Film with human qualities
The Films of Nathaniel Dorsky: “In film, there are two ways of including human beings,” the Bay Area filmmaker writes on his website. “One is depicting human beings. Another is to create a film form which, in itself, has all the qualities of being human: tenderness, observation, fear, relaxation, the sense of stepping into the world and pulling back, expansion, contraction, changing, softening, tenderness of heart. The first is a form of theater and the latter is a form of poetry.” The Yerba Buena Center for the Arts and Dorsky, in person, present 10 of his recent silent 16mm films, each about 20 minutes long, spread out over four programs, which were part of an extensive retrospective of his work at the New York Film Festival in September. You’ll never look at a movie in the same way again. 7:30 p.m. Thursday-Saturday, Nov. 12-14, and 2 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 15.
Fox Studios through
1935: The Stanford Theatre has quite an adventurous bit of programming — 36 movies that are rare not only on the big screen in 35mm, but anywhere, even on TCM. Take “Call Her Savage,” part of a 1932 double feature at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 12. It’s a talkie that was supposed to be silent “It” girl star Clara Bow’s comeback. Or “A Connecticut Yankee” (Friday and Saturday, Nov. 13-14) — not the Technicolor Bing Crosby version of Mark Twain’s story but the 1931 Will Rogers version, which co-stars Myrna Loy and Maureen O’Sullivan. Or the version of “Liliom” (Dec. 4-5), that ethereal story that was the basis for the musical “Carousel,” made by that most ethereal of directors, Frank Borzage (the betterknown “Liliom” was directed in France by Fritz Lang). There are six “Silent Sundays,” silent-film double features that include the rock-solid classics “Sunrise” (Nov. 29) by F.W. Murnau and Borzage’s “Seventh Heaven” (Dec. 6). Through Dec. 20 at the Stanford Theatre, 221 University Ave., Palo Alto. (650) 324-3700. www.stanfordtheatre.org. San Francisco Transgender Film Festival: Beginning with an opening gala featuring transgender-theme short films (7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 12, at the Roxie Theatre, 3117 16th St., S.F., (415 ) 863-1087), and ending with a slate of documentaries on Sunday, Nov. 15, also at the Roxie, the 14th annual event includes a special event at the Castro Theatre, 429 Castro St., S.F., (415) 621-6120, with a screening of “Major!” — that would be Miss Major Griffin-Gracy, a black transgender woman, now 75, who has been fighting for the rights of trans women of color for four decades in the Bay Area. www.sftff.org.