Popcorn & Candy is DCist’s selective and subjective guide to some of the most interesting movies playing around town in the coming week.
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(TriStar Pictures)The Library of Congress’ series The ’80s: The Decade that Musicals Forgot concludes this week with a rare 35mm screening of a 1984 film so universally dismissed that it’s become a nickname for the unnecessary sequel. Read the defense of the film that I wrote for Spectrum Culture here. Presented in association with DCist and Brightest Young Things, hosted by Music Division staff member and DCist’s chief film critic, yours truly. Mary Pickford Theater, third floor of the Library of Congress’ James Madison Building (101 Independence Avenue SE). Doors open 30 minutes before screening. Seating is very limited, but standbys are encouraged to line up starting at 6:30 p.m. In the likely event of a sellout, available seats will be released to standbys five minutes before show time. For information, call (202) 707-5502. Learn more about the Library of Congress’ 2014-15 concert season here.
Watch the trailer.
Friday, January 30 at 7 p.m. at the Mary Pickford Theatre, third floor of the Madison Building, Library of Congress. Free.
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Anne Dorval and Antoine Olivier Pilon (Shayne Laverdière/Roadside Attractions)Xavier Dolan’s nuanced and masterful Mommy exhibits qualities of a seasoned filmmaker experimenting with form. Which makes it all the more impressive, considering Dolan is only in his mid-twenties. The, shot in a 1:1 aspect ratio (it’s annoying at first, but you get used to it and he does it for a reason), is the story of a troubled teen living with his single mother who’s struggling to control her ADHD-addled child and make ends meet. But things ignite when he returns from a juvenile detention center and takes to the neighbor across the street who becomes a pseudo-tutor for him. Mommy is a wonderfully acted mediation on family and adolescence, seeped in a sugary sweet pop culture soundtrack, and Dolan skillfully balances intense drama with deeply felt moments. — Matt Cohen
Watch the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at Landmark Bethesda Row and AMC Loews Shirlington
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“The Dam Keeper”Oscar Nominated Live Action and Animated Shorts
This year’s Oscars will be handed out on February 22, which leaves area cinephiles a precious few weeks to track down every last nominee for their office Oscar pool. While J. K. Simmons might be an easy pick for Best Supporting Actor, only the most dedicated Hollywood trainspotters will be able to pick out the Academy’s favorite nominated shorts. This weekend E Street Landmark opens programs of Oscar Nominated Shorts in the categories of Live Action and Animation (read about West End Cinema’s programs of Oscar Nominated Documentary Shorts below). The Animated program includes the usual Disney ringer (“The Feast,” which potentially taps two can’t miss demographics of dog lovers and foodies), a vignette about a grotesquely-designed woman who can go backward and forward in time via a record player (“A Single Life”), and includes a few shorts that aren’t competing, including the crudely animated and written “Bus Story” and a shoulda-been-a-conteder from the reliable Bill Plympton (“Footprints”). The Live Action program includes, coincidentally, “Boogaloo and Graham,” an Irish look at two boys who adopt a pair of baby chicks; the Israeli-French co-production “Aya,” about a chance encounter at an airport; “Butter Lamp,” a Chinese-French coproduction about a photographer working with Tibetan nomads; the Swiss film “Parvaneh,” about an Afghan immigrant’s encounter with a Swiss punk girl; and “The Phone Call,” probably a lock because it features known entities like Sally Hawkins and Jim Broadbent.
Opens tomorrow at E Street Landmark Cinema.
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“Our Curse”Oscar Nominated Documentary Shorts
Completists who want to see every one of this years Oscar nominees should make time for two programs of Oscar nominated documentary shorts at West End Cinema. Five titles are split into two programs, each of which runs around 80 minutes. Program A includes Polish director Aneta Kopacz’s “Joanna,” which looks at a woman who starts a blog when she finds out she has cancer and has three months to live. Shown with “Crisis Hotline Veterans Press 1,” a look at Veterans Crisis Line counselors, directed by Ellen Goosenberg Kent & Dana Perry. Program B features “Our Curse,” a Polish short directed by Tomasz Sliwinski & Maciej Slesicki about the parents of an infant suffering from the congenital breathing disorder known as Ondine’s curse; “White Earth,” director J. Christian Jensen’s film about an immigrant mother living with her three children in the harsh winter of a North Dakota boom town; and “The Reaper (La Parka),” about a veteran slaughterhouse worker, from Mexican director Gabriel Serra Arguello.
Opens tomorrow at West End Cinema.
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Bending the Rules (aka The Rule of Accident)
The Freer’s 19th annual Iranian Film Festival continues this weekend with director Behnam Behzadi’s first feature film. An amateur theater group is invited to perform outside Iran, but the troupe’s members are reluctant to tell their families where they are going. According to the Freer, the film “paints a vivid, evenhanded portrait of the conflict between young people emboldened by the Green Revolution and an older generation that fears the consequences of rebellion.” Note: the film will be screened in DCP.
Watch the trailer.
Friday, January 30 at 7:00 pm and Sunday, February 1 at 2:00 pm at the Freer. Free.
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Also opening this week, Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan follows his near-mythic masterpiece Once Upon a Time in Anatolia with the domestic drama Winter Sleep. We’ll have a full review tomorrow.
