WYRMWOOD: APOCALYPSE (2021)

Eight years on we get a sequel to WYRMWOOD: ROAD OF THE DEAD, a Mad Max/zombie hybrid horror comedy action film that seemed more intent on looking cool than getting the tone right. We return to the  days of the zombie plague with everyone looking for cure to the disease and feeling it might be with a hybrid

This film is filled with an intensity and urgency you only find in films. its the sort of thing that either works or falls deep into parody- even if its not supposed to be serious. This is supposed to walk the fine line between serious and knowing humor unfortunately it plummets into over done siliness - that pulls it all down.

As with most zombie/madness  little of this makes sense. Being a second film, there is almost no exposition to bring us up to speed, the film just opens and goes and assumes that we know what the hell is going on.  That all would be fine but eight or so years later this minor sequel to a minor film could have used a tad of explanation or reintroduction. Frankly I barely remember the first one, and I doubt most other people do, so I felt a more than a tad lost. It quickly switched to not really caring. Yea the action and gore are cool but frankly it's not enough. With out a plot it means nothing.

As with most of these sort of films there is little sense. There is basically a few survivors and an endless supply of monsters.  As with all of these films where all the zombies come from in the middle of the wilderness is never addressed. As are the rules of the world. Additionally the rules of the world seem to come and go as needed. 

I really never cared

Tale of King Crab (2021) Opens Friday

TALE OF KING CRAB has haunted me from the first frame. It is a gorgeous film that reminds me of the films that helped me fall madly and passionately in love with world cinema. Directors Alessio Rigo de Righi and Matteo Zoppis have created a masterpiece that will stay with you for a long time.

The film is based on a story the directors heard when they were making their documentary IL SOLENGO. That film was the story of the resident of a small Italian village told by the villagers. It’s a film that echoes in the opening moments of King Crab when a bunch of villagers are sitting around shooting the breeze when one of them tells the story of Luciano. He was a man from the village who lived at the turn of the twentieth century. He wanted to live his own way and ran into all sorts of problems. For example he got into a battle of wills concerning a closed gate that a local prince wants locked for no good reason. Events eventually push him to travel across the Atlantic to try and find a treasure in the Americas.

This is grand filmmaking of the highest order. This is a film that made me think of the finest Italian cinema of the last 60 years. I’m talking of the works of  the  Taviani Brothers. ​Ermanno Olmi, ​Luchino Visconti, Bernardo Bertolucci and others. The look and feel of the Italian countryside is mythic and epic. Its also tactile. You can feel, smell and taste the places we are seeing.  This film is very often the definition of writing with light since the composition of the image deepens and enhances the action and characters the way whole paragraphs put us into the head space in a novel. The spaces the characters in habit, speaks volumes about their inner terrain.  As I was watching the final sections of the film, the rocks and the ocean matched -Luciano‘s heart.

This film is a kind of great cinematic novel.

You’ll forgive me if I don’t do a deep dive discussion of the film but I am still processing the film. I received the film about 24 hours before it played the New York Film Festival. In order to try and be timely with the review I put the film on figuring I might be able to bang something out quickly…and then the first images hit the screen and I fell into to the Italian countryside and I haven’t quite come back yet. I keep finding myself turning over the events and so I’m bouncing between locations in my head.

I am stunned. I didn’t think anyone was making films like this anymore.

My only question regarding the film is why is this in the Currents section of the New York Film Festival and not the Main Slate or Spotlight. Currents, which tends to be about more experimental films, is a place many people won’t venture. This is a fantastic old school epic. This is the sort of film that will win over new generations to the wonders of world cinema

TALE OF KING CRAB is a must see. More so if you can see it on a big screen- which frankly is the best way to see it.

Women Of the White Buffalo (2022)

Women of the White Buffalo is a portrait of nine women in the Lakota nation who are working to take back their heritage and give it life in the present day. As the film makes clear the heritage of the Lakota was stripped away by the whites who conquered them and placed them on reservations. The presents each of the women as direct conduit from the past to the present working to heal the wounds of the past.

Lyric in the telling the film is a kind of tone poem  that is not only trying to tell the stories of the women but create an approximation of the space where the women are operating. They are searching to make the lives of their people by attuning them to a higher purpose and way of thinking. Being connected to one’s culture and history lifts a person up and in many ways make things better because things we see that there is more to life beyond the walls we normally inhabit. Director Deborah Anderson structures her film to be more than just the facts and we are better for it.

This is a sweet film and recommended

Disfluency (2022) Florida Film Festival 2022

 

DISFLUENCY the name for not being able to put words together to express a thought. Its something we all experience at one time or another. Jane is a young woman who is trying to finish up her class work in speech pathology and manages to blow her final presentation putting her academic career at risk. Going home to regroup and prepare for a make-up presentation. However it soon becomes clear that there is more going on inside jane than we initially are lead to believe.

This is a really good film. It’s the rare drama that feels more like real life than real movie life. For better or worse too many narrative of late feel good and entertain but they don’t really feel like real life. DISFLUENCY does, thanks in large part to the performance of Libe Barer, as Jane It is through her eyes that we come see and feel things in ways that make what happens  feel like it was ripped from real life.  This isn’t to short sell the script by Anna Baumgarten, which refuses to be neat in tying things up, rather it’s Barer's performance that sells it to us with out question.

I need to mention that there is a weird thing happening in the discussions of  DISFLUENCY that had me shaking my head. While there is an indication in the early part of the film and the official material that all is not right with Jane, we are largely left to discover what is happening on our own. As we watch the film more or less blind we are left to watch the film peel away the layers of the story until we are left bruised and battered by the turn of events. On the other hand the almost every review or piece on the film spells out what happens in the film. I know why this is, the writers who are discussing the events are connecting it up to their own lives in a cathartic release, but at the same time I get a sense that the discussions might diminish the narrative for some. I say this because some pieces were quite detailed in discussing turns.

Quibble or not this is a great film.

DISFLUENCY plays at the Florida Film Fest April 10 and 13 and is highly recommended.

Cow (2021)

The life and times of dairy cow on a farm in England.

This is a cinema verité look at what the life of a dairy cow is like. It’s a series of long takes that put us right in the pens and fields with Luma, the cow at the center of the events.

How you feel about the film will be determined by how you fall in with the luma and the other cows. This really is a film that is all about the cows and what you get out of it will be affected by what you bring to it. I say this because in reading on the film I came a cross various takes about what the film is about. Various writers tied various details together to form their own narratives. In many cases they were things I didn’t notice or didn’t see as important and as a result the film took on a new look. I’m not going to tell you what various people said because I don’t want you to be influenced.  I went into the film blind and I came out with my own thoughts, however now I’m still pondering what it all means… or if it means anything.

Honestly the fact that this film can be read in various ways lifts it up. Great movies should not have only one way of looking at it.  COW has multiple ways of seeing the film and as such it’s something special. Anyone can look at the film and take different things away from it. Because of this COW is a truly special film

Recommended

Move Me (2022) Reel Abilities 2022 Full Frame 2022

MOVE ME is the story of the film’s co-director Kelsey Peterson, who dove into Lake Superior and ended up paralyzed.  Kelsey was a dancer struggles however now she finds she is forced to get around in a wheelchair. As she is trying to figure out which way she wants to go she is given a chance to choreograph a new piece for herself.

While there have been a number of films  on people dealing with a disability, few films have been this intimate. There is no fourth wall. Peterson is simply there, right there, living her life discussing everything. There is no filter and we are better for it. If films like MOVE ME want to show us what life is like then the need to learn to filter less.

I was moved. I fell into Peterson’s story. I love how we see not only her journey but that of her friends and family as well. We come to understand the ripple effect the accident had on everyone around Peterson.

This is a super film and is recommended when it plays Full Frame and Reel Abilities.

Alone Against Rome (1962)

After subduing a rebellious province a Roman counsel takes over the home of one of the wealthy citizens pressing the daughter of the owner into service.and sending her fiance to the arena. A rebellion rises up in an effort to over throw the Romans.

Better than average historical drama is ripe for rediscovery. How this film didn't get attention after GLADIATOR, which looks to have lifted bits of this, is beyond me.

The film scores with a great cast,  and great action sequences that don't appear to be walked through. This is a film where everyone actually seems to care about hat is going on. This is more than a just a paycheck job.

What also sets the film apart from other similar films is that the film doesn't focus on simply one or two characters. There is a wade swath of people populating the film and as a result things feel more real. Additionally there is shading to the Romans. They are not all black or white but a shade of gray with their actions truly being okay in their eyes. This adds a complexity almost always missing from other similar films.

One of the best sword  and sandal films ever made is definitely one to search out

See For Me (2021) hits Shudder this week

Sophie is former skier who has lost her sight. She takes a job house sitting the mansion of a recently divorced woman who is going on vacation.  Sophie gets along with the help of friends and some on line helpers who act as her eyes. Things become complicated when during the night a group of thieves break in looking for safe full of valuables. It then becomes a battle  for survival as Sophie must fight for her life with only distant fiends to help her.

If there is any real flaw it's the insistence during the first half hour to explain how Sophie maneuvers around with her friends and helpers. There are too many discussions about being blind and what it means. Its all well and good, and we need to know some of it but we don't need a solid third of the film given over to it since it over highlights something that we as an audience already know.

On the other hand once SEE FOR ME gets going it is a very solid thrill ride. Genuine suspense is generated as we can't be sure how Sophie is going to manage to stay alive to the end. Truly I had a blast watching this and wish I had thought to make some popcorn and curl up on the couch at night. This is definitely one you will want to watch and share.

One of the most enjoyable films in theaters SEE FOR ME is recommended.

Until The Wheels Come Off (2022) hits VOD today

This is the story of John Tarlton who enlists his whole family when he decides to enter the Race Across AMerica (RAAM) a grueling non-stop bike race across America where participants have to average 10 miles an hour, every hour, for twelve days. Over the course of the trip tempers flare, Tarlton's body begins to breakdown and the family begins to circle the wagon.

This is a good film. Its an interesting look at what it takes to compete in a race that is not only one of the most grueling in the world, but also one most of us had never heard of. Focused largely on Tarlton it is a film that highlights the human cost of the race. If you've ever wondered what it takes to do an extreme race like this film, this film will show you.

As good as the film is the film feels a tad incomplete. What I mean it is while we follow Tarlton's race, and we follow some of the other racers, there never is a full sense of the race outside of the people we see. While I got a sense of the race I wish I had more of a handle on it.

Quibble aside this film is worth a look.

Uncle Howard Hits Ovid April 7

UNCLE HOWARD was one of the great treasures and real surprises of the New York Film Festival. a few years back How did I not know of this film until it showed up on the festival slate?

This is the story of what happened when filmmaker Aaron Brookner tried to run down materials to restore his Uncle Howard's film BURROUGHS about William Burroughs. Along the way he discovered that everything that had been shot for the film still existed and was still in what was Burroughs home called the Bunker. After months of trying Aaron got the material back As he dug threw the material it revealed that his Uncle had documented not just Burroughs but everyone and everything around him. It was something that he would do with his other projects as well As Aaron talks to those connected his Uncle a wonderful portrait of his uncle, and his projects beyond emerges.

What a great film.

This is one of those rare movies where the instant it was done I wanted to start it over again because not only was there stuff I wanted to see again, but because I wanted to spend time with the people in the film. Uncle Howard the man was clearly some one special, You understand why so many people loved him and why William Burroughs let him get close enough to shoot a documentary. Through this film I truly go the sense that I was getting to know Howard.

Perfect companion piece to the film BURROUGHS, not only because a good chunk of the film is about that one, but also because the two films compliment each other. While BURROUGHS is very much about the man at it's center, it is also it seems about the man who put it together. Watching UNCLE HOWARD there was this moment where I suddenly realized that the film could only have been made by one man who put it all out there.

I know I should talk about the film and pull it apart, but that's not really possible for me. I am a long term fan of Burroughs (the man and the movie) and kind of get short circuited when I see something as awesome as this film connected to him/it. Reason doesn't come into it, only pure emotion, and on that level, this film is really cool.

This is a hidden gems . Its a must see (more so for Burroughs fans like me)

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Horror and trash film fest Cabane à Sang celebrates 5th year

The greasiest genre film festival Cabane à Sang celebrates its 5 year anniversary from April 15th to the 24th.

 Montréal, Québec - April 4th 2022 | From April 15th to the 24th, Cabane à Sang film festival will celebrate its 5th anniversary in hybrid format — In person as well as online. The programming will kick off on the 15th of April with a carefully curated selection of high concept Sci-Fi shorts to Sci-LoFi, all free of charge via Facebook Live. The festival will anchor in Hochellywood (Hochelaga, Montreal) the following day. B-Movie enthusiasts are invited to l’Ancien Marché Maisonneuve for an evening dedicated entirely to horror and trash cinema.

From April 21st to the 25th, the full programming of the festival will be available via video on demand thanks to the American streaming platform Filmocracy.

 The in person screening of the festival will feature the Party Pooper Spectacular Trash Film Competition where Quebec based filmmakers from Montreal to Gaspésie will face off in an attempt to with the overwhelming grand prize of 200$ 

Directors of the Party Pooper Spectacular Trash Film Competition answered a call to production posted on social media by Cabane à Sang. With budget limits set to 200$, each director produced a short film with an imposed theme: anniversary.

 Alix Brenneur will be showcasing her first film ever alongside first time filmmaker Guillaume Corneau, both of which will be sharing the screen with more prominent local filmmakers Jean-Claude Leblanc and Jimmy G Pettigrew.

The Cabane à Sang festival also features acclaimed filmmakers of high profile events such as South By Southwest (John Poliquin, Michael Reich, Mike Pinkney). 

#MEOWTOO, the most recent short film of South African director Ryan Krueger (Fried Barry), will bring this festival program of more than 80 films to a close.

Screenings: 

April 15th, 2022 at 8:00 pm - Science-Fiction program via Facebook Live (www.facebook.com/cabaneasang).

April 16th, 2022 at 7:30 pm – Horror and Trash event at l’Ancien Marché Maisonneuve (4445 Ontario East, Montreal).

April 21 - 24, 2022 - Complete program available via video on demand (www.filmocracy.com).

 ith a program with more than 80 Anglophone and Francophone films from many countries around the world. (Canada, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Indonesia, Israel, Italy, Netherlands, Mexico, Portugal, Republic of Korea, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan and the United States).

About Cabane à Sang

Cabane à Sang (CàS) is a genre film festival with a grindhouse aesthetic created in 2017 by filmmaker Frank Appache. Born out of the need to highlight the exceptional talent of the filmmakers of this style of cinema in Quebec. The festival begins as a road cinema, traveling city to city like a touring band, eventually stopping for good, in Hochelaga (Montreal). It covers horror and trashy comedies as well as science fiction. Following the growing success of the festival, Cabane à Sang presents a 12-episode television series on Frissons TV in the fall of 2020. The show is then noticed by mainstream media, intrigued by this iconoclastic vision of TV and cinema.

Night Visitors (2022)

 

Small Town Monsters and investigator Shannon LeGro  are on the prowl again, this time to the Miller Ranch in southern Colorado. Tom Miller has had a number of his heads of cattle end up as victims of mutilation.  Complicating matters are sighting of black helicopters , weird sounds and  parts of the property where no one wants to go because really bad things tend to happen to anyone who go there.

In an age when the coverage of the weird things in the sky is getting sillier and sillier thanks to History and other cable channels needing to turn mountains out of ant hills it’s nice to know that director Seth Breedlove and the crew at Small Town Monsters are not taking things into ridiculous directions. They are turning out well thought out and films that are made with some form of care and no silliness. As a result when I see one of their productions hit my in box I usually jump at the chance to take a look. I may not always think they are on to something, but I’m curious enough to follow along.

Night Visitors is the latest from the group and it’s pretty good. There is something weird going on on the Miller Ranch and LeGro and Breedlove make a healthy stab at trying to find out what it is.  Do they uncover all of the dark secrets. No, but they raise a lot of interesting questions and entertain the hell out of us in the process.

As with all the films I’ve seen in the series I enjoyed it and recommend it, especially if you want time away from the cable TV circus that most TV shows of this sort inhabit.

Coast (2021) opens Friday

COAST blindsided me. I was not expecting a film that was going to hang with me and make me instantly email friends that they too should be covering the film.

The film is, nominally, about 16 year old Abby who falls for the singer of a rock band and has to decide if she is going to run out on her friends and family and go on tour with him or not. The reality is this is a film about a whole community of people who love each other and the path one of them takes toward finding herself and where she belongs.

This is a great film. Its that simple. This is just a great film.

I love that going into the film kind of blind I didn't know who the film was about. I love that the film opens with a sense of friends first before it focuses on Abby. Watching the opening minutes I kept discovering all of these great people who we might want to follow.  What delighted me even more was the fact that the film maintains the sense of people and of family all the way through it. No one is two dimensional. No one  is just background. Sure they might not get more than a line or a passing appearance but there is always a sense that there is a full person right there. When the film started I thought it was going to be a typical coming of age story and then all these other people showed up and I was forced to embrace them too.

What a glorious piece of filmmaking. So many filmmaker, including the Scorseses and the Spielbergs simply do not give us an entire film of people who all belong together and all seem like family- theirs and ours.

When the film ended I got misty. The ending was spot on. More importantly I found I was attached to the characters. I was so attached I wanted to go back in and do it all again. More importantly I just wanted to tell people about this wonderful film.

COAST is highly recommended

A Sunday Piece

 

Greetings to all.

As we enter April I need to take a couple of minutes to talk about the state of things at Unseen Films and yours truly.

First up I need to say another HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Bully’s best buddy and Randi’s hubby John. He celebrated another year on the planet by dressing up as Ben Grim and running up and down Yancy Street rescuing cats.

As some of you know a couple weeks back my computer crashed. It has something to do with the way the computer boots up. Its being worked on, however odds are I will need to get a new one sooner than later. As of right now I am working on a loaner computer, which presents it’s own challenges.

One of the challenges has been corrected and I am back on Twitter. Its a small thing in the course of things but I found that non-fest period the ability to post reviews does keep the readership up.

Adding into all of this are issues with the day job. The short version of the story is that my office only has a tiny fraction of the people needed to do the work. We are well past the point where if one person is out it causes a problem  into there is a problem and if anyone is out we are screwed.  The tension is such that I go home at night and stare at the walls and watch TV shows I don’t have to do anything with.  Things are in motion to fix the situation but for now I, like everyone in my office ,is burnt.

Adding to the sense of being burnt is the fact that the first three months of this year have overwhelmed me movie wise. As the we begin the fourth month of the year we’ve already covered more films in 2022 than we would have had we only reported on one a day.  We are already doing a killer pace and look to be covering a record amount of films. I don’t think there is going to be an avalanche of festival coverage this month so I should be able to recover before Tribeca kicks in at the end of May and June.

Right now I am doing the best I can with what I got, but there is a chance that I will be dipping into the preprogrammed coverage of older titles for some of this month. Then again I am hoping to have some pieces from Ariela and some other members of the Unseen Family, including the recently joined Reid Ramsey (Reid’s first piece on the New Richard Linklater film Apollo 10 ½  can be found here). 

Speaking of Tribeca, as this posts Liz Whittemore and I are trying to work out  pooling our coverage for Tribeca.

I should also mention that we will be having coverage of New Directors New Films at the end of the month. I have seen several of their offerings and the festival is exactly precisely what you'd expect from the annual team up of The Museum of Modern Art and Lincoln Center.  

There will also be coverage of a few other fests including HOT DOCS, which appears to be running a massive amount of good films from other fests such as Sundance and DOC NYC.

AND I will be covering this spring's Monsterama drive in Fest at the Riverside Drive in by Pittsburgh.  Coverage will include a report on the recently moved Living Dead museum which is at the Monroeville Mall (where Dawn of the Dead was filmed)

In the you probably don't care category, I’m trying to sort out if it’s do able to do the Living Dead Weekend at the mall since it’s the first weekend of Tribeca (details here)

I'm also looking to do more coverage of classic drive in fests. If you know of any let me know (I am aware of the Mahoning Circle Drive ins.)

For the two of you wondering I did see some of the Oscars and I was less than impressed. I thought the acceptance speeches were fine but pretty much everything else was awful. (The In Memoria was WTF especially with the note to check the website for more passings).  The Will Smith /Chris Rock dust up was just a low point in a bad show that had me mumbling "oh my god" repeatedly.

Pretty much all of the awards went to winners who had the best PR. I say that despite being delighted CODA and QUEEN OF BASKETBALL won. This year the awards went to the films/performers (except for Chastain)  where the producers or the actors pushed the hardest to win (Especially Will Smith- who did what he had to get an Oscar for his worst performance-sorry, not sorry- I would have been happy with him winning for any other film except this one)

For now that's it. hopefully I can swing back to doing a regular nightcap cap piece soon, and pick up on the filmmakers lists which are growing despite my not publishing the next installment

Brief thoughts on City of a Million Dreams (2022) Ashland Independent Film Festival April 1

Nominally this is the story of New Orleans Jazz funerals it is actually a cultural history of the city and the people in it.

I am a sucker for the jazz funerals that we see in the film.  Ever since I saw them as a  kid I wanted one. If I have to die, I want to have one  to send me off. 

But I digress.

I really liked this film. I liked that the film not only showed us what we think of as a jazz funeral with a band marching in the street, but I liked that we see how it spun off in other directions. I also love how the film shows us how they influenced everyone in the city.

This is a sweet film.

Recommended

Brief thoughts on Salma's Home (2022) Cinequest 2022

Salma was married to Bakri but they divorced. She strugles to get by and to help her daughter who is having troubles with her husband. When Bakri dies, things that complicated as his current wife shows up on Salma's door because the only money in the estate is the half of the Salma's house he owns.

This is a sweet little film. Its a lovely little film about three women trying to get by and end up finding a family. Yea, it is occasionally can be by the numbers, but at the same time it is  good time with good people.

Definitely worth a look.

Vault of Walt 10

Billed as the final trip to the vault Jim Korkis’s Vault of Walt 10 is a fitting send off.  Over the last decade plus Korkis has been revealing hidden tidbits of Disney history. Korkis has gone into every aspect of Disneyana from the man to the films to the parks, it’s all been made public from one of the greatest historians working today.

Korkis is ending his series, not because there aren’t enough stories, but rather with the internet and the various sites there are increasing less and less numbers of untold stories. Korkis’ work shined because there weren’t that many people doing the leg work on Disney history and now there are hundreds. While Korkis’ is the grandfather and his work is the source for many other reporters, other people are finding the stories he wants to tell before he gets the chance. While it saddens me that Korkis is stopping I know he will be writing other books and still spinning out tales.

I’m happy to report that this is one of the best books in the series. While some of the material on Disney himself isn’t as strong as the reset of the book there are some great bits. For example the section on the making of ENCHANTED is great fun. I know someone who worked on the film and while they filled me in with details about the making of the film Korkis revealed a great deal more. There is a wonderful piece on Disney during Hurricanes. Additionally there are pieces on the up and down relationship of Disney and Rbbin WiIlliams, a look at the odd duck film CONDORMAN, how the Swiss Family Robinson tree house became Tarzan's, and an intriguing look of Disney on the radio. Plus much more.

This book rocks and is highly recommended and an absolute must for Disney fans.

Monthly Anime at Japan Society: In-Person Showcase of Classic, Underseen, and Contemporary Anime

 

New York, NY (Mar. 31, 2022) Japan Society is pleased to announce the launch of Monthly Anime on April 15, 2022, which will kick-off with a screening of Mamoru Oshii’s seminal cyberpunk classic, Ghost in the Shell. Offering an eclectic range of classic, underseen, and contemporary visions from Japanese animation, Monthly Anime explores the widely influential legacy of anime. Tracing the lineage of anime from modern-day digital animation back to the days of hand-drawn cel animation, this program aims to uncover the multifaceted and remarkable variety of stylistic, technological, and generic possibilities that have kept the medium at the forefront of popularity not just in Japan, but worldwide. 

Following Ghost in the Shell in April, the rarely-screened Matrix anthology film The Animatrix—featuring works by Cowboy Bebop’s Shinichiro Watanabe, Vampire Hunter D’s Yoshiaki Kawajiri, and Akira animator Koji Morimoto—screens in 35mm on May 27, 2022. Masaaki Yuasa’s The Night is Short, Walk on Girl, a JAPAN CUTS 2018 selection and Tomihiko Morimi adaptation, screens on June 17, 2022. Finally, to commemorate 25 years since its 1997 release, Hayao Miyazaki’s mystical epic Princess Mononoke screens in 35mm on July 22, 2022.

Tickets: $15/$12 students and seniors /$5 Japan Society members.

Lineup and other details are subject to change. For complete information visit japansociety.org.

SCREENING SCHEDULE

Ghost in the Shell

Friday, April 15, 2022 at 7:00 PM

Dir. Mamoru Oshii, 1995, 83 min., DCP, color, in Japanese with English Subtitles. With Atsuko Tanaka, Akio Otsuka, Iemasa Kayumi.

Preceded by a 6PM pre-screening party with Japanese foods and snacks provided by Kikkoman. Mamoru Oshii’s groundbreaking cyberpunk classic conjures a startling vision of the future—a new age of global interconnectedness wherein neural pathways and information networks have become inextricably linked. Surveilling the sprawling technopolis of New Port City, Major Motoko Kusanagi, a cyborg officer specializing in cybercrime, hunts down a mysterious entity responsible for a series of ‘ghost-hackings’ that have infiltrated human hosts. Known only as the Puppet Master, the newly-surfaced threat leads Major to uncover a vast conspiracy—prompting her to question her own humanity and purpose of existence.

The Animatrix

Friday, May 27, 2022 at 7:00 PM

Dir. Peter Chung, Andy Jones, Yoshiaki Kawajiri, Takeshi Koike, Mahiro Maeda, Koji Morimoto, Shinichiro Watanabe; 2003, 102 min., 35mm, color, in English. With Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Clayton Watson.

A straight-to-DVD classic, the anime companion to The Matrix series received a limited number of theatrical screenings in 2003 as part of a promotional push for Reloaded. Rarely screened since, this dazzling and visually inventive tie-in laid the groundwork for franchise anthology spinoffs with its nine imaginative stories—directed by some of anime’s greatest luminaries including Ninja Scroll’s Yoshiaki Kawajiri, Cowboy Bebop’s Shinichiro Watanabe and Æon Flux’s Peter Chung. Expanding upon the series’ universe, this frenetic and imaginative addition to the Matrix franchise is anything but a lazy cash-grab and ranks as one of best Matrix films.

The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl

Friday, June 17, 2022 at 7:00 PM

Dir. Masaaki Yuasa, 2017, 93 min., DCP, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. With Gen Hoshino, Kana Hanazawa, Hiroshi Kamiya, Ryuji Akiyama.

Spunky college student Otome embarks on a booze-soaked romp through Kyoto in search of a book from her childhood. As the night stretches on for what seems like years, her quest takes on epic, hallucinatory proportions—starring a fanged god of used books, a guerilla theater troupe, a committee of crab-dancing philosophers, and love-inducing carp that fall from the sky. Meanwhile, an upperclassman at her university (voiced by pop star Gen Hoshino) undergoes a series of equally improbable misadventures in his attempts to win her heart. Adapted from the award-winning novel by Tomihiko Morimi, acclaimed animation director Masaaki Yuasa’s The Night is Short, Walk on Girl is a delightful trip down the rabbit hole into questions of fate and interconnectedness, rendered in an astounding visual style.

Princess Mononoke

Friday, July 22, 2022 at 7:00 PM

Dir. Hayao Miyazaki, 1997, 134 min., 35mm, color, in Japanese with English subtitles. With Yoji Matsuda, Yuriko Ishida, Yuko Tanaka.
25th Anniversary. The arrival of a diseased boar spirit, enraged and corrupted by an iron slug, leaves young warrior Ashitaka infected by its demon curse. With his days numbered, Ashitaka journeys westward to seek a cure for his affliction, tracing the boar’s path to the sacred forest of the Deer God, a forbidden realm belonging to an ancient forest spirit. Upon his arrival, Ashitaka stumbles into an elemental conflict between the forest’s protector San, a fearless warrior princess raised by wolves, and a neighboring iron town that has ravaged the earth. Released to universal acclaim, Hayao Miyazaki’s 14th-century tale is one of the director’s grandest achievements, a sweeping epic with breathtaking visuals and profound thematic ambitions that has captivated audiences ever since its release.

Original Film Series, Classic Films for Kids Debuts on The Film Detective Channel April 2nd

 

LOS ANGELES — March 31, 2022 — For Immediate Release:  Cinedigm, the leading independent streaming company super-serving enthusiast fan bases, announced today that The Film Detective (TFD), the classic film restoration and streaming company, will premiere the original film series, Classic Films for Kids, on Saturday, April 2.

Classic Films for Kids will be hosted by Jennifer Churchill, classic film enthusiast and author of Movies are Magic, the children’s book dedicated to an engaging and educational look at the history of film, which features an introduction from Turner Classic Movies (TCM) primetime host Ben Mankiewicz. She is joined by co-host, son Weston,7, exploring family-friendly programming with Golden Age stars from Abbott and Costello to Shirley Temple.

The first season of Classic Films for Kids will feature full-length, classic films, contextualized with insight and commentary. Initial films include Jack and the Beanstalk (1952), starring Bud Abbott and Lou Costello; The Little Princess (1939), starring Shirley Temple; Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928), starring Buster Keaton; and the Fleischer Brothers’ classic animation, Gulliver’s Travels (1939).

New episodes will premiere every Saturday morning at 11 a.m. ET on The Film Detective channel, followed by SVOD releases on TFD’s classic film and television app, beginning with Jack and the Beanstalk on April 2.

“It’s so important to make sure kids know about these films,” said Churchill. “A lot of kids only see modern movies with fast editing, explosions and CGI. It’s really important for them to know the history of film and that these movies exist.”

“We are thrilled to partner with Jennifer to bring new life to these family-friendly classics,” said Phil Hopkins, president of TFD. “Audiences of all ages will enjoy Jennifer and Weston’s love of the classics and learn why teaching new audiences about the history of film is so essential.”

Classic Films for Kids is the latest in a series of collaborations between TFD and Churchill, who’s exclusive audio commentary has been featured recently on such TFD special-edition Blu-ray and DVD releases as Dancing Pirate (1936), The Fabulous Dorseys (1947) and the upcoming Girl on a Chain Gang (1966), being released April 19.

TFD’s classic film and television app is available to stream on web, iOS, Android, Roku, Amazon Fire TV and Apple TV. For more information on TFD, visit www.thefilmdetective.com.

About The Film Detective:

The Film Detective (TFD) is a leading distributor of restored classic programming, including feature films, television, foreign imports and documentaries and is a division of Cinedigm. Launched in 2014, TFD has distributed its extensive library of 3,000+ hours of film on DVD and Blu-ray and through leading broadcast and streaming platforms including TCM, NBC, EPIX, Amazon, MeTV, PBS and more. TFD has released its classic movie app on web, Android, iOS, Roku, Amazon Fire TV and Apple TV and is available live with a 24/7 channel on Sling, STIRR, Plex, Local Now, Rakuten TV and DistroTV. For more information, visit www.thefilmdetective.com

About Cinedigm:

For more than 20 years, Cinedigm has led the digital transformation of the entertainment industry. Today, Cinedigm entertains hundreds of millions of consumers around the globe by providing premium content, streaming channels and technology services to the world's largest media, technology and retail companies.

Burn (2022) opens today

 

Mafia foot soldier finds his life turned upside down when he discovers his brother killed the mistress of his boss. With time running out he moves to get his brother out of town, but there are complications.

This is a solid crime thriller. To be certain the film isn’t full of bang bang shoot em ups, however the film is full of tension as everyone is found to be maneuvering each other in order to remain alive. That the film works as well it does is due to the excellent cast headed by writer director Patrick Lazzara, who don’t sleep walk through things. Additionally Lazzara’s script is well written. The turns are believable and compelling enough that we forgive it any minor bumps along the way.

To be honest BURN kind of delighted me more than it probably should have. I see a good number of crime dramas every year and while many are good, a good number of them suffer from a lack of sense of believability. It’s not a real world believability, I mean most of the films operate in a filmmaker’s idea of the crime world, rather I mean we don’t buy the world the film creates.  We don’t accept the world it sets up. We don’t believe the actions or the characters. On the other hand writer director Patrick Lazzara creates a world that we accept.  It may sound odd, but its so nice to see a film create a world that works, where we believe the characters and their actions. It’s something rare

I really like BURN a great deal and I recommend it.