LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD: ALAN SANBORN

MIFF has given its Mid-Life and Lifetime Achievement Awards to some of the finest and most famous cinema actors and creators of the past four decades. Though every one of them was richly deserving, none deserves it more than our own Alan Sanborn, for 43 years a rock that Railroad Square and MIFF have been built on. For 41 of those years—the only exceptions were the time lost during the pandemic shutdown and after the fire that destroyed the original Railroad Square building in 1994 before it was rebuilt—you could find Alan, behind the counter selling tickets or buttering your popcorn, or up in the projection booth, lighting your eyes with cinematic images. Amiable to all and cool as a proverbial cinematic cucumber, Alan never calls attention to himself. This special evening in his honor will be a spectacular and past-due occasion to make that not the case for a change. Like all our award winners, Alan will be honored with the screening of a film of their choice—and his is CHINATOWN, certainly itself a stage-stealer.

Saturday, July 16 6:30 P.M. | RR1

Lifetime Achievement Award Presentation CHINATOWN

USA 1974 - DCP - 130 minutes, in English

Director: Roman Polanski

Screenplay: Robert Towne

Producer: Robert Evans

Cast: Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, John Huston, Perry Lopez, John Hillerman

Print Courtesy: Paramount Pictures

What can you say about arguably one of the greatest films ever made? What starts out as a crackerjack private eye movie turns into an iconic indictment of capitalism, greed, power and a depiction of pure, unforgettable charming evil in disguise as Jack Nicholson’s J.J. Gittes becomes involved both professionally and personally with Faye Dunaway’s alluring, deeply threatened Evelyn Mulwray and her Biblically named father, John Huston’s Noah Cross, in Robert Towne’s nonpareil screenplay. Filled with iconic lines and scenes and a truly killer finale, CHINATOWN looked great in its 1974 day, nominated for 11 Oscars including Best Picture (though only Towne emerged a winner) and looks even more iconic and just plain terrific now, combining the grandest of Hollywood lavish craftwork and beauty with a deeply committed and embittered anti-establishment view, a seeming contradiction that makes the movie and its spectators shake. —Ken Eisen Sponsored by Peter and Lee Lyford