Friday, January 04, 2013

Next Week in Tickets: Films playing Boston 4 January 2012 - 10 January 2013

Happy new year! I think January is the most schizophrenic time of the year, movie-wise: It's half Oscar contenders that are finally expanding from their qualifying LA/NYC runs, half things that aren't very good being released when they won't cannibalize the studios' other mainstream pictures with greater potential.

  • The awards hopefuls start out with Zero Dark Thirty, which reunites Kathryn Bigelow with her The Hurt Locker screenwriter Mark Boal for a systematic take on the ten-year hunt for Osama Bin Laden. It plays multiple screens at Boston Common and Fenway (including the RPX screen). Those theaters and Kendall Square each have The Impossible on one screen, with Ewan McGregor and Naomi Watts as a family of tourists in Thailand when the tsunami hit in 2004.

    On the other end of the spectrum is Texas Chainsaw 3D, which IMDB lists as a remake (Just ten years after the last one) but the synopsis reads like a sequel. Whatever it is, they're in Texas, there's a guy named Leatherface, and he's cutting folks up. In 3D at Boston Common, Fenway, and Fresh Pond (which also has it in 2D).
  • The Brattle opens a reissue of Volker Schlöndorff's The Tin Drum, a fantasy about a child born with an adult intellect in 1924 who refuses to age physically after turning three. It's a classic which won both the Palme d'Or and Foreign Language Oscar upon its 1979 release; this version has twenty minutes restored. It plays from Friday to Tuesday, digitally projected.

    On Wednesday, there's a special screening of Being Flynn at 8pm, Paul Weitz's adaptation of Nick Flynn's memoir Another Bullshit Night in Suck City; Flynn will have a 6pm reading separate from the film, and will also do a Q&A afterward. The Thursday night screening of a Madoka Magica double feature, the film version of a popular anime series, is sold out, but a second screening has been scheduled for Saturday the 12th.
  • The Coolidge picks up a couple movies that opened elsewhere a week or two ago - Promised Land (mostly) in Theatre #2 and The Central Park Five on the GoldScreen.

    They do begin stepping the special programs up again in the new year. The Friday and Saturday midnight shows continue, this week with David Cronenberg's The Brood, with anger manifesting itself physically. Monday night is a "Stage & Screen" presentation of Do the Right Thing, tied to Oren Jacoby's production of The Invisible Man, with Jacoby, cast members De'Lon Grant & Joy Jones, and moderator Phillip Martin.
  • The MFA started their January calendar earlier in the week with a rotation of three documentaries that will run over the weekend and into midweek: Hitler's Children, an Israeli documentary about the children and grandchildren of the Nazis' inner circle; Bestiaire, a Quebecois look at the animals in a zoo; and Bel Borba Aqui, which profiles Brazillian artist Bel Borba. All three play Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Wednesday; Indelible Lalita steps in for Bestiaire on Thursday, with both the director and subject of this documentary about a woman who has lost her skin color (and thus a piece of her identity) during her travels from India to Europe to Quebec on hand for a Q&A and reception.
  • The Regent Theatre
  • has two film events this week. On Friday night local production company Kai Mitchell Pictures presents their new satire Corporate! at 7pm; those who arrive early (5:30pm) can see a double feature including their featurette "The Dinner Party". On Thursday the 10th, they have the first of two screenings of $ELLEBRITY, a documentary on the corporate fame machine (the second will be on the 17th).

  • iMovieCafe still has Dabangg 2 at Fresh Pond all day from Friday through Monday and on Tuesday afternoon; Telugu- and Tamil-language movies show for the rest of the week.
  • The Somerville Theatre will get Zero Dark Thirty next week; this week, it picks up Not Fade Away (which is cut down to a single 10:35pm showing per day at Boston Common) and starts presenting the evening screening of Life of Pi in 3D; Jack Reacher and Skyfall move to The Arlington Capitol.
  • The Harvard Film Archive has their annual Members' Weekend; if you're a member, you probably know what's playing!


My plans? Zero Dark Thirty, The Impossible, The Brood, Promised Land, and maybe Do the Right Thing.

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