#ELOQUENT FIND HAS MANY SERIES#

She discovers him in a homeless encampment while looking for a 'forgotten man' during a scavenger hunt, hires him as the family butler, and the film drops us into the reckless, thoughtless, comically disorganised lives of the empty-headed rich. Nothing could be less authentic than this madcap Depression-era comedy, in which an indulged Fifth Avenue heiress named Irene Bullock, played by Carole Lombard at her most antic, falls for Godfrey, played by William Powell at his most urbane. She cites two documentaries about drag – the little known The Queen (1968) and the classic Paris Is Burning (1990) – as films about a subculture that has since gone mainstream with shows like RuPaul's Drag Race.Īmong these endless possibilities, here are 11 of the most definitive, iconic New York films, depicting the city in all its ethnic diversity and class differences, its grimy moments and glamorous star turns. The series' curator, Jessica Green, tells BBC Culture, that she sought out 'those moments caught on film when subcultures were born that went on to dominate the planet.

Gloria Swanson, 26 years before Sunset Boulevard, plays a shopgirl who dreams of bigger things, a plot that has never gone away.

#ELOQUENT FIND HAS MANY SERIES#

Its exhibition This is New York: 100 Years of the City in Art and Pop Culture includes a year-long film series arranged decade by decade, starting with the 1924 silent film Manhandled. That series is running in conjunction with The Museum of the City of New York's centennial celebrations. The 1998 film that predicted the future 'The city really has to play a part in the story and the way people live,' he says.

Bruce Goldstein, the cinema's Repertory Program Director, tells BBC Culture that for a film to be truly 'New York', it needs more than a setting. The Manhattan theatre Film Forum has this spring been running The City: Real and Imagined, whose title alone suggests the true-to-life, the mythic, and the sometimes blurred line between dreams and reality. Two ambitious film series here capture that range. But from the earliest days of cinema, the city has appeared on screen in all its variations, from its great art and glittering lights to packed subways and littered streets. We'll never know how many people have been drawn to New York because of its image on screen (Holly Golightly has a lot to answer for) and how many have been frightened away (lookin' at you, Taxi Driver).

Eloquent find has many