DCist’s highly subjective and hardly comprehensive guide to the most interesting movies playing around town in the coming week.
There’s a scene early on in The Apartment where Jack Lemmon’s C.C. Baxter is talking to the object of his affection, a certain Miss Kubelik, an elevator operator at his office played by Shirley MacLaine. Baxter reveals that his position at the insurance company they work for allows him access to employee files, and he’s been peeking in Kubelik’s. He rattles off a bunch of personal information about Kubelik, who smiles, surprised and flattered. It’s a scene that should come off, particularly to modern audiences, as kind of creepy and stalkerish, but somehow it doesn’t. Which might be a function of Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond’s effortlessly charming script, or maybe Jack Lemmon’s fantastic performance as the nice guy who always finishes last.
What does come off as creepy are his scummy bosses, led by a never-slimier Fred MacMurry, who take advantage of Baxter’s unassertive nature to use his apartment for their extramarital trysts. Dangling the carrot of career advancement in front of him if he hands over the keys and wielding the stick of the pink slip if he refuses, Baxter’s apartment becomes a regular revolving door of top-floor executives and ditzy mistresses. The movie is, yes, a romance, and also a comedy, but those two words together weren’t always an indicator of cinematic saccharine. In this case there are more than a few bitter pills to go with the sweet laughs, all of which are richly earned. The Apartment is pretty close to a career best for everyone involved here, and considering this crew, that’s saying a lot.
View the trailer.
Monday night at Screen on the Green, on the Mall between 4th and 7th Streets, NW, beginning at dusk.
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Elizabeth Farnsworth, a former correspondent and substitute anchor on the News Hour with Jim Lehrer, has been deeply involved in covering events in Chile for many years now. With producing partners Patricio Leverton and Richard Pearce, she has put together a new documentary for PBS on the prosecution of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet by judge (and former supporter) Juan Guzmán. While this might sound like a courtroom documentary, in Chile judges don’t just try cases, they investigate and prosecute them as well. Guzmán gave the filmmakers a great deal of access to his investigative materials, and using them they’ve made a film that examines not only how Pinochet got away with his regime for so long, but also how he remained so popular with so many during that time. The documentary premieres on PBS on August 19, but is currently traveling to a number of cities, roadshow style, in advance of the television premiere. The film’s first public showing in D.C. takes place next week.
View the trailer.
One night only, Wednesday, August 6 at 8 p.m. at the Avalon.
