Bonus Features: June 26, 2024

Lists For Days

Looking for a good time? Pop by the New Mexico Film Office’s website (nmfilm.com) and look for the NM Filmography section. In short, it’s a year-by-year breakdown of everything that was ever filmed here (not counting porn, probably), including movies and TV and promo stuff for Meow Wolf—and it dates back to 1987. You could surely use this to rig a bet, or at least find out that we’re only about halfway through the year and there have already been roughly 30 things shot in our fair state. In fact, you might be amazed how many movies have been shot in New Mexico. We’re super-important to the history of Westerns, for example, and there was that one terrible vampire movie with James Woods called—get this—Vampires.

Another Series in the Series

Violet Crown Cinema (1606 Alcaldesa St., (505) 216-5678) has really been going wild in the realm of film series and will keep it going with CineDoom from Diné filmmaker Blackhorse Lowe (Reservation Dogs). The curated series digs into screenings of films that inspired Lowe, and he’s no stranger to putting such programming together—Lowe did a similar series in Albuquerque in 2017, then again in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 2019. Thus far at Violet Crown, Lowe has screened Wong Kar Wai’s 2046, as well as the Sundance Indigenous Film Tour featuring numerous recent films from Indigenous directors. At 6:30 pm on Sunday, June 30, Lowe is slated to screen David Lynch’s Wild At Heart with a Native-made short kicking off the evening. Tickets run $16.

The Film-to-Opera Pipeline

SFR previously recommended the Center for Contemporary Arts and Santa Fe Opera’s collaborative Screen to Stage series, wherein folks working on Santa Fe Opera productions this year pick films to screen at the CCA, and then they talk about those films. The next iteration includes the weird and funny The Eyes of Tammy Faye screening on Monday, July 8, which was paired with The Righteous (music by Gregory Spears; libretto by Tracy K Smith), which has its world premiere this summer (July 13-Aug. 13). Santa Fe Opera Director of Community Engagement Andrea Fellows Fineberg previously told us that particular pick came from SFO General Director Robert K Meya, and says the relationship between film and opera is less one of influence and more one of contrasts. Visit ccasantafe.org and/or santafeopera.org for more info on either venue.

Squeeze, Don’t Pull

Ever since John Wick changed our collective minds about what action films could be in 2014 (not counting kung fu movie fans who already totally knew), there has been no shortage of close combat gore fests wherein people shoot and stab people in a borderline intimate/sexual fashion. Hell, even Bob Odenkirk did that movie Nobody that was basically John Wick: Now in Dad Form. Not to be left out of the conversation, Jessica Alba stars in Trigger Warning, which came to Netflix on June 21 and was filmed in and around Albuquerque, Madrid, Cerrillos and Santa Fe. The imdb.com synopsis reads: “A devoted daughter is attempting to figure out the cause of her father’s passing,” so one can only assume that Trigger Warning is very likely stupid but also very likely awesome and actiony—and Anthony Michael Hall is in it, so score one for you, Weird Science fans.

Downwinders Doc Held Over

Director Lois Lipman’s First We Bombed New Mexico, which began a series of community screenings and Q&As earlier this month at Violet Crown, was held over for a third week, with showings through tomorrow, June 27. The movie documents the state’s downwinders and uranium miners’ ongoing quest to receive compensation for generations of illnesses as a result of the Trinity Test and the nuclear industry’s work in the state, and features Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium founder Tina Cordova and her quest for justice. After premiering last year at the Santa Fe International Film Festival, the movie has since traveled across the country, and won several awards at various film festivals. Lipman, earlier this month, told SFR she made the movie “so we could reach more people in an intimate way that would touch people’s hearts and bring about change.” We’ve seen it twice and recommend everyone catch it on the big screen.