DCist's highly subjective and hardly comprehensive guide to the most interesting movies playing around town in the coming week.

Strait-Jacket

You know what's missing from the modern cinema? Middle aged women who can play good old-fashioned, over-the-top, campy batshit insane. Where are the Bette Davises and Joan Crawfords for the 21st Century? Must we really wait 30 years for Lindsay Lohan and Britney Spears to star in a remake of What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?. Actually, the way those two are aging themselves, ten years might do the trick. But maybe there's a simpler reasoning for the absence of the mentally unbalanced grande dame: no one's ever going to do crazy better than Crawford. And few roles highlighted her wild-eyed madness better than Strait-Jacket, in which she plays a jilted wife who lops off the heads of her husband and his lover when she catches them in flagrante. Twenty years of reformation later, she's released just as her daughter is about to get married. While her doctors seem to think she's fine, she barely holds it together as she tries to assimilate back into normal life. Of course, Crawford couldn't assimilate into normal life in reality, let alone in the movies, so it should come as no surprise that heads start rolling again.

The Hillwood Museum's Divas Outdoors series is screening some great flicks on the lawn this summer, and the screenings come with contests, prizes, and considering the diva in question tomorrow, probably some fabulous Joan Crawford-inspired drag tomorrow night.

View the trailer.
Tomorrow night at the Hillwood Museum and Gardens. Doors open at 6 p.m., activities at 7:30, and movies at sundown. Movies included in price of admission to Hillwood, $15 for adults, $10 for kids 6-18. Reservations required, call (202) 686-5807.

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Green Hair, Grey Hair

Mark Anderson may not be in a band, but for 20+ years he's been as vital a part of the D.C. punk community as any of the more instantly recognizable names from Dischord or DeSoto. In addition to co-authoring one of the definitive books chronicling the D.C. scene, Anderson also co-founded Positive Force D.C., an activist organization that has been doing good work in the community here for 23 years and has always been closely aligned and intertwined with the city's music. Anderson's latest project is the We Are Family Senior Outreach Network, an organization devoted to bringing assistance to many of the area's low income senior citizens. Many of the volunteers who provide this assistance come from D.C.'s punk community, and at WAF's fundraising event next Wednesday evening (which also serves as Positive Force's 23rd anniversary), a documentary titled Green Hair, Grey Hair will be part of the festivities. The documentary chronicles the relationships that form between the young punks who volunteer with WAF, and the elderly city residents they work with.

Screens Wednesday, June 18 as part of We Are Family Senior Outreach Network's fundraiser, which runs from 6:30-8:30 p.m. at the Gala Theatre in Tivoli Square, 3333 14th Street NW in Columbia Heights. Wine and hors d'oeuvres will be served. Suggested donation is $25, but the organization's press release indicates that "no-one turned away for lack of funds."

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Kung-fu Cinema: Masters of Shaolin

Kung fu films have long been popular in the west. According to genre expert Craig Reid, who we interviewed yesterday, they've become even more popular here than in their country of origin. Their reach is far, and in some cases unexpected. If it's difficult to imagine the direction hip hop took in the 90s if the Wu-Tang Clan hadn't come on the scene, it's even harder to imagine the Wu without the grounding of their sound and their words in kung fu cinema. This weekend, as part of their exhibit on the Shaolin Temple, National Geographic screens three of the best loved films from the legendary Shaw Brothers studio about the temple and the Shaolin monks, including one (36 Chambers of the Shaolin) that the New York Times rates as the best kung fu flick of all time. It's a rare opportunity to catch these films on a big screen, where the intricate fight choreography that defines the genre will seem even larger than life. The films will be introduced by Craig Reid.

View the Shaolin Temple trailer.
Saturday starting at 1:30 p.m. at the National Geographic Society's Grosvenor Auditorium, 1600 M Street NW. Tickets $6 for a single film, $12 for all three.

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Vinyl Scrapyard

Are these really the end days for the brick and mortar record store? After all, the complete demise of vinyl was predicted decades ago, only to see a resurgence in recent years. But whether tangible and cumbersome delivery methods for music can muster the rise of a completely digital distribution system remains to be seen. Tucson artist/writer Billups Allen, who used to call D.C. home, has made a short documentary about the rise and fall of the independent record shop. And who better to tell the story than those who love to hear themselves talk anyway: record store clerks (full disclosure: I did a decade behind record store counters myself). Allen talks to clerks in Tucson, Memphis, and right here in D.C., and is sure to be a nostalgia ride for anyone who's ever enjoyed wandering the aisles of the neighborhood record emporium.

Tonight only at 7 p.m. at Smash! Records in Adams Morgan, 2314 18th Street, NW. Free.

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Ballou

As D.C. residents, we're no stranger to seeing our city in the movies. Or at least, streets that are supposed to be our city, but are often Toronto or Baltimore or some other city with better tax credits for big budget movies. Plus, the movies are usually about intrigue in the White House, or spies, or just about anything that takes place in the tiny piece of D.C. that the Rand McNally Road Atlas chooses to enlarge as an inset. Ballou is a film that looks at the real lives of District residents who aren't in the secret service and who don't walk the corridors of power: the marching band at Ballou High School in Anacostia. Ballou's music program has long been a standout in D.C. public schools (though that's not necessarily saying much considering that a lot of D.C. schools don't even have music programs), and often competes with schools all over the country. Michael Patrei's documentary follows the kids as they compete in just such a national competition, with commentary from local and African American leaders and luminaries from Mayor Fenty to Jesse Jackson to Chuck Brown.

View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at E Street Cinema for one week only.

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The Incredible Hulk

Marvel is doing their best to forget about the failure of Ang Lee's well-intentioned, but deeply flawed big-screen adaptation of the funny books' big green smashing machine. Hot on the heels of their huge success with Iron Man comes the second film from the company since their transition into a full-fledged movie studio. The series does a partial reboot: new director (The Transporter's Louis Leterrier), new leads (Ed Norton as Dr. Banner, Liv Tyler as Betty), but rather than giving another go at an origin story, producers made the decision to ditch all the exposition and get to the action. Which apparently includes a final battle scene that occupies fully a quarter of the film's relatively lean sub-two hour running time. Hopefully this doesn't mean that they'll sacrifice the story and character elements that made Iron Man such a crowd pleaser, but with perfectionist Norton rumored to be "suggesting" a lot of script elements, chances are good it won't just be mindless action. And for those who just can't get enough of Robert Downey, Jr. as Tony Stark, good news: the billionaire industrialist has a small part, as Marvel injects into their movies the kinds of character crossovers that are commonplace in print.

View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow pretty much everywhere.

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And don't forget that SILVERDOCS kicks off next week on Monday. D.C.'s highest profile film festival runs until June 23, and we'll be covering the festival more in depth next week.