DCist’s highly subjective and hardly comprehensive guide to the most interesting movies playing around town in the coming week. Ed. Note: Apologies for the slightly abbreviated format for this week’s column, but your humble film critic is filing in between snowboard runs out west in the Sierras, at a ski village that he was perhaps a little too excited to discover had its own cinema.
What it is: The story of a high school wrestling coach working the angles to score a financial windfall for his family and a winning team for the high school wrestling squad he’s coaching.
Why you want to see it: Director Thomas McCarthy’s track record with deadpan dramatic comedies is stellar (The Station Agent, The Visitor), Paul Giamatti is rarely anything short of magnificent no matter what he’s in these days, and the reviews are looking just as good as one might expect from a collaboration between the two.
View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at Bethesda Row.
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I. M. Pei: Building China Modern
What it is: A documentary about I.M. Pei designing a new museum for a 2,500-year-old Chinese village.
Why you want to see it: The work of Pei may be familiar, but only from the finished structures. The film provides a rare glimpse inside the creative process of a renowned architect.
Saturday at 2 p.m. at the National Gallery of Art, presented in conjunction with the Environmental Film Festival.
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What it is: D.C.’s biggest film festival, in terms of the number of films and number of venues. We talked about it a couple of weeks back as it was getting underway.
Why you want to see it: The festival ends this weekend, but there are still plenty of films left on the slate worth checking out before it’s done for the year.
Through Sunday at venues throughout the city. Check the schedule for complete details.
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Katherine Graham Double Feature
What it is: The Portrait Gallery’s “Reel Portraits” series lands on former Washington Post publisher Katherine Graham, with two classic films about journalism (His Girl Friday and All the President’s Men), the latter of which details events that happened under her watch at the Post. A discussion of Graham and of journalism in film follows.
Why you want to see it: Cary Grant, Rosaline Russell, Robert Redford, Dustin Hoffman. Enough said. Oh, and also, it’s free.
View the trailers for His Girl Friday and All the President’s Men.
Sunday at 1 p.m. at the National Portrait Gallery. Free.
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What it is: A documentary on the iconic New York Times fashion photographer known for celebrating everyday fashion.
Why you want to see it: We’ve covered this film here a couple of times before for one-off and festival screenings, but this marks it’s first actual theatrical run in D.C., and the first chance for a lot of people to see it. It’s simple, effective, and in the end, poignant. You can read my full review over at NPR.
View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at E Street.
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What it is: The latest action fantasy and excuse for gratuitous use of slow motion from 300 and Watchmen director Zack Snyder, this one is the first film he’s done that isn’t based on someone else’s film/book. The story follows a group of institutionalized young women who retreat into a fantasy world where they engage in epic battles as they try to plot their escape in real life.
Why you want to see it: Because it’s been a long week, and you just want to sit back, watch stuff blow up and be entertained. Snyder’s “go big or go home” attitude to action filmmaking is almost laughably overdramatic, without an actual sucker punch in his telegraphed arsenal. But as visually stylized eye candy, it’s a decent diversion.
View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow all over the place.
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Also opening tomorrow: a pair of phenomenal foreign films from two of the biggest names in world cinema. One is the latest from Thai phenom Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes last year. The other is the latest from Iranian legend Abbas Kiarostami, Certified Copy, his first narrative feature in nearly a decade and his first film made in Europe. We’ll have full length reviews of both tomorrow.
