The Best Old Movies on a Big Screen This Week: NYC Repertory Cinema Picks, November 2-8
After Hours (1985)
Directed by Martin Scorsese
Originally intended to be Tim Burton’s debut feature, this blisteringly dark satire about a Manhattan yuppie’s horrible night out was an unexpected turn for Scorsese. At 97 minutes, it is one of his shortest films, and was also his first film in ten years to not star Robert DeNiro. Griffin Dunne, the DeNiro surrogate here, plays Paul Hackett, an office drone whose night on the town begins with the promise of romance but quickly dissolves into a paranoid nightmare. Scorsese stretches and warps time in this urban wonderland, juxtaposing frenetic camera movements against the backdrop of SoHo’s eclectic nightlife. Overlooked upon its initial release, After Hours deserves its place among Taxi Driver and Raging Bull as one of the filmmaker’s finest depictions of New York City. A.J. Serrano (November 6, 2pm at Film Forum)