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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.
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