The Film Society Turns 50
This fall Dartmouth enjoyed a typical movie- going season. The term began with an advance screening of David Lynch's "The Straight Story." Then the mix included the latest Dogma '95 movie, "Mifune," and the Israeli film "Kadosh." "The Bicycle Thief double-featured with "La Strada," as did "The Little Foxes" and "Kind Hearts and Coronets." Hollywood classics and a series based on Shakespeare's plays rounded out the season.
Perhaps this doesn't beat the fall of 1993, when "The Piano" showed here three weeks before appearing at the New York Film Festival; or the fall of 1997, when Meryl Streep came to town to celebrate 25 years of coeducation.
Indeed, movies have long been one of Dartmouth's best kept secrets; freshmen and new faculty are startled to dis cover that Hanover offers a repertoire of films rivaling that of any big city. Most of the credit for this goes to the Dartmouth Film Society (DFS). At a time when campus film societies are disappearing, here's one that still holds to the highest standards: to show, in pristine 3 smm prints, a mix of new and old films from around the world. While film critics lament the lack of film literacy among young people, DFS still takes impressionable freshmen and transforms them into cinephiles.
In October the DFS celebrated its 50th anniversary with three days of movies, seminars, tributes and nostalgia. About 120 movie-mad alumni returned to campus to see films and hear presentations made by Buck Henry '52, who wrote "The Graduate," directed "Heaven Can Wait" and acted in "Short Cuts"; David Picker '53, the head of United Artists in the 1970s; Tom Ruegger '76, the creator of the animated series "Tiny Toons" and "Animaniacs", and Bob Gitt '63, director of the U.C.L.A. Film Television Archive.
Of course, there was talk about how much better things used to be. During a seminar on screenwriting, Henry told the audience, "If you can sew up the holes in a film like 'Double Jeopardy,' then you've got more needle and thread than I've ever seen in my life. Why do people go to see it? Because they like to look at Tommy Lee Jones and what's-her-name." Henry's former teacher, Maury Rapf '35, the cofounder of DFS, added, "It used to start with a story. Nowadays it starts with two people in bed. And then I walk out."
But for all of the occasional crankiness to be heard, there was also much in the way of celebration. At a teary tribute dinner cinematically entitled "My Dinner With Maury," Rapf was the subject of toasts and roasts and regaled with a showing of a documentary about his life made by Todd Garfield '00 and a song performed by documentary producer Sara Hoagland Hunter '76 to the tune of "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" theme.
And the director Mike Leigh flew in from London to receive the Dartmouth Film Award and to screen his new Gilbert & Sullivan costume drama "Topsy-Turvy." "I've never been to one of these squeakyclean Ivy League universities before. I feel like I need to go and keep having a shower," he said. Later, he postulated that Dartmouth's uniqueness as a movie-going mecca has everything to do with its bucolic setting. "What you do here is watch world cinema. Much of world cinema looks at the downside of life and urban existence. And so the tension between the ambient wholesomeness of this environment and what's going on in the rest of the world is very intriguing."
Most of the returning DFS- ers seemed to agree, as they reminisced fondly about first discovering the worlds of Godard, Bergman and Truffaut.
They also remembered the exuberant Monday afternoon DFS meetings—which to this day may begin with a discussion of Fellini's "Satyricon" and end as a Fellini-esque melange of rancorous debate, academic theorizing and celebrity gossip. Even Leigh proved himself a worthy can didate for honorary DFS membership, when he joined with a group of current and former students for drinks at one in the morning at a Hanover tavern. Over a lastcall lager, he discussed the historical accuracy of "Topsy Turvy," debated the merits of fellow British filmmaker Ken Loach and enthused about the London theater scene. When the conversation turned to lighter topics—as when one student asked Leigh about attending the Oscars in 1997, when "Secrets & Lies" was up for best picture—he talked about those too. "It wasn't very much fun. We had five nominations going in and we got f—--all."
Bob Gitt, Buck Henry, Dave Picker and Tom Ruegger had starring roles at the film society anniversary celebration.
