DCist’s highly subjective and selective guide to some of the most interesting movies playing around town in the coming week.
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Tye Sheridan, Matthew McConaughey, and Jacob Lofland (James Bridges/Roadside Attractions)Noble menfolk are stymied time and again by unreliable women in the new film by Jeff Nichols. Mud is a coming of age story set on an Arkansas stretch of the mythical Mississippi River, where 14-yr old Ellis (Tree of Life’s Tye Sheridan) and Neckbone (Jacob Lofland) explore a deserted island and discover a speed boat caught up in a tree and the titular dirty hero. Matthew McConaughey is at his unwashed best as he continues to take the kinds of roles Robert Mitchum might have, but Nichols, who last directed Take Shelter, can’t shape full performances out of the young actors who lead the expedition. And it’s astonishing how much a supposed indie production shortchanges women. Like a Boyz n the Hood on the Mississippi, most of the evil visited upon the film’s central characters comes as the result of a cheating lover or an uncaring mother, while Men Who Have Killed get to be all mythical. Mud has the feel of a 1970s indie, its muted palette looking lovely on the 35-millimeter print the West End Cinema will be showing. As rare as commercial 35-millimeter prints are these days, I wish I could just recommend it on that account. Then again, I’ve seen many movies much worse than Mud this year, so go see it if you like McConaughey and don’t mind a movie whose idea of a developed female character is heartless white trash Juniper (Reese Witherspoon).
View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at West End Cinema (the only venue in city limits showing a 35mm print), Angelika Mosaic, and selected Regal and AMC theaters.
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Keanu Reeves and David Lynch are excellent to each other Side by Side: The Science, Art, and Impact of Digital Cinematography
I’ve lamented frequently in these parts about the increasing rarity of the 35mm film experience in area theaters. Local chains have all gone to the digital side, with rare exceptions like E Street’s Studio Ghibli series, which screened 35mm prints on weekend matinees. Major studios are about to do away with celluloid distribution altogether, independent outposts like the Avalon are faced with the daunting and expensive task of converting to digital. On its 90th anniversary (and their 10th anniversary as a non-profit), the Avalon ironically hosts a screening of Side by Side, a documentary that lays out technical advances in digital film making. Keanu Reeves produced the documentary, which features interviews with directors like James Cameron, David Fincher, David Lynch, Robert Rodriguez and Martin Scorsese. But the real education comes from technicians from every stage of the movie making process: Reeves talks to cinematographers (like legendary Apocalypse Now DP Vittorio Storaro), editors, and color timers, to give a full look at what digital processes gain and what they lose. The game seems to be over, despite the impassioned cries of contrary directors like Christopher Nolan, who’d like nothing more than to continue shooting on film. This one-time only screening will be followed by a panel discussion with Washington Post film critic Ann Hornaday, local documentary filmmakers Sean and Andrea Nix Fine (whose film “Inocente” won the 2013 Oscar for Best Documentary Short), and Ed Arentz, Managing Director of Music Box Films.
View the trailer.
Sunday at 6:30 at the Avalon. Screening and discussion, $50.
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(IFC)Malcolm (Ty Hickson) and Sofia (Tashiana Washington) are a pair of Bronx graffiti artists whose latest bomb is sprayed over by a rival gang. They hatch a plan to tag the Big Apple sign that shows up at Shea Stadium whenever the Mets hit a home run. This low-budget Sundance indie won the Grand Jury prize for Best Narrative Feature at South by Southwest last year, and is the kind of scruffy, well-meaning indie movie that critics like to hug. But energy can’t make up for writing that sounds completely unconvincing.
View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at Landmark E Street Cinema
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Cohen MediaA daughter who doesn’t know her mother learns the bullfighting art of her father and evil stepmother and runs away with dwarves. The third retelling of Snow White in the past year takes a novel approach to the fairy tale: Set in 1920s Spain, this is a silent movie. Director Pablo Berger painted an uncanny retro picture with his 2003 film Torremolinos 73, and from the trailer it looks like he gets the tonal quality and spirit of silent movies much better than The Artist did, if not as well as Guy Maddin.
View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at Landmark E Street Cinema
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(Joss Barratt/Sundance Selects)Twenty-something Robbie (Paul Brannigan) has responsibilities: Three hundred hours of community service and a new baby. His girlfriend’s father offers to pay Robbie to leave Glasgow, but when he finds he has a natural connoisseur’s taste for Scotch whiskey, there may be another way out of poverty. Director Ken Loach is best known for social realist dramas like The Wind that Shakes the Barley and Kes. The Angels Share , named for that portion of spirits that are lost to evaporation, promises to be more of a crowd-pleaser than one expects from a Loach film. Whether that makes you more or less likely to see it probably depends on how you feel about Loach and whiskey.
View the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at Landmark E Street
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Also opening this week Michael Bay’s lurid Miami crime caper Pain & Gain. We’ll have a full review tomorrow.
