Keep it light.

by Ryland Walker Knight

After I submitted that essay on Bright Star, Ekkehard asked me to give him three things that marked my year—and they needn't be strictly cinematic. But, as this year was marked by all kinds of junk and dumps (as much as true highlights) and plenty of fear and trembling and loathing to go along with flight and dance and cheer (life felt like a real Søren leveling at times), I chose to not bore this blog world with me. Thus, I kept my miniature missive to maximum light, kept it pithy and kept it to cinema. You can read my list (and so many others!) in German by clicking here. Or you can read the English I sent to EK below:

1. Any time you get to see Playtime in 70mm is a highlight. This time, it was an unofficial introduction to my stint in New York early in 2009. I saw it at the Walter Reade Theatre with Keith Uhlich, Matt Zoller Seitz and Glenn Kenny. Then we ate yummy Italian food in Park Slope.

2. The DREYER at BAM series was an education this spring. Very happy to have met those films in that setting, that is the cinematheque over the home, and to have written something about each screening.

3. Jumping back into the PFA swing of things with an Alain Resnais series was just plain fun, from the Marienbad beginning all the way through—forwards and backwards, of course—to the end, which was a film from that often-cloudy, always-jumpy second phase in the 60s, fittingly calling an end in its title: La guerre est finie.