still from Diva

1981 / 117 min
Director: Jean-Jacques Beineix / Screenwriters: Jean-Jacques Beineix & Jean Van Hamme, based on the novel by Delacorta (Daniel Odier)
Cast: Frédéric Andréi, Wilhelmenia Wiggins Fernandez, Richard Bohringer, Thuy An Luu, Dominique Pinon
Digital

Film introduced by Columbia Film professor Annette Insdorf. 

Critic Pauline Kael’s review captured the heady feeling of seeing Diva for the first time: “The French romantic thriller Diva dashes along with a pell-mell gracefulness, and it doesn’t take long to see that the images and visual gags and homages all fit together and reverberate back and forth. It’s a glittering toy of a movie … Every shot seems designed to delight the audience.”  The plot has something to do with a young postman who has secretly taped a concert by an American soprano who refuses to make records. Soon he’s being pursued by various nefarious forces, and is rescued by an unlikely pair of guardian angels — a dissolute bohemian and a Vietnamese teenager. (Ira Deutchman worked on the release of the film while at United Artists Classics.)

This screening is part of NY Indie Guy: Ira Deutchman and the Rise of Independent Film

On September 14-16 and September 20-23, 2018, Columbia University’s Lenfest Center for the Arts will host a retrospective exhibit honoring the career of Film Professor and Producing Concentration Supervisor Ira Deutchman. Since 1975, Deutchman has been a leader in distributing, marketing, and producing American independent films, international films, and arthouse films. He is perhaps best known for founding and running the distribution companies Cinecom, Fine Line Features, and Emerging Pictures. Deutchman has taught at Columbia since 1987.  

This retrospective will screen essential motion pictures from various points in Deutchman’s career, such as The Brother From Another Planet; Diva; Harlan County USA; sex, lies, & videotape; Swoon; and A Woman Under the Influence. Many showings will feature Q&A talkbacks with filmmakers or performers. The celebration will also include panel discussions and an extensive exhibit covering Deutchman’s impact on cinema.  

Sponsors

The Art House Convergence
Cowan, DeBaets, Abrahams & Sheppard
Film and Media Studies, Columbia University School of the Arts
The Society of Fellows and Heyman Center for the Humanities at Columbia University
The Institute for Research on Women, Gender, and Sexuality at Columbia University
The University of Michigan Library