You Only Live Once
Fritz Lang / US, 1937 / 86 min.
One of Fritz Lang’s best American films and an early film noir. Eddie Taylor (Henry Fonda) has served his time and is trying to lead an ordinary life. His criminal past works against him.
When Eddie is falsely accused of a crime he did not commit, he becomes the victim of a miscarriage of justice. Pending the judge’s decision, the cynical news office prepares three headlines, depending on the outcome of the trial.
In June, Eye focuses on actor Henry Fonda, the father of Jane and Peter Fonda. We screen two films that were restored last year, John Ford’s adaptation of Steinbeck’s novel The Grapes of Wrath (1940) and an early film noir by Fritz Lang, You Only Live Once (1937).
In his The Devil Finds Work (1976), writer and activist James Baldwin wrote about You Only Live Once, the film he saw as a 13-year-old: 'There is that moment in the film, in prison, when Fonda whispers to Sidney, through jail-house glass: Get me a gun. Sidney said: I can't get you a gun. You'll kill somebody! And Fonda says: What do you think they're going to do to me? I understood that: it was a real question. I was living with that question.'
This is part of
Special screenings
Details
Director
Fritz Lang
Production year
1937
Country
US
Original title
You Only Live Once
Length
86 min.
Language
English
Subtitles
NONE
Format
DCP
Part of
Restored & Unseen
At last, a chance to see that Italian classic that’s been on the list for so long? Or relish that wonderful restoration of Blue Movie, the Netherlands’ most talked-about nude film of the seventies, when the Bijlmer district was still a sexual paradise? Restored & Unseen is a biweekly programme featuring classics and recent restorations, with introductions by experts.
Planning on having a drink or a bite to eat? Book online for Eye Bar Restaurant.
Support Eye. Join the Eye Society.