There are plenty of great films playing in Seattle this weekend (despite the disappointing release of Criminal) and we’ve compiled the best ones here, along with links to when and where you can see them. See all of our critics’ picks below, from special events like The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Storefront Hitchcock (with Robyn Hitchcock in person!) to blockbuster hits like the “eventually lovable” sequel to 1993’s Dazed and Confused and the adorable but questionable The Jungle Book. If these options aren’t enough, check out our complete movie times listings for even more options.
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NEW RELEASES
1. Barbershop: The Next Cut
“When the whole #OscarsSoWhite storm hit, Ice Cube, a founding member of the hiphop crew NWA, said that it was wrong for blacks to boycott the Oscars because movies were not about the awards but the fans. Who knew Cube had become such a Republican? (I hear LL Cool J is one too.) But clearly Cube is in the one percent and makes sure his bread is always buttered on the right side. Barbershop: The Next Cut was made with one function in mind: to put that extra butter on his slice of bread.” CHARLES MUDEDE
2. Everybody Wants Some!!
“Over the course of two hours, Everybody Wants Some!!, Richard Linklater’s ‘spiritual sequel’ to 1993’s Dazed and Confused, goes from detestable to damn near lovable—it’s an eventually enjoyable movie that I almost walked out of. It’s broad and cheesy and kind of porny, but eventually you come to realize that it’s not ‘college’ porn, but a very specific porn based on an idealized version of Linklater’s own college experience. College hijinks have been done to death, but there’s something endearing and slightly universal about a middle-aged man looking back on his college years and only remembering the parts that were super awesome(!!).” VINCE MANCINI
3. The Jungle Book
“I’m not convinced remaking The Jungle Book was absolutely necessary, but Disney’s latest navel-gazing foray into its own archives delivers everything it needs to: The kid who plays Mowgli is adorable. The digitally animated jungle inhabitants are as warmhearted as they are slick-looking. Do you need more baby animals in your life? The Jungle Book has you covered! You’ll squee all the way through as you watch a delightful parade of baby elephants and baby wolves.” MEGAN BURBANK
ONE-NIGHT SCREENINGS
4. Storefront Hitchcock
“This 1998 Jonathan Demme film revolves around a simple conceit: Train a camera on eccentric British singer-songwriter Robyn Hitchcock performing 14 beautiful, hilarious rock songs in the storefront of a disused New York City shop window, and let the sonic, lyrical, and between-song-banter enchantments ensue. It’s hard to discern which is more gobsmacking—Hitchcock’s charmingly doleful post–Syd Barrett songs or his serpentine, acid-logic introductions to said songs. Both of Hitchcock’s skills possess a cracked wisdom all too rare in today’s (or yesterday’s) musical world. Tonight, he’ll give a live introduction to this screening.” DAVE SEGAL
(Thursday only)
5. Beyond Metabolism
“Metabolism is the last great architectural movement that the world experienced. It happened in the 1960s in Japan. Its basic idea was to design buildings that were massive but also organic and mobile. The city was a living thing for these bold thinkers. One of the most famous works from this school is the Kyoto International Conference Center. The mega-building was completed in 1966. Stefanie Gaus and Volker Sattel’s film explores the geometric spaces, the silent furniture, and often imposing concrete of this wonderfully strange place, which in 1997 held a major global conference on climate change.” CHARLES MUDEDE
(Saturday only)
6. The Rocky Horror Picture Show
How does a new generation of fighters for trans rights inherit Dr. Frank N. Furter of Transsexual, Transylvania (played by Tim Curry), in this campy 1975 horror musical? Susan Sarandon costars, along with ripped fishnet stockings, corsets, and the dreams of science fiction.
(Saturday only)
7. Seijun Suzuki Retrospective
“The dominant image we have of Japanese culture is that it’s a very orderly society. Rules are rigidly followed, a person knows who is above and below them, there is lots of bowing, and women speak softly. But that view of Japan is very limited and is contradicted by the films of directors who constitute what is known as Japan’s silver age, 1960 to 1980. One leading figure of this moment is Seijun Suzuki, whose movies are celebrated for their visual and narrative excesses. His work often overflows with violence, sex, madness, and criminals. It’s not at all surprising that they influenced Quentin Tarantino. The copresented (Northwest Film Forum and Grand Illusion) Seijun Suzuki Retrospective will provide an excellent opportunity to enter and absorb the genius of this director, who is still alive.” CHARLES MUDEDE
(Saturday and Sunday only: Gate of Flesh and Fighting Elegy)
8. The Off Hours
“More than anything else, this film, which is local and set mostly in a dismal diner visited by truckers, is about strong performances. The director, Megan Griffiths, has the gift of getting a lot of out her actors. In scene after scene, we see the characters slowly and convincingly evolve. And it is this measured evolution that moves and makes the story. The cinematography, by Ben Kasulke, is strong, and the music and art direction are fine. But if it were not for the peculiar warmth of the characters played Amy Steimetz, Ross Partridge, and others, this film would not matter a dot.” CHARLES MUDEDE
(Sunday only)
LIMITED RUNS
9. April and the Extraordinary World
This French-Belgian-Canadian animated thriller, starring Marion Cotillard, is based on Jacques Tardi’s 1976 graphic novel about an adventurer exploring a warped, fictional universe.
10. Embrace of the Serpent
“The Colombian film, nominated for best foreign language film at this year’s Academy Awards, brings up images of Apocalypse Now and Fitzcarraldo and even Deliverance, by a short stretch of the imagination. Insanity inspired by the river and its surrounding wilderness, cultural conflict left behind and reencountered, and the punctuated momentum (alternating moments of paddling serenity with the anticipation of climbing ashore) all feel comforting—and like a part of a film that will soon join the ranks of our many river-based artistic landmarks.” JULIA RABAN
11. Francofonia
“In Francofonia, which is about the Louvre (how it was made, how it obtained the treasures it holds, and what happened to it during the Second World War when the Nazis rolled into Paris and became her master), a ship traveling across a storm-enraged sea is the film’s leitmotif and a symbol of what the Louvre is. The chaos all around it is, of course, history. Altogether, Francofonia is a film that shows Alexander Sokurov in his element. This is what he does best—philosophical meditations on the highest forms and productions of culture.” CHARLES MUDEDE
12. Midnight Special
“Midnight Special, Nichols’s latest, continues the director’s winning streak. While on its surface an affectionate throwback to the kid-friendly sci-fi adventures of yesteryear (as the critic Matt Zoller Seitz said on Twitter, if this had been made in the ’80s, it’d never stop playing on HBO), its underlying themes of families under pressure make it very much of a piece with the filmmaker’s other work.” ANDREW WRIGHT
13. Shaun of the Dead
This film has been on our radar since the very beginning, as evidenced by Erik Henriksen’s 2004 review: “A sharp, clever, and gory horror-comedy that manages to be as scary as it is hilarious, Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg’s Shaun of the Dead shows all the marks of becoming a cult classic [how very prescient of 2004 Erik Henriksen]. In the recent glut of financially successful zombie flicks, from 28 Days Later to the remake of Dawn of the Dead, the UK-made Shaun is the clear spiritual and intellectual winner, a film that simultaneously respects and satirizes the zombie genre.”
14. A Space Program
“A Space Program is a documentary about a performance that took place in a huge installation space, Manhattan’s Park Avenue Armory, and had at its center a life-size model of the Apollo lunar module. The model is made of steel and plywood. These and other materials are vividly described by the narrator (for example, the layers of plywood are like ‘a delicious sandwich’). The ship is manned by two women, one of whom the narrator describes as beautiful. Not long after the launch, the women make out. This kind of space is sexy.” CHARLES MUDEDE
15. Too Late
“Against all odds, first-time feature director Dennis Hauck has made a film that’s as gimmicky as hell—shot on 35 mm in five unbroken 20-minute takes—and yet it becomes more involving as it goes along. He starts by introducing Dorothy (Crystal Reed), a Los Angeles stripper who has ‘seen something she shouldn’t have,’ presumably a murder, so she calls her private-eye pal, Mel Sampson (John Hawkes in a custom-built role), for assistance, but he arrives too late.” KATHY FENNESSY
CONTINUING RUNS
16. 10 Cloverfield Lane
“It starts conventionally: with a crash. Our heroine, Michelle, is driven off the road by a truck and careens into a nearby ditch. She twists and turns and flips – then, for the next two hours, 10 Cloverfield Lane takes us through its own wild ride. Essentially, what Dan Trachtenberg (a new face to the directing scene) has done is presented a compelling genre movie in a blender. Thriller and sci-fi. Sci-fi and mystery. Mystery and horror. They combine and intertwine and coexist so fluently, it’s often difficult to tell what kind of movie you’re seeing. But one thing’s for certain: It’s damn good stuff.” JACOB LICHTY
17. The Boss
“The first act of The Boss is clunky, clumsily written, and forced, but thanks largely to a cast of gifted improvisational actors (including the terrific Cecily Strong, Kristen Schaal, Timothy Simons, and PETER MOTHERFUCKING DINKLAGE—who is so hilarious, he gives Melissa McCarthy herself a run for her money), the movie eventually gels and the laughs come fast and furious.” WM. STEVEN HUMPHREY
18. Demolition
“Once Davis Mitchell (Jake Gyllenhaal) loses his wife, he stops shaving and doing all that other Wall Street worker stuff. Instead, he becomes a demolition man who dismantles refrigerators, computers, and other items that don’t work as they should. The symbolism may be heavy-handed, and the message obvious—everyone mourns in their own way—but Gyllenhaal makes Davis’s funny-sad journey worth watching.” KATHY FENNESSY
19. Eye in the Sky
“If Eye in the Sky accomplishes one thing, it’s to function as a gripping thriller despite dealing almost exclusively with people staring at screens while talking on the telephone. But if the film accomplishes two things, it also generates awareness of what modern warfare technology looks like (awesome, brimming with unintended consequences), and encourages careful consideration of the ethical liability that comes with this power. What Eye in the Sky doesn’t do, however, is provide a faithful portrayal of how those who are in power have weighed that responsibility.” MARJORIE SKINNER
20. Hail, Caesar!
“It doesn’t matter that Hail, Caesar! barely hangs together. It’s too much fun to watch. With Hail, Caesar!, [Joel and Ethan Coen] have foregone the brow furrowing and decided to revel in their favorite topic of all—movies. In what amounts to little more than an extended string of cameos and hilarious set pieces, Hail, Caesar! is a firm, feature-length pinch on Hollywood’s swollen, self-absorbed posterior.” NED LANNAMANN
21. Hello, My Name is Doris
“Michael Showalter’s Hello, My Name Is Doris banks on [Sally Field’s] mix of insecurity and charm to winning, if discomforting, effect…What starts out as Harold and Maude by way of Marvin’s Room ends like a John Hughes tale with an ever-so-slightly older heroine.” KATHY FENNESSY
22. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
“WTF is well-cast, which is key for a film that seems unable to decide if it is a wacky fish-out-of-water comedy, or a serious tale of war, or an unlikely romance, or, IDK, an episode of This American Life? SURE. It’s uneven. But what’s utterly convincing is that somehow, this good-but-not-great movie has accurately captured that particular moment when a reporter discovers the ineffable joy of chasing a high-stakes story for the first time. It’s something that I suspect fellow Tina Fey-appreciating journalists will delight in.” MEGAN BURBANK
23. Zootopia
“Zootopia may ostensibly be an animated buddy cop flick with a few winks to Chinatown, but it’s also chock full of smart, incisive observations on race and gender, as well as front-loaded with tons of laughs and heart. Disney is doing better.” WM. STEVEN HUMPHREY
