This Week In Tickets: 22 June 2009 to 28 June 2009

It's a pretty good thing that Landmark and Kendall Square have been getting a steady stream of interesting-looking movies this summer, because the major studios have not been holding up their end of the bargain at the multiplex. The only June release that's gotten me in a theater is The Hangover, and I wasn't terribly impressed. It looks to get a little better this weekend, but I don't know if I'll be missing that much going to Montreal.



Sunday was spent back up in Maine, at the funeral for my father's wife's father, a nice old guy who I saw a couple times a year, when I went up for Thanksgiving and Christmas. I'll miss him a bit.

This upcoming week could be kind of crazy if I let it get that way. I'd really like to see The Hurt Locker at the HFA preview on Thursday, since it opens in the Boston area the day after my planned trip to Montreal, I missed it at SXSW, and though it looks like a big, exciting action movie, there hasn't been a successful Iraq War movie yet. I'm looking at going back up to Maine on Saturday for a Fourth of July cookout, although who knows what the weather will be like. After that, I am awful tempted to head back into NYC for the closing night of the New York Asian Film Festival, as most of its features don't look like they'll be repeated at Fantasia from the email I got today (which has me shocked, quite frankly - given that they had Shusuke Kaneko and Sion Sono as guests in the last couple of years, I figured Pride and Be Sure to Share would be shoo-ins).

Bonnie and Clyde

* * * (out of four)
Seen 27 June 2009 at the Brattle Theatre (American Independents)

I often feel like there's something wrong with me in that I don't get bowled over by things like Bonnie and Clyde. I like it well enough, for sure, and was kind of tickled to see Genes Hackman and Wilder in relatively early roles. I can sort of see how it was a big deal, and recognize the quality of the work (though maybe not so much if I saw it in context).

It just doesn't speak to me, though. As much as I love crime, and will tear through Hard Case Crime paperbacks on my way to and from work, I have a hard time with movies that romanticize criminals. I just have a hard time get into Bonnie & Clyde as a romance, and the crime itself is often kind of random background. I do love the tension between Bonnie, Clyde, Buck, and Blanche, though; that holds up well even as the sidetracks seem unnecessary and the violence is no longer shocking.