The Dartmouth Film Society's summer series focuses on "sex and sweat" and portrays the various ways humans respond to and experience high temperatures and passion, according to Grey Cusack '11, former director of DFS. The series, titled "Hot Hot Hot" runs from June 24 to August 23.
"I think the summer series is a really great lineup of films that approaches the topic of films much more creatively than it seems to at first glance," Tien-Tien Jong '10, current director of DFS, said in an interview with The Dartmouth.
Volatile sexuality, for example, features prominently in the series designed by Gabriel Rosenstein '13. Ang Lee's "Lust, Caution," (2007; playing June 29) garnered an NC-17 rating for explicit and "acrobatically incredible" sex scenes, Jong said.
Martin Scorsese's adaptation of "The Age of Innocence" (1993; Aug. 3) deals with romantic passion in a society bound by rigid social hierarchies and sexual mores, while "Incendies" (2009; July 13) presents a more straightforward vision of heat, portraying two siblings' odyssey through a Middle-Eastern desert, according to Cusack.
Cusack and Jong worked with Bill Pence, director of films for the Hopkins Center, and Sydney Stowe, film manager for the Hopkins Center, to compile a diverse and thematically consistent film series, she said "These are all very different films brought together by some sense of physical, emotional heat," Cusack said.
"Hot Hot Hot" features films by Bernardo Bertolucci, Ingmar Bergman, Kelly Reichardt, Gore Verbinski and Michael Mann among others, Jong said.
The variety of directors creates quirky contrasts as well as a range of vision. While Verbinski's "Rango" (2011; June 26) and Sergio Leone's "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly" (1966; July 17) both employ wild west milieus, the former is a recently released, computer-animated family film, and the latter a classic spaghetti western, according to Jong.
Although blockbusters and recent films like "Rango" draw large audiences, they often prove the least important films in a series, Cusack said.
"Our primary goal is not only to entertain the Dartmouth and Upper Valley community, but to expose them to film history and really great films," she said. For this series, Cusack said she is particularly excited about "Sunrise: A Song of Humans," (1927; July 20) and "Kaboom," (2010, July 24), she said.
"Sunrise" is just one of the greatest silent films ever made," Cusack said. "Even if you don't like silent films, you'll love it."
"Kaboom" won the first Queer Palm an award given to the best lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender film at the Cannes Film Festival in 2010, but has yet to be widely released, according to Cusack.
"It's exciting that Dartmouth students have the opportunity to see this," she said. "They probably never would have gotten the chance to see it at home."
DFS members select the series through two rounds of voting during the eighth and ninth meeting of the term, Cusack said. While trying to remain faithful to Rosenstein's original concept designed this winter, Cusack drew up almost 20 drafts of 50-100 films. "Around the 15th draft or so it really began to feel like a comprehensive list," she said. "The theme is defined, changes and becomes clear as you work with it."
DFS strives to present a diverse range of styles, time periods and filmmakers in every series it presents, Cusack said. Rubrics call for at least one silent film as well as a balance between domestic and foreign films. DFS also prohibits series from screening a film that has been shown in the last four years, ensuring that undergraduates never see the same film twice in their Dartmouth career, Cusack said.
"Every year someone wants Casablanca, but we can't just show that," she said.
"Hot Hot Hot" is one of the most seasonally appropriate series the DFS has put on, according to Jong.
"It's a really deep series with a lot of high-quality films that are also really fun to watch in the summer," she said.
"Hot Hot Hot" films will be shown every Wednesday, Friday and Sunday at 7 p.m. in Spaulding Auditorium.
Rosenstein could not be reached for comments.
