In 1969, film critics Roger Ebert and John West hatched the idea of watching a movie like a coach studies game film: frame by frame. Ebert taught the method to his University of Chicago film class, and then brought it to the Conference on World Affairs at the University of Colorado Boulder. Every year for more than three decades, he and hundreds of audience members took a week to dissect a single film.
At any point during Cinema Interruptus—or Ebert Interruptus, as it is now called in Boulder—any audience member can yell “Stop!” to halt the film and share their observation. Be it frame composition, dialogue, production design, or lighting, any subject is valid and welcome. Conference founder Howard Higman called the event “democracy in the dark.”
Interruptus drew several different hosts after Ebert’s final session in 2010, but Chicago critic and author Josh Larsen has anchored the series since 2017. This year, from December 3 - 6, Larsen and the Gene Siskel Film Center will bring the tradition back to its birthplace of Chicago. Their subject: the masterpiece Phantom Thread.
“After a number of years hosting Interruptus in Boulder, it just seemed like too good of an experience to keep to myself,” says Larsen. “And bringing it to Chicago was the natural next step, not only because it's my home base, but because there is the connection with Roger Ebert and his legacy. And of course, the Siskel Film Center has that connection as well, so I was thrilled when they were open to trying something unique and experimental like this.”
Ebert drew from a deep well when selecting films for the series. Some were contemporary to the session (Taxi Driver in 1982, JFK in 1992, Fight Club in 2001), but the majority were gilded classics by the time they got the Interruptus treatment. Citizen Kane, Notorious, and The Third Man were the first trio dissected in Boulder.
Phantom Thread continues Larsen’s tendency of choosing newer movies for inspection, a conscious diversion from the event’s legacy. Larsen adds, “For a first-time Interruptus in Chicago, we knew we needed something that people would be excited about seeing again as soon as they heard the title so that they'd be willing to give something new and different like Interruptus a try.”
Phantom Thread centers on 1950s London fashion designer Reynolds Woodcock (Daniel Day-Lewis) and his muse, Alma (Vicky Krieps). The premise is simple enough, but just as Woodcock stitches messages into the lining of his pieces, director Paul Thomas Anderson fills his stories with details for us to uncover. Larsen cites the rich production design, editing, and music among the elements he looks forward to probing in the Film Center’s nearly 200-seat main house.
Befitting a film about a dressmaker, costumes also play a lead role in Phantom Thread. To bolster the discussion on December 5, Larsen enlisted Bambi Breakstone, veteran television costume designer and Fashion Design professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She will critique the accuracy and significance of the period wardrobe in the film.
Having watched Phantom Thread several times myself, I can confirm it withstands and rewards scrutiny. But Phantom Thread has not yet revealed all of its secrets to me, and it may also remain a mystery to the Interruptus audience after four days of analysis. Ebert himself conceded to Mulholland Drive following Interruptus 2002, claiming the film “resists, defies and finally defeats logical explanation.” And yet, the session made him love David Lynch’s movie even more.
Larsen also relishes a challenge.
“In a sense, you want an Interruptus film to be one—like Mulholland Drive—you'll never fully comprehend,” he says. “It's a tricky needle to thread: complexity that's intentional but not nonsensical or intentionally trying to keep its audience at a distance. I too love films like that.”
Cinema Interruptus celebrates all that film can be. In an era of joke reviews and ironic takedowns, here is a place to cherish the care put into making a movie, to patiently imbibe all it has to offer. If the subject proves difficult or vexing, all the better.
This event is also an exercise in community and empathy. “I wasn't the teacher and my students weren't the audience, we were all in this together, Ebert wrote in 2012. All reactions to film and art deserve equal attention. Here’s your chance to have everyone stop and listen.
You can purchase complete ticket packages and single-day tickets to Cinema Interruptus through the Film Center.
You can find Josh Larsen’s work at Larsen On Film, Filmspotting, and Think Christian. Larsen has also written the books Movies are Prayers and Fear Not! A Christian Appreciation of Horror.
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