Best in Show, Broken Hearts Club, The Contender, Dr. T. and the Women, The Ladies Man, Lost Souls, One, Rififi, Two Lane Blacktop
*Aelita, Queen of Mars
The Paramount's great Silent Movie Mondays are back for the month of October, with a collection of sci-fi/action films from the dawn of time. This week, an incredibly rare work from the early days of Russian expressionism shows up to confound and amaze us. Set in Moscow and--via some amazing sets--on the Surface of Mars, Aelita pre-dates even the classic age of Soviet cinema by a few years, and was largely forgotten prior to its resurrection by silent film advocate Dennis James. This screening will feature the four-part chamber ensemble Filharmonia accompanying the film on an eclectic assortment of instruments, including the Theremin. Don' t miss this rare screening!! Mon Oct 9. Paramount Theatre
Bittersweet Motel
Rock documentaries are born with an extremely slim chance at being anything more than a 90-minute pornfest for those people who get off on watching their favorite bands sing. Yet, there has been, in the history of documentaries, a few that aren't designed to feed a cult-like following. Gimme Shelter for example, ably demonstrated the repulsiveness with which the Stones conducted themselves. Unfortunately, Bittersweet Motel has now set a new record on the opposite end of the scale: It is remarkable just how incredibly this film skims over the thousands of idiots who follow Phish around every year. If you're into waking up naked in a national park after a five-day acid trip, you'll probably like this film. Otherwise, you'll hate it. (Katia Dunn) Opens Fri Oct 6. Varsity Calendar
Dancer in the Dark
Director Lars von Trier lays down yet another cinematic gauntlet with this new musical Opens Fri Oct 6; see review this issue. Harvard Exit, Seven Gables
Digimon: The Movie
Not to be confused with Digimon: The Emerging Third Party in the American Political System. Opens Fri Oct 6. Meridian
Get Carter
You can place a bid on the goatee Stallone is sporting in this "brilliant" film on eBay. No shit! Opens Fri Oct 6. Metro
*Gold Rush
Chaplin dances his dinner rolls round the table to the sound of a banjo plucking manically away in this special presentation with a live score. Wed Oct 11; see Stranger Suggests. JBL Theater at EMP
*The Kingdom
Lars von Trier's ultra-silly spookfest, presented in all 8 hours of its glory. Fri-Sun Oct 6-8; see Stranger Suggests. Seattle Art Museum
Meet the Parents
Ben Stiller explores his inner Jew in this classic Yid meets Goy fantasia. Opens Fri Oct 6, reviewed this issue. Guild 45th
*Mon Oncle D'Amerique
Resnais at his most intellectual; which is like saying Scorsese at his most frenetic or Keaton at his most deadpan, I know; but like those artists, Resnais is most entertaining when he's most himself. However lukewarm I am to many of the director's films, this tripartite examination of the behaviorist theories of French psychologist Henri Laborit (complete with lab rats) is consistently dazzling, and often hilarious. You don't have to agree with Dr. Laborit's thesis on aggression and its determining role in our lives to enjoy the intertwined stories of a factory worker promoted to management, an actress leaving her family and finding herself in conflict with her lover, and an up-and-coming politician worried more about advancement than aiding his constituents. (Bruce Reid) Sat-Sun Oct 7-8. Grand Illusion
My Name is Julia Ross
The first installment in SAM's "Shadowlands: the Film Noir Cycle." Thurs Oct 5; see related article this issue. Seattle Art Museum
Rachel's Daughters
I'm unenthusiastic about Rachel's Daughters, but wait--it's playing with Unbound, the breast movie of all breast movies. Director Claudia Morgado pushes through fetishism to the other side, to genuine revelation and surprise. Old feminist joke, still apt: Sigmund Freud says, "What do women want?" And we answer, "Ask us, one by one." One by one, the women in the movie astonish and delight us with their feelings about their breasts. The movie makes those feelings vivid, with hilarious dignity. I can't imagine anybody's not enjoying it, from wistfully randy nine-year-olds to my sainted mother. Please take your kids. (Barley Blair) Opens Thurs Oct 5. Little Theatre
*SEATTLE UNDERGROUND FILM FESTIVAL
Clanging projectors! Ripped emulsions! SUFF is back for a second year! Opens Fri Oct 6; see preview this issue. Cinema 18, Little Theatre
Spartacus
Sure, the script is cheesy as hell, the sets are laughable, the acting can be painful (especially from Jean Simmons), and the musical score is nearly unbearable, but this 1960 homoerotic epic provides over three hours of Hollywood tough guys at their skimpily clad best. Many of the historical details are fudged, but the story of a Roman slave's tragic attempt to attain freedom still resonates. This restored 70mm version includes footage censored from the original, including the classic bathing scene where Laurence Olivier tries to seduce Tony Curtis into the bisexual fold by noting that one can enjoy eating "both snails and oysters." Really, though, it's all worth it just to see Kirk Douglas in those gladiator undies. (Melody Moss) Opens Fri Oct 5. Egyptian
*White Zombie
The first up in a month of Zombie films at the Grand Illusion, White Zombie is a defining, hilariously schlocky stab at the genre. Bela Lugosi stars as a sugar baron on Voodoo Isle, Haiti, using the walking dead as laborers in his plant. From the opening shots of Bela Lugosi's eyes to the close-up of the black cab driver's face as he looks in the camera and yells "Zombies!," the entire film is wonderfully laughable. Madge Bellamy co-stars as the virginal bride, zombified by a jealous lover. Be sure to watch for the great scene in the sugar factory where a zombie falls into the threshing machine! (Jamie Hook) Fri-Sat Oct 6-7. Grand Illusion
*Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
It's your standard story: Boy meets Chocolate Baron, Boy offends Chocolate Baron, Boy inherits Chocolate Factory. Plays as part of the Seattle Art Museums Free Children's Film Series. Sat Oct 7. Stimson Auditorium
An Affair of Love
An Affair of Love is a tidy little tale about a man and a woman. They meet cute: He answers her ad for a partner in a sexual act whose nature is never revealed. Their liaison lasts for a while. Then, for the first time, they make what they both call "normal" love, and everything changes. I can't say more, but it's straight out of The Gift of the Magi. Sentimental, pat, very enjoyable, no relationship to real life. (Barley Blair) Crest
Almost Famous
The truth of the matter is that this movie is nothing more and nothing less than a light and entertaining crowd-pleaser. Which is fine. Good, even. It's just that for a rock 'n' roll tour film set in 1973, the content comes across as so... clean--like R-rated content in a PG-13 package. (Andy Spletzer) Factoria, Guild 45th, Meridian 16, Oak Tree, Redmond Town Center
*The Art of War
This is a dazzling film. A dizzying film. Its structure is so baroque, so complex, so color-bright that it's totally incomprehensible. All we understand and enjoy is the fluid movements of the hero (Wesley Snipes) through underground sex clubs, rainy streets, corporate lobbies, office spaces, and cyberspace. Vertiginous, delirious, unstable, beautiful--this is the best action film you'll watch this year. You'll not, however, understand it. (Charles Mudede) Pacific Place 11
Autumn in New York
The most compelling question this movie begs is not one about the moral solvency of having sex with someone young enough to be your daughter, it's the one about the moral solvency of having sex with your daughter. You see it, and tell me Winona Ryder's character, Charlotte, isn't Richard Gere's character's daughter. Ewww. (Jamie Hook) Pacific Place 11
Bait
Foxx is a petty thief who is sent to prison for stealing from a seafood warehouse. While serving time, his cell mate leaves Jamie Foxx with a coded message, which, when deciphered, will lead him to a secret stash of gold worth $42 million. Meanwhile, the government wants to do two things: (a) catch an arrogant and amoral computer hacker and (b) recover the missing money. To accomplish these goals they use Jamie Foxx as bait. I refuse to say anything more about this film. (Charles Mudede) Aurora Cinema Grill, Factoria, Grand Alderwood, Meridian 16
Barenaked in America
Barenaked Ladies are the quirky Canadians who scored radio hits with "One Week" and "It's All Been Done"; Barenaked in America is the befuddling popumentary (directed by Jason Priestley) that would indicate This is Spinal Tap isn't being re-released north of the border. Not entirely a concert film, not a road film... it's not much of anything, really. (Jason Pagano) Uptown
Beautiful
This poor homely kid is addicted to beauty pageants. Too ugly to win anything as a child, she grows up and poof! she's Minnie Driver. Now her life goal is to become Miss America Miss, whatever that means. First-time director Sally Field has as uncanny ability to drain the blood from her characters until they flatline, and they're as dead as the plot. The movie skips by its own scenes, waving briskly at the main characters' moral poverty, sexual abuse, and jail time. Beautiful is neither dark nor funny. Field extricates all traces of camp from a movie about beauty pageants! Watching Beautiful is a non-event, like watching campaign speeches by the Democrat or the Republican. Roll your eyes, sigh audibly... then vote for Nader. (Paula Gilovich) Factoria, Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16, Metro, Redmond Town Center
Bless the Child
The Christ child has been snatched by Scientologists! Quick! Call in the hardened homicide detective who dropped out of the seminary! Lurk around a casting call for the next Street Fighter CD-ROM and hire anybody with a facial piercing! Rent a stage in Studio City that has spraypainted bricks so we'll know it's the Big Apple. Lure Christina Ricci into playing a junkie who gets decapitated four minutes into the movie! Hurry, there's little time left! (Tamara Paris) Pacific Place 11
*Bring it On
Universal Studios' marketing goons have not a goddamn clue what a great movie they've got on their hands. It's so sad--they keep playing it off like it's some nasty jiggle-fest (which in part it is) with no redeeming qualities (which it has plenty of). Best of all, the film is funny in a pre-postmodernist way--remember what that was like? When irony was just a brand of humor instead of a cynical philosophy? It was (and is) funny! (Jamie Hook) Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16, Metro, Redmond Town Center
The Cell
The succulent Jennifer Lopez and the ever-more dissolute Vince Vaughn disappear into the mind of serial killer Vincent D'Onofrio, who is building an interesting career exploiting his rubbery anonymity. The stunning visuals are lifted whole from Damien Hirst, Mathew Barney, the Bros. Quay, and others, but remain creepily potent. (Tamara Paris) Pacific Place 11, Redmond Town Center
Coyote Ugly
I'm going to list all the great things about this latest "Jerry Bruckheimer feel-good flick": (1) Melanie Lynskey (who plays the "goofy best friend") does a fabulous New Jersey accent. (2) John Goodman is adorable as Funny Dad. (3) There's a cute cat in one of the scenes. (4) The outfits are pretty. (Min Liao) Pacific Place 11
*Croupier
A bottle-blond exponent of God's lonely man takes a job in a private London casino and gets embroiled in some serious heist-related trouble. Mike Hodges, who directed the semi-obscure British new wave classic Get Carter, brings grace and severity to what could have just been neo-pulp. Instead, like the best pulp, Croupier becomes high lowbrow, thanks to a seasoned director's eye for detail, pneumatics, and sexy actors. (Sean Nelson) Metro
Duets
Why see this mishmash of cheesy product placements and a dozen contradictory genres? Not for Gwyneth as a skinny showgirl doing karaoke--see what I mean about contradictions? For Paul Giamatti. You may have forgotten his name, but his head and jowls make a figure eight, with bags like eggcups under his eyes--first-rate comic apparatus. If he had two solos instead of one, I would recommend the movie. (Barley Blair) Grand Alderwood, Pacific Place 11
*The Exorcist
Though the re-release of The Exorcist is unlikely to leave the same mark it did in 1973--when audience members purportedly vomited and ran screaming from theaters across the globe--it is nevertheless a great excuse to see the film in a dark theater, with the surround-sound effects of a remastered soundtrack. (Melody Moss) Cinerama, Factoria, Metro, Oak Tree, Redmond Town Center, Southcenter
The Five Senses
Writer/director Jeremy Podeswa has placed a self-conscious title on an unself-conscious film, the virtues of which far exceed the formal detail referred to in the title. True, the masseuse, the man going deaf, the baker of cakes, the man with the sensitive sniffer, and the ophthalmologist account for each physical sense, but the film isn't about senses at all; it's about sensuality beyond the senses... a delicate, lovely portrayal of the spaces between people. (Evan Sult) Metro
Girlfight
I feel more comfortable pretending that the conflict in this movie takes place--oh, let's say over a Scrabble board. Okay. Diana, played by the hunky Michelle Rodriguez, is in trouble at her high school. We see her in an impromptu crossword match, and her principal warns her that one more unwarranted word-fest and she's expelled on the spot. Later that same day, Diana's father sends her on an errand to the local Scrabble club, where her brother takes lessons. Diana watches him squander a Q on a 12-point word with no bonus. Outraged, she pulls an F, an I, and an H from his tiles and slams down a triple-word FISH for 30 points. She sees a possible outlet for her aggressions. (Barley Blair) Neptune
Godzilla 2000
A stumbling mime in a kick-ass rubber monster suit battles a 65-million-year-old silver nasal inhaler. Godzilla, after a bout of anorexia and a makeover into an enormous iguana (in the unfortunate movie that need not be named), is back with a vengeance in this pitch-perfect homage. (Tamara Paris) Admiral
Goya in Bordeaux
A dull, laughably pretentious attempt to portray the painter's twilight reminiscences, Goya in Bordeaux marks a definite nadir in Carlos Saura's career. The elder, barrel-bellied Goya smugly pontificates to his daughter about the tragedies and obligations of being an artist; his younger self mulls over the compromises inherent in being a court painter and the agonies of loving a notorious mistress. Neither appears smart enough to paint a bathroom wall, let alone the masterpieces that are liberally scattered throughout the film. (Bruce Reid) Metro
Hollow Man
Kevin Bacon delivers another fine, nuanced performance as the megalomaniacal scientist who uses his newfound invisibility to act out his sick, twisted sexual desires. Hey, it's a Paul Verhoeven film... what did you expect? Not a good time, I hope. (Bruce Reid) Pacific Place 11
*The New Eve
La Nouvelle Ève (The New Eve) looks and feels like a hit movie. It has all these big ideas and claims about the new woman, the post-feminist Eve. Yet, despite this huge intellectual project--mapping out the territory of the new, urban, hyper-liberated woman of the advanced capitalist world--the film is incredibly light. Indeed it's a comedy, and the ideas/concerns it raises are as substantial and frantic as bubbles in a glass of champagne. This is what Europeans call entertainment: Marx, sex, and a dash of slapstick. (Charles Mudede) Grand Illusion
Nurse Betty
Betty, a diner waitress, settles comfortably into a thick confusion after accidentally witnessing her sleazy husband's murder. She instantly blocks out reality, and decides to drive from Fair Oaks, Kansas to Los Angeles in pursuit of her favorite soap-opera character, "Dr. David Ravell," whom she believes is her long-lost true love. On paper, this all sounds so great--interesting, silly, action-packed, dramatic, full of potential. But what director Neil LaBute produces onscreen is surprisingly disappointing. (Min Liao) Factoria, Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16, Oak Tree, Redmond Town Center, Varsity
The Original Kings of Comedy
True comedic greats have an ability, much as great drummers have, to maintain a solid underlying rhythm while impetuously improvising the tempo and pace, and the fusion of the two dynamics must appear effortless at all times. The Kings, on the other hand, toil and labor for every laugh, for every moment of comedic sincerity. (Kudzai Mudede) City Centre
Place Vendôme
Catherine Deneuve does more than merely save Place Vendôme--she ennobles it. Jittery and exhausted, Deneuve wanders through the first half of the film seeming to expect at any moment to collapse into coma. There's a genuine fear clawing through her, as well as signs of a steely pragmatism that emerges more forcefully as the film unfolds. Too bad not much else in Place Vendôme contains such surprises. (Bruce Reid) Harvard Exit
Remember the Titans
Produced by Jerry Bruckheimer (Armageddon), directed by Boaz Yakin (Fresh), and starring Denzel Washington (The Bone Collector), Remember the Titans is set in the early '70s and based on real life, real people, the real America. It's a "problem film"--a movie about a black man (a football coach, in this case) who has to win the trust and love of angry, white racists. Incredible as this may sound, the movie is actually fascinating--not because it's well done or acted (nothing stands out in that regard), but because it has the manic pace of The Rock coupled with the content of Do The Right Thing. Now how in the world can you top that? (Charles Mudede) Factoria, Grand Alderwood, Lewis & Clark, Metro, Northgate, Pacific Place 11
The Replacements
What do I think about this fucking film? It's impossible to believe all that money went into it. Now, my parents were in town from Africa last week, and they told me things are getting worse, people are hungry and starving. Well, what does this have to do with this film? Waste! That's what. Waste. Waste of time, waste of food. Waste of money. (Charles Mudede) Grand Alderwood, Pacific Place 11
Saving Grace
If you've seen a Cheech and Chong film, you've seen every gag here: absentminded cops oblivious to the cloud of smoke around an acquaintance's head; balding, potbellied hippies lighting up to the strains of a sitar; two sweet old ladies, inadvertently stoned and gorging themselves on candy bars. If these situations sound remotely amusing to you, you might as well go. (Bruce Reid) City Centre, Crest
Scary Movie
Scary Movie is largely a satire of the Scream films--which are already satires (go figure). Though it certainly has some knee-slappers, most of the infantile jokes simply go on way too long. (Melody Moss) Admiral, Grand Alderwood
Shower
Contrary to what the lady's bottom in the advertisement promises, this film is populated almost exclusively by melancholic old men who predictably complain about youth and argue among themselves. Shower is comfort food for the cinema--bland, but soothing. (Jamie Hook) Crest
Silent Cinema Classics
An evening of silent films, including Walt Disney's Alice Rattled by Rats, and Laurel and Hardy in Habeas Corpus. Professor Hokum W. Jeebs provides musical accompaniment on the mighty Wurlitzer organ. Tues-Wed Oct 10-11. Hokum Hall
*Space Cowboys
Alongside voting and worrying about your body, one of your duties as an American is to see every Clint Eastwood film released, regardless of individual failures, hyperbole, plot holes, or any other misdeeds whatsoever. He alone has earned that right. Aurora Cinema Grill, Pacific Place 11, Redmond Town Center
The Tao of Steve
Chunky, attitudinal Dex (an extraordinarily charming Donal Logue, a prizewinner at Sundance) teaches kindergarten. He's great with women and drifting a decade out of college when an old college friend shows up and doesn't fall for his line. Hyperarticulate and hypersexed, Dex must learn the meaning of his words and his heart. Funny stuff. (Ray Pride) Broadway Market
Urban Legends: Final Cut
For those who create teen-slasher flicks, it is acknowledged that effort needn't necessarily be at a premium, but it is also ackowledged that one should do as best as one can do anyway. Why? Common fucking human decency--obviously not on the agenda when this fetid offering spluttered off the mill. (Kudzai Mudede) Factoria, Grand Alderwood, Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16, Oak Tree
Urbania
Midway through Urbania things finally get better. The hero (Dan Futterman) leaves his apartment and starts cruising the streets for flesh. During this night journey, he has an erotically charged conversation with a heterosexual bartender. But just as you're about to forgive the director for the slow start and raise the grade of his effort from an E- to a C+, the horrible ending arrives and ruins everything. (Charles Mudede) Broadway Market
The Watcher
I believe that the makers of this movie, sensing the impending threat of Mr. Reeves' disagreeable offerings, spared no expense upon damage limitation. Hence, The Watcher is a frightfully unimaginative, by-the-numbers thriller with no plot twists, no clever bits, horrendous slow-motion dance sequences, few thrills, and anemic character development, successfully leaving Reeves well within his depth. (Kudzai Mudede) Aurora Cinema Grill, Grand Alderwood, Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16
The Way of the Gun
Christopher McQuarrie's The Way of the Gun is an evil film, though not for the self-conscious reasons it would have you accept. Rather, it is evil because secretly it does not know what it is; because it is adrift in a world that is too opiated to confront its soulless convictions; because it comes from a place that has confused the fantastical and the realistic. (Jamie Hook) Meridian 16
What Lies Beneath
A well-preserved pair of thoroughbred movie stars find that all is not well in their gorgeous New England home, what with the dead girl in the tub and all. The whole damn thing is ripped right out of the Hitchcock how-to manual, so of course it succeeds fantastically at its admittedly simple goal: scaring you so badly you throw your popcorn all over the people in the row behind you. (Tamara Paris) Uptown
Woman on Top
Penélope Cruz is Isabella, a Brazilian chef with severe motion sickness who leaves a small fishing village in Brazil for San Francisco in order to escape her two-timing husband. She subsequently finds herself on television in her very own spicy Latin cooking show, blessed with magical chef powers and a neverending supply of Wonderbra-friendly outfits. All that, and it still sucks. (Rachel Kessler) Grand Alderwood, Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16, Metro, Oak Tree
