The Christmas movies have taken over local theaters, but there's still some non-seasonal fare worth checking out this week as well. I'm hoping to see the newly restored Filipino classic Bona at the Trylon tonight, and even though I'm not much of a pet person, I really want to check out Flow.
Special Screenings
Thursday, December 5
Sing Sing (2024)
Capri Theater
Prisoners change their lives via theater. $5 or free for Northsiders. 7 p.m. More info here.
The Family Man (2000)
Grandview 1&2
Not gonna lie, I forgot this Nicolas Cage movie even existed. Also Sundy. $12. 9:15 p.m. More info here.
White Christmas (1954)
The Heights
Sorry, all screenings are sold out. People just love this damn movie! Thursday-Friday 7 p.m. Saturday-Sunday 2 & 7p.m. More info here.
Bona (1980)
Trylon
A central film in contemporary Filipino cinema. Presented by Archives on Screen. Free. 7 p.m. More info here.
Friday, December 6
Female Trouble (1974)
Alamo Drafthouse
"Crime is beauty." Keats said that first, right? $10. 9:15 p.m. More info here.
Dr. Seuss's The Grinch (2018)
Marcus West End
Stop. Remaking. The. Grinch. Through Wednesday. $5. Showtimes and more info here.
Elf (2003)
Marcus West End
Elf? Elf. Through Wednesday. $5. Showtimes and more info here.
Candy Cane Lane (2023)
Marcus West End
"The 12 Days of Christmas" comes to life! Through Wednesday. $5. More info here.
It's a Wonderful Life (1945)
Marcus West End
Is it though? Through Wednesday. $5. Showtimes and more info here.
Scream It Off Screen
Parkway Theater
Tis the season to scream at movies. $13/$19. 8 p.m. More info here.
Heretics (2024)
Trylon
Starring Hughs Grants? $8. Friday, Monday-Tuesday 5 p.m. Saturday-Sunday, Wednesday 1 p.m. More info here.
Good Morning (1959)
Trylon
Two children refuse to speak until their parents buy them a TV. $8. Friday-Saturday 7 & 9 p.m. Sunday 3 & 5 p.m. More info here.
2024 British Arrow Awards
Walker Art Center
As always these showings are selling out fast. $15/$18. Friday, Wednesday 7 & 8 p.m. Saturday 1, 4, & 7 p.m. Sunday 1 & 4 p.m. More info here.
Saturday, December 7
How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000)
Alamo Drafthouse
That feeling when knee surgery is tomorrow. $10. 1:30 p.m. More info here.
The Polar Express (2004)
Alamo Drafthouse
Nah, it's just creepy-looking. $15.04. 11 p.m. More info here.
Live at the Met: The Magic Flute
AMC Rosedale 14/AMC Southdale 16/Marcus West End
Toot toot! $28.70. 1 p.m. More info here.
My Neighbor Totoro (1988)
AMC Rosedale 14/AMC Southdale 16/Emagine Willow Creek
I choose to believe the story that Disney wanted to rename Totoro "Craig" for American audiences even though it seems pretty apocryphal. $16.35. Showtimes and more info here.
UFC 310: Pantoja vs Asakura
Emagine Willow Creek
Fightin'! $25. 7 p.m. More info here.
Gremlins (1984)
Main Cinema
Sorry, but Jay was SCANDALIZED by my dirty Gremlins joke so I retired it. $10. 10 p.m. More info here.
The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)
Parkway Theater
It's fine. $5-$10. 1 p.m. More info here.
Sunday, December 8
Klaus (2019)
Alamo Drafthouse
Some kind of Santa origin story, I gather? $10. 12:15 p.m. More info here.
Love Actually (2003)
Emagine Willow Creek
#actually. Also Wednesday. $11. 12 & 6 p.m. More info here.
Pure Grit (2021)
Emagine Willow Creek
Documentary about a young Native American woman competing in the male-dominated world of bareback racing. $10. 4 p.m. More info here.
Outrage (1950)
Trylon
Not a lot of other movies addressing sexual assault in the '50s. $8. 7 p.m. Monday-Tuesday 7 & 8:30. More info here.
Monday, December 9
Elf (2003)
Alamo Drafthouse
No really, I think this is your last chance to see it in theaters this year. $15.04. 6:30 p.m. More info here.
Mix 'n' Mash Experimental Film Festival
Bryant Lake Bowl
MCAD students show their stuff. $10. 2 p.m. More info here.
The Dorm That Dripped Blood (1982)
Emagine Willow Creek
That's it! I'm moving off campus. $10. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
It's a Wonderful Life (1945)
The Heights
Not for you it isn't—this movie is sold out. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
Tuesday, December 10
Batman Returns (1992)
Alamo Drafthouse
It's (sigh) a Christmas movie. $10. 7 p.m. More info here.
Wednesday, December 11
The Holiday (2006)
Alamo Drafthouse
Sometimes Nancy Meyers romcoms just try too hard, you know? $10. 7 p.m. More info here.
André Rieu’s Christmas Concert
AMC Rosedale 14/AMC Southdale 16/Emagine Willow Creek/Marcus West End
OK, sure. $23.90. 7 p.m. More info here.
The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978)
Bryant Lake Bowl
A toy-raiser for Toys for Tots. 3:30, 6:30, & 9:30 p.m. More info here.
BABYMETAL Legend-43 The Movie (2024)
Emagine Willow Creek
The Japanese rockers, live in Okinawa. $12.50. 6 p.m. More info here.
Secret Movie Night
Emagine Willow Creek
Don't tell anyone. $10. 7 p.m. More info here.
Catch Me If You Can (2002)
Grandview 1&2
Not to be confused with the 1965 movie about the Dave Clark Five. $12. 9:15 p.m. More info here.
National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989)
Parkway Theater
Why are those art New York people living in the suburbs??? $9/$12. Ugly sweater contest at 7:30 p.m. Movie at 8 p.m. More info here.
Placebo: This Search for Meaning (2024)
Trylon
A doc about the heady Brit rockers. Presented by Sound Unseen. $13. 7 p.m. More info here.
Opening This Week
Follow the links for showtimes.
Flow
A cat has to cooperate with other animals during a flood.
for KING + COUNTRY’s A Drummer Boy Christmas LIVE
Sounds like a real Event!
Nightbitch
*Bob Seger voice* Workin' on my nightbitch.
The Order
An FBI agent takes on white supremacists.
Pushpa 2: The Rule
An Indian action flick.
The Return
Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche in a retelling of The Odyssey, or at least part of it.
Solo Leveling: ReAwakening
A new anime.
Werewolves
Darling, this is no joke. This is lycanthropy.
Y2K
What if the world really had fallen apart on 1/1/2000?
Ongoing in Local Theaters
Andrea Bocelli 30: The Celebration
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
The Best Christmas Pageant Ever
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+
Gladiator II
Gladiator worked as well as it did (which might not be quite as well as you remember) because Ridley Scott stocked his swords ‘n’ sandals rehash with hams who knew how to spout nonsense about "the dream of Marcus Aurelius" and "the glory of Rome" as though it were meaningful, nay crucial. And this sequel is almost worth seeing solely for Denzel Washington, who accepts his role as a challenge, supercharging the eccentric cadences that made his Macbeth a darkly comic curiosity a couple years back—his “I own … your house. I want … your loyalty” may be the line reading of the year. As the wily former slave Macrinus, Washington traipses, flounces, pounces, smirks, exclaims, and keenly outwits his dim foes. Close your eyes and he could be playing an evil Disney tiger. But poor Paul Mescal looks as out of place as a puppy at a Senate budget hearing. He’s surely swole enough as the son of Crowe’s Maximus (and a rightful heir to the imperial throne) to credibly wallop challengers in the arena, whether corporeal or poorly animated. But we all know Paulie’s a weeper not a fighter. Every generation needs its moody dreamboat, and Aftersun and Normal People made Mescal that nontoxic totem. As for the combat scenes, if the first Gladiator challenged Scott to revamp a genre for modern audiences, all his sequel can offer is more. Read our full review here. C+
A Real Pain
You might expect a buddy comedy about Holocaust tourism to flounder on the side of bad taste or staid reverence. So one thing I’ll say about A Real Pain, written and directed by Jesse Eisenberg, is that it does strike the right delicate tonal balance. As to why that balance needed to be struck, however, I’m still not entirely sure. It's the story inseparable cousins who now rarely see each other, reunited because their beloved grandmother’s dying wish was for them to visit the home in Poland that she fled during the Holocaust, David is an uptight and tetchy, Benji is mouthy and moody. In other words, David is Jesse Eisenberg and Benji is Kieran Culkin. If you were hoping for Mark Zuckerberg and Roman Roy on the Road to Lublin, you’re in luck. Do they learn a little about themselves—and each other—along the way? Oh, brother (er, cousin?), do they ever. Though Culkin and Eisenberg are an ace comic pair, yuks are not enough for A Real Pain, and it’s one of those movies where the characters’ backstories seem to be written after the fact to justify the drama. The great thing about comedy? It never requires justification. B
Wicked
Thinkpieces are surely in the works about how Wicked, the story of a good woman who is cast as an enemy of the people by authoritarians using fiendishly disseminated lies, is a perfect Trump era fable (just as it was a perfect Bush era fable two decades ago). But maybe the best topical lesson that Wicked offers is that villains are often more entertaining than heroes. If anything, Cynthia Erivo has too much screen presence for her already underwritten part, and her almost-adult dignity undermines her character arc. Her Elphaba (aka the Wicked Witch of the West) is no ingénue misled by foolish dreams, and seems incapable of humiliation. Meanwhile, Glinda is a dream of a role that Ariana Grande floats through with perfect timing, flaunting her shallow vanity, scene-stealing blonde hair tosses, and comically sudden upshoots into her showy soprano. And while I’ll take songwriter Stephen Schwartz’s generically inspirational pop over the wan schlock of the dreaded Pasek and Paul, I have seen better movie musicals set in Oz. Read our full review here. B
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
