Flick Picks 10/15/2015: Tomorrowland, San Andreas, Varda a-go-go

We might not have something for everyone this week, but we come mighty close.  George Clooney, meet The Rock.  The Rock, meet legendary French filmmaker (and someone about half your size) Agnes Varda.  Now that would be an interesting dinner party.  Not to mention the entertainment that  Channing Tanning and his buff friends might provide....

Feature Films

TOMORROWLAND

Never one to miss a marketing tie-in, the people at Disney renamed the film that had a working title of 1952 to Tomorrowland, after the futuristic themed land found at Disney amusement parks.  George Clooney stars as a disillusioned inventor joined by a young science enthusiast in the titular world where their actions have a direct consequence not only on themselves, but the ambiguous world itself.

SAN ANDREAS

Fear not, California.  The Rock is here to save the day.  Well, even The Rock has his limits.  That very famous fault slips to the tune of 9.1 on the Richter Scale and a great deal of death and destruction follow.  Is there any hope for the future?  Is this perhaps a good time to buy real estate in San Francisco?  Watch and find out.    

ME AND EARL AND THE DYING GIRL

One of the audience favorites of 2015, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl is based on the young adult novel by Jesse Andrews.  Rachel, the dying girl in question, is befriended by filmmaking friends Greg and Earl.  She's amused by their film parodies and eventually the boys are convinced to make a film for Rachel as she begins a course of chemotherapy to fight her leukemia.  Me and Earl and the Dying Girl deftly parries  this tearjerker set-up with frequent humor and insight into adolescent bravado and coping.

MAGIC MIKE XXL

Well, you know.

It's nice to see a young man wearing a tie these days, isn't it?  

Also new:

3 WOMEN

Named by Roger Ebert the best film of 1977, 3 Women is a Robert Altman classic long unavailable on video.  Shelley Duvall and Sissy Spacek star as two Texas natives who become roommates in a remote California town.  Much strangeness ensues when the more shy of the pair (Spacek) becomes obsessed with the more charismatic woman (Duvall).  We have 3 Women in a new Criterion Collection edition.

Series

THE SLAP

Told from multiple points of view, The Slap unfolds after a man strikes the misbehaving son of a friend at a social gathering.  A thorny aftermath divides the attending families, as some consider the slap justified, while others consider it criminal.

BATES MOTEL, SEASON 3

The back story of Norman Bates continues as we find out what went so horribly wrong with the infamous mamma's boy.  Here, mother is actually quite alive and played by the appealing Vera Farmiga.

Also new:

AMERICAN HORROR STORY, SEASON FOUR

SILENT WITNESS, SEASON TWO

DCI BANKS, SEASON FOUR

Classics

MAN WITH THE GUN

We have recently acquired two classic films starring Robert Mitchum:  Foreign Intrigue and Man With the Gun.  In the latter, the question is what price law and order?  Mitchum plays Clint Tollinger, a gunfighter hired to save Sheridan City from a band of thugs ever threatening the peace of the town.  But will the cure be worse than the disease?

Foreign

LA POINTE COURTE
CLEO FROM 5 TO 7
LE BONHEUR
VAGABOND

French filmmaker Agnes Varda  is in the midst of a brief Chicago residency.  To celebrate this fact, we have acquired Criterion Collection editions of four classic Varda films.  Her first film, La Pointe Courte (1955), told with two interwoven narratives, serves as a kind of bridge between Italian neorealism and the French New Wave.  Cleo From 5 to 7 (1962) is basically a real-time account of a lovely French singer biding her time around Paris as she awaits the results of a medical test.  Several luminaries from French cinema make cameo appearances.  Le Bonheur (1965) and Vagabond (1985) arrived twenty years apart and couldn't be more different on their surface, the the former colorful and serene, the latter a rather more harsh affair.  But both deal with the reality lurking beneath their charactes and relationships.  Long a rare female voice among more celebrated male contemporaries, Agnes Varda is one of the greats of French cinema.

Cleo From 5 to 7

Le Bonheur

Agnes Varda at work

Documentary

BLACKOUT

1977 was a wild year in New York City.  Adding to the chaos of that particular summer in the city was a blackout that affected virtually the entire metropolitan area for two hot days in July.  A product of the PBS series The American Experience, Blackout sets the tumultuous context of New York in the 70's and offers first person accounts from those who lived through those strange days.

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Flick Picks 10/7/2015: Avengers: Age of Ultron, Pitch Perfect 2, Spy, Furious 7

Summer is not over just yet, even if fall jackets have made an appearance this past week.  Several summer blockbusters have arrived in DVD, along with one overlooked independent film worth a look.

Feature Films

AVENGERS, AGE OF ULTRON

The Marvel gang is back to save the world.  Again.  As thundering summer fare goes, one can at least count on the Avengers films for relative intelligence and even the occasional moment of wit.  The cast of heavy hitters includes Robert Downey, Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson and Samuel Jackson.  We have Avengers:  Age of Ultron in both regular DVD and Blu-ray.


PITCH PERFECT 2

Also back, the equally (if not more) fierce singing competitors from Pitch Perfect.  Pitch Perfect 2 picks up three years after the original, when the a capella singing group The Bellas are trying to regain their lost glory.  Anna Kendrick, Rebel Wilson and Hailee Steinfeld head the large and very vocal cast.


SPY

It's not all martinis and formal wear:  Melissa McCarthy in Spy.

Melissa McCarthy plays a desk-bound CIA agent drawn into the world of international intrigue, burdened with aliases each more frowzy than the one before.  No, this is not exactly Shakespeare, but as with Avengers:  Age of Ultron, we have well-made entertainment.  Among the relatively all-star cast is Jason Statham, sending up all those serious tough guys he's played in films past,  Like the best of spoofs, McCarthy and everyone else play it admirably straight.  Unlike most such action films, serious or tongue in cheek, Spy is more than a testosterone fest.

FURIOUS 7

Do not try this at home...or on the road.  

Yes, we're up to number seven for those keeping score at home.  And did someone say testosterone? We've got your Vin Diesel, your Rock and yes, Mr. Statham.  Furious 7 is the latest entry in the Fast & Furious franchise, the last for the late and likable Paul Walker.  Gentlemen (and a couple of token ladies), start your engines.

RESULTS

Need an antidote to all that frenetic summer mayhem?  Andrew Bujalski is an independent filmmaker who has been flying well below the mainstream radar for years.  With his fifth, Results, he works for the first time with name actors, Guy Pearce and Cobie Smulders (How I Met Your Mother).  Fortunately, a bigger budget budget has done nothing to dull Mr. Bujalski's unique point of view.  Pearce and Smulders play fitness instructors and would-be romantic partners, brought together by an unlikely agent, an irreverent and decidedly out of shape man played by the wonderful Kevin Corrigan.  What looks like a lightweight romantic comedy is invested with considerable insight, wit and off-kilter style.

Series

JANE THE VIRGIN, SEASON ONE

Chicago's own Gina Rodriguez plays the title character in this popular and much-lauded series.

Also new:

GEORGE GENTLY, SEASON SEVEN

VERA, SEASON FIVE

BONES, SEASON 10

Foreign Film

BLIND CHANCE

The late Polish master Krzystof Kieslowski is best known for his "Three-Color" trilogy (Blue, White, Red), as well as The Double Life of Veronique and The Decalogue.  If you're familiar with any or all of those films, you'll recognize similar elements in Blind Chance:  a great lead performance; a gift for storytelling that plays out in three versions of a a story, each determined by whether a man does or does not catch a train for which he runs as it departs a station; the repetition of exact, seemingly innocuous actions from one story to the next (very much like "Three Colors").  As ever, Kieslowski considers not only the effects of chance, but the ramifications of the choices we make.  We have Blind Chance in a new Criterion Collection edition.

                             

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Flick Picks 10/1/2015: The Age of Adaline, Empire, Iris

After a summer hiatus, Flick Picks has returned.  To accompany the agreeable weather, autumn is usually a good time for filmgoers, as studios tend to release what they feel are some of their best films in advance of the award season.  We can also expect a very solid crop of DVD releases this fall - feature films, documentaries and series alike.  Not that the summer blockbusters were a complete waste of time.  Both Mad Max:  Fury Road and the latest Mission Impossible were refreshing oases in a typical summer desert of bombastic and forgettable fare.   Mission Impossible:  Rogue Nation is coming soon.  In the meantime, we have Mad Max:  Fury Road in both regular DVD and Blu-ray.

Feature Films

Romance is the order of the day, or the week, even if such things don't always end happily....


THE AGE OF ADALINE

When Adaline Bowman says she's turning 29 - AGAIN - she means it.  Actually, Adaline simply is 29, as she has been for almost eight decades.  Lucky her.  Of course, there is a price to be paid for anything.  The drawback of Adaline's perpetual 29-year-old existence is that she doesn't allow herself to grow close to anyone else...until she meets a charming (and, of course, handsome) philanthropist.  Blake Lively plays the ever-youthful Adaline, while Harrison Ford plays her father.




I'LL SEE YOU IN MY DREAMS

Welcome back, Blythe Danner.  If you haven't yet had the pleasure, remind yourself what a welcome presence is Ms. Danner on screen.  In the bittersweet I'll See You in My Dreams, Danner plays a long-time widow, tempted to emerge from the comfortable confines of her life through the friendship of a charming young pool man and a romantic interest in the form of Sam Elliot.  But start to finish, this is about the ageless appeal of Blythe Danner.





Also new:

A LITTLE CHAOS

This period romance is the second film directed by veteran English actor Alan Rickman.  Kate Winslet plays a landscape artist romantically entangled while building a garden at Louis XIV's Palace at Versailles.

MADAME BOVARY

Mia Wasikowska takes on another literary classic (after very much reviving the title heroine in Jane Eyre) in this handsome adaption of Gustave Flaubert's novel.

QUEEN AND COUNTRY

Twenty eight years after his appealing and autobiographical Hope and Glory, director John Boorman has given us the very entertaining sequel, Queen and Country.  Callum Turner plays Boorman' s alter ego, dealing with rigid superiors during his 1950's basic training and occasionally straying into the nearby town to pursue a young man's fancy.

Series

EMPIRE, SEASON ONE

Terence Howard and Taraji Henson star in this Fox series in which family members via for control of a hip hop and entertainment empire.

GOTHAM, SEASON ONE

Featuring characters from DC Comics Batman franchise, this Fox series focuses on the James (later commissioner) Gordon and Bruce Wayne.

AQUARIUS, SEASON ONE

David Duchovny stars in this period police drama.  As the title of the series would suggest, it's the Summer of Love.  But not all is peace and love in Los Angeles in the late 60's.  Duchovny's fictional LAPD detective is trying to track down a missing teenage girl, only to find that she is living with Charles Manson's "family."  The appearance of the notorious Manson is one example of the mix of real characters and fictional story lines in Aquarius.

Also new:

RED ROAD, SEASON TWO

MISS FISHER'S MURDER MYSTERIES, SEASON THREE

MODERN FAMILY, SEASON SIX

MIKE AND MOLLY, SEASON FIVE

GREY'S ANATOMY, SEASON ELEVEN

Documentary

IRIS

The great documentarian Albert Maysles died this past March.  The highlights of a long and venerable careeer include Salesman, Gimme Shelter and the original Grey Gardens (all made with his brother David, who died in 1987).  With the posthumously-released Iris, Albert Maysles goes fairly gently into that good night of documentary film with his portrait of 93-year-old fashion icon Iris Apfel.  A charming 80 minutes is pretty well guaranteed, whether you're a fashion maven or not.

MAGICIAN:  THE ASTONISHING LIFE AND WORK OF ORSON WELLES

2015 is the centenary of Orson Welles' birth (not so far north of us in Kenosha, Wisconsin). With Chuck Workman's documentary you can better familiarize yourself with the great director and his colorful life.

The Glencoe library has many films directed and/or starring Orson Welles, including...

THE STRANGER

TOUCH OF EVIL

THE THIRD MAN

CITIZEN KANE

THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI

ME AND ORSON WELLES

We also have Richard Linklater's charming, generally fictional evocation of Welle's early career in the Mercury Theater, featuring an uncanny performance from English actor Christian McKay as Welles.

Foreign

THE FAREWELL PARTY

Nominated for Best Picture at the Orphir Awards (The Israeli Oscars), The Farewell Party is a sometimes sad, sometimes funny meditation on aging and death.  When a group of friends in a Jerusalem retirement home help a friend who's terminally ill, others begin to ask for their help.  "I can't recall any film ever making me laugh and cry in complete comic and dramatic balance like "The Farewell Party." -- Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune.

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Flick Picks 8/21/2015: Death of a Cyclist, The Knick, Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell

We place the focus on series DVDs this week, but have also recently added several interesting indie features and a couple of excellent foreign films courtesy of the Criterion Collection.  All of that and a documentary about the man who has been playing Big Bird since the inaugural season of Sesame Street in 1969.  Which can't actually be a documentary, because it's not true.  Because Big Bird is real.  Which everyone knows.  Right?

Series

THE KNICK, SEASON ONE

Starring Clive Owen and directed by Steven Soderbergh, The Knick takes us into the fictional Knickerbocker Hospital in New York City in the early days of the twentieth century.  Despite the limitations of medical science at the time, the hospital maintains a remarkably high mortality rate.  Owen plays Dr. John Thackery, battling cocaine and opium addictions even while introducing life-saving innovations.  Andre Holland plays African American assistant chief surgeon Alergnon Edwards, dealing with the city's and co-workers' racism, as he labors in the hospital and runs an after-hours clinic in the basement of for those turned away from the institution by day.

JONATHAN STRANGE & MR. NORRELL, SEASON ONE

Based on Susanna Clarke's bursting at the seams novel of the same title, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell is a seven-part BBC miniseries that presents an alternate version of England's nineteenth century history.  You know - the one in which magic exists but is rarely practiced.

DIG, SEASON ONE

The one season and done USA series Dig is a combination thriller and historical mystery.  FBI agents, investigating an American's murder in Jerusalem, discovery a conspiracy thousands of years in the making.

Feature Films

Sure, we  have recent feature film releases with familiar names - Michael Douglas, Nicole Kidman, etc. But it's a good time to look at some films that feature both unfamiliar faces and places - from an American farm to one of the ends of the Earth, all clocking in at a convenient 70 to 90 minutes.

RUNOFF                    

Writer and director Kimberly Levin's Runoff shows us both the beauty and hardship of independent farming, occurring as it does against all economic odds.  Joanne Kelly stars as such a farmer, working in tandem with a husband ultimately less willing than her to take ethical shortcuts to keep the family on their land.  While it takes a turn toward the melodramatic at film's end, Runoff is for the most part a lovely study of characters and place that don't usually appear on the film radar these days.

RED KNOT

Olivia Thrilby and Vincent Kartheiser star as a couple whose new marriage is sorely tested on cruise from South America to Antarctica.  Aside from the subtle handling of the young couple's estrangement, Red Knot is well worth the time for its stunning cinematography.   

                                                                                      UNCERTAIN TERMS

Here, yet more marriage problems, as a 30-year-old Brooklynite flees his troubled relationship to work for a time in the country at his aunt's home for pregnant teens.  Trouble ensues when his interest in one of the young women goes beyond friendship.  As with Runoff, Uncertain Terms takes a turn toward melodrama at film's end, but is otherwise a quietly assured story that will draw you into its world with the naturalistic performances of its unheralded stars.  

Also new: Michael Douglas is on the dark side of a version of The Most Dangerous Game in BEYOND THE REACH.  The always interesting Nicole Kidman stars in the Australian drama, STRANGERLAND,   Even more dark and dramatic is EVERY SECRET THING, starring Diane Lane and Elizabeth Banks.

Foreign Film

Bicyclists beware!  Brides too, in this interesting trio of foreign films.

DEATH OF A CYCLIST

One of the great films of the 1950's and evidence of the far-reaching feel and influence of film noir, Death of a Cyclist is a work with which any film lover should acquaint them self.  Beneath its impeccable surface, Death of a Cyclist offers a pointed critique of Franco's Spain.  Not that you need to stray far from the story of Death of a Cyclist to find plenty of enjoyment and substance.  An affluent couple strike a bicyclist on a remote highway and must contend with their consciences and a potential blackmailer in this classic directed by Juan Antonio Bardem (uncle of Javier Bardem).  This one is a must see.

HUMAN CAPITAL

Reminiscent in plot to Death of a Cyclist, this contemporary Italian film sees another unsuspecting cyclist struck by car that fees the scene, involving two well-known families in the incident.





DIVORCE ITALIAN STYLE

What do you do if you're a middle-aged Sicilian who wants to divorce your wife and marry your cousin in a country where divorce is not allowed?  Well, you could just grow up, but that would hardly be the stuff of film comedy.  Instead, star Marcello Mastroianni seeks a more creative solution.  Like Death of a Cyclist, this is a new Criterion Collection edition of a film classic.

Also new: Viggo Mortensen stars in the beautiful and trippy JAUJA,  Mads Mikkelsen is an ex-soldier out to avenge the deaths of his wife and son in THE SALVATION,

Documentary 

I AM BIG BIRD

The story of the man who has been Big Bird (and Oscar the Grouch) since the big, beloved character was first introduced to American audiences in 1969.  And quite a story it is.    

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Flick Picks 7/24/2015: Gett, Tangerines, Slow West

The dog days would seem to be upon us.  For some, the heat, the humidity, like those big budget films crashing through the multiplex, are good things.  For others of us...not so much.  This is a time of year when the flow of substantial films seems to slow to a near trickle, a phenomenon mirrored by the limited number of DVD releases just now.  Fortunately, the new arrivals in DVD offer a rare chance for summer substance.

Foreign Film

TANGERINES

A worthy nominee for best foreign language film at both the Golden Globe and Academy Award ceremonies this year, Tangerines is a particularly graceful entry to the canon of anti-war films.  Two Estonians, Ivo and Margus, find themselves between warring forces in the Caucasus Mountains of Georgia in the early 1990's.  The two men are among the few native Estonians who have not fled the area, trying to harvest a tangerine crop before all hell breaks loose.  When a young Georgian and a Chechen mercenary - very much on opposite sides of the conflict -  are wounded near his home, Ivo takes them both in and tries to nurse both back to health while preventing them from killing one another.  Tangerines is very serious subject matter rendered gently, even beautifully.  Not one to be missed.

Feature Films

SLOW WEST

Very well reviewed, Slow West is a western starring the ever-fascinating Michael Fassbender.  Fassbender plays a bounty hunter aiding a young Scottish man, traversing the American West in the late 1800's to find his lost love.  By most all accounts, an impressive debut for writer/director John Maclean and a treat for those who enjoy smart, moody westerns.  

We have also added two very different films from the Criterion Collection.

MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE (1985) features Daniel Day Lewis' breakout performance as a street punk who becomes the romantic partner of a young Pakistani man living in London, who aspires to open an upscale laundrette.  Stephen Frears' revered film considers with wit and insight issues as weighty as homophobia, class and racism against the backdrop of Margaret Thatcher's Britain of the 1980's.







THE BLACK STALLION (1979).  This the very successful film adaption of Walter Farley's beloved novel.  Mickey Rooney won a best supporting actor nomination for his performance as the former jockey, Henry Dailey.

Also new to DVD...In SET FIRE TO THE STARS, Elijah Wood plays an aspiring poet in 1950, trying to shepherd his hero, Dylan Thomas, in a story based on true events .

Documentary/Non Fiction

TOUGH BEING LOVED BY JERKS

The story of Philippe Val, former editor of the satirical French newspaper, Charlie Hebdo.  The newspaper chose to publish Danish caricatures of Muhammad in 2005, which has resulted in two deadly attacks on the Charlie Hebdo offices.  Daniel Leconte's documentary follows the court cases against Val and his newspaper and their obvious implications for the larger issues of freedom of speech, religious respect and the nature of fundamentalism.

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Flick Picks 7/17/2015: The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, The Crimson Field, Five Easy Pieces

A somewhat light agenda this week, but not without its globetrotting, a few thrills, the perils of war and a classic dose of early 1970's alienation.  All of that, and one of the world's great structures rising before our very eyes....

Feature Films

THE SECOND BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL

Okay, the journey might be a bit familiar this time, but we are still in very good company.  Everyone (save the character who perished in first film) is back, as well as silver-haired Yanks David Straithairn and Richard Gere, the latter making the heart Madge Hardcastle (Celia Imrie) go pitter-patter.  Dame Judy returns, so too the wonderful Bill Nighy.  Even Penelope Wilton is back to haunt the happy emigres, hopefully with  a less tragic hairdo and dialog than was the case in the first film.

Foreign Film

ROMAN DE GARE

Roman de gare is actually a 2007 film from French veteran Claude Lelouch, finally making its way to DVD and international distribution.  The radiant Fanny Ardant stars as a writer looking for ideas for her next thriller, getting much more material than she bargained for.  

Series

THE CRIMSON FIELD

Part of the BBC's massive World War I centenary season, The Crimson Field delves into the lives of medical staff and patients at a fictional field hospital in France during the First World War.  

Classics

FIVE EASY PIECES

Director Bob Rafelson and the inimitable Jack Nicholson combined their talents for several films, never more successfully than with Five Easy Pieces.  Nicholson plays Robert Eroica Dupea, estranged from his affluent, dysfunctional family and the world in general.  Poor, good-hearted Karen Black tries to love the alienated Dupea.  Best known for what may be the most tortured and humorous diner order in film history (should it really be so hard to order wheat toast?), Five Easy Pieces is a film of considerable feeling and substance at time rich with films (and audiences) unafraid to venture into uncomfortable ground.  If you haven't seen Five Easy Pieces in years, or never had the pleasure, enjoy this new Criterion Collection edition.  

Documentary

SAGRADA:  THE MYSTERY OF CREATION

Amazing as the experience might be of visiting Notre Dame, Chartres, the Hagia Sofia, or Angor Wat, you're obviously seeing great structures that have been completed and in place for centuries.  Not so, with Sagradia Familia, the great Antonio Gaudi's "Expiatory Temple."  It's being built as we speak.  Gaudi saw only a small portion of the church completed before his death 1926.  The Spanish Civil War and further upheaval delayed construction, which now takes place at a furious rate.  Sagrada Familia:  The Mystery of Creation offers some good background and striking visuals, more than compensating for occasionally tiresome and pretentious narration.   

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