George Eastman House, “Rochester’s Home,” is also home to the legacy of George Eastman and the arts he made possible. As such, it attracts many of Hollywood’s finest filmmakers, including Oscar nominees Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor.

Payne has been nominated for three more Academy Awards this year, for producing, directing and writing THE DESCENDANTS (2010). Jim Taylor, his frequent collaborator, was also nominated this year for his work co-producing the film. This is their fifth feature film but the first time they have not shared a writing credit.

Payne and Taylor were invited by Assistant Curator Jim Healy to introduce a screening of their second film, ELECTION (1999) in July 2006, and participated in a Q&A after the film. Payne returned in December of that year to host a screening of one of his many favorite films, Richard Fleischer’s THE GIRL IN THE RED VELVET SWING (1955). [Fleischer himself was a guest of GEH ]. Once he arrived a good relationship was established between our archive and the filmmaker. During both visits, Payne spent a few days at GEH, mostly watching many private screenings of films from our archive in the Dryden Theatre. He’s a real cinephile – but not the kind who slavishly repackages his influences in his own movies. They’re best classified not as comedies or dramas but as Alexander Payne films.

(l to r) Jim Talylor, Jim Healy and Alexander Payne

Healy, in his introduction to ELECTION, called Payne and Taylor “contemporary descendants to great filmmakers like Frank Tashlin, Michael Ritchie, Hal Ashby and the pioneers of film satire – Billy Wilder and Preston Sturges.” Healy called their films “exquisitely written and profoundly funny.” He praised their “great taste in cinema and their expansive knowledge of film history and a deep understanding of essential film grammar – the cinematic language laid out by their predecessors.”

Of the four films that he has written and directed, when asked why he chose to screen ELECTION for the Rochester audience Payne said that it tends to be the “favorite of film nerds. And it is Cinemascope. And can I brag and say that both Barack Obama and Richard Holbrooke have told me that it’s their favorite political movie?”

The following are some of the highlights from both of Alexander Payne’s visits to George Eastman House.

Payne: “Casting is Job 1. The old cliché that 90% of directing is casting is really true. Even though I spend a lot of time complaining about working with the studio, [we] deal with who the top two or three actors are then after that it’s completely mine.”

“I shot [ELECTION] soon after CASINO (1995) had come out. It kind of quietly had an influence on the style of the film. It’s one of the few American films that I’ve seen with multiple voiceovers. [It is] moving and cutting quickly to constantly changing music cues which [Scorsese] began in GOODFELLAS (1990). I think CASINO is kind of a masterpiece.”

In response to a question about how they met, Jim Taylor said “[In 1989] Alexander had a room that was for rent. He had a two bedroom apartment. We were just acquaintances but I moved into that room and we became friends and started writing together.”

Payne, Taylor and Healy on the Dryden Theatre stage.

George Eastman House: “Your first film was in ’96. How many scripts did you guys work on together before you hit on one that got made?”

Payne: “Actually in ’91 we wrote and I directed two shorts for the Playboy Channel called INSIDE OUT – an anthology series. The producer Alan Poul, who later produced SIX FEET UNDER, did that show. He tried to get who at the time he thought were cutting edge and non-DGA directors.”

Audience member: “Has SIDEWAYS brought you a lot of freedom? Do you have a narrow window of opportunity? How secure do you feel?”

Jim Taylor: “We’re doing really well. But we don’t want to feel to secure. That could be a problem.”

Payne: “But I think filmmakers should act as though they have complete freedom. Especially when we’re writing, we’re pretending we have a billion dollar budget. Let restrictions come later.”

Payne on classic Hollywood cinema: “The more I learn as a film director, the more I learn about technique, the more I see the huge achievement of the classical Hollywood film style. No matter how they are made or under what conditions, a director is always thinking about how to make the actors move and where to put the camera. Whether you’re Godard or Michael Curtiz, it’s the same problem. Where do I put my actors and how do I move my camera. I see the elegance and practicality and efficiency and economy with which classical Hollywood film directors worked. And it’s astonishing. Young film school kids in love with the French New Wave, or now they talk about Korean cinema or something like that, they might [minimize] the film that they’ve seen the most, like CASABLANCA (1942). I say go try to make a CASABLANCA. Making something like that is going to be harder than trying to emulate any of these other films.”

Because it is my blog I can close with my favorite part of the evening. Jim reminded the audience that “we should remember the Stanley Kubrick quote that ‘the only person in the world who has final cut is the projectionist’. So kudos to Ben Tucker up there in the booth.”

Payne: “Thank you, Ben.”

Those moments make it fun to work at George Eastman House.

We wish Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor the best of luck on Oscar night.

Payne with audience members after the screening.

Guest Blog by film critic Jack Garner

Silent film legend Buster Keaton was long known as “Old Stone Face” because he never cracked a smile, even while houses collapsed around him and tornadoes blew through town. However, at least one thing was known to put a smile on his face: his George Eastman Award from Eastman House. Author Marion Meade noted in his biography, Cut to the Chase, the great comedian considered his Eastman award more prestigious than an Oscar®.

Keaton was part of the astonishing first group of winners of the aptly nicknamed “George” award, on Nov. 9, 1955. He joined an all-star roster that included Charles Chaplin, Harold Lloyd, Mary Pickford, Gloria Swanson, Ronald Colman, Cecil B. DeMille, John Ford, and Lillian Gish. Though not all came to Rochester for the honors, many did, including Keaton, Pickford, Swanson, and Gish. They attracted a sellout crowd at the 3,000-seat Eastman Theatre.

Lillian Gish speaks from the Festival of Film Artists stage at the Eastman Theatre in 1955.

In the more than a half-century since, Rochester and George Eastman House have been host to a sparkling array of Eastman Award winners, from Fred Astaire and Jimmy Stewart to Gregory Peck, Audrey Hepburn, and Meryl Streep. The award ceremony is held every few years, the centerpiece of a night of black-tie celebrating and important community fundraising at the Eastman House and its Dryden Theatre.

The event adds prestige to the Eastman House film archive, generates awareness and enthusiasm for the collection and the Museum’s motion picture preservation activities among important Hollywood figures, and is a great excuse for a grand party.

And sometimes, the honorees return the favor with important gifts to the museum. Director Martin Scorsese, the 1994 honoree, now stores some 8,000 titles from his world-class film collection at Eastman House, where they are often scheduled for screenings and will eventually be a permanent part of the Eastman House collection. And the 1997 honoree, actress Isabella Rossellini, has made Eastman House a repository for films by her famous father, Italian filmmaker Roberto Rossellini.

The awards began in 1955 as an idea by the Museum’s first director, Gen. Oscar Solbert. Founding film archivist James Card recalls in his memoirs that with the proliferation of film festivals in 1955 — and the growing popularity of the Academy Awards® — he should have foreseen that the “PR-conscious director” would conceive of a ceremony of his own. Card wrote that he was called into Solbert’s office: “ ‘We will award Georges,’ he announced. I firmly believed he was confident that in a manner of time, the Oscars® would be superceded by Georges.”

Certainly, that hasn’t happened. Yet the awards, which are held in high regard among those who’ve been honored, and probably a few who wish they would be honored.

First called the Festival of Film Artists Awards in both 1955 and 1957, the name was changed to the George Eastman Award “for distinguished contribution to the art of film” soon after but has had the nickname ‘The Georges” on and off since.

“The George Eastman Award was the first token of recognition established by a US cultural institution to pay tribute to the artistic achievements of the leading artists of the film industry,” says Patrick Loughney, a former Motion Picture Department curator at Eastman House, and now at the Library of Congress. “In terms of longevity and the prestige of past recipients, only Oscar® stands in comparison.”

Part of the initial attraction of the Georges was that the 1955 and 1957 honors were awarded to stars, directors, and cinematographers from 1915 through 1930, and were selected through extensive balloting, organized by Card, through mailings to any and all significant surviving participants of that important period of film history.

After the initial flurry of the 1955 and 1957 honors, the complex and difficult balloting process was put aside, and the museum directors, archivists, and boards began the process of selecting the stars, which were usually just one per ceremony, and usually about once every two or three years. The new process began in 1965 with Fred Astaire, and continued in the ’70s with Johnny (Tarzan) Weissmuller, Blanche Sweet, and director George Cukor (who, before becoming Katharine Hepburn’s favorite Hollywood director, honed his craft in the ’20s at Rochester’s Lyceum Theatre).

This reporter’s observance of the Georges began in 1978, when the incredibly likeable Jimmy Stewart was honored. As part of the ceremony, the Dryden Theatre hosted a screening of the then-rare and out-of-circulation Vertigo, which drew film aficionados from around the world.

1978 Eastman Award honoree James Stewart poses playfully on the site of the Schuyler C. Townson Terrace Garden while touring the Museum grounds.

The Eastman House also revisited the concept of honoring several stars at a large Eastman Theatre celebration in 1982, when several exceptional women were honored simultaneously: Joan Bennett, Dolores Del Rio, Myrna Loy, Maureen O’Sullivan, Luise Rainer, and Sylvia Sidney.

The seventh of these legendary women was Louise Brooks, the silent screen siren who spent her last decades living in Rochester, and who had spent many hours studying films at Eastman House for her memoir, Lulu in Hollywood. The ill, apartment-bound recluse didn’t make it to the ceremony, but she sent word that she was thrilled with the honor  — which came only three years before her death.

The Eastman House has continued to be remarkably successful in attracting prestigious names to receive Georges and to be the all-important magnets for the fundraising ceremony. Fortunately, the awards establish their own natural sort of celebrity networking. Martin Scorsese, for example, led Eastman House to his friend and former wife, Isabella Rossellini, which led to another award (and to important treasures for the archive).

Meryl Streep in the Dryden Theatre with her 1999 Eastman Award.

As Meryl Streep said when she was honored in 1999, “I can see I’m in very august company.” And, since she’s an Oscar® champion and arguably the greatest actress of her generation, she and the newest recipient to be named, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild award winner Richard Gere, make the company even more august when future Eastman award recipients are determined.

The only time things didn’t work out as planned was in 1994 when Scorsese was honored and had to withdraw from attending at the last minute because of complications on the set of his movie, Casino. In his stead he sent Griffin Dunne, who’d starred in Scorsese’s After Hours.

On one of the grandest nights of Eastman Award history, on Oct. 24, 1987, recipient Gregory Peck was surprised by the appearance of one of his favorite co-stars, Audrey Hepburn. “I’m honored to bring to this ceremony the film industry’s admiration for your talent, their respect for your integrity, and the love they feel for you.”

Peck was delighted. But he also said he was happy because the Eastman House honors also put a spotlight on the Museum’s important role as a leading center of film preservation.

“For a long time, Hollywood didn’t realize the importance of preserving its films,” he told the audience here. “These old films are an invaluable source of information for film students. And, for the general public, they’re a window into the past.”

Audrey Hepburn shows her Eastman Award to a sold-out Dryden crowd in 1992, after its presentation by then-chairman of the Museum’s board of trustees Bruce Bates.

Five years after Peck’s ceremony, Hepburn would herself be honored with an Eastman Award. Though her adoring fans didn’t know it at the time, they witnessed history. Those close to Hepburn knew she was quite ill, though she put on a brave and stunningly gorgeous face. Ultimately, it was a bittersweet occasion, the last major public appearance by the Hollywood icon, who died four months later.

Jack Garner was staff film critic of Rochester’s Democrat and Chronicle for 28 years and for 20 of those years was the nationally syndicated chief film critic of Gannett News Service. A fixture in Rochester journalism since 1970, he was part of the team that won a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the Attica prison rebellion in 1971. Today he is a member of Eastman House’s Motion Picture Acquisitions Committee and the Eastman House Council, and in 2007 was honored with the George Eastman Medal of Honor for his contribution to motion pictures and the community.

Before he screamed “Heeeeeere’s Johnny!,” mugged as The Joker, and co-starred with Adam Sandler in Anger Management, Jack Nicholson made a reputation as an actor of fierce control and subtlety.

After spending a decade in the exploitation trenches with grindhouse compatriots Roger Corman and Monte Hellman, Nicholsonmade a sudden jump to stardom playing washed-up ACLU lawyer George Hanson in Easy Rider at the age of 32. The role set the pattern for the next glorious decade: with an Old Hollywood sense of star power and a scruffy, definitely R-rated attitude, Nicholson straddled generations.

Five Easy Pieces, 1970.

The hippies saw a genteel but like-minded rebel; their parents found a rough-edged, neurotic link to earlier Method luminaries like Marlon Brando and Montgomery Clift. Nicholson’s work with some of the foremost New Hollywood directors (Bob Rafelson, Roman Polanski, Hal Ashby) speaks for itself and stands capably for the strengths of the era. Nicholson and the films he made were ferociously adult — angry, righteous, ultimately mellowing out. Our sampling of Nicholson’s ’70s best— Five Easy Pieces, The Fortune, The King of Marvin Gardens, Chinatown, and  The Passenger— documents a radiant personality breaking and re-making the rules of acting.

The King of Marvin Gardens, 1972.

Chinatown, 1974.

In this last of the blogs focusing on the films that are being broadcast on Turner Classic Movies ‘Tribute to George Eastman House’ (all day today!), I’m highlighting the films made in the middle of the Twentieth Century. George Eastman House’s collections are packed with great silent films, and films from the early studio era, but the selection is broader than that. These last four films hint at the important work from the ‘40s, ‘50s and ‘60s that still needs preservation.

THE MOON AND SIXPENCE (1942) is one of only six films directed by writer Albert Lewin. Loosely based on the life of Gaugin, it follows George Sanders as he deteriorates from family man to self-obsessed painter hiding out in the tropics. Our material is notable for its sepiatone footage, similar to the ‘Kansas’ scenes that bookend THE WIZARD OF OZ. This type of toning imitated the look of silent films and was used for hundreds of projects from the ‘30s to the ‘50s, but most of the surviving prints no longer have the tone, but are instead black-and-white reproductions. There is also a scene using Cinecolor, a short-lived two-color process. The restoration was done in 1993 with the assistance of Crystal Pictures, Inc.

PANDORA AND THE FLYING DUTCHMAN (1951)

PANDORA AND THE FLYING DUTCHMAN (1951) is another of the 6 films directed by Lewin, along with the well-known PORTRAIT OF DORIAN GRAY (1945). One of our highest-profile restorations in recent years, this Technicolor marvel weaves together the legends of Pandora’s Box and The Flying Dutchman into a tragic 20^th-Century romance starring James Mason and Ava Gardner. Especially important to the film, and essential that we get right, is the blue of the sea, often reflected in Gardner’s wardrobe, beckoning the two lovers into each other’s arms. This restoration was completed in 2009 with the help of The Film Foundation.

FEAR AND DESIRE (1953)

FEAR AND DESIRE (1953) was Stanley Kubrick’s first feature film, after he had worked as a photographer for Look Magazine in New York City and directed two documentary shorts for RKO. A low-budget, independent production, he cast New York actors and took them to the California hillsides to create an allegorical war drama that starred, among others, Paul Mazursky, who went on to direct such films as BOB& CAROL & TED & ALICE (1969), HARRY AND TONTO (1974) and DOWN AND OUT IN BEVERLY HILLS (1986). Legend has it that Kubrick was embarrassed by the film and sought out copies of it to suppress the title and remove it from his legacy. George Eastman House received their print from the original American distribution company and preserved the film in 1989.

The last film being shown on TCM is also the latest film in the tribute. In 1964, Philip Kaufman, who went on to write three Indiana Jones movies and direct such films as INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS (1978), THE UNBEARABLE LIGHTNESS OF BEING (1988), RISING SUN (1993) and THE RIGHT STUFF (1983) – a personal favorite – started his career with the impressionistic feature GOLDSTEIN, which dreamily follows the separate adventures of a pregnant woman and an old man in Chicago. This avant-garde film was preserved from original material donated to George Eastman House by the director himself, one of several artists that entrust us with their life’s work. The preservation was finished just this year and has not been seen in theaters.

I want to thank you for taking the time to read my impressions of the salute and for watching the films on TCM (All day today!). I have the honor of appearing with Robert Osborne, starting at 8pm tonight to discuss four of our featured films: FEAR AND DESIRE, HUCKLEBERRY FINN, PANDORA AND THE FLYING DUTCHMAN, and ROARING RAILS. I hope that everyone reading this enjoys the salute as much as we at George Eastman House have enjoyed bringing it to you.

Happy Holidays!

There are 15 films being presented by Turner Classic Movies on Wednesday, December 14. All of them come from the archives of the George Eastman House— a result of decades of acquisition, conservation and preservation. For this blog entry,  I am highlighting the ‘30s films being shown that day.

PAYMENT DEFERRED (1932)

PAYMENT DEFERRED (1932) is one of my personal favorites in the TCM lineup. I consider it a proto-noir, in that the protagonist (the fabulous Charles Laughton) experiences the same type of dilemma, decision and destruction that characters such as Walter Neff of DOUBLE INDEMNITY (1944) and Christopher Cross of SCARLET STREET (1945) endured in the golden age of noir. The plot follows Laughton, a bank clerk, as he struggles to keep his family financially afloat. He has news about an impending shift in the money markets but has no capital to take advantage of it. A long-lost nephew (an early appearance by Ray Milland) shows up on his doorstep but has no interest in Laughton’s proposal. Before Milland leaves, Laughton plans and executes a cold-blooded murder, stealing Milland’s money and burying him in the back yard. Laughton makes a killing on his investment, but is haunted by the body in the garden. It has little of the stylistic effects that are the hallmarks of the noir look, but the themes are the same and Laughton’s performance is grand. Like many of the MGM films we have here, the originals came to us early in our professional life. A nitrate picture negative and a nitrate track negative were received in 1967 and our print was taken directly from these in the 1970s, as was a new Fine Grain Master. Airs at 6:15 pm.

In 2007 Fox produced the mammoth and impressive “Ford at Fox” DVD Box Set, boasting 24 of the director’s films in one beautiful package. One of the films in the set, THE WORLD MOVES ON (1934), came directly from our material. We received a nitrate positive from Fox in 1972 and performed our own preservation in 1989, creating new pic and track negs and a new print. For the new preservation, Fox decided to use the old track neg, but went back to the nitrate to create a new pic neg and, with those elements, a new print. The story starts in 1825 New Orleans and follows the lives and loves of the Girard family over several generations, through the first World War and the stock market collapse to the present day. The cast is led by Madeleine Carroll, Franchot Tone and Reginald Denny. Airs at 2:45 am.

The shortest film featured is a 1937 documentary entitled THE SPANISH EARTH and directed by Joris Ivens, a well-known Dutch director that was deeply influenced by Russian greats Eisenstein and Pudovkin. The company that sponsored this film, Contemporary Historians, was formed by group of American writers and intellectuals, including Ernest Hemingway, Lillian Hellman, John Dos Passos, Dorothy Parker and Archibald MacLeish. The film follows loyalist forces and the land-working people of Spain as they struggle to survive the onslaught of Franco’s army, and as released was narrated by Ernest Hemingway. Our print was a pre-release positive that still retained the narration by a 21-year-old Orson Welles. We got our original material, a nitrate positive print, back in 1958, and performed a standard preservation, creating new pic and track negs and a new print in 1985. Airs at 9:00 am

We’ve covered nearly 20 years of film history, from an early feature released in 1918 to a documentary released solidly within the sound era. The last four films will take us all the way into the mid-‘60s, rounding out a fascinating slate of preserved wonders.