The Curtis Harrington Short Film Collection

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The Curtis Harrington Short Film Collection Blu-ray PRE-ORDER



NEWS
https://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=10950

Independent distributors Flicker Alley will release on Blu-ray The Curtis Harrington Short Film Collection. The release is a joint effort between Flicker Alley and Drag City featuring restorations carried out by the Academy Film Archive. Street date is Jun 25th.

Curtis Harrington, widely regarded as one of the important avant-garde directors of the 1940 s, as well as an early influential figure in what would come to be known as New Queer Cinema, was born in Los Angeles in 1926. He began making films as a teenager, often deeply surreal, intuitive, and owing much to the writings of Edgar Allan Poe. After graduating from UCLA with a degree in film studies, his unique career trajectory led him from the academic circles of cinematic criticism (he wrote a publication on the films of Josef von Sternberg); to the Hollywood assistant desk of writer/producer Jerry Wald; to the elite group of independent filmmakers associated with Kenneth Anger (the two remained life-long friends); to the famed film factory of cult icon Roger Corman; then on to his own stint in the world of genre movie-making with Night Tide and Games; and most unpredictable of all, to finding commercial success in television.

Fragment of Seeking (1946, 16 mins.) Harrington plays a young man desperately seeking out the fleeting image of a female companion, and though he never quite catches her, he discovers much more through the surreal explorations of his own sexuality. Made a year before Kenneth Anger's Fireworks, the films contain some similarities in their treatment of homoerotic themes, though Fragment is more restrained and subtle.

Picnic (1948, 22 mins.) Beginning in the reality of American middle-class life, Picnic portrays the idealistic dream-quest of the protagonist, from which he is finally cast off. Harrington himself described the film thus: 'A satirical comment on middle-class life frames a dream-like continuity in which the protagonist pursues an illusory object of desire.'

On the Edge (1949, 6 mins.) In this fragile, yet frightening poetic fantasy, set against a dark industrial landscape, Harrington casts his own mother and father in the lead roles.

The Assignation (1953, 8 mins.) Long considered lost, this was Harrington s first color film. It was shot in Venice, Italy, and not unlike Fragment of Seeking, follows a masked figure through the labyrinthine canals of the city, building to a spectacular climax.

The Wormwood Star (1955, 10 mins) A film study of the artwork of famed painter, occultist and Alistair Crowley-enthusiast Majorie Cameron. Cameron went on to star in Harrington s feature-length Night Tide. It is by far one of his most visually arresting works.

Usher (2002, 38 mins.) Harrington s final film before he died in 2007, Usher is a remake of a short he made in high school based on the classic Edgar Allan Poe story The Fall of the House of Usher. He once again expresses his interest in the occult by casting known members of the Church of Satan, Nikolas and Zeena Schreck.

Bonus Features

The Four Elements (1966) is a poetic and avant-garde documentary Harrington made for the U.S. Information Agency.
The Fall of the House of Usher (1942) is the original film made by Harrington when was in high school from which Usher is based.
A short interview shot by filmmakers Tyler Hubby and Jeffrey Schwarz, who are responsible for the documentary House of Harrington (2009)
2003 interview with Harrington made courtesy of the Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles.
An enclosed booklet contains notes on restorations by Academy Film Archive preservationist Mark Toscano and an essay by Lisa Janssen.

ABOUT THE ACADEMY FILM ARCHIVE
Dedicated to the preservation, restoration, documentation, exhibition and study of motion pictures, the Academy Film Archive is home to one of the most diverse and extensive motion picture collections in the world, including the personal collections of such filmmakers as Alfred Hitchcock, Cecil B. DeMille, George Stevens, Fred Zinnemann, Sam Peckinpah and Jim Jarmusch.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences was founded in 1927 and began
acquiring film material in 1929. The Academy Film Archive, established in 1991, holds
all of the Academy Award-winning films in the Best Picture category, all the Oscar-
winning documentaries and many Oscar-nominated films in all categories. The collection includes silent films, animated shorts, documentaries, experimental and avant-garde films as well as technical tests, home movies as well as the largest collection of movie trailers and advertisements in the world. The Archive is located in the heart of Hollywood at the Academy's Pickford Center for Motion Picture Study.

The Academy Film Archive participates in and supports the preservation of lost or
damaged motion pictures of historical significance. Recent notable preservation projects include Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon (1950), William Wyler's The Big Country (1958), Otto Preminger's The Moon is Blue (1953), and Night Tide (1961), the feature debut of director Curtis Harrington starring Dennis Hopper in his first leading role.

ABOUT DRAG CITY
Drag City is an independently owned and operated record company based in Chicago,
Illinois and the rest of the world. Established in 1989, it remains one of the last of the
labels of its kind from that period - waiting not just for the best offer to sell out, but the first one! To this day, DC executives (all two of them) are unsure what to ascribe the paucity of visitations from corporate raider-types: was it the stable of freaks on the roster, the tendency to issue press releases as densely-worded horseplay, or just simply the overriding aesthetic of anarchic idiosyncrasy? Whatever the good fortune was, core artists including Royal Trux, Smog, Silver Jews and Palace Songs established Drag City's tendency for the extreme, the odd, and the brilliant.

Over the years, Drag City has expanded "the brand" into the publishing world, pushing
books, comics, and magazines as well DVDs and sometimes just a t-shirt. With releases such as Harmony Korine's Collected Fanzines, and the reissue of Rudy Wurlitzer's Hollywood novel Slow Fade, it makes sense for Drag City to be behind the forthcoming release of Curtis Harrington's memoir Nice Guys Don't Work in Hollywood. As the American Entertainment Machine rumbles into the twenty-teens, Drag City continues to expand its range into hitherto unknown areas, one discerning culture stalker at a time.

ABOUT FLICKER ALLEY
Flicker Alley, LLC was founded in 2002 by Jeff Masino. Each Flicker Alley project
is the culmination of hundreds of hours of research, digital restoration, and music
production. Flicker Alley has partnered with Turner Classic Movies on several historic
cable broadcasts including three previously unavailable silent films produced by Howard Hughes, three rarely seen Rudolph Valentino films and new digital editions of J'Accuse and La Roue, by Abel Gance. The Flicker Alley brand has grown to enjoy national and international critical acclaim and is regularly featured in annual "Best Of" lists. In 2008, 2010 and 2011, the company has been honored as a "Heritage Award" recipient by the National Society of Film Critics.

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