Friday, May 13, 2022

Next Week in Tickets: Films playing Boston 13 May 2021 - 19 May 2022

It's the week after a Marvel behemoth, so folks are going to mostly stay out of the way, but that makes what does come out just a little more interestingly random.
  • The Coolidge Corner Theatre gets to run their 35mm print of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness for another weekend, but they also get two new releases: Happening is a possibly-too-timely drama in which a struggling student tries to obtain an abortion, a procedure that was illegal in 1963 France. It also screens at the Kendall, Boston Common, and the Embassy. The Coolidge also has documentary The Automat, which looks at the cafeteria-style restaurants where one purchased items from individual coin-operated cupboards and boasts a new song written and performed by Mel Brooks. Director Lisa Hurwitz will be on-hand for the 2pm show on Sunday.

    The After Midnite crew makes its first trips to the Rocky Woods of the summer season, with Friday the 13th Parts II & III on Friday the 13th (yes, the back of the double feature is in 3D!) and a campout double feature of The Burning and Cabin Fever on Saturday. If you can't get out there, they have two of Takashi Miike's more noteworthy bits of madness: Dark musical comedy The Happiness of the Katakuris on Friday and a 35mm print of the one that really put him on the map internationally, Audition, on Saturday.

    In addition to the Automat event, Sunday also has Gothe-Institut selection Chess Story, about a lawyer who becomes obsessed with the game after he's thrown in jail for not assisting the Nazis in 1938. Monday's Big Screen Classic is La Dolce Vita, Tuesday's mother-from-hell is John Waters's Serial Mom, with a 35mm print of Bong Joon-Ho's Mother on Wednesday, while Thursday features a "Shakespeare Reimagined" presentation of Kenneth Branagh's Much Ado About Nothing on 35mm film.
  • I never saw the first take on Steven King's Firestarter, but it's telling that this new version's trailers reference superhero stories as much as anything when it seems like a comparison one would have avoided making 40 years ago. Zac Efrom, Ryan Kiera Armstrong, and Sydney Lemmon star, Keith Thomas directs, and there are some interesting folks behind the scenes - music by John Carpenter (among others) and cinematography by Karim Hussain. It's at Fresh Pond, Boston Common, Fenway, South Bay, Assembly Row, Arsenal Yards, and on Peacock.

    Family Camp, in which two rival fathers over-compete during summer vacation, looks like an Adam Sandler thing but it's actually from internet sketch guys; it plays Boston Common.

    There's another Abba: The Movie Fan Event at Boston Common and Fenway on Saturday afternoon. Arsenal Yards has Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation on Tuesday. In addition to the usual Thursday sneaks, there is a Downton Abbey: A New Era "Early Access" show at the Kendall, West Newton, Boston Common, Fenway, South Bay, Assembly Row, Arsenal Yards, and Chestnut Hill on Wednesday. Twenty One Pilots Cinema Experience (an extended cut of last year's "Livestream Experience", I think) plays Boston Common andFenway on Thursday.
  • Landmark Theatres Kendall Square opens Sundance hit On the Count of Three, whose description says it follows two best friends played by director Jerrod Carmichael and Christopher Abbot on the last day of their lives.

    They, too, continue a "May Is for Mothers" series, with Rosemary's Baby on Tuesday. Take Me to the River: New Orleans plays on Wednesday, with Martin Shore following up his 2014 documentary on Memphis with one that looks at the legendary music scene in NOLA.
  • The Brattle Theatre has the new restoration of Dennis Hopper's Out of The Blue, a spiritual sequel to Easy Rider which he rejiggered to feature teenage co-star Linda Manz. Manz also co-stars in Terrence Malick's Days of Heaven, which plays in 35mm on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, while Hopper's Easy Rider plays Wednesday and Thursday.

    The DocYard has their final show of the season on Monday (and the year, as there will not be a fall session), with Nuclear Family, which looks at how the same land has hosted nuclear missiles and native lands Directors Erin and Travis Wilkerson will dial in to discuss afterward.
  • Hindi-language comedy Jayeshbhai Jordaar opens at Apple Fresh Pond and Boston Common, featuring Bollywood action star Ranveer Singh cast against type as a bullied man trying to look out for his wife and daughter. Action movie Sarkaru Vaari Paata is in the Telugu language and features Manesh Badu in the middle of a banking scheme; it opens in the same places. Fresh Pond also picks up Gujarati-language comedy Kehvatlal Parivar (through Sunday), Tamil-language action-comedy Don and Kannada-language mystery-comedy Avatar Purusha (through Sunday). CBI 5 returns starting Sunday.

    Egyptian comedy Another One plays Fenway, featuring Ahmed Helmy as a social worker who feels he is getting lazy, while Vietnamese horror film The Ancestral is at South Bay.

    CGI sports anime Ryoma! The Prince of Tennis (Decide) plays subtitled matinees at Kendall Square from Friday to Sunday, while Ponyo is this month's Studio Ghibli Fest entry at Boston Common, Fenway, South Bay, Assembly Row, and Arsenal Yards on Sunday (dubbed), Monday (subtitled), and Wednesday (dubbed). Eureka: Eureka Seven Hi Evolution (which is apparently different from the Eureka Seven: Hi Evolution production from a few years back) plays Boston Common on Tuesday (dubbed) and Wednesday (subtitled).
  • The Somerville Theatre brings back the Slaughterhouse Movie Club on Friday, with a drag & burlesque pre-show before they run a 35mm print of Gore Verbinski's The Ring. On Saturday and Sunday, they pull out their 70mm print of 2001: A Space Odyssey, then play Takashi Miike's 13 Assassins on 35mm film on Monday and Tuesday for those who didn't get enough (or couldn't stay up late) at the Coolidge over the weekend. Wednesday's Crime Pays Double selection is a Walter Matthau double feature of The Taking of Pelham One Two Three and Charley Varrick, both on film.
  • The Harvard Film Archive continues "Forgotten Filmmakers of the French New Wave" with America as Seen by a Frenchman (Friday), Witness in the City (Friday), The Doll (35mm Saturday), Moranbong (35mm Saturday), A Game for Six Lovers (Sunday), and Enclosure (Monday).
  • Belmont World Film has their final show of this year's series on Monday with Agnieszka Woszczynska's Silent Land, in which a Polish couple on vacation in Italy witness an accident that shakes them to the core. This one screens at Arsenal Yards on Monday with a post-film discussion and discounts at a Mediterranean restaurant beforehand.
  • ArtsEmerson streams two programs this week, with "Within These Walls" a 50-minute dance piece inspired by U.S. Immigration Station, Angel Island State Park in San Francisco Bay and the Chinese Exclusion Act, while "Pandemic Communities" examines how marginalized people often bear an excess burden from these events, whether today or one hundred years ago. "Walls" is available from Friday evening, "Communities" from Saturday evening.
  • The Regent Theatre screens shorts made by local teens in a "Documentary Bootcamp" on Wednesday afternoon. Looking ahead to next week, animation legend Bill Plympton will visit with a program of shorts and the feature Demi's Panic on the 22nd, and I'm kicking myself because I contributed to the crowdfunding campaign but will be out of town.
  • The Museum of Science continues to run Doctor Strange on Friday and Saturday nights; they've also booked the summer's three "Third Thursday" film screenings presented by the Woods Hole Film Festival.
  • The Lexington Venue has Petite Maman and The Duke from Friday to Sunday.

    The West Newton Cinema sticks with Doctor Strange, The Duke, The Bad Guys, Fantastic Beasts (Friday-Wednesday), Sonic the Hedgehog 2, The Rose Maker (Saturday/Sunday), Sing 2 (Saturday/Sunday), and Encanto (Saturday/Sunday). No shows Monday.

    The Luna Theater has Everything Everywhere All At Once on Friday and Saturday, Stanleyville (an interesting if sometimes meandering oddity from last year's Fantasia festival) on Saturday and Thursday, Labyrinth on Sunday, and the Weirdo Wednesday show.

    Cinema Salem has Doctor Strange, Petit Maman, Everything Everywhere All at Once, and The Northman from Friday to Monday (Monday's matinees captioned).
  • For those still not ready to join random people in a room for two hours, theater rentals are available at Kendall Square, The Embassy, West Newton, the Capitol and Somerville, The Venue, CinemaSalem, and many of the multiplexes. The film program at the MFA is still in limbo, but Jordan's is selling tickets for when they re-open the Imax screen with Top Gun: Maverick.
Can I swing the midnights? Probably not, no. But I'll certainly get back to 13 Assassins, the Matthaus, a Red Sox game, Much Ado About Nothing and maybe The Automat.

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