southbank NFT2

Sunday 25 May, 20.40
BFI Southbank NFT2

Preceding the screening on Sunday 25 May, Guest Curators Rebecca Arnold and Adrian Garvey will give a talk “ Sometimes the Truth is Wicked: Fashion, Violence and Obsession in Leave Her to Heaven.” Arnold is a Fashion Historian and a Research Fellow at Royal College of Art; Garvey is a Film Lecturer at Birkbeck College.

Throughout John M. Stahl’s 1945 noirish melodrama, Gene Tierney’s character Ellen Berent Harland presents a mask of impenetrable beauty. Immaculately groomed and coordinated, her style speaks of wealth and exclusivity. This is echoed in the cinematography’s luxurious Technicolor, which emphasises the impressive vistas of the American landscape. However, beneath this apparently idyllic façade is a dark, psychological story of obsession and violence. Rather than being at one with the natural environments she inhabits, Ellen is alienated and disturbed, with her repressed emotions expressed through the dramatic mise-en-scène and costume.

"If Looks Could Kill features other films with iconic female villains" -
ms .45, Office Killer, A Question of Silence, Asphalt, Desire, The Tenth Victim.
Also see Violent Years which has a whole gang of them.

Purple Noon (Plein Soleil)
France 1960. Dir René Clément. 115 min. 35mm.

Sunday 18 May, 14.00
Ciné lumiére

Introduced by Guest Curators Stella Bruzzi, Professor of Film and Television Studies at the University of Warwick; and Pamela Church Gibson, Reader in Cultural and Historical Studies at London College of Fashion.

This iconic French thriller, which was remade in the late Anthony Minghella’s The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), is a portrayal of a murderer who is at once alluring and terrifying. Much of Ripley's anti-hero mystique is tied up with his ambiguous sexuality, expressed in the film not only through his bronzed torso but also through the use of fashion and adornment. His polished look of Gucci loafers, white jeans and suede shirts brings to the screen a breeze of wealthy and easy living, but also comes to represent his perverse criminality. Director Clément cast Alain Delon in the lead role, implicitly aware that the actor’s own association with the criminal underworld would aid his notoriety and international stardom.  

Mannequin in Red (Mannekäng i rött)
Sweden 1958. Dir Arne Mattsson.
With Antia Björk, Lillebil Isben. 108 min. 35mm

UK PREMIERE

Tuesday 20 May, 20.15
Ciné lumière

Introduced by fashion designer Bella Freud.

A private detective doubling up as a fashion mannequin, a head designer with lesbian inclinations and a mean, wheelchair-based fashion house matrona ominously accompanied by a white cat… Welcome to the strange world of “La Femme” where the elegant surface soon starts to peel, revealing what’s hidden and repressed underneath. The remarkable rigid, yet sumptuous, portrayal of a couture salon and its mannequins, comes from the collaboration between cinematographer Hilding Bladh, costume designer Mago (Max Goldstein) and director Arne Mattsson (dubbed the “Swedish Hitchcock” due to his daring framing and calculated use of colour). Shot in beautiful Eastmancolor, Mannequin in red is long overdue for its international “discovery.” This recently restored print is the first opportunity for an English-speaking audience to see a treasure of Swedish cinema.

With grateful thanks to Swedish Film Institute Stills Archive.

also see: Blood and Black Lace

Fata Morgana
Spain 1965. Dir Vicente Aranda.
With Teresa Gimpera, Marianne Benet . 84 min. 35mm.

Friday 16 May, 20.45
Ciné lumière

Aranda’s futuristic thriller Fata Morgana (1965) is an intriguing exploration of violence committed against beautiful women. The plot is centred around the murderous pursuit of Gim, a publicity model, played by one of Spain’s favourite models of the time, Teresa Gimpera. The model-turned-actress was “an ever-present visual fetish of her time in Spain” and a fascination for Gonzalo Suárez who turned the top model phenomenon into a film script. Set in a city evacuated after a thermonuclear catastrophe, the film’s cool aesthetic owes much to the ‘60s pop-art-meets-Cold-War world of comic books, advertising and fashion. With its essayistic approach to filmmaking, Fata Morgana inaugurated the avant-garde School of Barcelona (1965 - 1970), one of Spain’s most distinct film movements.

With grateful thanks to Filmoteca de Catalunya.

Chronicle of a Love (aka Story of a Love Affair/ Cronaca di un amore)
Italy 1950. Dir Michelangelo Antonioni.
With L ucia Bosé, Ferdinando Sarmi, Massimo Girotti. 98 min. 35mm.

Saturday 24 May, 20.40
BFI Southbank NFT 2

Introduced by Guest Curator Elizabeth Wilson, cultural historian and crime novelist.

Monday 26 May, 17.50
BFI Southbank NFT2

One of Martin Scorsese’s all-time favourites, Antonioni’s first feature film is a mature work packed with characteristic sensuality, themes of yearning and jealousy, and a keen interest in high fashion. The film is a labyrinthine story of a love triangle tainted by two enigmatic deaths, and the director’s ode to the deluxe bourgeois girl Paola played by the 1947 Miss Italy, L ucia Bosé . Bosé’s splendid wardrobe was created by the lawyer-turned-costume designer Ferdinando Sarmi (here also cast as her husband Enrico) who was to make a successful career as a fashion designer at Elizabeth Arden and later in his own name.