Film Forum

In anticipation of our February 18 opening of John Boorman’s latest film QUEEN AND COUNTRY – a sequel to his 1987 HOPE AND GLORY – we pay tribute to the British-born, Ireland-based director’s brilliant moviemaking by showcasing ten of his most important films, including his breakthrough 1967 cult crime picture POINT BLANK, starring Lee Marvin; backwoods suspense classic DELIVERANCE, an Academy Award nominee for Best Picture and Director, starring Jon Voight and Burt Reynolds; medieval fantasy EXCALIBUR, the director’s magnificent take on the Arthurian legend; rare screenings of HELL IN THE PACIFIC, starring Marvin and Toshiro Mifune, and THE EMERALD FOREST, his 1985 rainforest thriller; social satire LEO THE LAST, winner of the Best Director prize at Cannes, starring Marcello Mastroianni; ZARDOZ, Boorman’s sole venture into science fiction, starring Sean Connery; and  HOPE AND GLORY, his Oscar-nominated, comedic childhood memoir of WWII.

“Boorman” has been programmed by Mike Maggiore.

Special thanks to Mary Tallungan (Disney), Kelsey Barry and Michael Dwyer (Screen Media), Chris Chouinard (Park Circus), Gwen Deglise (American Cinematheque), Christopher Lane (Sony Repertory), Kristie Nakamura and Nicole Woods (Warner Bros), David Pendleton (Harvard Film Archive), Jake Perlin, Joe Reid & Barbara Crandall (20th Century Fox), Soumya Sriraman, Deborah Schonfeld, Jessica Rosner (BBC Worldwide North America), Matt Jones (University of North Carolina School of the Arts), and Denise Orzel (Chartwell).

Reviews

“Boorman is rare and mystical; there is no other filmmaker quite like him… He’s troubled by inequity and injustice, but he frames them with an artist’s eye. He’s incapable of making a politically themed picture that’s just a hammering tract – it will also be a work of exacting visual beauty. He believes in the fierce power of nature, particularly as revealed in the misty landscapes of the British isles, dotted with sacred rock formations that must surely be the handiwork of the gods… You can catch more than a fleeting glimpse of Boorman’s polychrome genius at Film Forum’s week-long tribute… This ten-film series rounds up the greatest hits…but even more tantalizing are the relative rarities, like the bracing 1995 political drama BEYOND RANGOON, in which Patricia Arquette stars as an American tourist trapped in Burma during the 8888 uprising. Others, like the 1968 HELL IN THE PACIFIC…rarely show up on the big screen. And some, like 1970’s strange and wonderful LEO THE LAST, are relatively unknown to all but Boorman’s most ardent devotees.”
– Stephanie Zacharek, Village Voice
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“There aren’t many filmmakers who can match John Boorman’s visual imagination.”
 – Terrence Rafferty, The New Yorker

“A master of ambiguous action, unexpected interludes, and charged silences, Boorman in the late Sixties and early Seventies seemed to single-handedly set a new standard for cinema’s depiction of physical struggle and nature.”
– Gavin Smith, Film Comment

Films in this Series