Mary Bronstein’s Adventures in Moviegoing
11 Episodes
Following her blistering debut feature, YEAST (featuring a breakthrough performance by a young Greta Gerwig), Mary Bronstein directed Rose Byrne to an Academy Award nomination in her emotionally stunning maternal maelstrom IF I HAD LEGS I’D KICK YOU. In this edition of Adventures in Moviegoing, Bronstein sits down with Aliza Ma, head of programming for the Criterion Channel, to talk about her love of movies, from her early infatuation with Hollywood legends like Natalie Wood and Marilyn Monroe, whose blend of star power and fragility fascinated her, to discovering the possibilities of indie filmmaking through directors such as Richard Linklater and Todd Solondz. The films she has chosen to present—including Shirley Clarke’s vérité landmark PORTRAIT OF JASON, George A. Romero’s horror bombshell NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, and Susan Seidelman’s punk classic SMITHEREENS—reflect the same uncompromising DIY ethos she has brought to her own work.
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26:12Episode 1Mary Bronstein in Conversation
Episode 1
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03:58Episode 2Mary Bronstein on SMITHEREENS
Episode 2
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1:33:34Episode 3Smithereens
Episode 3
Directed by Susan Seidelman • 1982 • United States
Susan Seidelman established her distinctive vision of New York City with this debut feature, the lo-fi original for her vibrant portraits of women reinventing themselves. After escaping New Jersey, the quintessentially punk Wren (Susan Berman)...
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04:04Episode 4Mary Bronstein on PORTRAIT OF JASON
Episode 4
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1:47:36Episode 5Portrait of Jason
Episode 5
Directed by Shirley Clarke • 1967 • United States
Starring Jason HollidayOn the night of December 2, 1966, Shirley Clarke and a tiny crew convened in her apartment at the Hotel Chelsea to make a film. For twelve straight hours, they filmed the one-and-only Jason Holliday as he spun tales, sang,...
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04:01Episode 6Mary Bronstein on NEWS FROM HOME
Episode 6
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1:29:27Episode 7News from Home
Episode 7
Directed by Chantal Akerman • 1976 • United States
Following her time living in New York in the early 1970s, Chantal Akerman returned to the city to create one of her most elegantly minimalist and profoundly affecting meditations on dislocation and estrangement. Over a series of exactingly compo...
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Mary Bronstein on NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD
Episode 8
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1:36:34Episode 9Night of the Living Dead
Episode 9
Directed by George A. Romero • 1968 • United States
Starring Duane Jones, Judith O’Dea, Karl HardmanShot outside Pittsburgh on a shoestring budget, by a band of filmmakers determined to make their mark, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, directed by horror master George A. Romero, is a great story of in...
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04:00Episode 10Mary Bronstein on FROWNLAND
Episode 10
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Frownland
Episode 11
Directed by Ronald Bronstein • 2007 • United States
Longtime Safdie brothers collaborator Ronald Bronstein has described his lone directorial effort as "a rotten egg lobbed with bad aim at the silver screen." Be forewarned: audience response has been intensely divided. FROWNLAND has garnered bot...
