If you scroll down, you'll see reviews of Anemone, Predators, and The Smashing Machine. You won't see a review of One Battle After Another, because I wasn't able to squoosh my thoughts into a blurb. Either I'll write long about it next week, or I'll squoosh harder.
Special Screenings
Thursday, October 2
Hazbin Hotel (2025)
Alamo Drafthouse
Sing along to four episodes of the musical animated series. $13.99. 7 p.m. More info here.
Ricky (2025)
Capri Theater
A 30-year-old man starts his life over after 15 years in prison. $5. 7 p.m. More info here.
Hot Fuzz (2007)
Emagine Willow Creek
When the spire pierces Timothy Dalton’s neck… $11.60. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
American Psycho (2000)
Grandview 1&2
Patrick Bateman invented poptimism. $14.44. 9:15 p.m. More info here.
Aliens (1986)
Heights Theater
This time, there’s more than one of them. $13. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Parkway Theater
They’re so quiet! $9/$12. Trivia at 7:30 p.m. Movie at 8 p.m. More info here.
The Onion Investigates Jeffrey Epstein: Bad Pedophile (2025) Trylon
Sorry, both screenings are very much… Sold out. 7 & 9 p.m. More info here.
Friday, October 3
Le Panache (2024)
Alliance Française
A teen with a stutter overcomes his insecurity, thanks to a teacher. $10 donation requested. 5 p.m. More info here.
Spider-Man (2002)
AMC Rosedale 14/AMC Southdale 16/B&B Bloomington/Emagine Willow Creek/Marcus West End
Fact: Sam Raimi made the best Spider-Man movies. Times, prices, and more info here.
Now You See Me Movie Marathon
Coffman Memorial Union
The magical heist series, hosted by an actual magician. Free. 4 p.m. More info here.
Hocus Pocus (1993)
Como Midway Pavillion
Summer's over, but movies in the park continue in St. Paul. Free. Dusk. More info here.
Freaks (1932)
East Side Freedom Library
Gabba gabba hey! Free. 7 p.m. More info here.
The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)
Granada
A little early but we’ll allow it. Includes meal. Presented by Taste the Movies. $169. 5:30 & 8:30 p.m. More info here.
Over the Garden Wall (2014)
Insight Brewing
Insight kicks off its October movie nights with this cult-loved animated series. Free. 8 p.m. More info here.
The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Orchestra Hall
The Minnesota Orchestra performs the score. $74-$149. Friday-Saturday 7 p.m. Sunday 2 p.m. More info here.
Scream It Off Screen
Parkway Theater
Shout at local short films. $13/$19. 8 p.m. More info here.
The Stepford Wives (1975)
Trylon
What’s wrong with women taking an interest in homemaking? I kid, I kid! In 35mm. $8. 7 p.m. Saturday 9 p.m. Sunday 3 p.m. More info here.
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)
Trylon
Took my baby away from me. $8. 9:30 p.m. Saturday 7 p.m. Sunday 5:30 p.m. More info here.
Saturday, October 4
Spider-Man 2.1 (2004)
AMC Rosedale 14/AMC Southdale 16/B&B Bloomington/Emagine Willow Creek/Marcus West End
Maybe even better than Spider-Man. Showtimes, prices, and more info here.
Beetlejuice (1988)
Parkway Theater
Beware! Pretentious NYC people are moving to the country! $5/$7. 1 p.m. More info here.
Alien (1979)
Southern Theater
The Picturegoer Film Club does things up at the Southern, with a pre-film screening of Haredevil Hare (1946) and a special presentation. $15. 6 p.m. More info here.
Sunday, October 5
Goldeneye (1995)
Alamo Drafthouse
What’s the conventional wisdom on the Brosnan Bond flicks these days? $10.99. 12:30 p.m. More info here.
Closer (2004)
Alamo Drafthouse
I bet the “why aren’t the movies sexy anymore?” folks love this one. $10.99. 4 p.m. More info here.
Spider-Man 3 (2007)
AMC Rosedale 14/AMC Southdale 16/B&B Bloomington/Emagine Willow Creek/Marcus West End
OK, this is a weird one, for sure. Showtimes, prices, and more info here.
Are We Good? (2025)
AMC Southdale 16
A documentary look at Marc Maron. $15. 7 p.m. More info here.
Night of the Living Dead (1968)
Grandview 1&2
Never heard of it. $14.44. 9:15 p.m. More info here.
Catvideofest 2025
Riverview Theater
If it’s the weekend, it’s time for cat videos at the Riverview. $5. 10 a.m. More info here.
American Psycho (2000)
Roxy’s Cabaret
The other Psycho was American too, but I quibble. Free. 7 p.m. More info here.
Hour of the Wolf (1968)
Trylon
Bergman sure loved humiliating Max von Sydow. $8. 7:30 p.m. Monday-Tuesday 7 & 9 p.m. More info here.
Monday, October 8
The Devil’s Rejects (2005)
AMC Rosedale 14/AMC Southdale 16/Marcus West End
They must be pretty bad if the devil rejected them! Also Wednesday. Tickets, showtimes, and more info here.
The City of the Dead (1960)
Emagine Willow Creek
I sure wouldn’t want to live there! $7.60. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
Frankenstein (2025)
Main Cinema
This week’s Cine Latino fest kicks off with Guillermo del Toro’s take on the big undead guy and his maker. Sold out. 7:30 p.m. More info here.
Marcus Mystery Movie
Marcus West End
What could it be? $6. 7 p.m. More info here.
Tuesday, October 7
Scream (1996)
Alamo Drafthouse
Back when meta was still fresh. $22. 6 p.m. More info here.
Bride of Re-Animator (1990)
Alamo Drafthouse
It had to happen, right? $10.99. 9:15 p.m. More info here.
Broken Mary: The Kevin Matthews Story (2025)
AMC Southdale 16/Marcus West End
A busted statue of the Blessed Virgin saves an ailing radio personality’s life. Or something. Showtimes, prices and more info here.
Wednesday, October 8
Secret Movie Night
Emagine Willow Creek
A mystery movie selected by a local notable. $11.60. 7 p.m. More info here.
What You Can’t Keep (2025)
Parkway Theater
A new film from two locals: writer Harrison David Rivers and director Tyler Michaels King. $25/$40. Q&A at 7:15 p.m. Movie at 7 p.m. More info here.
Inertia: Re-making The Crow (2001) + James O’Barr’s The Crow (1998)
Trylon
A doc about two teens recreating The Crow in film, and the actual film they made. Presented by Sound Unseen. $13. 7 p.m. More info here.
Opening This Week
Follow the links for showtimes.
Anemone
In his first feature-length picture, director Ronan Day-Lewis proves himself capable of crafting scenes that would shine in the context of a great film. Unfortunately, those scenes are part of Anemone, a mediocre movie merely aching for greatness, and here they’re ponderous and overreaching. You can’t blame papa Daniel for wanting to work with his boy, though you can blame him for the script, which he co-wrote, and which overuses that creaky actorly device, the monologue. Though this is one of those movies that pretends to generate mystery by just not telling you what the fuck is going on, the story’s pretty simple. After an unnamed (but—don’t you worry—quite dramatically revealed) trauma, a former soldier (Day-Lewis) disappears into the wilds, leaving his brother (Sean Bean) to look after his wife (Samantha Morton) and son (Samuel Bottomley). Decades later, brother sets out to retrieve soldier because son has become bitter and violent. Cinematographer Ben Fordesman, who’s done excellent work with director Rose Glass, is permitted to indulge himself with sometimes overly gorgeous results; so is Bobby Krlic, aka The Haxan Cloak, who attempts to drown the film beneath ambient swells. We get another (final?) elder Day-Lewis performance to add to the limited store. And it’s possible the younger Day-Lewis will eventually learn to hold back, maybe even to recognize how this story could have made for a quieter, more effective drama. But the climatic hail storm that sends ice chunks the size of fists plummeting from the sky doesn’t give me a lot of hope. C+
Avatar: The Way of Water
The latest chapter in James Cameron’s eco-action blockbuster franchise is back in theaters.
Bone Lake
“A dream getaway soon spirals into a nightmarish maze of sex, lies and manipulation as terrifying secrets come to light, triggering a bloody battle for survival.” Well then!
Casper
A friendly ghost? Preposterous.
Good Boy
A dog saves a man from supernatural forces.
Kantara: A Legend—Chapter 1
An Indian mythological action movie.
The Official Release Party of a Showgirl
Brace yourself.
Perfect Blue
The Satoshi Kon animated classic returns to theaters.
Predators
I never watched To Catch a Predator—mostly I had better things to do with my time, but I was also put off the self-righteous thirst for public humiliation that powered the show. David Osit’s skeptical documentary first places the show in context, reminding us of the high-level, universal adulation host Chris Hansen received (Jon Stewart bestows a particular sloppy smooch). Then he arrays his critiques: He speaks to the young women who pretended to be teenage girls, recounts the suicide of one nabbed “predator,” shows us the messes made by online copycat versions, and looks into the problems with prosecuting people set up by a TV show. It’s hard to capture in words what he’s after. Even taken as a whole, the concrete, documentable damage the show caused probably won’t feel damning to anyone who doesn’t already, like Osit and I, find the underlying ethos of the Predator spectacle socially corrosive. But for the haters, it’s vindication. A-
Re-Animator
Back in theaters for spooky season.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
Re-released for its 50th anniversary.
The Smashing Machine
Benny Safdie is on to something with this character study of UFC pioneer Mark Kerr. The ungainly grappling and kicking of mixed martial arts, the improvised clutter of knees and fists—these call for a style other than the pulp classicism of the boxing picture, and Safdie’s vérité editing rhythms, jaggedly aestheticized by Nala Sinephro’s ambient-jazz soundtrack, mostly do the trick. Dwayne Johnson, in uncanny-valley prosthetics, is Kerr, an almost pathologically genial behemoth who pounds faces to mush for a living. Only one person seems capable of disturbing his peace—his needy girlfriend Dawn (Emily Blunt, in a pushup bra as aggressive as any of the fight scenes here). Safdie’s script gives them plenty to work with: He nails the self-fragilizing “I gotta call my sponsor” tone of the newly sober, and maps the moving goalposts of lovers’ squabbles with hectic precision. Even the climactic showdown between Mark and Dawn, set to the entirety of Springsteen’s “Jungleland” and fated to be analyzed by dim YouTube scholars who want to demonstrate “acting,” is as impressive as it wants to be. But the phonier moments leap off the screen—not just the training montage set to Elvis’s “My Way” but the ringside announcers who compulsively restate the obvious stakes of each match while crafting the sort of hokey sports narratives the film seems to want to rise above. And though Kerr battles addiction and control issues, we don’t get inside his head, and his only external foe is Dawn. I don’t think anyone here wanted to make a movie about a crazy girlfriend distracting a warrior from his goal, but the way the story plays out, that’s what we’re left with. B
The Summer Book
An adaptation of Tove Jansson’s wonderful little novel.
Ongoing in Local Theaters
Follow the links for showtimes.
A Big Bold Beautiful Journey
What if Knight Rider had been a romcom? That's not exactly the concept behind the latest from mononymous director Kogonada, who may be the first to tell you that he didn't write the script, as he had with his more subtle successes Columbus and After Yang. Put simply, this is a movie about a magical GPS that forces two relationship-averse single people to relive the most traumatic moments in their lives until they fall in love. Margot Robbie and Colin Ferrell are charming, hot, and determined to make this damn thing work, and at some of the loopier moments (Ferrell performing in a high school production of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying) and quieter ones (Robbie, as her 12-year-old self, seeking advice from her mother) they pull it off. In fact, I'll go out on a limb and say this may be the best possible movie you could make about a magical GPS that forces two relationship averse single people to relive the most traumatic moments in their lives until they fall in love. B-
Caught Stealing—ends Thursday
What a slog. Austin Butler (weirdly channeling Barbarino-era Travolta at times) is Hank Thompson, a hunky bartender on the Lower East Side who coulda been a star ballplayer if he hadn’t rammed his IROC into a tree as a kid. His neighbor (Matt Smith with a mohawk that would’ve got him hooted off St. Mark’s Place in 1998, which is when this movie takes place for some reason) asks Hank to look after his cat; soon Russian mobsters start pummeling Hank, and Hasidic hitmen are on his trail too. The film veers between bloody ha-ha and bloody oh-no without settling on a style, and if you try to miss its “last good days of New York” thesis, don’t worry, Darren Aronofsky will get the Twin Towers into every shot he can. Maybe Charlie Huston’s 2005 novel of the same name works on the page, but nothing in his lackluster adapted script suggests how, and though Butler does have charisma you’d never know it from his performance here. Still, Aronofsky haters (we are legion) will be relieved that the film keeps his auteurist tics in check, so no women are tormented to the brink of insanity and beyond—which doesn’t mean no women get a bullet to the head. C
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle
Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale
Dude Perfect: The Hero Tour—ends Thursday
The History of Sound—ends Thursday
Noah—Live!—ends Thursday
Spinal Tap II: The End Continues—ends Thursday
Strange Journey: The Story of Rocky Horror—ends Thursday
Weapons—ends Thursday
Zach Cregger is no Oz Perkins (complimentary). Still, “17 children left their homes in the middle of the night and they never came back” is the easy part, and without giving too much away to the “I’ll wait for streaming” crowd, the explanation struck me as anticlimactic and a little goofy. As with Barbarian, Cregger works better with premises and characterization than with “what’s behind that door,” and, ugh, old ladies still creep him out. Still, Weapons as a manic meditation on grief, kind of an energy-drink-fueledThe Sweet Hereafter, with each adult is wrapped up in their own world—the kids’ teacher (Julia Garner) makes it all about herself, Josh Brolin is a dad doing his own research, and Alden Ehrenreich is a hapless cop who distracts himself by targeting a homeless swindler. So, how do you grade a film that zips from ominous to amusing to dumb to creepy-despite-itself to arrive at a truly galvanizing ending. Let’s try… B
