This week, I've got reviews of two of the big awards season movies to hit theaters, if you'd kindly scroll down. Also, German and Romanian film festivals hit the Main this weekend. And Sound Unseen kicks off on Wednesday—I'll have more to say about that next week.
Special Screenings
Thursday, November 7
The Boondock Saints (1999)
Alamo Drafthouse
Vigilante brothers wreak havoc on Boston's underworld. $10. 7:25 p.m. Sunday 4:30 p.m. More info here.
A Thousand and One (2023)
Capri Theater
Teyana Taylor is great as a mother who kidnaps her son from foster care. $5; free for North Side residents. 7 p.m. More info here.
Anna Karenina (2012)
Grandview 1&2
Choo choo! Also Sunday. $12. 9:15 p.m. More info here.
Dr. Strangelove (1964)
The Heights
A lotta people want to decompress after the election with a comedy about nuclear war, apparently. Sold out. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
The Fox (1998)
Main Cinema
A German soldier bonds with an orphaned fox cub. Part of the Twin Cities German Film Festival. $10. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
The Jerk (1979)
Parkway Theater
That's not a very nice thing to call someone! $9/$12. Trivia at 7:30 p.m. Movie at 8 p.m. More info here.
Friday, November 8
Horia (2023)
Main Cinema
A teen runs away from home on his motorbike. Part of the Romanian Film Festival. Free. 5:30 p.m. More info here.
Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush (2022)
Main Cinema
A Turkish woman fights to get her son freed from Guantanamo. Part of the Twin Cities German Film Festival. $4. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
It's Such a Beautiful Day (2012) + Me (2024)
Trylon
Don Hertzfeldt's incomparable animated stick figure film, preceded by his new short film. $8. Friday-Saturday 7 & 9 p.m. Sunday 3 & 5 p.m. More info here.
No Goal
Walker Art Center
Short films about "the utopian potential of sports." $12/$15 or free if you wear a sports jersey. 7 p.m. More info here.
Saturday, November 9
Grave of the Fireflies (1988)
Alamo Drafthouse
Not for kids! $10. 3:30 p.m. More info here.
Warboy (2023)
Main Cinema
During World War II, a boy fights to save his family's horses. Part of the Romanian Film Festival. Free. 3 p.m. More info here.
Where Elephants Go (2024)
Main Cinema
A drifter and a child have adventures in Bucharest. Part of the Romanian Film Festival. Free. 5 p.m. More info here.
Balloon (2018)
Main Cinema
Two families flee East Germany in a hot air balloon. Part of the Twin Cities German Film Festival. $10. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
Babe (1995)
Parkway Theater
The other side of George Miller. $5-$10. 1 p.m. More info here.
The Combination (2024)
Trylon
The true story of Minnesota's most notorious gangster, Kid Conn, preceded by the short 2022 film Cold World. Sold out. 5 p.m. More info here.
Sunday, November 10
Red One (2024)
Alamo Drafthouse
Advance screening of the big budget Santa action comedy. $15.50. 4 p.m. More info here.
Elf (2003)
Alamo Drafthouse
Oh, come on! Already? $15.04. 1:30 p.m. More info here.
A Fantastic Woman (2017)
Emagine Willow Creek
A trans woman's life in Chile is turned upside down after her boyfriend dies. $10. 4 p.m. More info here.
Osamu Tezuka's Metropolis (2001)
Emagine Willow Creek
As in "not Fritz Lang's"—this one's adapted from the manga. Also Monday. $12.50. 3 p.m. More info here.
Pulp Fiction (1994)
Emagine Willow Creek
Taranti-YES! Also Wednesday. $11. 12 & 6:30 p.m. More info here.
The Sound of Music (1965)
The Heights
A benefit for the Groveland food shelf. $15. 1 p.m. More info here.
Three Kilometers to the End of the World (2024)
Main Cinema
A gay teen is assaulted in a rural village. Part of the Romanian Film Festival. Free. 1 p.m. More info here.
Gundermann (2018)
Main Cinema
Ugh, not another superhero movie! Part of the Twin Cities German Film Festival. $4. 4 p.m. More info here.
The Miracle of Taipei (2019)
Main Cinema
How women fought to play international soccer. Part of the Twin Cities German Film Festival. $4. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
Amazing Grace (2018)
Minneapolis Central Library
Aretha Franklin, live and in church. What more could you want? Free. 2:30 p.m. More info here.
Pavement Butterfly (1929)
Trylon
Anna May Wong is a Chinese dancer accused of murder in this silent film with live accompaniment by the great Katie Condon. $12. Sunday-Tuesday 7 p.m. More info here.
Monday, November 11
California Split (1974)
Alamo Drafthouse
Some days it's my favorite Altman. Top three at least? $10. 7 p.m. More info here.
Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker (1981)
Emagine Willow Creek
Hey, that's not how the rhyme goes? $6. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
Munchhausen (1943)
The Heights
Gonna send someone to watch this German fantasy classic for me. That's right: I'm gonna watch Munchhausen by proxy. $15. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
The Path (2022)
Main Cinema
Two children try to escape from the Nazis through the Pyrenees. Part of the Twin Cities German Film Festival. $10. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
Tuesday, November 12
Phase IV (1974)
Alamo Drafthouse
But I still haven't seen Phase III! $7. 7 p.m. More info here.
Radiating Joy: The Michelle Duppong Story (2024)
AMC Rosedale 14/AMC Southdale 16
Another Christian movie. $16.26. 5 & 7 p.m. More info here.
Singin' in the Rain (1952)
The Heights
Can't think of a better theater in town to see this in. $12. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
Wednesday, November 13
Blazing Saddles (1974)
Alamo Drafthouse
Never heard of it. $10. 5:10 & 7 p.m. More info here.
Secret Movie Night
Emagine Willow Creek
You gotta go to find out what it is. $10. 7 p.m. More info here.
Gravity (2013)
Grandview 1&2
Sandra Bullock is trapped in space! $12. 9:15 p.m. More info here.
Devo (2024)
Parkway Theater
Sound Unseen 2024 kicks off with this acclaimed new documentary about the Akron new wavers. $25/$30. Music from Revo at 7 p.m. Movie at 8 p.m. More info here.
The World According to Allee Willis (2024)
Trylon
The life of gender (and every other kind of) nonconformist Allee Willis. Part of Sound Unseen. $15. 7 p.m. More info here.
Teaches of Peaches (2024)
Trylon
Follow the electroclash star on her 2022 tour. Part of Sound Unseen. $15. 9 p.m. More info here.
Opening This Week
Follow the links for showtimes.
Andrea Bocelli 30: The Celebration
I don't want to be a dick, but he looks a lot older than 30.
The Best Christmas Pageant Ever
That's overselling it a little.
Dragon Ball DAIMA
Goku and his friends get shrunk!
Elevation
Anthony Mackie fights monsters in a post-apocalyptic world.
Heretic
The old, weird Hugh Grant is such an improvement on his early career as "Mr. Stuttery Blinky" (his words).
Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom
"Ains Ooal Gown, formerly Momonga, leads the Sorcerer Kingdom's undead forces to ally with the Sacred Kingdom and Slane Theocracy against Demon Emperor Jaldabaoth." Haha ok, whatever you say.
The Piano Lesson
John David Washington stars in this August Wilson adaptation, directed by his brother Malcolm.
Small Things Like These
I've been meaning to read the Claire Keegan book for a while.
Ongoing in Local Theaters
Anora
From Kitana Kiki Rodriguez’s enraged trans sex worker in Tangerine to Simon Rex’s washed up porn star in Red Rocket, Sean Baker knows how to let a character loose upon a movie, and Mikey Madison’s Ani may be the most fully realized of Baker’s high-powered, self-deluded survivors. A stripper and occasional escort whose charm and sheer self-determination haven’t failed her yet, she’s eking out a life in Brooklyn’s least glamorous southern reaches. (Sheepshead Bay, Brighton Beach, and Coney Island are captured in all their drab, offseason outer-borough-ness.) Her life changes after a dance for a Russian oligarch’s son parlays into a paid fuck, which in turn goes so well he hires her for an extended stint. Baker captures their whirlwind spree through all forms of excess, ending with a Vegas wedding, as an audiovisual sugar rush that makes Pretty Woman’s shopping montage look like amateur hour. But when Ivan’s parents find out, they sic his handlers on him; he runs off like the spoiled little fuckboy we always knew he was and Ani is left to unleash her rage on the hired muscle as they hunt for him. Madison can be as subtle here as she was on Pamela Adlon’s Better Things and even more furious than she was in Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood before Tarantino thought it’d be a hoot to immolate her with a flamethrower. This decade, we’ve seen plenty of commoners enter the worlds of the wealthy, often ending with fantasies of vengeance. Anora’s trip through the looking glass ends on a far more ambiguous note. A
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice
It’s nice to be pandered to occasionally, so in the run up to the release of this redundant sequel I’ve enjoyed hearing how Winona Ryder and Jenna Ortega geeked out on set about their shared love of Soy Cuba, as well as the Letterboxd promo where Ortega tried to sell Catherine O’Hara on The Passion of Joan of Arc. But then there were the CarMax, Denny’s, and Progressive ads reminding us the real reason why beloved films of the past can never die: $$$. And the movie itself? Well, with Geena Davis and Alec Baldwin’s quaint Maitlands having moved on via an unexplained “loophole,” the Deetz clan—Ryder's Lydia (now a famed ghost hunter), O'Hara's Delia (now an established NYC artist), and Ortega as Lydia’s sullen daughter Astrid—reunites for the funeral of its patriarch Charles (l’affair de Jeffrey Jones is navigated around cleverly). From the re-maniacal Michael Keaton and Ryder’s unstable goth mom to newcomers Justin Theroux as Lydia’s weaselly beau and current Burton GF Monica Bellucci as a soul-sucking spook, everyone here is game, and yes, there is involuntary singing and goopy mayhem. But while this silly little romp through a familiar world consistently errs on the side of goofball exuberance, the storylines race around frantically in search of a reason to happen. As for Ortega, she was good enough in the 2021 school shooting film The Fallout that I hope she frees herself from the afterlife of 20th century IP at some point and shows us what she's got. And I couldn’t help but be haunted by the fact that if he’d made the original a few years later, Burton would probably have cast Johnny Depp instead of Keaton. B-
Conclave
Edward Berger may think he’s cooked up something more substantial than a chewy Vatican potboiler here—a meditation on faith in the modern era, or some other middlebrow (papal) bull. Who knows and who cares? The crowd I saw it with thought Berger’s flamboyant pope opera was funny as hell (pardon the expression, Father) and they were right. Watching old guys from around the world in funny clothes politic, gossip, and backstab is just solid entertainment. Cinematographer Stéphane Fontaine milks everything he can from the ornate setting and bright costumery, and this cast knows how to project an ominous seriousness that’s forever camp adjacent. We’re talking Ralph Fiennes working his timeworn visage of existential indigestion, John Lithgow looking more like Donald Rumsfield than ever, Sergio Castellitto as a gregarious bear who wants to repeal Vatican II, Isabella Rossellini as a mysterious nun, and, for the ladies, a little Stanley Tucci. You’ll guess most of the twists, groan at some, and even get blindsided by a few. Still, without giving too much away, it’s hard not to notice that none of the scandals here are as horrific as those the Catholic Church has covered up in real life. B+
Didi
The semi-nostalgic coming-of-age comedies aren’t creeping closer to the present, you’re just getting older. Sean Wang’s directorial debut is calibrated to trigger feelings of sheepish relatability in any late millennial who ever had second thoughts about the instant message they almost sent or creeped on a crush’s Facebook page so they could lie about their favorite movie. But Dìdi stands apart in one significant way: its teen hero Chris (Izaac Wang) is a first generation Taiwanese-American, his adolescent awkwardness compounded by the culture gap with his well-meaning mom (Joan Chen). As Chris navigates the limbo that is the summer between middle and high school, he splits away from his old pals and starts shooting video for some older skaters while flirting with a girl who finds him “cute for an Asian.” A justifiable crowd-pleaser, with moments of secondhand embarrassment and uncomfortable laughter—you’ve seen a lot of this before. But you’ve never seen it quite like this. Generic it ain’t. B+
Emilia Pérez
Jacques Audiard’s musical crime melodrama about a trans Mexican gangster who remakes herself as a social activist is indeed “a big swing,” as apologists for unrealized ambition like to say. And there’s plenty to admire here, starting with Zoe Saldaña as the lawyer who helps make this transformation happen. Not only does she get to appear in her natural human skin color for once, but she can really move—the film’s one real showstopper owes her ability to bring Paul Guilhaume’s otherwise lackluster choreography to life. And as Emilia herself, Karla Sofía Gascón puts her charisma and her telenovela pedigree to good use. (As Emilia’s wife-turned-foe, Selena Gomez is fine.) But this level of stylized overstatement requires a surety of command that Audiard lacks here, not to mention better musical numbers. The French songwriter Camille supplies little more than hookless recitatives, an excuse for characters to dump their inner thoughts at unnecessary length to the tune of forgettable melodies. Call me old-fashioned, but I think you should be able to remember a musical’s songs after you’ve heard them. B-
The Substance
Without our shared cultural knowledge of Demi Moore’s life and career, The Substance, Coralie Fargeat’s absurdist experiment in gory meta-hagsploitation, is a fairly limp if expressively graphic satire of impossible female body standards. Moore’s presence, and her performance, give the film its moments of depth—moments Fargeat doesn’t always seem particularly interested in. Moore is an aging, discarded star who injects herself with a black-market serum that looks like radioactive pee and mitoses into the “ideal version of herself,” a perky-butted and gleam-smiled Margaret Qualley who calls herself Sue. Each woman gets to remain conscious for exactly a week apiece, spending each alternate week as a nude, comatose lump ingesting bagged nutrients. And as Elisabeth begins to sulk through her allotment of days and Sue wants more time to shine, rules are inevitably bent, with increasingly disastrous results. The subtlety-free finale, which fire-hoses blood at the patriarchy and anyone else in proximity, will either have you pumping your fist at its audacity or rolling your eyes at what a cop out it is. For better or for worse, what Fargeat is “trying to say” and her grisly overindulgence are inseparable. Read the full review here.
The Wild Robot
What happens when an all-purpose droid designed to perform just about every utilitarian task crash lands on a human-free island? Short answer: She learns intuition and love from the wild animals around her. Longer answer: After she accidentally smooshes a family of geese, ROZZUM Unit 7134 (aka Roz) makes it her task to raise the sole survivor, a runt. Lotsa nice messages about motherhood and such here and the animation has a brisk sense of physical comedy. Lupita Nyong'o is fun as Roz, and so’s the rest of the all-star voice cast—Pedro Pascal as a wily fox (is there any other kind?), Catherine O’Hara as a hedgehog mom who keeps losing count of her progeny. But I was so impressed with how casually Lilo & Stitch creator Chris Sanders captured the everyday, no-big-deal, unsentimental brutality of the animal world in the first part of the film that I was a little bummed when the critters all learned to get along in order to survive. Sorry, I’m just an “overwhelming indifference of nature” guy, what can I say? B
