10 Years of ‘The Babadook’ Unleashed! Plus, The Best Movies of the Week You Can’t Miss!

Hi there, I’m Mark Olsen and welcome back to your regular guide to the world of Exceptional Cinema.

This week, we’re looking forward to the release of two much-lauded films from this year’s festival circuit: Coralie Fargeat’s “The Substance” and Aaron Schimberg’s “A Different Man.”

“The Substance” debuted at Cannes Film Festival, earning Fargeat a screenplay award, and was also featured at the recent Toronto International Film Festival. Demi Moore delivers a powerful performance as Elisabeth Sparkle, a television fitness guru who is being sidelined by her sexist, ageist boss, portrayed by Dennis Quaid. She discovers a mysterious solution that releases a younger version of herself from her back, who is dubbed Sue (played by Margaret Qualley) and takes over Elisabeth’s previous role. The two identities are meant to swap who is alive every week, but Sue becomes desperate to hold onto her new glamorous lifestyle, leading to catastrophic results.

In a conversation in London with Emily Zemler, Moore, Qualley, and Fargeat discussed the film and its exploration of aging and societal pressures on women regarding appearance and beauty. Moore talked about the film’s unsettling body-horror prosthetics and the challenges both actors faced, including a finale that involved spraying 30,000 gallons of blood from a fire hose.

Moore said, “You need to leave feeling like you gave it your all. It demanded it and it’s what you want to bring to it.”

Schimberg’s “A Different Man” made its premiere earlier this year at Sundance Film Festival. Sebastian Stan portrays Edward, a man suffering from neurofibromatosis, a genetic disorder causing tumors to grow on his face. An experimental treatment transforms him into, well, Sebastian Stan, but soon his life begins to be taken over by Oswald (Adam Pearson), an actor with the same condition who is playing Edward in a stage production based on his life.

In a conversation with Josh Rottenberg, Stan, Pearson (who has neurofibromatosis in real life), and Oscar-nominated makeup artist Mike Marino discussed the film. Marino also worked on the prosthetics for Colin Farrell in the new series “The Penguin.”

When asked if he would undergo the procedure depicted in the movie, Pearson said he would not.

Pearson quipped, “I often joke with my friends that my disability does a lot of heavy lifting for my terrible personality. Everyone thinks about how difficult it is to become disabled from being non-disabled. I think the reverse would be even more challenging. The journey we take and the obstacles we face shape us and are inseparably linked.”

A Decade of ‘The Babadook’

In honour of the tenth anniversary of Jennifer Kent’s “The Babadook,” which has become a staple in modern horror, the film will be returning to theaters for a limited time. Most screenings will include a taped Q&A between Kent and Alfonso Cuarón. Kent will be present for a screening at Vidiots on Oct 1.

As critic Noel Murray once noted, “‘The Babadook’ is an emotional rollercoaster, a horror film designed to disturb rather than just shock.”

The film centers around a single mother Amelia (Essie Davis) and her 6-year-old son Samuel (Noah Wiseman). Amelia is still grappling with the death of Samuel’s father on the night her son was born, while Samuel’s behavioral issues make him a challenging child. Then, it appears they are being haunted by a peculiar character from a pop-up book they read one night and Samuel starts seeing the creature among them.

Manuel Betancourt spoke to Kent about the film’s enduring impact, including its adoption by the LGBTQ+ community. Kent revealed that she wrote the script while grieving her father’s death but that it has taken on more significance since then.

Kent explained, “I wrote this very honestly for myself, from a very real place. And yes, it’s about grief. But it’s also about suppression, actually. And what the public is saying is, ‘You can’t get rid of me, guys! I’m here! I’m just going to get bigger and more intimidating if you try and suppress me!’”

Leonard Maltin on Universal Treasures

Since the Museum of Modern Art showcased a series of rarities from Universal Studios’ archives in 2016, film critic and historian Leonard Maltin has been eager to bring some of those films to Los Angeles. This weekend at the New Beverly Cinema, Maltin will present six lesser-known films from the 1930s, none of which are available on streaming platforms.

In a recent phone conversation, Maltin discussed his ongoing curiosity for new discoveries and his excitement to introduce these relatively unknown films to local audiences.

Maltin observed, “If you only see duds, it can be disheartening, I’ll concede. But if you occasionally unearth a hidden gem while digging through these unknowns, it justifies the effort and fuels further curiosity.”

The program kicks off with Russell Mack’s 1932 film “Once in a Lifetime,” a film adaptation of a stage play by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart that satirizes Hollywood. That is followed by John Francis Dillon’s 1932 film “The Cohens and Kellys in Hollywood,” part of a popular series with cameos by stars like Boris Karloff and Tom Mix.

Maltin admitted that even he hasn’t seen “The Cohens and Kellys in Hollywood,” one of the films in the series, and will be viewing it for the first time along with the New Beverly audience.

Maltin said, “It could be good, it might not be good, but it needs to be seen.”

Edward L. Cahn’s 1932 films “Afraid to Talk,” shot by “Metropolis” cinematographer Karl Freund, will be paired with Cahn’s 1932 “Law and Order,” co-written by a young John Huston and featuring his father, Walter Huston.

The series concludes with two films starring Margaret Sullivan, John M. Stahl’s 1933 “Only Yesterday” and William Wyler’s 1935 “The Good Fairy.”

When asked what draws him to films from the 1930s, Maltin said: “It’s one of my favorite decades, along with the ’70s. You’d be hard-pressed to find a young filmmaker who doesn’t consider the 1970s a seminal period, and rightly so. But I find the same allure in the 1930s. There’s always something of interest, be it art deco set design, innovative camerawork, pushing boundaries of good taste, or the character actors who fill the cast. There’s always something that intrigues me.”

As a longtime chronicler of classic films, Maltin is invigorated by the current surge in repertory programming in Los Angeles, with crowds showing up for formats such as nitrate or 70mm and rare titles finally getting their moment in the spotlight.

Maltin expressed his delight, saying, “I’m thrilled. Who would have thought that the word nitrate would become a buzzword and a marketing tool? It’s gratifying. As a full-time advocate for films of this type, I wouldn’t say it’s vindication, but it’s a satisfying feeling.”

Noteworthy Mentions

‘Rhythm Thief’ in 4K Restoration

On Wednesday, Mezzanine will host the world premiere of a new 4K restoration of Matthew Harrison’s 1994 film “Rhythm Thief” with the director present. Made for a mere $11,000, the film captures the energy of New York’s Lower East Side in black-and-white with a jittery feel. The story centers around Simon, a cassette tape bootlegger — a delightfully dated detail! — played by Jason Andrews, who is struggling to keep his life together when a woman from his past (Eddie Daniels) brings shocking news that sends him on an emotional journey.

Esteemed filmmaker Martin Scorsese praised the film as “creative, thrilling, original.”

In his original review, Kevin Thomas described the film as “a triumph of thriftiness in all respects,” adding, “Often humorous in its sense of absurdity and ultimately moving, ‘Rhythm Thief’ … exudes a sense of living life on the edge.”

Haile Gerima’s ‘Black Lions, Roman Wolves: The Children of Adwa’

On Saturday, in collaboration with the inaugural KITFO Film Festival focused on Ethiopian and Eritrean filmmaking, the American Cinematheque will present the first episode of Haile Gerima’s 10-hour documentary “Black Lions, Roman Wolves: The Children of Adwa.” The film chronicles the struggle of Ethiopian patriots during the second Italo-Ethiopian War. The event will feature a Q&A with Gerima, recipient of the Academy’s Vantage Award, and his son, Merawi Gerima, the Spirit Award-winning filmmaker who caused a stir at the awards ceremony earlier this year.

‘Purple Noon’ and ‘La Piscine’

In a series celebrating the late French actor Alain Delon, who passed away in August at the age of 88, the American Cinematheque will screen two films on Friday that showcase him at his most striking: René Clément’s 1960 film “Purple Noon” and Jacques Deray’s 1969 film “La Piscine.”

“Purple Noon” is an adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s novel “The Talented Mr. Ripley” with Delon starring as the deceitful murderer Tom Ripley (the same role recently played by Andrew Scott in the series “Ripley.”) When the film was re-released in 1996, Kevin Thomas wrote, “ ‘Purple Noon’ belongs to Delon. … His catlike grace, aura of danger, lonely vulnerability and sexual magnetism make him a most compelling antihero.”

“La Piscine” — which was remade by Luca Guadagnino as “A Bigger Splash” — finds Delon in a complicated holiday in Saint-Tropez along with Romy Schneider, Jane Birkin, and Maurice Ronet.

As Robert Abele noted about the film when it was re-released in 2021, “Saint-Tropez holidays don’t get much more erotically photogenic than this movie’s opening moments, in which a perfectly bronzed, buff and blasé Alain Delon and a luminous, fresh-from-the-water Romy Schneider — playing vacationing couple Jean Paul and Marianne — engage in some teasing, merry poolside foreplay. Delon and Schneider had been a real-life couple but remained friendly enough after their breakup that he insisted Schneider be cast or he wouldn’t do the film, and their on-screen chemistry easily rivals the brilliance of this midday scene’s natural light source.”