“A Deeper Look”: Hollywood's First 3-D Wave, 1953-1954 Film Festival

“A DEEPER LOOK” :  HOLLYWOOD’S FIRST 3-D WAVE, 1953-1954
FESTIVAL CELEBRATING 70th ANNIVERSARY OF 3-D CRAZE
SELECT SCREENINGS THROUGH NOVEMBER

Press release,
Opens August 6 and 7
With Restored 3-D Cult Classic ROBOT MONSTER

Includes Hitchcock's DIAL M FOR MURDER, Jack Arnold's CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON, André De Toth's HOUSE OF WAX, New Restorations of THE DIAMOND WIZARD and I, THE JURY, and more.

Presented in Association with 3-D Film Archive

 “A DEEPER LOOK”: HOLLYWOOD’S FIRST 3-D WAVE, 1953-1954, a celebration of the 70th anniversary of Hollywood’s 3-D craze of the early 1950s, will run at Film Forum, beginning with the NYC theatrical premiere of the 3-D Film Archive’s new restoration of the cult classic ROBOT MONSTER, considered the PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE of 3-D movies, screening on August 6 at 8:25 and August 7 at 6:00. The festival will continue with select screenings through November, with 3-D features, shorts, trailers, and special presentations. 

In ROBOT MONSTER, an alien gorilla in a fishbowl space helmet decimates Earth with death rays and soap bubbles. George Nader, longtime friend (and one time lover) of Rock Hudson, stars, with music by a pre-TEN COMMANDMENTS Elmer Bernstein. Critic/historian Leonard Maltin wrote of it, ”One of the genuine legends of Hollywood: embarrassingly, hilariously awful…and dig that bubble machine with the TV antenna!”

The series includes the first NYC 3-D screening ever THE DIAMOND WIZARD (1954), starring Dennis O’Keefe as a U.S. treasury agent sent to England to track down a ring of diamond counterfeiters, in a brand new 3-D Film Archive restoration, and Mickey Spillane’s I, THE JURY (1953), a stereoscopic Film Noir starring Biff Elliott as Spillane’s private dick Mike Hammer, restored by the UCLA Film & Television Archive, PKL Pictures, and Romulus Films Ltd.
 
In 1953, seventy years ago, 3-D conquered Hollywood. After years of speculation and experimentation, stereoscopic movies finally caught fire, luring audiences away from their televisions. Within the first few months of the year, every major studio was looking to explore the third dimension in every movie genre: horror (HOUSE OF WAX, THE MAZE), Film Noir (MAN IN THE DARK, I THE JURY), big-budget musicals (KISS ME KATE), thrillers (INFERNO, DIAL M FOR MURDER), monster movies (CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON), slapstick comedy (the Three Stooges’ SPOOKS and PARDON MY BACKFIRE), animation (Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker, Casper The Friendly Ghost and Popeye cartoons), war pictures (CEASE FIRE!), Westerns (HONDO, GUN FURY, TAZA SON OF COCHISE, WINGS OF THE HAWK), and sci-fi A pictures (IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE) and Z pictures (ROBOT MONSTER).

Some of Hollywood’s top directors jumped on the band wagon:  Alfred Hitchcock, Budd Boetticher, William Cameron Menzies, Roy Ward Baker, George Sidney, Jack Arnold. Douglas Sirk, Raoul Walsh, and André de Toth (the latter two each with a single functioning eye that prevented them from enjoying the final effect). Nearly fifty 3-D feature films were produced in the years 1953 and 1954 alone, but the craze soon came to an abrupt end, aced by a newer and more enduring movie vogue: CinemaScope. But those two years can now be looked on as the Golden Age of 3-D Movies and Hollywood's first great 3-D Wave.

Film archivist, 3-D Film Archive founder and CEO Robert Furmanek, one of the world’s leading experts on stereoscopic movies, will introduce select screenings, as well as a special compilation of stereoscopic shorts restored by the Archive called 3-D RARITIES (see description below). 

Bob Furmanek has played an important behind-the-scenes role in film preservation for more than forty years. Among his achievements, he is recognized for his restoration work with the films of Abbott and Costello and Jerry Lewis. In 1990, he began his ongoing efforts to save and restore our stereoscopic film heritage. Since 2014, the Archive has released over thirty acclaimed restorations on Blu-ray.

Top-quality Poloroid 3-D glasses provided!

Public Screening Schedule:
Additional titles to be announced

ROBOT MONSTER 
U.S., 1953
NYC THEATRICAL PREMIERE OF 3-D RESTORATION
Directed by Phil Tucker
Starring George Nader, Claudia Barrett, George Barrows
Approx. 79 min. 3-D Film Archive restoration courtesy Bayview Entertainment.

-With-
STARDUST IN YOUR EYES
U.S., 1953
Directed by Phil Tucker
Starring Slick Slaven
3-D short that accompanied ROBOT MONSTER on its original release. Approx. 7 min. 
SAVING SLICK, a 2-D documentary on the restoration of the short, will precede it.  
Approx. 6 min. 

Sunday, August 6 at 8:25*
Monday, August 7 at 6:00*

*Introduced by Robert Furmanek, 3-D Film Archive Founder and CEO 

HONDO 
U.S., 1953
Directed by John Farrow
Starring John Wayne, Geraldine Page, Ward Bond
Approx. 88 min. 3-D restoration courtesy Batjac Productions (thanks to Gretchen Wayne).

Monday, August 14 at 6:15 

I, THE JURY 
NYC 3-D RESTORATION PREMIERE
U.S., 1953
Directed by Harry Essex
Starring Biff Elliot, Preston Foster, Peggie Castle
Restored by the UCLA Film & Television Archive.  
Approx. 97 min. 3-D DCP courtesy Studiocanal and Rialto Pictures.

Monday, August 28 at 6:00
Friday, September 8 at 9:50 

MISS SADIE THOMPSON
U.S., 1953
Directed by Curtis Bernhardt
Starring Rita Hayworth, José Ferrer, Aldo Ray
Approx. 91 min. 3-D DCP restoration courtesy Sony Pictures.

Monday, September 4 at 6:00 

3-D RARITIES
Robert Furmanek, founder of the 3-D Archive, presents this eye-popping collection of the Archive’s restorations, including the earliest (1922) extant 3-D film; NEW DIMENSIONS, the first full-color American 3-D movie, first shown at the New York World’s Fair in 1940; Allen H. Miner's DOOM TOWN, a once-banned anti-nuke movie; “I’ll Sell My Shirt,” a racy 3-D burlesque short unseen for six decades; BOO MOON, a Casper the Friendly Ghost “stereotoon”; animated puppet sci-fi short “The Adventures of Sam Space,” and a stereoscopic Nat King Cole! 
Approx. 94 min. 3-D DCP courtesy Flicker Alley.  

Monday, September 11 at 6:00 

THE DIAMOND WIZARD 
NYC 3-D PREMIERE
U.S., 1954
Co-directed by Dennis O’Keefe and Montgomery Tully
Starring Dennis O’Keefe, Philip Friend, Margaret Sheridan
Approx. 83 min. 3-D Film Archive restoration courtesy Park Circus. 

Monday, September 18 at 6:10 

EL CORAZÓN Y LA ESPADA 
Mexico, 1953
Directed by Edward Dein and Carlos Véjar hijo.
Starring Cesar Romero, Katy Jurado 
Approx. 80 min. 3-D Film Archive restoration.

Monday, October 9 at 6:10 

GUN FURY
U.S., 1953
Directed by Raoul Walsh
Starring Rock Hudson, Lee Marvin, Neville Brand
Approx. 83 mins. 3-D restoration courtesy Sony Pictures.

Tuesday, October 10 at 6:10 

HOUSE OF WAX
U.S., 1953
Directed by André de Toth
Starring Vincent Price, Phyllis Kirk, Carolyn Jones, Frank Lovejoy
Approx. 88 mins. 3-D restoration courtesy Warner Bros.

Friday, October 13 at 6:00
Sunday, October 15 at 6:00 

CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON 
U.S., 1954
Directed by Jack Arnold
Starring Richard Carlson, Julie Adams, Richard Denning
Approx. 87 mins. 3-D restoration courtesy Universal Pictures.

-With-
SPOOKS
U.S., 1953
Directed by Jules White
Starring The Three Stooges
Approx. 16 min. 3-D DCP courtesy Sony Pictures.

Saturday, October 14 at 8:50
Sunday, October 29 at 11
Tuesday, October 31 at 6:20 

MAN IN THE DARK 
U.S., 1953
Directed by Lew Landers
Starring Edmond O'Brien, Audrey Totter, Ted de Corsia 
First 3-D feature  released by a Hollywood studio.
Approx. 90 min. 3-D restoration courtesy Sony Pictures.

Sunday, November 5 at 5:10, 8:40 

DIAL M FOR MURDER 
U.S., 1954
Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
Starring Grace Kelly, Ray Milland, Anthony Dawson, John Williams
Approx. 105 min. 3-D restoration courtesy Warner Bros.

Friday, November 10 at 3:10
Tuesday, November 14 at 2:15
Thursday, November 16 at 12:15 

ADDITIONAL TITLES TO BE ANNOUNCED. 

Programmed by Robert Furmanek, founder and CEO of 3-D Film Archive,
and Bruce Goldstein, Film Forum Repertory Artistic Director