An all-IFC, pre-opening day characterization M4
What a beautiful spring day in Manhattan, which I know because I had a half-hour to get outside between movies 2 and 3.Gimme the Loot
IFC
Note to self: find Marion Williams's cover of "I Shall Be Released."This wasn't a front-runner for the program today until I was reminded that it's about a pair of graffitist buddies bent on "bombing" the home run apple at Citi Field. Since I'm gonna be at Citi on Monday (and Thursday, and Sunday week, and repeatedly thereafter), and since I hope to see that apple appear with some regularity, how could I skip it?
Glad I didn't. A sweet buddy movie, like Butch and Sundance if one of them had actually been female, thus rendering the existing sexual tension both more and less (because secondary to the partnership) conventional. Nothing amazing or profound, but thoroughly likable and almost certain not to play in New Haven, and that pretty much defines the M4 flick.
The We and the I
IFC
Repeat last sentence from previous review.My spoiler-avoidance policy kept me from reading much about this, but Michel Gondry seems to have written a script that lets some actual high schoolers portray versions of themselves on the ride home from school--the hour-and-a-half odyssey for some--on the Bx66 bus. What that gives us is a reasonably convincing simulacrum of the life, the cruelty, the confusion, and the innocence-in-spite-of-itself of youth. Ballsy thing for a French dude to attempt, one that could have failed laughably, but it works.
Leviathan
IFC
Whoa, that wasn't Iron Man 3, was it? Often lightless, mostly wordless, this challenges us to know just what is going on on this New Bedford fishing boat. I was sort of under the impression there would be whales (see earlier note about obsessive spoiler avoidance), but even with just various fish (including sea scallops that made me reconsider my all-but-vegetarianism), sea birds, and, oh yeah, some humans, it's a fascinating slice of a foreign life. In retrospect, however, a pic with little light or language is maybe not ideal for the midafternoon slot in an M4 being conducted on < 7 hours' sleep; battled the drowsies from beginning almost to end, and I confess that from time to time I found myself wondering whether any of my Mets tickets were selling on StubHub (they weren't).Nice Times-underwritten short, Allergy to Originality, riffing on the nothing-new-under-the-sun trope via Wikipedia.
După dealuri (Beyond the hills)
IFC
It's a nice quiet monastery until Alina shows up, intent on rekindling romance with Voichita, who opted for nunhood when Alina split for work and a non-Romanian life in Germany. But Alina doesn't fit, won't fit, doesn't want to fit (except perhaps as a means of getting Voichita back), and the charismatic priest who runs the joint ain't having her evil influence screwing up his good thing. Ugliness, up to and including an exorcism-cum-crucifixion, ensues. A brutal, remarkable watch.Trailers
- One Track Heart: The Story of Krishna Das--Doc about a chanter.
- Portrait of Jason--Gay hustlerand champion drinker, circa 1965, I'm guessing. (Good guess: the film is '67.)
- Upstream Color--From Shane Carruth, director of Primer; I'm a yes here.
- Simon Killer--Funny, I already don't remember this clearly, but I remember that it looked promising.
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