Popcorn & Candy is DCist’s selective and subjective guide to some of the most interesting movies playing around town in the coming week.
JR (top) and Agnes Varda (Cohen Media Group)
In this endearing and unlikely collaboration, 89-year old director Agnès Varda (Cleo from 5 to 7), one of the leading figures of the French New Wave, teams up with 33-year old French photographer and muralist JR for a free-wheeling road trip—and a movie, which the pair co-directed. Varda and JR set out on their trip with only a vague intention to focus on “visages et villages,” traveling around the countryside in a mobile photo-booth with a built-in large format printer. The results of this multi-generational project are often whimsical and sometimes profound, as a beachfront paste-up of Varda’s friend, the late photographer Guy Bourdin, is quickly washed away at high tide, confirming the ephemeral nature of life and art. What could be a mere human-interest story inflated to feature length becomes a quaint affirmation of life in all its forms, and for Varda, a youthful openness that has never subsided.
Watch the trailer.
Opens tomorrow at Landmark Bethesda Row
Lee Marvin (Offscreen)
Tough guy Walker (Lee Marvin) is left for dead, which is bad news for every member of the criminal organization that owes him money. It’s the simplest of neo-noir plots, built with exquisite wide-screen style by director John Boorman and cinematographer Philip Lathrop, whose compositions demand to be seen on the big screen. Boorman famously stated that he “wanted an empty, sterile world, for which Los Angeles was absolutely right.” As part of Noir City DC, the AFI Silver celebrates the 50th anniversary of this hard-boiled classic.Film Noir Foundation founder Eddie Muller will introduce the October 21 screening. While Point Blank will be a digital presentation, two Noir City screenings next week will feature 35mm prints: the 1965 Alain Delon drama Any Number Can Win (October 21 at 2:45 p.m. shown on a double bill with a digital presentation of the Delon-Ann-Margaret heist movie Once a Thief); and Jonathan Glazer’s 2000 thriller Sexy Beast (October 21 at 7:30 p.m.).
Watch the trailer for Point Blank.
Saturday, October 21, Monday and Tuesday, October 23-24, and Thursday, October 26 at the AFI Silver.
Hedy Lamarr (National Film Archive, Prague)
The National Gallery of Art’s film series From Vault to Screen: Czech National Film Archive showcases a number of obscure and rarely screened titles, but this 1933 title was once a staple of late-night UHF television stations that broadcast muddy, nearly unwatchable transfers. But thanks to the archive, the Gallery will be showing a 35mm print of this early and once-scandalous showcase for actress Hedy Lamarr, the subject of an upcoming documentary. Also in the series this weekend, a 35mm print of director Vladislav Vančura’s 1933 film On the Sunny Side, a study of two children that, according to the Museum of Modern Art, “draws on a wide range of styles, from the surrealist inflected stylization of René Clair to the frenzied montage of Dziga Vertov.
Ecstasy screens Sunday, October 22 at 4 p.m. at the National Gallery of Art, East Building auditorium.
(The Freer)
With the reopening of the Freer, movies return to the Meyer auditorium with a new film from Chinese director Xu Bing, who assembled over 10,000 hours of surveillance video into a drama voiced by actors. The movie tells the story of Qing Ting, who leaves a Buddhist temple for the secular world, only to be caught up in the digital world. It’s a fascinating concept, and as Variety writes, “dissecting the run-of-the-mill melodramatic plot line, it’s easy to recognize critiques of reality TV, celebrity culture, the obsession with plastic surgery, and the strange isolating phenomenon of video chat rooms.” But the film reportedly doesn’t quite pull off its bold gimmick.
Watch the trailer.
Saturday, October 21 at 7 p.m. at the Freer. Free.
(The Green Lantern Corps)
Next week the Washington Psychotronic Film Society offers this 1975 Blaxploitation title (originally called Welcome Home Brother Charles) from Penitentiary director Jamma Fanaka. The curators write, “Our main man Charles gets busted by some sadistic cops and subjected to heinous experiments. Once released, Charles returns home, vowing to never deal dope again, liviing life on the straight and narrow. One exception, though. Brother Charles has plans to serve up a serious helpin’ of payback to everyone involved in his incarceration. And he’s gonna be a real big dick about it. The biggest.”
Watch the trailer.
Monday, October 23 at 8 p.m. at Smoke and Barrel.
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Also opening this week, Dina, a documentary about an unlikely mid-life romance. We’ll have a full review tomorrow. And don’t miss our preview of the Double Exposure Film Festival, which starts tonight.
