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Anyone who has spent time at the Revue — or any Toronto cinema — has benefitted from the legacy of Bob Huber, the city’s repertory cinema pioneer, who passed away on April 1 at the age of 94.In 1966, Huber launched Toronto’s first commercial repertory cinema at the Elektra Theatre with Michelangelo Antonioni’s Red Desert, one of the most visually influential works of postwar European cinema.
At a time before TIFF, before home video, and before repertory cinema had a firm commercial foothold in the city, Huber believed film should be presented with the seriousness and care usually reserved for opera, theatre or ballet. Through the Elektra, Cinema Lumière, the Revue and the Fine Arts, he helped build the foundations of Toronto’s moviegoing culture.
As filmmaker Ron Mann recently said: “My film school was the Cinema Lumière, the Revue, the Fine Arts, and Bob Huber was the Dean.”
This memorial screening returns Red Desert to the screen in honour of Huber’s life and legacy. It is especially fitting that the tribute takes place at the Revue, which Huber ran with Paul Ennis from 1972 to 1984, and which remains one of the city’s great homes for repertory cinema.
The screening will be preceded by brief tributes from Bob’s friends and family.
— Eric Veillette
The 4K restoration of Red Desert courtesy Janus Films.
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Event Venue
Revue Cinema, 400 Roncesvalles Avenue,Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Tickets
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