Paul Schrader on First Reformed

Director: Paul Schrader

2017 / 113min / DCP

Join director and screenwriter Paul Schrader live in conversation with author and critic Claire Donato after a screening of First Reformed to celebrate the book launch of the Academy Award-nominated screenplay from Archway Editions. Copies of the books will be available for purchase and signing by Paul Schrader after the event as well.

The fifth film of Schrader’s so-called “man in a room” series, which includes Taxi Driver (1976) and American Gigolo (1980), First Reformed dives into consuming obsession along with its protagonist, Reverend Ernst Toller (Ethan Hawke, extraordinary), the caretaker of a historical upstate New York church who becomes gradually possessed by a horror of forthcoming ecological catastrophe, and fixated on the idea of laying down his life to punish the corporate overlords responsible. Harrowing and, finally, hallowed—a fierce and unforgettable film.