The thinking man’s movie star, Ethan Hawke has moved seamlessly between mainstream hits and acclaimed passion projects for directors such as Richard Linklater and Paul Schrader ever since breaking into Hollywood at age fourteen, garnering Academy Award nominations for both acting and screenwriting along the way. In this edition of Adventures in Moviegoing, Hawke sits down with his friend and collaborator, artist and author Greg Ruth, to discuss why the first movie he ever saw is still his favorite, how the rise of video-store culture shaped his view of cinema, and which films he would have given anything to have been on set for while they were being made. The films that the Texan-born Hawke has curated reflect his Lone Star State roots and include offbeat revisionist westerns from John Huston and Robert Altman and an independent gem from Eagle Pennell, the unsung pioneer of Austin’s indie scene.
Directed by Charles Chaplin • 1952 • United States
Starring Charles Chaplin, Claire Bloom
Charlie Chaplin’s masterful drama about the twilight of a former vaudeville star is among the writer-director’s most touching films. Chaplin plays Calvero, a once beloved musical-comedy performer, now a was...
Directed by Jacques Demy • 1961 • France, Italy
Starring Anouk Aimée, Marc Michel
Jacques Demy’s crystalline debut gave birth to the fictional universe in which so many of his characters would live, play, and love. It’s among his most profoundly felt films, a tale of crisscrossing lives in Nante...
Directed by John Cassavetes • 1968 • United States
Starring John Marley, Lynn Carlin, Gena Rowlands
John Cassavetes puts a disintegrating marriage under the microscope in the searing FACES. Shot in high-contrast 16 mm black and white, the film follows the futile attempts of the captain of indust...
Directed by Les Blank • 1968 • United States
Les Blank creates a vivid portrait of bluesman Lightin’ Hopkins through a vital collection of musical performances and oral histories.
Directed by Eagle Pennell • 1983 • United States
Starring Sonny Carl Davis, Lou Perryman, Steven Mattila
On the day before its demolition, a colorful assortment of barflies, local oddballs, and urban cowboys assemble at the titular Houston honky-tonk for one last round. Among them is local legen...
Directed by Cristian Mungiu • 2007 • Romania
Starring Anamaria Marinca, Laura Vasiliu, Vlad Ivanov
Romanian filmmaker Cristian Mungiu shot to international prominence with this rigorously realistic Palme d’Or–winning second feature. In 1987, during the dictatorship of Nicolae Ceaușescu, colle...
