Duet for Cannibals
1969 / 105 minutes /
Director: Susan Sontag
CAST: ADRIANA ASTI, GÖSTA EKMAN, LARS EKBORG
NEW 2K RESTORATION
Essayist, novelist, critic, cinephile, and all-around intellectual dynamo, Susan Sontag made her directorial debut with this definition-defying, dryly funny psychological serio-comedy, the result of a Swedish studio’s invitation to her to make a film in Stockholm. The result, revolving around the quadrangular relationship between an arrogant ex-revolutionist German intellectual exile, his elegant wife, their Swedish student secretary, and the earnest secretary’s bride-to-be, is a roundelay of partner-swapping that gradually drifts toward uncharted territory, gamesmanship that broaches the surreal and violent. Defying literal-minded interpretation, Duet for Cannibals is both an illustrative companion to Sontag’s criticism, and introduction of a startlingly original filmmaker.
As source material for the restoration the 35mm original camera negative was scanned in 2K. The optical sound track from a 35mm print was used as source for audio restoration.
A Metrograph Pictures release.
Previous Bookings
Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center, Buffalo, NY
Metrograph, New York, NY
Ryder Film Series, Bloomington, IN
Camera Obscura Film Society, Petaluma, CA
Cinema Arts Centre, Huntington, NY
Doc Films, Chicago, IL
The Roxie, San Francisco, CA
Harvard Film Archive, Cambridge, MA
Northwest Film Center, Portland, OR
Austin Film Society, Austin, TX
Cleveland Cinematheque, Cleveland, OH
Guild Cinema, Albuquerque, NM
Time & Space Limited, Hudson, NY
Northwest Film Forum, Seattle, WA
Nightletter, Philadelphia, PA
Alamo Drafthouse, Denver, CO
UCLA Film & Television Archive, Los Angeles, CA
Union Cinema, Milwaukee, WI
Veggie Cloud, Los Angeles, CA
Duke University, Durham, NC
Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH
FilmBar, Phoenix, AZ