‘NYC in Transit’: A new film festival kicks off featuring NYC subways in classic movies
Train enthusiasts, movie fans and NYC history buffs are sure to enjoy “NYC in Transit,” a film festival kicking off this month that celebrates the city’s subway system and its starring role in classic big-screen flicks.
Beginning July 28 and continuing on Tuesdays through early fall, the Film Forum in the West Village will host a weekly series spotlighting the role of the city’s subway system–along with its trolleys, buses and former “El”– in movies from the early to late 20th century.
Among the films to be screened are “The Naked City,” “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three” from 1974, the “French Connection” and “The Warriors.”
The festival coincides with the 50th anniversary of the New York Transit Museum. According to organizers, the event will show films that transform trains, stations, streets and platforms into places of romance, comedy, thrills, and suspense.
“New York’s subway system has played key roles in movies almost since it opened in 1904,” said Bruce Goldstein, producer and programmer of the series. “To this day, studios in Hollywood still have facsimiles of actual New York subway entrances on their New York streets and some of the studios once had standing New York subway station sets.”
The festival opens with the silent comedy “Speedy” from 1928, starring Harold Lloyd as a trolley conductor. According to Goldstein, it was Hollywood’s most ambitious New York production at the time, offering a look at the Jazz Age in Manhattan and Brooklyn, along with a cameo by a sports legend who today is still a household name.
“It also features a hilarious guest appearance by Babe Ruth, the most celebrated sports figure of the 1920s – his meeting with Harold Lloyd, the era’s most popular comedian, was the 1920s equivalent of the Beatles meeting Muhammad Ali in the 1960s,” Goldstein explained.
Special events in the festival include a program of subway films from the collection of the Transit Museum dating back to 1905, less than a year after the system opened, introduced by Jodi Shapiro, curator at the museum. There will also be a special presentation by Goldstein preceding “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three,” illustrating the movie’s careful attention to detail.
General admission is $18; More ticket information is available at filmforum.org.
Public screening schedule for NYC in Transit
Speedy, 1928
July 28, 7 p.m.
Directed by Ted Wilde
Starring Harold Lloyd, Babe Ruth
Approx. 85 min.
Followed by: In the Footsteps of Speedy (2015, Bruce Goldstein, 30 min.)
Bruce Goldstein tours the NYC locations captured by Lloyd and his Hollywood crew around Sheridan Square (steps away from Film Forum) – along with vivid scenes shot in Washington Square, Coney Island, Times Square, Sutton Place, Williamsburg, and the old Yankee Stadium.
The Naked City, 1948
Aug. 4, 7 p.m.
Directed by Jules Dassin
Starring Barry Fitzgerald, Don Taylor, Howard Duff, Dorothy Hart
Produced by Mark Hellinger
Photographed by William Daniels
Approx. 96 minutes
Followed by: Uncovering The Naked City (2020, Bruce Goldstein, 23 min.)
Bruce Goldstein tracks down many of the NYC locations used in his friend Jules Dassin’s classic police procedural, while also spotlighting the contributions of producer Mark Hellinger and cinematographer William Daniels.
The French Connection, 1971
Aug. 11, 7:20 p.m.
Directed by William Friedkin
Starring Gene Hackman, Roy Scheider, Fernando Rey
Photographed by Owen Roizman
Approx. 104 minutes
The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, 1974
Aug. 18, 8:10 p.m.
Directed by Joseph Sargent
Screenplay by Peter Stone
Photographed by Owen Roizman
Starring Walter Matthau, Robert Shaw, Héctor Elizondo, Martin Balsam, Jerry Stiller, and the downtown #6 train.
Approx. 104 min.
Introduced by Bruce Goldstein, with a special presentation showing the film’s precise details
Tracking Shots: Films from the New York Transit Museum’s Archives
Aug. 25, 6 p.m.
A program of rare films from the Museum’s own archive; introduced by Jodi Shapiro.
The Warriors, 1979
Sept. 1, 8 p.m.
Directed by Walter Hill
Starring Michael Beck, James Remar, Dorsey Wright, Brian Tyler
Approx. 90 min.
East Side, West Side, 1927
Sept. 8, 5:40 p.m.
Written and Directed by Allan Dwan
Starring George O’Brien, Virginia Valli, J. Farrell MacDonald.
Includes actuality footage of an NYC subway line under construction.
Approx. 90 min. 4K restoration courtesy the Museum of Modern Art.
Stations of the Elevated, 1981
Sept. 22, 6 p.m.
Directed by Manfred Kirchheimer
Approx. 45 min.
With One More Time (2021, Co-produced by Jake Perlin. Approx. 17 min.) 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.
Dutchman, 1966
Sept. 29, 6 p.m.
Directed by Anthony Harvey
Starring Shirley Knight, Al Freeman Jr.
Based on the 1964 play by LeRoi Jones (Amiri Baraka)
Approx. 55 min.
Preceded by a sequence from Jean-Luc Godard’s Masculine Feminine, parodying Jones’ play. With “The Candy Machine.” (George Griffin, 1972)
