In celebration of the New York Transit Museum’s 50th Anniversary, the Film Forum is hosting a NYC In Transit series, featuring some of transit’s most notable roles on screen. Check out the lineup of iconic films where buses, elevated trains, and subway cars take center stage.
New York Transit Museum Members can purchase up to two tickets per transaction for Film Forum’s NYC in Transit series screenings at a discounted price of $14 by presenting their Transit Museum membership card to their box office or booking online with promo code (for details, see July 21 member email).
U.S., 1981
Directed by Manfred Kirchheimer
Approx. 45 min.
Lyrical and contemplative this 45-minute wordless tone poem to elevated trains creaking by in northern Manhattan, the Bronx, and upstate is set to ambient city soundscapes and the gutbucket gospel squall of Mingus and Aretha Franklin. STATIONS is not only stunning, but it’s the first-ever film about graffiti, from “throw-ups” to “whole-cars” in gorgeous 16mm reversal, and is a meditation on the power of the image. Gorgeous.
With
One More Time (2021, co-produced by Jake Perlin, approx. 17 min.)
One More Time is a coda to the recent trilogy of films—Dream of a City, Free Time, and Up the Lazy River—of never-before-seen footage shot by Kirchheimer and Walter Hess beginning in 1958 through STATIONS OF THE ELEVATED.
Daybreak Express (1953, directed by D. A. Pennebaker)
Shot in 1953, though not completed until 1957, Daybreak Express was the first film D. A. Pennebaker made, a mad rush of images of New York City captured from a train and edited to the rhythm of Duke Ellington’s song of the same name. A jazz aficionado, Pennebaker thought his career would continue along this path, making short films cut to songs.
Presented with support from The Roy Lichtenstein Foundation Fund
