With great regret and a heavy heart we have taken the decision to postpone Global Roots Film Festival: The Reporter until the Fall when it will be recreated as a high profile showcase within the Vermont International Film Festival (Oct 23 – Nov 1).
Directed by Lewis Milestone
USA | 1931 | 98 mins
Source: Academy Film Archive. Restored in 2016 by the Academy Film Archive and The Film Foundation. Restoration funding provided by the George Lucas Family Foundation. Elements for this restoration provided by The Howard Hughes Corporation, the University of Nevada, Las Vegas College of Fine Arts, Department of Film and its Howard Hughes Collection at the Academy Film Archive.
Post screening discussion with Jim Welch and Greg Guma, moderated by Mitch Wertlieb
Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur’s 1928 play is one of the most durable comedies in the American repertory and Lewis Milestone’s 1931 brash and brisk screen adaptation deserves a place of pride alongside it. Set in Prohibition-era Chicago, this is a cynical valentine to the ink-stained wretches of the world. The 1931 film version was the first and the one most contemporaneous to its depicted events. It is a pre-Code marvel with a machine-gun stride, capturing a sense of nihilism that the country was getting dragged into as the Depression kicked off. Its success started a cycle of cynical newspaper films. In 2010 the film was selected for the United States National Registry by the Library of Congress as being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant and In 2016 the film was finally restored by the Academy Film Archive to the original American release version for the first time in decades. The version you will see is this restoration.