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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A Cambodian album cover featuring Pen Ran and Meas Saman. (DTIF Cambodia)Last month, the AFI hosted a once-in-a-lifetime film and concert program featuring some of the musicians documented in this excellent film about Cambodian rock stars. While you missed your chance to have your picture taken with guitarist Mol Kamach, this weekend the AFI gives you another chance to catch one of the year’s best movies. In my Spectrum Culture review of the film, I wrote that the director interviewed “some of the surviving musicians of the era. In this film, being a survivor isn’t just a platitude about living through rock ‘n’ roll decadence. These men and women survived a more chilling reality: they’re the ones who weren’t killed … Don’t Think I’ve Forgotten is more than a music documentary. It preserves the memory of musicians who paid the ultimate price for making people dance.” Read the rest of my review here—and don’t miss this movie.
Watch the trailer.
Friday, May 29-Thursday, June 4 at the AFI Silver.
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Julie Adams and friend.The Creature from the Black Lagoon
You can’t throw Goobers in a first-run multiplex anymore without hitting a 3D blockbuster. While there are good 3D movies in current release, this weekend the AFI celebrates Adventures in 3D with director Jack Arnold’s classic monster movie from 1954. Shapely star Julie Adams, who went on to a long career that included an irregular stint on Murder, She Wrote, will appear at the May 30 show to sign copies of her memoir, The Lucky Southern Star: Reflections from the Black Lagoon. The Saturday night screening will also be introduced by shapely film historian Foster Hirsch. Note: this will be a DCP presentation.
Watch the trailer.
Saturday, May 30 at 7:30 p.m. (with appearances by Julle Adams and Foster Hirsch) and Tuesday, June 2 (with no special guests) at the AFI Silver.
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H.R. Giger and Müggi III. Photo Courtesy of Icarus Films Dark Star: H. R. Giger’s World
H.R. Giger’s Mother; H.R. Giger, Jazz Pianist; The Tattooed Fans of H.R. Giger; A Very Special Episode of Hoarders. Director Belinda Sallin’s oddly unengaging documentary glosses over any number of points that could have given more traction to her portrait of the artist as a dying man (Giger passed away soon after shooting ended). His dark, distinct visual style may not be to everybody’s taste, but his work would seem to be ripe for a psychological drama that eludes Sallin. Part of the problem is Giger himself, who’s known for hiding in the nooks and crannies of his hoarded house. The artist is not a natural raconteur, his reticence perhaps affected by his health—it often seems that it physically pains him to speak. The film also curiously skips over his involvement with Alejandro Jodorowsky’s ill-fated Dune project, the subject of an excellent documentary in which Giger appeared. The oversight makes it appear that Hollywood called Giger out of the blue to design the iconic creature for Alien, but more than one member of Alien‘s design team came from a fabled project that Dark Star doesn’t even mention in passing. Maybe the producers wanted to avoid comparisons with a much more engaging storyteller and a much more rewarding film. Giger’s inimitable aesthetic is the stuff of nightmares, but it takes more than strong design to make a good film.
Watch the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at Landmark E Street Cinema.
The Freer’s annual Korean Film Festival showcases the work of irreverent director Jang Jin, who will appear at this weekend’s screenings. The gallery writes that Jin, “has made a career of cleverly subverting genre movie tropes, and Man on High Heels is no exception. He blends explosive action scenes with sly humor in this send-up of the Korean gangster movie genre. Cha Seung-won plays a macho homicide detective so tough he can defeat a roomful of gangsters with his bare hands and emerge without a scratch. But he has one secret: He’s a woman trapped in a man’s body and is preparing to get a longed-for sex change operation when a ruthless gang comes seeking revenge.” The Freer will be screening two other Jang Jin films this weekend, We are Brothers (May 30 at 2 p.m.) and Quiz Show Scandal (May 31 at 2 p.m.). Note that the AFI will be showing a 35mm print of We are Brothers on June 1 and 3 as part of their Korean Film Festival offerings, but this weekend’s programs at the Freer will be screened in digital formats.
Watch the trailer.
Friday, May 29 at 7 p.m. at the Freer. Free.
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William Klein is primarily known as a street photographer, but he also made a series of feature films in the ’60s and ’70s. Next week the Washington Psychotronic Film Society offer’s Klein’s 1969 satire about a patriotic superhero who attacks anyone who doesn’t agree with him. Starring Delphine Seyrig (Last Year at Marienbad) and Donald Pleasance.
Watch a clip.
Monday, June 1 at 8 p.m. at Acre 121, 1400 Irving Street NW.
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Also opening this weekend, two highly entertaining movies about real and fictional thrills: Sunshine Superman, a documentary about BASE jumper/filmmaker Carl Boenish; and rescue team divorcee Dwayne Johnson saves his family from the worst earthquake in recorded history in San Andreas. We’ll have full reviews tomorrow.
