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The Week of August 31 - Red Riding Lost in a Quiet Little Marriage PDF  | Print |  E-mail
Monday, 30 August 2010 21:42

RED RIDING TRILOGY - This widely acclaimed, three-part U.K. neo-noir epic is loosely based on actual events and has been described by its screenwriter as "like Dickens on bad acid." All gritty as cobblestones drenched in blood, the films were shot by three different directors: Oscar winner James Marsh (MAN ON WIRE), Julian Jarrold (BRIDESHEAD REVISITED), and Anand Tucker (SHOPGIRL). The stories follow several characters affected by the "Yorkshire Ripper," a serial killer who terrorized northwest England in the 1970s and 80s. We've been waiting with bated breath for this one!!

OSS 117: LOST IN RIO - France's answer to Austin Powers, the clueless "pride of French intelligence" is back with more spyspoofery and retro chauvinism than you can shake a croissant at. This is actually a pretty hilarious send-up, more straight-faced than Austin Powers but also more daring.

HARRY BROWN - Michael Caine plays a "vigilante pensioner" in this gritty U.K. crime drama about an elderly widower who tries to clean up his depressed housing estate after his best friend is murdered by thugs.

9TH COMPANY - Modern Russia's equivalent to FULL METAL JACKET or APOCALYPSE NOW, this acclaimed war movie is based on actual events. A group of young soldiers drafted to serve in Afghanistan continue their defense of Height 3234, forgotten and unaware that the war has ended.

MADE FOR EACH OTHER - After 3 months of an unconsummated marriage, the protagonist Dan finds himself having casual sex with another woman, and decides that the only way to rectify this is to find the perfect man for his wife to cheat on him with.

MARMADUKE - This giant Great Dane seems like a whole lot of fun, until you have to clean up after it.

A QUIET LITTLE MARRIAGE - In this indie drama, Dax and Olive are a young married couple whose disagreement over whether or not to have children prompts them to sabotage each other in ways that escalate beyond what they had imagined.

WHY DID I GET MARRIED TOO? - The sequel to Tyler Perry's WHY DID I GET MARRIED, this romantic dramedy has the couples gathered in the Bahamas for a one-week reunion, where their commitments and patience with each other will be put to the test. Janet Jackson stars as a relationship guru whose own marriage may be fatally flawed.

SONS OF ANARCHY: SEASON 2 - The outlaw biker gang from a California town called Charming is back. See our review of the first season to see why this series is worth a spin!

Here's this week's CRITERION COLLECTION round-up from our JUST ADDED section (3 for 5 days for $5)

CRITERION COLLECTION: 3 Silent Classics by Josef von Sternberg

Vienna-born, New York–raised Josef von Sternberg directed some of the most influential, stylish dramas ever to come out of Hollywood. The titles in this collection, made on the cusp of the sound age, are three of von Sternberg’s greatest works, gritty evocations of gangster life (UNDERWORLD), the Russian Revolution (THE LAST COMMAND), and working-class desperation (DOCKS OF NEW YORK) made into shadowy movie spectacle.

ECLIPSE SERIES 22: Presenting Sacha Guitry

Billed as the "Gallic Noël Coward" Sacha Guitry was a household name- for those of us living in France during the 1900's, well the first half at least. He is known as a prolific playwrite, and was beloved as an actor and filmmaker before and during the German occupation. The Germans liked him too, so Sacha partied down while his country men suffered and when the occupation ended the liberated French locked him up for a couple of months without charges.

Guitry brought a witty inventiveness to the cinema and deployed radical techniques with such aplomb and control that he’s considered one of the medium’s first complete auteurs. With these four films, American audiences can finally sample Guitry’s creative, comic confections.

ECLIPSE SERIES 11: Larisa Shepitko

The career of Larisa Shepitko, an icon of sixties and seventies Soviet cinema, was tragically cut short when she was killed in a car crash at age forty.The body of work she left behind is masterful, and her genius for visually evoking characters’ interior worlds is never more striking than in her two greatest works: Wings, an intimate yet exhilarating portrait of a female fighter pilot turned provincial headmistress, and The Ascent, a gripping, tragic wartime parable of betrayal and martyrdom. A true artist who had deftly used the Soviet film industry to make statements both personal and universal, Shepitko remains one of the greatest unsung filmmakers of all time.

 

Last Updated on Monday, 30 August 2010 22:43
 
The week of August 24th- Hey look, it's Jenny from the Block! PDF  | Print |  E-mail
Sunday, 22 August 2010 11:28

I CAN SEE YOU - This critically acclaimed psychological thriller, or "psychedelic campfire flick," as the director calls it, takes what would appear to be a standard horror movie premise - naive city slickers out in the middle of nowhere - and turns it into something transcendentally bizarre and unique. When three Brooklyn ad men convene in the woods to brainstorm the re-branding of a household cleaner, they are confronted with the phantom of an ad campaign from the past, and "a harrowing descent into unreality."

THE SQUARE - This well-reviewed new Australian thriller brings film noir down under, when an adulterous couple's plans to pilfer money and run away together turn unbelievably foul. And just when you think things can't possibly get any worse...a dog crossing a river gets eaten by a shark. Well, that's Australia for ya.

CITY ISLAND - A quarrelous Italian-American family on the outskirts of the Bronx keep often hilarious secrets from each other, in this indie dramedy. Andy Garcia stars as a cop who is so embarrassed about his dreams of being an actor that he lets his wife believe he's having an affair while he's off in acting class. Soon it is revealed that every family member has been hiding something from the others, with chaotic results.

BASS ACKWARDS - In the tradition of the thoughtful, quirky indie road trip epic, we present you with this Sundance festival pick. After being rejected by his girlfriend and kicked off his buddy's couch in Seattle, Linas (director Linas Phillips, playing himself) finds an abandoned VW bus on a llama farm, goes on a profoundly life-altering road trip, and...well, mostly we are just surprised that he doesn't end up in Arcata. What's up with that?

THE AGE OF STUPID - This disaster documentary takes a novel approach by transporting Oscar nominee Pete Postlethwaite to a post-apocalyptic 2055. Postlethwaite plays an archivist in a large storage facility called "The Global Archive," where his job is to sort through prophetic news clips and scientific reports from the past (actually from the present day). His aim: to figure out why we didn't save ourselves from the coming climate change while we were still able to. This is done with surprising lightness and humor.

SURVIVAL OF THE DEAD - The latest from legendary horror director George A. Romero serves up the usual sharp social commentary, served with a heaping helping of braaaaaaaaaaains.

THE JONESES - David Duchovny and Demi Moore play salespeople who pose as a married couple with kids, moving into an upscale community with the intent of getting all their neighbors hooked on the products they represent. While the couple convince their new friends they need the same designer clothing, golf clubs, and gourmet food, their fake teenagers get the other kids at school hooked on alcoholic energy drinks. It's like the internet come to life...

LOST: THE 6TH & FINAL SEASON - If you made it this far, all the secrets of the universe are about to be revealed to you...At least, they had better be.

CRUDE - Acclaimed documentarian Joe Berlinger (PARADISE LOST, METALLICA: SOME KIND OF MONSTER) takes an inside look at the infamous $27 billion "Amazon Chernobyl" case, one of the most controversial legal battles on the planet, between Chevron and indigenous peoples of Ecuador. The question: when Chevron dumped 18 billion gallons of toxic waste into the Amazonian rain forest, was it "industrial exploitation permitted by law?" Berlinger shows both sides fighting dirty in this shocking, real-life legal drama.

$5 A DAY - Christopher Walken, the king of strange, plays a con artist and deadbeat dad who longs to reconnect with his grown son. Diagnosed with a terminal illness, he convinces his son to drive him across country for experimental medical treatment. Along the way they pull off increasingly ludicrous schemes, in order to spend just $5 a day. Also stars Sharon Stone, Alessandro Nivola, and Amanda Peet.

1981 - This cheeky coming-of-age story from Quebec tells the story of 11-year-old Ricardo, who becomes a compulsive liar while struggling with his move to a new school. With a flare for inventiveness and a desperate desire to impress his classmates, Ricardo dismisses his family and weaves an elaborate web of untruths...

AJAMI - This intense, Oscar nominated crime drama is set in the multicultural Ajami neighborhood of Jaffa, Israel. The interweaving story lines follow two brothers fearing assassination, a young Palestinian refugee working illegally to take care of his mother, a wealthy Palestinian dreaming of a future with his Jewish girlfriend, and a Jewish cop obsessed with finding his brother's killer.

THE BACK-UP PLAN - J-Lo is back on the big screen, and no, the "back-up plan" has nothing to do with the rumor about her insuring her backside for millions of dollars (but we understand how you could reach that conclusion). It does have to do with a successful woman whose not-so-successful dating life drives her to artificial insemmination. Of course, as soon as J-Lo becomes pregnant with twins, she meets the man of her dreams, and tries to hide the pregnancy from him for as long as possible...

SHIRIN - The latest from Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami (THE TASTE OF CHERRY, TEN), this more experimental feature focuses on the reactions of a theatre audience to a movie we hear but never see, based on a tragic 12th century Persian poem. There is definitely nothing quite like it.

THE SIMPSONS: SEASON 13 - Lisa becomes a Buddhist, Bart becomes a bubble boy, Homer does community service, and the family offends the entire nation of Brazil. D'oh!

I THINK WE'RE ALONE NOW - This documentary on celebrity stalking follows two rabid Tiffany fans (hence the film title), who are just as obsessed now as they were back in 1988, when one of them decided to greet Tiffany with flowers (and a samurai sword, an unfortunately ill-planned gift). Jeff is now 50, and Kelly, then a girl trapped inside a boy's body, is now a woman. The director aims to present the humanity of these lonely people, rather than just the creepiness (although there is bound to be a little of that from Jeff, who believes Tiffany's nude Playboy pose was a coded message just for him).

UNCERTAINTY - Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars in this drama about a young New York couple's experiences in two alternate realities on the same day, each triggered by the flip of a coin.

Last Updated on Monday, 23 August 2010 22:51
 
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