"The inmates are taking over the asylum," sneered a crusty studio head when Hollywood titans Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks, Charles Chaplin and D.W. Griffith formed United Artists in 1919. Evolving in the first "studio without a studio," and thus eschewing crushing overhead expenses, UA would eventually forge partnerships with such independently-minded filmmakers as Buster Keaton, Billy Wilder, Stanley Kubrick, Woody Allen, Robert Altman, John Huston, Richard Lester, John Schlesinger, Jules Dassin and Martin Scorsese—resulting in some of the most entertaining, adventurous and Oscar-laden American movies of the last nine decades. We salute United Artists as it enters its tenth. (note courtesy Film Forum)

AFI member passes will be accepted at all screenings in United Artists 90th Anniversary Film Festival.

ROCKY

Sylvester Stallone's career-defining vehicle (he was a relative unknown before ROCKY with 35 previously rejected scripts) as the down-and-out boxer from Philadelphia won three Academy Awards including Best Picture. Rocky Balboa, a once-promising boxer, is stuck working for a loanshark and taking small fights for chump change. When offered a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get into the ring with reigning champion Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers) for a publicity stunt, he vows to "go the distance."

DIR John G. Avildsen; SCR Sylvester Stallone; PROD Robert Chartoff and Irwin Winkler. US, 1976, color, 93 min. RATED PG

Saturday, May 10, 4:30; Sunday, May 11, 3:00

ANNIE HALL

Woody Allen's signature film won four Academy Awards including Best Picture, Director and Actress for Diane Keaton. Allen is neurotic comedian Alvy Singer and Diane Keaton is neurotic nightclub singer Annie Hall. They quickly fall in love, but when their relationship ends Allen tries to figure out where it went wrong in an imaginative blend of flashback, fantasy and slapstick while she flees to Los Angeles and begins a relationship with a record executive. With memorable appearances by Marshall McLuhan, Paul Simon, Christopher Walken, Shelly Duvall and Truman Capote.

DIR/SCR Woody Allen; SCR Marshall Brickman; PROD Charles H. Joffe and Jack Rollins. US, 1977, color, 93 min. RATED PG

Sunday, May 11, 1:00, 7:30; Monday, May 12, 7:00; Tuesday, May 13, 7:00

THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY

The final installment of Sergio Leone's hugely influential trilogy finds Clint Eastwood as a mysterious loner who roams the western frontier for fortune at the height of the Civil War. Forced to form an uneasy alliance with Lee Van Cleef (the Bad) and Eli Wallach (the Ugly) to steal a cache of gold, these outlaws cross and double-cross each other to walk away with the treasure and stay alive. Ennio Morricone's iconic soundtrack was on the charts for more than a year, reaching No. 4 on the Billboard Pop Charts.

DIR/SCR Sergio Leone; SCR Agenore Incrocci, Furio Scarpelli and Luciano Vincenzoni; PROD Alberto Grimaldi. Italy/Spain, 1966, color, 179 min. RATED R

Friday, May 23, 9:00; Saturday, May 24, 9:30; Sunday, May 25, 9:15; Monday, May 26, 6:00

MIDNIGHT COWBOY

Academy Awards for Best Picture, Director and Adapted Screenplay went to British director James Schlesinger's adaptation of a James Herlihy novel. Jon Voight is a naive boy from Texas who journeys to New York convinced he can amass a fortune by servicing the city's lonely society ladies. When his first client not only fails to pay him, but swindles money for cab fare in the process, he takes on a scrounging, tubercular grifter (Dustin Hoffman) as his manager—and a deep and unexpected friendship is born.

DIR John Schlesinger; SCR Waldo Salt based on James Leo Herlihy's novel; PROD Jerome Hellman. US, 1969, color, 113 min. RATED R

Friday, May 30, 9:30; Saturday, May 31, 9:30; Sunday, June 1, 9:30; Monday, June 2, 9:15

RAGING BULL

Nominated for eight Academy Awards and boasting some of the best fight scenes on film, Robert DeNiro (who won Best Actor honors and famously gained 50 pounds for the role) plays the self-destructive middleweight champion Jake LaMotta. His increasing paranoia leads to professional and personal devastation as his manager brother Joe Pesci and teenaged wife Cathy Moriarty grapple with his violence outside the ring. Bristling with energy and shot in crisp black-and-white, this is a must see on the big screen.

DIR Martin Scorsese; SCR Paul Schrader and Mardik Martin, based on the novel Raging Bull: My Story by Jake LaMotta, Joseph Carter and Peter Savage; PROD Robert Chartoff and Irwin Winkler. US, 1980, b&w, 129 min. RATED R

Saturday, June 7, 9:20; Sunday, June 8, 7:15; Monday, June 9, 9:15

MARTY

Originally a teleplay by Paddy Chayefsky, MARTY was nominated for eight Academy Awards (winning for Best Picture) and won the Palm d'Or at Cannes. "I've been looking for a girl every Saturday night of my life," says lovelorn Bronx butcher Marty (Ernest Borgnine). Still living with his mother and resigned to a life of loneliness, he is over the moon when he meets shy schoolteacher Betsy Blair who reciprocates his feelings. However, to Marty's surprise, his mother dislikes the girl and his friends put her down, and eventually he, too, begins to question his newfound love.

DIR Delbert Mann; SCR Paddy Chayefsky; PROD Harold Hecht. US, 1955, b&w, 94 min. NOT RATED

Saturday, June 14, 3:05; Sunday, June 15, 5:10

THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE

John Frankenheimer's renowned take of McCarthyism and Cold War fanaticism finds Laurence Harvey as a US soldier abducted during the Korean War and stolen away to Manchuria. There a Communist cell brainwashes him before returning him to the US to serve as an unwitting political assassin. Army buddy Frank Sinatra has hallucinatory dreams and begins to unravel the deadly truth—that Harvey is a ticking time bomb--while the clock counts down to a political rally where everything is at stake. Angela Lansbury shines as Harvey's mother, the influential wife of a powerful conservative senator. For this role, she was nominated for the Academy Award and voted #21 on AFI's list of the 50 greatest villains in American film history.

DIR/PROD John Frankenheimer; SCR/PROD George Axelrod, based on Richard Condon's novel. US, 1962, b&w, 126 min. RATED PG-13

Saturday, June 28, 7:10; Sunday, June 29, 12:30; Wednesday, July 2, 9:10