DCist’s highly subjective, thoroughly uncomprehensive guide to the most Napoleonic, titillating movies playing around town in the coming week.
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Askel Hennie in HEADHUNTERS, a Magnet Release. Photo courtesy of Magnet Releasing.What it is: Napoleon complex and the art world meet in this bloody Norwegian thriller.
Why you want to see it: Roger Brown is ordinary in name and stature, and freely admits his tall blonde wife is just one way of compensating for his shortcomings. He lives far beyond the means of his 5’ 6” frame with the help of his career as an art thief (and his wife’s as a gallery owner), but he meets his match with the mercenary Clas Greve (Game of Thrones’ Jaime Lannister). Based on a novel by Jo Nesbø, director Morton Tyldum weaves a conventional thriller but takes strange turns that come off like a crime drama written by Boccaccio. Aksel Hennie’s performance develops from banal to vulnerable, overcoming his uncanny resemblance to the love child of Christopher Walken and Rob Schneider. Naturally, an American version is in the works, and If anybody ever wanted to give Adam Sandler a crack at tortured action hero, here’s your chance.
View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at E Street.
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Miss Joule. Courtesy of DC Shorts.What it is: “Short and Sexy Films from the DC Shorts Film Festival and Burlesque from Tilted Torch All in One Night”
Why you want to see it: The DC Short Films Festival teams up with DC variety show Tilted Torch for an evening of multi-dimensional entertainment for brief attention spans. Risque titles like “The Unicorn” and “Hand solo” from the archives of the DC Shorts festival will be accompanied by Washington’s best burlesque artistsm including Miss Joule, Maria Bella and Stella Sweet. Thrill to the incendiary terpsichore and laffs guaranteed by sideshow performers Malibu, Na’la and Cheeky Monkey Sideshow founder Swami YoMahmi, hosted by Staxx Burly-Q Revue producer Shortstaxx.
Friday, May 11, 2012 at 7:00 pm and 9:30 pm and Saturday, May 12, 2012 at 7:00 pm, 9:30 pm, and midnight. Atlas Performing Arts Center. $20 – purchase tickets here.
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Anne Arundel County resident Rebecca Houseknecht in FIRST POSITION, directed by Bess Kargman. Photo Credit: Bess Kargman. A Sundance Selects ReleaseWhat it is: The highly competitive world of ballet.
Why you want to see it: Director Bess Kargman followed six young dancers competing in the Youth America Grand Prix, putting them in the eyes of ballet professionals who could make or break their career. The stories range from an eleven year old military brat trying to ignore teasing and stereotypes, to a young woman who was caught in the Sierra Leone Civil War, to a blonde self-proclaimed Barbie who hails from Anne Arundel County. Talent and narrative interest vary, and it’s all tied together by an unfortunately slick score that sounds like a bombastic game show countdown. If that’s supposed to convey the intense feeling of competition, so be it, but it suggests that spectacle and drama is more important than the human interest that make these young people compelling to audiences beyond the ballet crowd.
View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at Bethesda Row.
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What it is: Ur-swashbuckler Douglas Fairbanks closes out The Alden’s
silent movie series.
Why you want to see it: The Artist‘s Jean Dujardin namechecked Fairbanks in his Oscar acceptance speech, and this is the silent icon’s favorite movie. Sarah Schallern., the Alden’s Performing Arts Director, write that the film is “loosely adapted from One Thousand and One Nights, the film tells the story of a thief who falls in love with the daughter of the Caliph of Bagdad. The film is full of gymnastic stunts that show off the star’s athleticism and acrobatic skill, as well as gorgeous Arabian-style sets and special effects with a Middle Eastern flair, including flying carpets, magic ropes and fearsome monsters.” Shown in a 16mm print with live accompaniment by Ben Model, with an introduction and Q&A by film historian and preservationist Bruce Lawton.
View the trailer.
Wednesday, May 16 at 8 pm at the McClean Community Center’s Alden Theater,
1234 Ingleside Avenue, McLean VA. $10.
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What it is: Smug, self-righteous crap.
Why you want to see it: Misanthropic auteur Bobcat Goldthwait wrote and directed this brutal, anvil-handed survey of What is Wrong with America, taking on the easy targets of reality tv, mindless water cooler conversation, entitlement, bigotry — name it, he hates it. Frank (Joel Murray, Mad Men‘s Freddy Rumsen) dreams about killing everybody he hates, but his fantasies turn into reality, and he takes in a teenage partner (Tara Lynne Barr) for a nihilistic crime spree. The buzz around Goldthwait’s fourth time as director is that it’s “dark” and “edgy,” but his response to hatred is simply more hate. One of his characters has the nerve to say “If you got it, you wouldn’t be offended.” I hate most of the things Freddy/Bobcat hates, and you probably do too. But that doesn’t magically transform the relentless whining, the offensively brutal act in the film’s opening minutes, and the horrifying violence, into a good movie. Go ahead, tell me it’s satire. Make my day.
View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at West End Cinema.
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Also opening this week: the mesmerizing Turkish police procedural Once Upon a Time in Anatolia; and Tim Burton’s adpatation of the beloved Gothic soap opera, Dark Shadows. We’ll have full reviews tomorrow.
