As part of its tribute to iconic director Francis Ford Coppola, the San Francisco International Film Festival will host a rare screening of THE RAIN PEOPLE on Friday evening, as part of An Evening with Francis Ford Coppola & Friends.

The film, released in 1969, was the first production from Coppola’s own company, American Zoetrope. An original script by Coppola, one year before his Oscar win for PATTON, the film stars Shirley Knight as a Long Island housewife on the run from domesticitiy with meets up with a brain damaged football player, played by James Caan (who the director who cast as the volatile Sonny Corleone in THE GODFATHER a few years later). The film won the Golden Seashell at the San Sebastian Film Festival, providing Coppola with his first major international exposure. The brilliantly improvised, beautifully shot road movie, is being shown in a pristine new 35mm print provided by Warner Brothers.

 Sandy Mandelberger, Festival Dailies Editor