Due to the ever-changing nature of the movie biz, showtimes as they appear in any and all newspapers should always be double-checked with the theaters before setting off for a night at the flicks.
***image2***Designates items highlighted in this week's issue.
Click here for movie theaters and showtimes
OPENS FRIDAY
***image2***Cars
See
.
Dreamcatcher, UA DeVargas, UA South G, 116 min
Classe Tous Risque
Neorealism and film noir overlap in this 1960 film by Claude Sautet, hailed as a lost classic, never
before screened in the US and screened in a newly restored print. A penetrating study of the underworld, starring iconic French toughguys Lino Ventura
and Jean-Paul Belmondo.
CCA, NR, 104 min.
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***image1***Prairie Home Companion
Robert Altman's newest, with a screenplay by Garrison Keillor, imagines what would happen if the small radio station producing "Prairie Home Companion" were purchased by a major media outlet. The film follows a fictional cast and crew as they prepare for their last broadcast. Features the usual Altman stellar cast including Kevin Kline, Woody Harrelson, Tommy Lee Jones, Meryl Streep and Lily Tomlin.
The Screen, PG-13, 105 min.
SHORT RUNS
A Boy Named Charlie Brown
The first of what would eventually be four feature films depicting the adventures of our pathetic, long-suffering little friend and his cohorts Snoopy, Lucy, Linus and Pigpen. This one features songs by Rod McKuen.
Santa Fe Film Center, G, 80 min.
A Day Without A Mexican
This widely acclaimed 2004 social satire, directed by Sergio Arau, imagines Los Angeles for one day without Latino immigrants, and all of the concomitant chaos and madness that would ensue. Showing in conjunction with a visit from producers Isaac and Jude Pauline Artenstein, whose films
Tijuana Jews
and
Break of Dawn
are also on the agenda (see below).
Santa Fe Film Center, R, 100 min.
Alles auf Zucker!
This dysfunctional-family farce may be an entirely unique creature in the annals of post-war film: a German-Jewish comedy. The New York Times even observed that
Zucker
, wildly successful in Germany, has proven "an unconventional form of therapy for the strained relations between Jews and gentiles." No surprise, then, to learn that Swiss-born filmmaker Dani Levi's currently in production on an even edgier comedy,
Mein Führer: The Really Truest Truth about Adolf Hitler
. Henry Hübchen and Udo Samel play estranged brothers from East and West, who must resolve their flagrant differences at their mother's deathbed.
Santa Fe Film Center, NR, 90 min.
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Awesome; I F**kin' Shot That!
See SFR Review (print edition only).
CCA, R, 90 min.
Break of Dawn
From 1988, this award-winning film tells the story of Pedro J Gonzales, the first Latino radio celebrity in Los Angeles in the '30s, who was framed and sent to San Quentin. Produced and directed by Isaac and Jude Artenstein, who will be in attendance at the screening for a Q and A.
Santa Fe Film Center, NR, 105 min.
Callas Forever
Franco Zeffirelli crafted this loving biopic which takes place during the last days of uber-soprano Maria Callas. Known for being crammed full of gorgeous music, Zefferelli's film was nominated for a Goya Award. Features Fanny Ardant and Jeremy Irons. Another in a series of Opera-related films that will be screened over the summer.
Santa Fe Film Center, PG-13, 111 min
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The Devil and Daniel Johnston
You may not have heard of the latter, although musicians from Tom Waits to Kurt Cobain (taking in Wilco, Sonic Youth and Pearl Jam along the way) have counted themselves among his ardent fans. The cartoonist and composer's life has without a doubt been made arduous by his struggles with manic depression, but its corresponding surges of creativity turned him into an outsider songwriter's songwriter, equal parts Robert Johnson and Henry Darger. Jeff Feuerzeig's intimate, startling and often funny documentary netted him a Grand Jury Prize at Sundance last year, with good reason: Devil, zero; Daniel Johnston, one.
CCA, PG-13, 110 min.
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Duma
Followers of St. Francis, rejoice in this gorgeously filmed story of a wide-eyed cheetah and the boy who loves him. White South African Xan (Alex Michaeletos) adopts an orphaned cub where it enjoys living high on the hog on the Kenyan family farm-but when they must relocate to Jo'burg, Duma must be returned to the wild. On their journey, Xan and Duma encounter a young African man, Ripkuna (the magnificent Eamonn Walker), and after some prickly initial interactions, the two form a bond which-like Xan's with Duma-winds up far exceeding ordinary expectations of friendship.
CCA, PG, 100 min.
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Elevator to the Gallows
It's hard to remember that late director Louis Malle (
My Dinner with Andre
,
Au revoir, les enfants
) was ever a 24-year-old hotshot who scampered away with the Prix Delluc and essentially kicked off the
nouvelle vague
with this 1957 noir confection, which also made an icon out of star Jeanne Moreau (perhaps never photographed quite so well again). When Moreau conspires with her lover (Maurice Ronet) to murder her
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husband, they're not prepared for how complicated such deeds can be,
nor how quickly it can all go pear-shaped. With François Truffaut's DP Henri Decaë at the wheel and a notoriously cool improvisational soundtrack by Miles Davis, a shiny new 35 mm print of
L'ascenseur pour l'échafaud
proves to be no less than pure créme brulée.
The Screen, NR, 88 min.
Independent Intervention
An eye-opening expose of how the media has covered the Iraq War, in all of its pandering, acquiescence to the Pentagon party line, sugar-coating and distortion. Interviews with Amy Goodman, Noam Chomsky and Jim Hightower among others, with the voices of Michael Moore, Howard Zinn and Bill Moyers.
Santa Fe Film Center, NR, 75 min.
Marilyn Hotchkiss Ballroom Dancing & Charm School
Strange how times have changed for Robert Carlyle, ever since his turn as psychotic Begbie in
Trainspotting
; the roles he's landed since then have tended much more toward the sweet side, if still often darkly funny: the alcoholic dad in
Angela's Ashes
, a romantic lead in
Carla's Song
and
The Full Monty
-and of course quirky Beeb detective
Hamish Macbeth
. Carlyle continues with the pure evaporated cane sugar, so far rarely redolent of sucralose, as a man broken-hearted by the death of his wife. A chance encounter with John Goodman leads him circuitously to the school of the title (overseen by Mary Steenburgen)-and to a fresh start, his transformation attended by fellow dance and charm students Marisa Tomei, Donnie Wahlberg and Sean Astin (don't you lose him, Samwise Gamgee!).
The Screen, PG-13, 103 min.
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Psycho Saturdays
Santa Fe Film Center continues its Saturday night series of schlocky horror films from the naive and glorious days of B-Movie production. This evening, entitled "Surviving Ed Wood," features the bizarre classic
Glen or Glenda?
along with
Bride of the Monster
.
Santa Fe Film Center, NR, 130 total min.
Saturday Night at the Baths
A real rarity, unseen since the mid-'70s, this is the story of a guy from Montana who thinks he's straight, gets a job as a piano player at the famous Continental Baths in New York, and slowly realizes that, well, he's not straight. A period piece for certain, post-Stonewall, yet pre-AIDS.
Santa Fe Film Center, R, 86 min.
Sir! No Sir!
A documentary film shining light on the complex dimensions of soldiers who both fought in and energetically opposed the Vietnam War. Narrated by Jane Fonda's son, Troy Garrity, the film combines archival footage with interviews. Sponsored by Veterans for Peace.
CCA, NR, 85 min.
Tijuana Jews
Another film by Isaac and Jude Artenstein (see also
A Day Without A Mexican
and
Break of Dawn
), this documentary provides a rare glimpse of Jewish culture within Northern Mexico. Both a personal journey and a chronicle of broader history and experience.
Santa Fe Film Center, NR, 52 min.
NOW SHOWING
The Break-Up
Vince Vaughn and Jennifer Aniston still deny their highly publicized involvement-not that we care, being above such tawdry topics as celebrity gossip (but come on, Brangelina: Shiloh Nouvel? We know you're trying to compete with such high-caliber weird baby names as Apple, Moses or Kal-el, but naming your spawn for a Civil War battle…?). We hope there'll be more to this battle-of-the-sexes comedy than the personal lives of its two leads; with a story co-written by
The Wedding Crashers
actor and Frat Packer Vaughn (and Albuquerque's own Jay Lavender) and direction from Peyton Reed (
Down with Love
,
Bring It On
),
Break-Up
will appeal to that thirtysomething crowd that understands real estate takes priority over passion. When Gary (Vaughn) and Brooke (Aniston) split up after two years' cohabitation, neither of them is willing to give up their flossy Chicago condo. Co-stars include Vaughn regular Jon Favreau (
Swingers
), Judy Davis and Jason Bateman.
Dreamcatcher, UA South, PG-13, 106 min.
The Da Vinci Code
Tom Hanks stars as Harvard "symbologist" Robert Langdon in this goofy but fairly entertaining adaptation of Dan Brown's goofy and not in the least entertaining novel. Naturally, during a Paris booksigning, Langdon's asked by the gendarmerie to assist with a murder case. Enter cryptologist Sophie Neveu (Audrey Tautou), the victim's granddaughter. All this abruptly leads to a clandestine midnight tour of the Louvre and Langdon's and Neveu's flight from Paris; frantically intercut scenes suggest that the Catholic order Opus Dei are not only evil cultists who brainwash their lay followers but are also tasking monastic albino hitman Silas (Paul Bettany), who murders his way across France one step ahead of Neveu and Langdon. While much of what's amusing may be unintentionally so (including the dialogue: "I have to get to a library-fast!"), director Ron Howard keeps things moving quickly enough so that you can't really dwell on the idiocies, which is an infinite improvement over Brown's book.
DreamCatcher, UA DeVargas, UA North, PG-13, 149 min.
Don't Come Knocking
Wim Wenders directs and Sam Shepard wrote and stars as washed-up Western movie star Howard (Shepard), who, once famed for playing cowboy heroes, now drowns his sorrows in a bottle, until one day he up and rides off into the sunset. Costarring Tim Roth, Eva Marie Saint and Jessica Lange,
Knocking
's worth seeing for old times' sake (though you could also just re-rent
Paris, Texas
or
Fool for Love
).
UA DeVargas, R, 122 min.
Just My Luck
This disastrously bad outing proves nothing except that Lindsay Lohan's still too young to carry a film as an adult lead. It's another swapping-identities plot, this time without props from Jamie Lee Curtis; Ashley (Lohan), notorious within her circle of Manhattan friends for being the luckiest chick around, kisses Jake (Chris Pine) at a masked ball, exchanging her fortune for his-and Jake's about as lucky as a frat boy at an Emily's List fundraiser.
UA South, PG-13, 103 min.
***image1***L'Enfant
Brothers and Palme d'Or winners Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardennes demonstrate with each film their singular ability to project an unforgiving working-class and immigrant Belgium with Dogme-like veracity (
La promesse
,
Rosetta
). Their latest draws mixed reviews (New Yorker francophile Anthony Lane offers, "There is something willed and implausible…beginning with the first non-crying, non-hungry infant in human history") but the Dardennes have a knack for extracting stunning performances from their leads, in this case Jérémie Renier and Déborah François as Bruno and Sonia, a pair of (very) young lovers in trouble-not only unwantedly pregnant but already struggling to survive on Sonia's unemployment and Bruno's petty theft. Unexpectedly, the birth of infant Jimmy offers an economic opportunity, albeit a morally problematic one.
CCA, R, 100 min.
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Look Both Ways
Aussie writer-director Sarah Watt tackles the ultimate taboo subject of death with a deft combination of live action and sketchy, dreamy cartoons, and the perfect blend of seriousness and tongue-firmly-in-cheek humor. Meryl (Justine Clarke) is a prettier, more Aussie version of Woody Allen; she's continually imagining the worst, haunted by graphic imaginings of the horrible, involuntary ease with which it's possible to slip the surly bonds of earth. When she actually witnesses a genuine accident, she finds herself drawn to another bystander-the photographer Nick (William McInnes), himself petrified of the Grim Reaper. "Ineffably Australian and intriguingly (rather than annoyingly) artsy," avers Lisa Schwartzbaum; we anticipate that peculiarly postcolonial blend of fantasy and gritty veracity found in the fiction of, say, Tim Winton or Peter Carey.
The Screen, PG-13, 100 min.
Mission: Impossible III
Lost
director JJ Abrams does everything in his power to keep you from remembering that it's the Sofa-Leaper Himself playing Ethan Hunt-from
M:I-3
's nerve-wracking opening sequence in which a bound and bruised Hunt negotiates frantically with gun-wielding villain Philip Seymour Hoffman. Alas, Abrams also wants us to see Ethan's "sensitive side," so he makes other choices like…cutting from this sequence straight to an engagement party for Ethan and his bride Julia (Michelle Monaghan). Hunt's summoned out of his mushy love-nest retirement to bring down Hoffman, a doer of international evil deeds, in the course of which there are helicopters to blow up, buildings off which to base-jump, a crack team of IMF experts to assemble (Ving Rhames, Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Maggie Q) and contrived plot lines to pursue.
UA DeVargas, UA North, PG-13, 126 min.
The Omen
More proof that there is seemingly no end to the strange attempts of Hollywood to catch some box office in the midst of a precipitous industry collapse. The original film was stunning, even shocking for many audience members way way way back when it was released. The New York Times says of this version: "Unrelentingly dull, morose and the opposite of entertaining."
DreamCatcher, UA South, R, 110 min.
Over the Hedge
Only black-sheep cousin DreamWorks, with its countercultural sense of humor, could get behind a story as subtly left-of-center as this one: RJ (Bruce Willis) is a fast-talking raccoon on the make, looking to score a large quantity of junk food so he can pay off an ursine leg-breaker (Nick Nolte). In the interest of saving his hide, he enlists an eclectic "family" of animals stymied by the new hedge enveloping their former forest home, now a tiny enclave of park surrounded by the identical tract-housing of suburbia. The family's cautious leader, turtle Vern (Garry Shandling), has returned from a preliminary investigation with horrific reports of the "freaking pink primates!" on the other side. RJ must convince the group that there's Oreos and Pringles to be had, and they'd better brave the 'burbs to store enough calories for the winter. Like many of cinema's con men, however, RJ finds himself wondering whether selling out his adorable new friends is worth it. And we take his point: Steve Carell as an overcaffeinated squirrel is particularly cute, whether stammering incoherently, "But I like a cookie!" or (in one priceless sequence) experiencing the world as slowed-down due to his own untrammeled velocity.
DreamCatcher, UA DeVargas, UA South, PG, 96 min.
Poseidon
First Law of Mediocre Disaster Blockbusters: Never give 'em time to think.
Poseidon
readily complies, permitting no reflection between hair-raising events, with lots of fairly graphic casualties. Which brings us to the Second Law: Substitute chaos, yelling, falling objects and random explosions for drama (since it's impossible to generate suspense if you don't care about anyone). Finally, the Third Law: Construct characters out of flabby dialogue, construction paper and gluestick; there should be a Sexy Maverick Leader (the tireless Josh Lucas), Rich Older Gay Guy (Richard Dreyfus), Hot Hispanic Chick (Mía Maestro), Hot White Chick (Emmy Rossum), Annoying Drunk Idiot (Kevin Dillon), Pretty Scared Mom in a Ballgown (Jacinda Barrett) and Kurt Russell. To assess whether
Poseidon
truly attains the goals of the MDB, though, compare it to an outstanding one-and there's a classic ready at hand, probably to director Wolfgang Petersen's dismay; it's called
The Poseidon Adventure
, and it's everything this sloppy, loud remake isn't.
UA South, PG-13, 99 min.
RV
Barry Sonnenfeld (
Men in Black
) directs the unamusing odyssey of Bob Munro (Robin Williams), who decides his suburban family would benefit from an RV trip to the Rockies, where they encounter NASCAR-lovin', beer-drinkin' campers, among them Jeff Daniels.
UA North, PG, 99 min.
See No Evil
In a blatant effort to pull in WWF audiences, this teen-slaying horror flick stars all seven feet and 320 pounds of wrestling champion Kane, who plays retiring psychopath Jacob Goodnight. When a group of delinquent teenagers draws the community-service job of cleaning out the hazardously disintegrating Blackwell Hotel, they're unaware that Goodnight is squatting in its ruins, bearing a grudge.
Dreamcatcher, R, 100 min.
Water
Deepa Mehta faced the destruction of this film's sets and threats against her life, just maybe a sign that our notions of the oppression of women being a quaint thing of the past are a tad too rose-colored. The final film in Mehta's trilogy, this installment depicts the plight of widows in India in the '30s, combining a razor-sharp social and political agenda with stunning cinematography.
UA DeVargas, PG-13, 117 min.
X-Men: The Last Stand
Ushering in the summer's really big blow-'em-up whoopie movies is
The Last Stand
(but should we really believe them, with
Die Hardest 4
in the offing?). And the gang's all here: Patrick Stewart, Hugh Jackman, Halle Berry, Anna Paquin and the rest of the mutants (including a Pictish Kelsey Grammer-and a resurrected if not particularly compos mentis Famke Jannsen) must defend their kind even more fiercely now that a "cure" for their aberrancies has been found, and humans seem increasingly disposed to rid the world of these weird people who can set things ablaze and fly around and what have you. Adding to the fun is Magneto (Ian McKellan, hamming it up with gusto) who seems desirous of giving mutants everywhere an even worse rap than the one they've already managed to snag.
DreamCatcher, UA DeVargas, UA North, PG-13, 104 min.
