Film: Burt Lancaster, All Month Long

July 19; filmforum.org and filmlinc.org

Burt Lancaster came by his tough guy reputation honestly. Raised on the streets of East Harlem, he attended high school in Hell’s Kitchen and earned an athletic scholarship to N.Y.U. before dropping out to join the circus. He cut such a physically charismatic swath in his 1946 film debut — as the Swede, an injured boxer-turned-bank robber, in “The Killers” — that the critic Pauline Kael anointed him “a great specimen of hunkus Americanus.”

From July 19-25, a new 4K restoration of that Robert Siodmak film noir classic, with a sizzling Ava Gardner as the femme fatale, kicks off “Burt Lancaster,” a four-week festival at Film Forum in Manhattan. The 37-movie lineup includes “Sweet Smell of Success,” “From Here to Eternity,” “Sorry, Wrong Number,” “Atlantic City,” “The Professionals,” “Birdman of Alcatraz” and “Elmer Gantry,” for which he won a best actor Oscar.

It also features Luchino Visconti’s “The Leopard” (July 28 and 31), starring Lancaster as a melancholy 19th-century Sicilian prince, which, though initially panned by critics, won over fans like Martin Scorsese. Film at Lincoln Center joins the Lancaster tribute in its 50th Mixtape Series with a free double-bill on July 25 that pairs “The Leopard” with Alice Rohrwacher’s “Happy as Lazzaro.” KATHRYN SHATTUCK