2013 Fall Film Issue Archives - Cal Alumni Association

Lights, Camera, Economics

Robert Reich brings his message to the big screen. If charisma were measured in inches, Berkeley political economist Robert Reich would be a very tall man—but he’s short. Famously so, barely 4’11”. It’s not something he hides. To the contrary, he works his height the way a fat comic works his weight, beginning speeches with deadpan […]

Movie Romance

On a warm summer night in Berkeley, a diverse group of moviegoers congregates on the south side of campus, just off Bancroft, near the entrance to the Pacific Film Archive (PFA) Theater. The building is sort of a hip take on a Quonset hut—intended as a temporary alternative to the theater in the Berkeley Art Museum (BAM), which has been closed for retrofitting since 1999. Yet, like the eastern span of the Bay Bridge, it still serves dutifully, screening films nearly every night of the year.

The Man Behind the Movies

James Schamus is a rare specimen in the film business. Not only is he a high-powered movie executive—CEO of Focus Features, the art house division of NBC Universal—he is also a writer and producer of the first order, with a long list of credits that include The Ice Storm, Brokeback Mountain, and Lust, Caution. He received an Academy Award nomination for Brokeback Mountain (Best Picture) and two more for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, including Best Original Song (he wrote the lyrics). And, as if all that weren't enough, Schamus is also a professor of film theory at Columbia University in New York City. As you might expect from that last item on the CV, he has a Ph.D., but he only finished his dissertation in 2003, after Berkeley asked him to deliver that year's commencement address to the English Department. Tim Gray, editor-in-chief of Variety, told a reporter, "He's the only person in the business I've ever seen who said, 'I can't go to Cannes because I've got to work on my doctorate.'"

Uncertain Prospects

A documentary filmmaker goes in search of a story (Note: In this gritty diary, director Jesse Moss captures his challenges filming “The Overnighters,” which just received the U.S. Documentary Special Jury Award for “intuitive filmmaking” at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival. Moss, who graduated from UC Berkeley in 1993, thanked the festival for “believing in this […]

The Right Fit

Sonny Dykes is ready to run a football program, not just an offense. Sonny Dykes, Cal’s new head football coach, had the highest-scoring offense in the country last year as head coach at Louisiana Tech. And for Cal fans coming off a string of lackluster seasons, the promise of big offense is welcome news. “We will […]

Scores of Spores

The Bay Area is fruitful hunting ground for mushrooms. What could be more irresistible than a chance to forage for wild mushrooms, those gorgeous gifts of nature, while not dying of mushroom poisoning or ending up on the liver transplant list? The lure of life and death, in a single bite! But mushroom hunting is not […]

Pinot Noir Crush

An alumna pursues her passion in the vineyard. Merry Edwards ’70 describes her fascination with pinot noir like a romance. “How do you decide who you fall in love with?” she said. “You can’t really respond to that. You fall in love because you fall in love.” The comparison makes more sense when you know that […]

5 Questions for Eileen Jones

Visiting assistant professor, Berkeley Department of Film and Media 1. What was the first film you saw? Eileen Jones: Bambi was the first film I remember. I hid under the seat during the terrifying parts: the shooting of Bambi’s mother, the stag fight, the forest fire. But at the same time I loved the intense emotional […]

Finding Her Tribe

A producer pursues her vision of a feminist TV show. One glance at the promo for her TV show was enough to send her heart plummeting like an elevator with snapped cables. The ad depicted a female flight attendant—or stewardess, as they were once universally called—lying in bed, partially draped in a sheet, wearing only a […]

The SS vs. Shirley Temple

Excerpt from The Collaboration: Hollywood’s Pact with Hitler by Ben Urwand, Ph.D. ‘11 (Harvard University Press, September 2013) The collaboration of American movie studios with Nazi Germany was complex and multifaceted, and as the decade progressed, it evolved in a clearly discernible way. More and more, the Nazis dictated the terms of every encounter, and the […]

Search Light

Researchers create a gel that moves in response to light. Fans of vintage science fiction will fondly recall The Blob, the 1950s flick starring a young Steve McQueen and a rapacious pile of alien goop that was irresistibly drawn to teenaged human flesh. Berkeley engineers have concocted an analogue of sorts. Rest easy, though; it was […]

For Better or for Worse

A Berkeley biologist investigates why mantis shrimp stick together. Mantis shrimp are known in the scientific community for their ocular prowess—they can see more colors than a butterfly. Some scientists study the shrimp’s raptorial appendages, which can generate as much force as a 22-caliber rifle. Others study their intricate fighting rituals. But Molly Wright, a former […]

Behind the Curtain

A Berkeley neurobiologist looks at the science behind film. Berkeley psychology professor Arthur Shimamura is unabashedly obsessed with cinema, but his day job is studying the brain. So, as both cineaste and scientist, it made sense to merge his livelihood with his passion. Shimamura has coined the term “psychocinematics” to describe the cognitive aspects of the […]