Next Week in Tickets: Films playing Boston 4 October 2024 - 10 October 2024

It's kind of nice to have a couple movies you don't care about come out when you're a little bit behind and coveting the rep stuff

• Joker: Foile à Deux is that big opening film, with Lady Gaga joining Joaquin Phoenix as the Harley to his Joker as they do musical numbers ahead of the trial for all the mayhem that closed the previews film. It's at the Capitol, Fresh Pond, Jordan's Furniture (Imax), West Newton, CinemaSalem, Boston Common (including Dolby Cinema & Spanish subtitled shows), Causeway Street, Kendall Square, the Seaport, South Bay (including Imax Xenon & Dolby Cinema), Assembly Row (including Imax Laser & Dolby Cinema), Arsenal Yards (including CWX), and Chestnut Hill.
  
  Also opening is oddity White Bird, a spin-off of Wonder that has a secondary character from that film learning of his grandmother's escape from occupied France during World War II; it has apparently been sitting on a shelf for a couple of years but plays West Newton, Boston Common, and Assembly Row.
  
  Saturday Night, chronicling the lead-up to the first episode of Saturday Night Live opens at Boston Common this week and will expand to Causeway Street, Kendall Square, the Seaport, South Bay, Assembly Row, Arsenal Yards, Chestnut Hill next week.
  
  Monster Summer, a spooky adventure with Mason Thames as a teenager whose friends try to save their island town from some paranormal incursion, plays Fresh Pond, Boston Common, South Bay. Supporting cast includes Lorraine Bracco, Kevin James, and Mel Gibson.
  
  Three different movies grabbing kind-of-crappy showtimes at Fresh Pond to say they've played Boston: Aussie animated film Scarygirl also has a kid trying to save her island home, although she's a half-octopus mutant in this case. Goebbels and the Führer actually seems to have some pedigree, as the German film cuts between dramatizations and documentary interviews of survivors. And The Problem with People features Paul Reiser and Colm Meaney as cousins from opposite sides of the Atlantic meeting in Ireland to try to bury a generations-long family feud.
  
  Furious 7 plays Boston Common as part of Latino Heritage month.
  
  There's an early screening of We Live in Time on Saturday with a livestreamed Q&A featuring Florence Pugh & Andrew Garfield, who seem to be pretty good interviews, at Kendall Square, the Seaport, and Assembly Row. AMC theaters at Boston Common, Causeway Street, Assembly Row have a "Screen Unseen" preview on Monday. Mean Girls has a 20th anniversary encore at South Bay and Arsenal Yards on Sunday. Boston Common has Insidious: Chapter 2 on Wednesday. There are double features of Terrifier 2 & Terrifier 3 at Boston Common, Causeway Street, and South Bay on Thursday to mark the latter opening
• Documentary Blink, in which a family whose children are facing the rapid deterioration of their eyesight decides to take a trip around the world to make sure they see everything they can, plays Landmark Kendall Square, Boston Common, Arsenal Yards. Also opening at the Kendall, the Capitol, Boston Common, South Bay is The Outrun, with Saoirse Ronan as a young woman returning to Scotland's Orkney Islands after crashing in London.
  
  The Kendall also has a pre-recorded Q&A with Sam Mendes after Tuesday's Retro Replay screening of American Beauty. On Wednesday, they have documentary Daytime Revolution, which looks at the week John Lennon & Yoko Ono took over the Mike Douglas show, and Fright Night Retro Replay Deep Blue Sea.
• Indian imports at Apple Fresh Pond opening Friday are Telugu-language Swag and Malayalam-language comedy Thekku Vadakku. Marathi-language comedy Navra Maza Navsacha 2 plays Saturday afternoon. The new Superstar Rajinikanth action/crime movie, Vettaiyan, opens Wednesday with Tamil and Telugu showtimes at Fresh Pond and Tamil shows at Boston Common.
  
  Held over are Telugu adventure, Devara Part 1 (at Fresh Pond and Boston Common), Tamil-language family drama Meiyazhagan, and Tamil comedy Lubber Pandhu.
  
  Chinese thriller Tiger Wolf Rabbit opens at Causeway Street.
  
  Anime Look Back has an unusual release, with full slates at the Coolidge, Boston Common, the Capitol, and Assembly Row (the latter two with one show daily) on Sunday and Monday; it's an hour-long featurette about two rival teenage comic artists who become friends. There are fewer shows for rock & roll comedy Bocchi the Rock!, which plays Sunday to Tuesday at Boston Common, South Bay, and Assembly Row. And there's an "AXCN Gundam Fest" encore of Mobile Suit Gundam subtitled at Boston Common, South Bay, Assembly Row on Sunday.
  
  Korean cop thriller I, The Executioner (aka Veteran 2) continues at Causeway Street.
  
  Thai comedy How to Make Millions Before Grandma Dies continues at Causeway Street.
• The Coolidge Corner Theatre picks up Lee in the smaller rooms. They also have three screenings of Pulp Fiction on a new 35mm print on Sunday afternoon and Wednesday & Thursday evenings.
  
  For midnights, Fridays during October will be The Texas Chain Saw Massacre on Fridays, while the other screen ties in with the Brattle's Corman series, in this case The Pit and the Pendulum. Saturdays are less themed; this week's is The Omen '76. There's also a Science on Screen show of The Babadook on Monday, "Schlock and Awe presentations of House on Haunted Hill (in Emergo!) on Tuesday and Matinee on 35mm Thursday. There's also Open Screen on Tuesday.
• In addition to picking up A Different Man, The Somerville Theatre starts their Halloween programming by booking The Forest Hills through Monday; the indie horror film features supporting turns by Dee Wallace, Edward Furlong, and Shelley Duvall, whose cameo is her final role and her first in 20 years. For those wanting more of Duvall, isolation, and horror, they have The Shining at midnight Saturday. The week's "Bit of Hitch" shows are Rear Window Tuesday and The Birds on Thursday, both on 35mm film.
  
  The Capitol has their first Creature Double Feature of Spooky Season on Thursday, with the Boris Karloff version of The Mummy and Claude Rains as The Phantom of the Opera.
• The Brattle Theatre has Six Films by Jan Egleson this weekend, including his "Boston trilogy", with the filmmaker in person for many if not all shows. The films are Billy in the Lowlands (Friday/Saturday), The Little Sister (Saturday), The Blue Diner (Saturday/Sunday), The Dark End of the Street (Saturday), Big Time (Saturday), and Lemon Sky (Sunday).
  
  Also showing this weekend are two anniversary re-releases that are coming around for a second round: Shaun of the Dead show up in a new 35mm print on Friday afternoon, late Saturday and Sunday, and then all day Monday, while a new 4K restoration of Dazed and Confused plays late Friday.
  
  For the work-week, they have three nights of "Transness in Cinema" tied to the new book by Caden Mark Gardner & Willow Maclay. Tuesday offers a double feature of The Silence of the Lambs - 35mm with the authors on-hand - and T-Blockers; Wednesday pairs Sleepaway Camp & I Saw the TV Glow; and Thursday celebrates Edward D. Wood's 100th by pairing Tim Burton biopic Ed Wood with the director's Bride of the Monster.
• More Melville et Cie at The Harvard Film Archive , with Jules Dassin's Rififi on 35mm film (Friday), Bob le Flambeur (Friday), The Second Wind (Saturday), The Silence of the Sea (35mm Sunday afternoon), and Les enfants terribles (35mm Sunday evening). There's also a Psychedelic Cinema entry on Saturday evening, One Step Away and another new 35mm print made for Japanese studio Shochiku's Centennial, Where Spring Comes Late, which is Yamada Yoji working with the same cast as his first Tora-san movie on a different story. Andrew Gordon and ALex Zahlten will have a post-film conversation.
• The Museum of Fine Arts has Cult Classic The Craft on Friday evening and The Boy and the Heron as part of "Global Cinema Now" on Saturday afternoon..
• The Museum of Science has three free screenings of A Million Miles Away, a documentary on the life of NASA flight engineer José Hernández - from a small village in Mexico to the International Space Station, on Friday and Saturday as part of Hispanic & Latinx Celebration Weekend. Reservations required.
• The Seaport Alamo has the last of the Harry Potter movies that have been all over their schedule with Deathly Hallows Part 2 playing Saturday, Sunday, and Wednesday. Don Coscarelli's original Phantasm plays Monday, and there's a preview of Piece by Piece with a live-streamed Q&A from Pharrell Williams & Morgan Neville on Tuesday.
• Movies at MIT has The Boy and the Heron on Friday and Saturday, $5, open to the public, although the email suggests you give them a head's up if you're not part of the MIT community.
• The Regent Theatre has more screenings of the 2024 edition of Manhattan Short on Friday & Sunday. Sunday also has Music for Mushrooms with pre-film meet-ups with psychedelic advocates and a post-film Q&A with producers Christopher Seward & Lewis Kofsky.
• The Lexington Venue has A Different Man and Lee Friday to Sunday and Wednesday to Thursday. They also have two documentaries: Bob Mackie: Naked Illusion plays Wednesday and 76 Days Adrift on Thursday.
  
  The West Newton Cinema opens Joker 2, White Bird, and Lee, keeping The Wild Robot, The Substance, Between the Temples, Sing Sing, and Inside Out 2. The movie this Wednesday is John Carpenter's They Live, and former Boston Globe/Watch List newsletter critic Ty Burr hosts Rear Window on Thursday.
  
  The Luna Theater shows The Texas Chain Saw Massacre Friday, Saturday, and Sunday; the original Nosferatu synced to Radiohead on Saturday, Sunday, and Thursday; The Front Rom on Saturday; a free presentation of the documentary Gaza hosted by the Lowell DSA on Sunday; and a Weirdo Wednesday show.
  
  Cinema Salem seems to be using fewer screens but more days with Joker 2 and Beetlejuice Beetlejuice Friday to Monday and Wednesday/Thursday (no BB> Thursday). Halloween '78 plays Saturday and Wednesday, Interview with the Vampire plays Sunday, and Blade on Wednesday and Thursday. It's also the start of Universal Monsters season with Creature from the Black Lagoon and Frankenstein onSunday and The Wolf Man on Wednesday.
  
  Wolfs is still going for another week at the Showcase in Dedham.
• Outdoor films on the Joe's Free Films calendar this week are The Craft at the Speedway on Tuesday and Ghostbusters on the Rose Kennedy Greenway for "Fall Fright Nights" on Thursday. They also list three documentaries at Harvard's Tsai auditorium with filmmakers present or video-calling in afterward - Tiananmen on Friday, The Forced Migration of Butterflies Tuesday, and Prime Meridian on Wednesday; Anatomy of a Fall and Four Daughters showing at BU as part of the Albertine Cinematheque French Film Festival on Monday and Wednesday, respectively.

Man, can we trade some Joker showtimes for what's at Fresh Pond to be at reasonable times? No? Fine, then a bunch of Melville, Rear Window, Where Spring Comes Late, and seeing if I can fit in The Outrun, 3D Wild Robot and maybe Tiger Wolf Rabbit