Friday, March 10, 2023

Next Week in Tickets: Films playing Boston 10 March 2023 - 16 March 2023

Happy "Geez, are the Oscars this Sunday? I had better catch up!" weekend to all who celebrate.
  • The weekend's new releases aren't exactly dumped, but they're also not expected to upstage the ceremony, either. 65, for instance, features Adam Driver as a colony-ship pilot who winds up going through a wormhole and having to deal with dinosaurs as he tries to survive on a prehistoric Earth. It's at the Capitol, Fresh Pond, Boston Common, South Bay, Assembly Row, Arsenal Yards, and Chestnut Hill. Oddly, the movie getting most of the premium screens and 3D shows is Scream VI, which comes out barely a year after #5, some old-school slasher turnaround considering that this series is more reliant on returning cast than other similar series, although Courtney Cox is the last holdover from the first, meeting up with prior targets and new blood in New York. It's at the Somerville, Fresh Pond (including 3D), Boston Common (including RealD 3D/Dolby Cinema), Kendall Square, South Bay (including Dolby Cinema), Assembly Row (including RealD 3D/Dolby Cinema), Arsenal Yards (including CWX), and Chestnut Hill (including RealD 3D).

    Bobby Farrelly reunites with Woody Harrelson for Champions, playing a coach saddled with a team of people with intellectual disabilities who finds there's more potential there than expected (worth noting that despite specializing in crass comedies, the Farrellys have always been earnest advocates for the disabled). It's at the Capitol, Fresh Pond, Kendall Square, South Bay, Assembly Row, Arsenal Yards, and Chestnut Hill.

    Fresh Pond opens The Magic Flute, a German-produced family film that re-imagines Mozart's opera as a Harry Potter-style adventure, with Amadeus's F. Murray Abraham amusingly cast as one of the teachers at "Mozart Academy". The Amazing Maurice is also doing a really impressive job of sticking around there.

    Irish horror movie Unwelcome, from Grabbers director Jon Wright and featuring Hanna John-Kamen, Douglas Booth, and Colm Meaney in a couple-goes-to-rural-Ireland-and-discovers-its-murderous-folklore scenario, plays 10pm shows at Boston Common.

    Boston Common also has the non-Netflix Best Picture nominees over the weekend. Darren Aranofsky's debut film Pi, shot on exceptionally grainy stock, gets an Imax blow-up and post-film QA broadcast in Imax at Boston Common for Tuesday as a "Pi Day" special.
  • Apple Fresh Pond opens Agilan a Tamil-language gangster flick about a crane operator who is also the smuggler known as the "King of the Indian Ocean", Thuramukham ("The Harbor"), a dramatic action movie about protests Maheshum Marutiyum, and a Malayalam romantic comedy set in 1983 described as a love triangle between a man, a woman, and his car. Bangledeshi action movie Shonibar Bikel, aka Saturday Afternoon, also opens; it appears to have been made three years ago, when the real-life attack that inspired it was much more recent, and waited for a post-pandemic release date.

    Bollywood romantic comedy Tu Jhoothi Main Makkaar opened Wednesday at Fresh Pond and Boston Common; Hindi-language action flick Pathaan continues to hang around at Fresh Pond. Boston Common has RRR "fan celebration" shows through Wednesday (at least).

    Anime hit Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba - To the Swordsmith Village continues at Boston Common, South Bay, Kendall Square, and Assembly Row; check showtimes for whether they are dubbed or subtitled. Vietnamese drama Nha Ba Nu ("The House of No Man") continues at South Bay.
  • The Brattle Theatre has All That Breathes, an Oscar-nominated documentary about brothers running a makeshift bird hospital to aid the black kites being choked by New Delhi's pollution, through Sunday. They also get their hand on a 35mm print of Skinamarink, which gets the last show of the day (which means 4pm on Sunday due to the theater's Oscar party).

    After that they have another quick rep series based upon a new restoration, this one focusing on Hou Hsiao-Hsien: Flowers of Shanghai plays Monday, the cleaned-up Millennium Mambo (which did the good work of introducing the wider world to Shu Qi) on Tuesday & Wednesday, and Assassin on Thursday
  • Return to Seoul picks up showtimes at The Coolidge Corner Theatre, though mainly on the smaller screens.

    As last weekend's midnight shows anticipated Oscars for Michelle Yeoh (Crouching Tiger still hanging around!), this weekend's are betting on Brendan Fraser, with Airheads on Friday and Monkeybone on Saturday, both on 35mm film. If you don't plan to watch the Oscars, or do anything else Sunday, their annual Lord of the Rings marathon is all Extended Editions this year, starting at 11am and finishing at 12:30am with tea and dinner breaks in between. Monday's Big Screen Classic is All About Eve, with Boston Globe critic Odie Henderson offering a pre-film seminar. There's an Open Screen on Tuesday, as two Claire Denis films: Beau Travail on Tuesday and a 35mm print of Trouble Every Day on Wednesday. Thursday's Cinema Jukebox show is School of Rock on 35mm.
  • Landmark Theatres Kendall Square mostly opens the same films as the mainstream multiplexes, and their David Lean throwback, Lawrence of Arabia, plays at 4pm on Thursday rather than the usual evening slot.
  • The Somerville Theatre picks up The Quiet Girl as well as Scream VI. Friday's midnight special is Death Becomes Her. Note that New Found Glory have a concert in the main room on Thursday, which will mess with times and crowd the lobby.

    The Oscar Shorts go up the road from the Somerville to The Capitol; the various programs are also playing at the Coolidge, the Kendall, CinemaSalem, and Luna Lowell.
  • The Boston Baltic Film Festival has a dozen films streaming online through the 19th.

    Boston Underground Film Festival has announced their lineup, with festival passes available, and Boston Jewish Film has done the same for their Israeli Film Festival. It doesn't look like we're getting an Irish Film Festival this March, despite them sponsoring a The Quiet Girl Q&A a couple weeks back; hopefully that's on tap for later in the year to avoid the logjam.
  • Last weekend for Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania on the dome at The Museum of Science!
  • The Lexington Venue is open through Sunday with The Quiet Girl, Living, and Cocaine Bear.

    The West Newton Cinema brings back Eo alongside Return to Seoul, Cocaine Bear, Four Winters, Women Talking, A Man Called Otto (no show Tuesday/Thursday), Everything Everywhere All at Once, The Fabelmans (no show Thursday), Aftersun (Saturday/Sunday), The Banshees of Inisherin, Puss in Boots (Saturday/Sunday), and Tár. No shows Monday this week.

    The Luna Theater has Close on Friday, The Whale Saturday and Thursday, and all three Oscar shorts programs on Saturday and Sunday. Weirdo Wednesday in between.

    Cinema Salem is open through Monday with the Oscar Shorts, Scream VI, The Quiet GIrl, and Champions. The Sting plays Saturday & Sunday afternoons, and VideoCoven has a double feature of the first two Slumber Party Massacre movies on Thursday.
  • For those still not ready to join random people in a room for two hours, theater rentals are available at Kendall Square, West Newton, the Capitol and Somerville, The Venue, CinemaSalem, and many of the multiplexes.
Still got some Oscar Shorts to catch up on, along with The Quiet Girl and Return to Seoul. I'm also looking forward to 64 and Unwelcome, and may try to do Skinamarink and Hou Hsiao-Hsien at the Brattle.

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