Filmgoing isn't a passive exercise. It feels like it is—you're just sitting there—but every ass in a theater seat is a vote that tells filmmakers, financiers, distributors, and theater owners know what they should be doing more of. That's why we're heading into our fifth Transformers, and why Terry Gilliam's fantastic latest, The Zero Theorem, is only playing at one theater in Portland and one theater in Vancouver.
Ned Lannamann reviewed The Zero Theorem for the Mercury when it came out via VOD in September, but Gilliam's spiritual successor to Brazil is a movie that demands to be seen on the big screen, big and bright and in the distraction-free silent darkness of a decent theater. Go see it this weekend. You'll be voting with your ass; more importantly, you'll be seeing a hell of a movie.
(Recommended post-film listening: This excellent conversation between Gilliam and Rian Johnson, the director of Brick, The Brothers Bloom, Looper, and something called Star Wars. Here's part one and here's part two; it's one of the best things I've listened to in a long time.)
OH YEAH, and some other movies came out today too:
Tusk is the latest from Kevin Smith. Andrew Wright says it's very... Kevin Smith-y:
As the momentum falters, the filler piles up—including multiple hockey references, extended cameos from the stars of Smith's next film, Yoga Hosers (including Smith's daughter), and an interminable monologue by highly publicized secret guest celebrity Johnny Depp that may, perhaps, be the single most self-indulgent thing that either Depp or Smith have ever been involved with.
This Is Where I Leave You stars Tina Fey, Jason Bateman, Tami Taylor, Jane Fonda, and Raylan Givens! Wow! Alas, it's directed by the guy who did Night at the Museum and Real Steel. Elinor Jones did not care for it:
It is, as one brilliant twitterer pointed out, a film dreamcast by Tumblr; it's also a Garden State for 40-year-olds.
The Maze Runner is the latest cranked-out YA movie; Marjorie says it's relentlessly, thrillingly adequate. Look for her quote on the film's poster!
The latest adaptation of a post-apocalyptic young-adult novel, The Maze Runner is serviceable if not game changing.
The Hollywood's Noir City series runs through Sunday, and Ben Coleman has the rundown on what to see:
The gem in the crown is 1946's Three Strangers (screens Sat Sept 20), which began life as a sequel to The Maltese Falcon but evolved into a proto-Coen brothers crime comedy (while retaining Peter Lorre and Sydney Greenstreet). In a festival full of dangerous dames, Geraldine Fitzgerald comes away with the most delightfully vicious performance.
The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby is a very long, very boring movie that the heroic Charles Mudede sat through the entirety of:
What the film indicates is that this class of white Americans just might not have any more stories to tell. Why? Possibly because it's a class that has no real problems, no real challenges, no real passions. The super rich at least have the problem of how to make life miserable for the rest of humanity. The poor have the big problem of being poor. The middle class have the problem of debt. The upper class are just there. They have nothing to worry about.
Starring Liam Neeson, A Walk Between the Tombstones is the latest from the perennially underrated Scott Frank. Andrew Wright says it's pretty great:
Amid the gumshoed masses of fictional detectives, author Lawrence Block's Matt Scudder looms large and wounded, an unlicensed private eye who continually takes the weight of the world on his shoulders in an attempt to quiet his inner demons. Adapting the 10th book in Block's Scudder series, A Walk Among the Tombstones nails the mournful cynicism of the source material. If the sight of a man in a trenchcoat doggedly chasing down leads dings your particular pleasure centers, get to the theater as soon as you can.
We've got even more reviews in our Film Shorts section, and here are your Movie Times. As ever, choose your films wisely; there's always the possibility you might unexpectedly die tomorrow in some kind of horrific manner.
