Police face off against antiwar demonstrators in The Seventh Day, a 1970 documentary shot by Portland State University students.

A long list of American filmmakers have chosen The City as a subject in documentaries, educational films, and narrative features. The following list is of films about The City which have an Oregon connection.

This list includes both fiction and non-fiction films. It is NOT comprehensive!

The Boy Mayor 1914, directed by Henry McRae. Starring teenager Eugene J. Rich, Portland’s real Boy Mayor. The fictional plot line depicts the “clean up the streets” motive behind the Boy Mayor campaign. Restored by National Film Preservation Foundation, thanks to Michele Kribs, Oregon Historical Society’s film archivist. Shot in Los Angeles.

Dementia 1953, retitled Daughter of Horror 1955, directed by John Parker, Jr.  The City is a moody, expressionist dreamscape in this combination art film/horror film made by the son of Portland theater chain owner, J. J. Parker. Score by George Antheil. Shot in Los Angeles.

Portland Expose 1957, directed by Harold Schuster. Exploitation film, based on real events. The plot line had to be fictionalized so it could be believed. In real life, it was a well known crime boss, not an upstanding small businessman, who blew the whistle on the corrupt union leader who was muscling in on his vice world territory. Shot in Portland.

The Olive Trees Of Justice 1962, directed by James Blue. Banks of barbed wire surround buildings, police are everywhere, bombs go off, tanks roll by, and yet somehow everyday life still goes on.  A young French colonialist tries to locate his childhood friends, and his own identity, in the middle of the chaos. Shot in Algiers.

The Seventh Day 1970, directed by students at PSU’s Center For The Moving Image. Documentary coverage of an anti-war demonstration which erupts into violence. Made by Tjeck Dusseldorp, with Charles Auch and future music video superstar Jim Blashfield. Shot in Portland.

We Are The City 1972, directed by Tom Chamberlin. Portland is never named in this educational film, made for Encyclopedia Britannica. Includes Mayor Terry Shrunk and Neil Goldschimdt (another Boy Mayor, but at that time still a City Councilman). The footage is 95% Portland.

The Case Of The Kitchen Killer 1976, directed by Tim Smith. Self taught 16mm filmmaker’s black comedy uses Portland locations sensitively. Smith was just out of high school when he made this film. The hand of crew member Matt Groening makes a cameo appearance holding a murder weapon. Ben Padrow provides the voice over narration. Shot in Portland.

Who Killed The Fourth Ward? (1976-77) and The Invisible City: Houston Housing Crisis (1978-79), directed by James Blue. Oregon’s first Oscar nominee focused on urban housing conditions for his two longest docs, made for Houston public television. Shot in Houston.

Property 1978, directed by Penny Allen. Eight Portland friends respond to gentrification by deciding to band together to buy a house in their Lair Hill neighborhood. Not a documentary, but inspired by real life events, with some of the participants in the real events joining the cast, playing themselves. Cinematography by Eric Ericson, sound by Gus Van Sant. Shot in Portland.

Talk Radio 1988, directed by Oliver Stone. Based on a play written by Portland artist Tad Savinar and New York actor Eric Bogosian. The play is about urban discontent, but the real reason this film is on this list is that Tad Savinar became one of Portland’s most important urban planners. Shot in Dallas.

Drugstore Cowboy 1989, directed by Gus Van Sant. The fictionalized memoir of a real life felon provides a portrait of a city. Shot as a period piece, set in the 1970’s. Starring Matt Dillon, Kelly Lynch and William Burroughs. Van Sant’s ascension to stardom branded Portland as an indie capital. Shot in Portland.

Alien Boy 2012, directed by Brian Lindstrom. Documentary examining the death of James Chasse, Jr., a man with severe and persistent mental illness who was arrested for running away from Portland police, and who died in their custody. Shot in Portland.

Not all Oregon film historians are women, but this first group was. Left to right: Heather Petrocelli,  Anne Richardson, Ellen Thomas, Rose Bond. Not pictured: Michele Kribs, unavailable because she was out riding her motorcycle.

Dateline: 2033, 20 years from now.

The Oregon Film History Initiative celebrated its 20th birthday today by blowing out candles on 20 virtual cakes scattered throughout the state.

Founded in 2013 by a group of librarians and historians, OFHI’s original mission was to ensure that key documents and artifacts essential to a full understanding Oregon’s unique film history were successfully archived within the state.

The Initiative began unofficially with the acquisition of James Ivory’s papers at the U of O.  A trickle of film scholarship triggered by Richard Herskowitz’s 2013 James Blue Tribute turned into a steady stream. Portland’s silent film industry, Oregon’s McCarthy era Westerns,  Godard’s trip through the Pacific Northwest with Jon Jost in 1972 – books on these subjects transformed public understanding of the intersection between Oregon film history and American film history.

Few can remember the time before a full length biography of Portland musician Melvin Jerome Blank, aka Mel Blanc, radically re-positioned pre-Portlandia Jazz Age Portland as an engine of American pop culture, and launched a new cultural tourism industry.

Oregon Film History Initiative brought together a truly diverse set of stakeholders. While UO collected papers of Oregon filmmakers, Oregon Cartoon Institute opened up a storefront catering to tourists. Oregon Heritage Commission, in cooperation with Travel Oregon and Oregon Cultural Trust, supported the restoration of downtown theaters in rural Oregon towns.

NWFC continued their trademark events. OSU began a media literacy summer school for teachers. PSU, working in cooperation with Oregon Cartoon Institute and Northwest Animation Festival, began hosting a biennial animation studies conference.  OHS secured a digital humanities grant to tell the story of Lew Cook, Homer Groening, and Frank Hood, three WWII vets whose passion for 16mm filmmaking would re-ignite Portland’s independent film scene.

Meanwhile, the Initiative’s popular annual fundraisers provide homesick Oregon film artists in LA and NY an annual reason to fly home for a visit.

Virtual candles for the 20th birthday celebration were blown out  in Salem, Astoria, Eugene, Pendleton, Cottage Grove, Joseph, Grants Pass, Bend, Baker, Klamath Falls, Jacksonville, Oregon City, McMinnville, Sandy, Brownsville, Corvallis, and all four quadrants of the city of Portland.

James Ivory listens to Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, above/James Blue listens to Robert Rossellini, below.

Two Oscar nominated Oregonians share the same first name. To help readers keep them apart, Oregon Movies, A to Z has compiled a handy checklist of distinguishing characteristics.

1. James Ivory was born in 1928 in Berkeley. James Blue was born in 1930 in Tulsa.

2. Ivory grew up in Klamath Falls. Blue grew up in Portland.

3. Ivory studied architecture and fine arts. Blue studied theater. Both at University of Oregon.

4. Ivory graduated from film school at USC in 1957. Blue graduated from film school at L’IDHEC in Paris in 1958.

5. Both men served in the military between undergraduate school and film school.

6. Ivory made his first feature, The Householder, in India in 1963. Blue made  his first feature, The Olive Trees Of Justice, in Algiers in 1962.

7. Ivory received Oscar nominations in 1987, 1993 and 1994. He was nominated for a Palme d’Or at Cannes in 1979, 1981, 1983, 1992, 1995 and 2000. Blue beat him to this particular punch. He was Oscar nominated in 1969. He won the Critic’s Prize at Cannes in 1962.

8. More support for the hypothesis that all Oregonians are secretly French? I would say so, since four of Ivory’s films were made in France, while Blue went to film school in Paris, and his breakthrough film was in French.

9. Both men became New Yorkers. Ivory lives in New York City. James Blue lived in Buffalo, where he taught at SUNY. He died in 1980.

When I began exploring Oregon film history, I knew I would run across surprises. I never expected to run across a filmmaker as accomplished, and as forgotten, as James Blue.

James Blue (1930-1980) grew up in Portland. He studied speech and theater at University of Oregon, graduating in 1953. After some years of military service, he entered film school in Paris where he was influenced by Jean Rouch. Although he first distinguished himself by winning the Critics Prize at Cannes for The Olive Trees Of Justice, a feature length narrative film, he spent the rest of his life making socially engaged documentaries.

Blue was a man of firsts. First Oregon director to go to Cannes, and the first to receive an Oscar nomination. First person ever to receive Ford Foundation funding for a film project. He helped start the Center for Advanced Film Studies at American Film Institute. The documentary programs at Rice University and at the Center for Media Study in Buffalo were both established by him. He served on the 1970- 1972 NEA funding panel which launched the first network of regional film centers, as proposed by Sheldon Renan. Northwest Film Center is the result of that NEA initiative.

Two Oregonians, James Blue and Sheldon Renan, on that panel!

The reason you haven’t heard of James Blue, or seen his films, is that his films have no distributor. They are not digitized. I am not sure even SUNY Buffalo, the school where he was teaching at the time of his death, can offer access to his films.

Here’s the crash course on Blue:

His IMDB page.

An interview with one of his students

A booklet compiled to accompany a retrospective of his films.

I am still trying to make sense of this new-to-me filmmaker. James Blue never returned to live/teach/work in Oregon. He is buried in Willamette Cemetery.

The first person to tell me about Oregon filmmaker James Blue was James Ivory.

Then Penny Allen told me that James Blue was the first Oregonian to take a film to Cannes. Blue was awarded the Critics Prize at Cannes  in 1962 for his first feature length film, The Olive Trees Of Justice.

I don’t know much about Blue! He grew up in Portland and graduated from University of Oregon in 1953.

Richard Engeman did a little sleuthing:

The Oregonian reported on February 1, 1953, that James Blue was starring in “Death of a Salesman” at U. of O, where he was a senior in speech. Earlier, on October 14, 1951, he was noted as the chief carpenter for a U. of O. production of “The Madwoman of Chaillot. He also won the Oregon State Broadcasters outstanding performance award, give at the U. of O. May 14, 1953 (Oregonian, May 15). There are a number of Oregonian pieces about, or mentioning him, 1962-1980. He’s buried in Willamette National Cemetery.

The Olive Trees Of Justice, Blue’s only narrative film, was based on the novel of the same name by Algerian novelist Jean Pelegri. It was shot in Algiers, with Pelegri playing a leading role in a cast of non-professional actors. The score is by Maurice Jarre.

Here’s a description from TCM.

Jean, a young Frenchman born and reared in Algiers, returns to his native land from Paris to be with his dying father. It is during the Algerian war of independence, and as Jean sits at his father’s bedside, he recalls his happy childhood in the family vineyards, where he played with French and Arab friends. Later he walks through the strife-torn Algerian streets and feels the terrible presence of war. One day his father dies peacefully in his sleep, and relatives and friends, both French and Arab, come to pay their respects. Jean has a long discussion with an Arab friend and attempts to explain why he must return to the peaceful life he has made for himself in Paris. After his father’s funeral Jean sees his normally chauvinistic aunt hasten to help an Arab boy who has been struck by a passing truck. Moved by this genuine expression of human concern regardless of nationality, Jean decides to remain in Algeria.

James Blue was born in 1930 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He arrived with his family in Portland in 1942. He was nominated for an Oscar in 1969. He died in 1980.

I hereby claim  The Olive Trees Of Justice as an Oregon film, on the basis of James Blue’s contribution as director.

“I think history was written today which will have its effect on coming generations with respect to our democracy, with respect to our ideals, with respect to the great struggle of man toward freedom and human dignity.” A. Philip Randolph

One hot August day in 1963, 200,000 American citizens traveled to Washington DC to exercise their Constitutional right to demonstrate.

The full title of the event, now known as the March on Washington, was the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.

Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke. Mahalia Jackson, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, and Marian Anderson sang. The demonstration was covered live on television.

Of the estimated five hundred cameras covering the event, twelve were under the direction of a young filmmaker from Oregon. James Blue directed and edited The March, wrote the voiceover narration, and performed it. A production of the United States Information Agency, The March was translated into 52 languages and seen all over the world.

It was not at that time, however, seen in this country.

These USIA films were rarely seen in America because, fearing propaganda, the 1948 Smith-Mundt Act mandated that no USIA film could be shown domestically without a special act of Congress. These films are being rediscovered because a 1990 act of Congress (P.L. 101-246) authorized domestic screening 12 years after release.

I hereby claim The March as an Oregon film based on the contribution of the director, Oregonian James Blue.

Shawn Levy snapped this picture on his phone of Gus Van Sant, James Ivory and Bill Plympton, posing with Mike Rich at the Oregon Sesquicentennial Film Festival. For whatever it says about Oregon, Gus Van Sant, James Ivory, and Bill Plympton are all highly regarded in France.

Stagecoach (1939), based on story by Ernest Haycox, nominated for 7 Oscars, including Best Picture

Hud (1963), co-written by Harriet Frank, Jr., nominated for Best Screenplay

A Few Notes On Our Food Problem ( 1968), directed by James Blue, nominated for Best Documentary

One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest (1975), based on Ken Kesey’s novel, nominated for 9 Oscars, won the top five, including Best Picture

Norma Rae (1979), co-written by Harriet Frank, Jr., nominated for Best Screenplay

Room With A View (1985), James Ivory nominated for Best Director

Howard’s End (1992), James Ivory nominated for Best Director

Remains of the Day (1993), James Ivory nominated for Best Director

Good Will Hunting (1997), Gus Van Sant nominated for Best Director

In The Bedroom (2001), Todd Field nominated for Best Screenplay, Best Picture

Iraq In Fragments (2006) James Longley nominated for Best Documentary, Feature

Little Children (2006), Todd Field nominated for Best Screenplay

Milk (2008), Gus Van Sant nominated for Best Director

The Final Inch (2009), directed by Irene Taylor Brodsky,  nominated for Best Documentary