Citizens Band. 1977. Directed by Jonathan Demme

Film

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Citizens Band. 1977. USA. Directed by Jonathan Demme. Courtesy Paramount Pictures

Citizens Band. 1977. USA. Directed by Jonathan Demme. Screenplay by Paul Brickman. With Paul Le Mat, Candy Clark, Bruce McGill, Roberts Blossom, Richard Bright. DCP. 98 min.

Shown at the 1977 New York Film Festival under the title Handle with Care (a title change prompted by the film’s poor box office numbers and confused audiences expecting a musical), Jonathan Demme’s fourth feature is a tender, bittersweet portrait of an unspecified Middle America small town whose inhabitants flock to their citizen’s band radio to vent, spread fake news, seduce each other, or interfere in emergency communications with made-up identities. Demme’s moving, empathic eye for human relationships—their innocence, eccentricity, disappointments, and contradictions—is on full display in one of the most underrated films of the 1970s.

This film accompanies Paramount in the 1970s.

Past events

Sat, Sep 14, 2024, 7:30 p.m.

MoMA, Floor T2, Theater 2

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Fri, Sep 13, 2024, 4:30 p.m.

MoMA, Floor T2, Theater 2

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