Next Week in Tickets: Films playing Boston 24 September 2021 - 30 September 2021

Really, studios and exhibitors? Just one terrible-looking wide-release this week? No clever indie studios grabbing a free screen or two or Chinese/Hong Kong/Korean imports?

This is a level of nothing usually reserved for New Year's weekend.

• So that means the big release of the week is Dear Evan Hansen, an adaptation of the Broadway musical about a teenager who tries to benefit from his classmate's suicide (although, I guess, somewhat reluctantly), starring the man who originated the part on the stage but was in his late twenties as he filmed it and now has to deal with close-ups. Seems ripe for counter-programming, but, nope, nothing. It's at The Capitol, Fresh Pond, the Lexington Venue, West Newton, Boston Common (including Dolby Cinema and an Imax matinee), Fenway, South Bay (including Dolby Cinema), Kendall Square, Assembly Row (including Imax), Arsenal Yards, the Embassy (closed Monday-Wednesday), and Chestnut Hill.
  
  MGMazon (can we call it that yet?) is getting audiences prepped for the big Bond finale in a few weeks by putting a couple of Daniel Craig's films back in theaters, kicking off with Casino Royale at Boston Common. There's also a re-release of Gorillas in the Mist (starring Sigourney Weaver as Dian Fossey) at Boston Common and South Bay. Boston Common also has The Rocky Horror Picture Show at 9:30pm Saturday, listed as a "Special Show", so maybe a live cast? There is an anniversary release for The Transformers: The Movie on Sunday and Tuesday at Fenway, South Bay, Assembly Row, and Arsenal Yards (Tuesday only), with one for Carrie on Sunday and Wednesday at Fenway, South Bay, and Assembly Row, and Arsenal Yards (Tuesday). Arsenal Yards has Francis Ford Coppola's latest revisitation of his previous work, The Outsiders: The Complete Novel, on Sunday and Monday. And it also looks like the third "After" movie, After We Fell, gets a one-night deal on Thursday at Boston Common, Fenway, South Bay, Assembly Row.
• That does leave a little room for a larger-than-usual release for the Telugu-language Love Story, starring Naga Chaitanya Akkineni and Sai Pallavi as two young people who move from their village to the big city but presumably keep finding their way back to each other. It's at Apple Fresh Pond, Kendall Square, Fenway, and Arsenal Yards.
• I'm Your Man opens at Kendall Square and the smaller rooms at The Coolidge Corner Theatre; a German-language comedy starring Maren Eggert as a scientist who can only get the funding for her work if she agrees to beta-test an android personalized to make her happy (Dan Stevens).
  
  At the Coolidge, Marty After Midnite continues with Nicolas Cage in Bringing Out the Dead on Friday (in 35mm) and The Wolf of Wall Street on Saturday (a little early, because it's 180 minutes). The Big Screen Classic on Monday is a 35mm print of Best in Show with a print of The Royal Tenenbaums playing for Wes World on Tuesday
• Landmark Theatres Kendall Square continues to help streaming movies get a little bit of extra theatrical credibility by playing Antoine Fuqua's The Guilty, a remake of a Dutch movie about a cop demoted to answering 911 calls - here played by Jake Gyllenhaal - who may wind up in over his head when one comes in.
• The Brattle Theatre has a bit of many interesting things this week. It starts with a weekend of African-American Neo-Noir, including Devil in a Blue Dress on Friday, One False Move (one 35mm) and Deep Cover as a separate-admission twin bill on Saturday, and Set it Off on Sunday.
  
  The DocYard offers a true double feature on Monday, with "Profit Motive and the Whispering Wind" at 5:30pm and director John Gianvito's latest film, Her Socialist Smile at 7pm, with Gianvito on-hand for a discussion of both films afterward. The DocYard double feature is also available on The Brattlite, as is Eyimofe (This Is My Desire), What We Left Unfinished and Witches of the Orient.
  
  On Tuesday they present three experimental shorts from the late Luther Price (aka Tom Rhoads) on 16mm film. They also stretch National Silent Movie Day out to two nights, with Buster Keaton in Seven Chances and Paul Leni's The Cat and the Canary on Wednesday (both with musical accompaniment from Jeff Rapsis), while Chaplin's The Kid and Fritz Lang's Metropolis play Thursday.
• The Regent Theatre in Arlington has the Manhattan Short Film Festival 2021 program, where audience votes on which films get awards, on Sunday and Thursday; it's also at Cinema Salem from Friday to Sunday.
• Emerson's Bright Lights continues with IFFBoston alum Fruits of Labor, with with director Emily Cohen Ibañez and subject Ashley Solis Pavon joining the online discussion Thursday evening, after a 24-hour window to watching it beginning on Wednesday evening.
• The Boston Latino International Film Festival is entirely online via ArtsEmerson's platform this year, running from Friday 24 September to Sunday 3 October, with five features and a free shorts program available for the whole festival and three more being added on Thursday, plus the Bright Lights presentation.
  
  We've already missed the start of the Boston Film Festival, which has had all of its in-person screenings already, although they have three short programs, four narrative features, and ten documentaries available on Eventive through Sunday.
  
  The Taiwan Film Festival of Boston will be at Boston Common and online next weekend.
• The West Newton Cinema is a little less packed from Friday to Sunday, paring down to Dear Evan Hansen, The Eyes of Tammy Faye, Blue Bayou, Cry Macho, Shang-Chi, Roadrunner (Saturday), and Summer of Soul (Sunday).
  
  The Lexington Venue also thins things out, opening Dear Evan Hansen alongside The Eyes of Tammy Faye.
• Cinema Salem has Shang-Chi, The Eyes of Tammy Faye, Cry Macho, and the 2021 edition of the Manhattan Short Film Festival package Friday to Sunday. The Friday late show is the delirious anime Mind Game.
  
  The Luna Theater has the 2021 Sundance short program on Friday and Saturday (masks required Saturday); All the Streets Are Silent: The Convergence of Hip Hop and Skateboarding (1987-1997) and The Green Knight on Saturday; John Carpenter's The Thing on Sunday. No Weirdo Wednesday this week.
• The Harvard Film Archive has virtual programs showing up on their calendar, but still nothing in-person. Theater rentals are available at Kendall Square, The Embassy, West Newton, the Capitol, The Venue, and many of the multiplexes.

I've got some catching up to do, especially since I've got an actual real get-out-of-town vacation coming up! I'll be hitting the Saturday AANN at the Brattle, and maybe I'm Your Man and/or The Guilty. .