Now Playing
The Long Good Super Mario Galaxy Friday
Pick of the Week:
Flour Storm: Iranian Animation plays at the Clinton on April 8th from Church of Film. I really love these animation showcases and the Ukrainian one last week was great.
“A curated program of Iranian animation, before and after the revolution! Flower Storms: Animation in Iran takes us through the wild experimental works of the artists at Iran’s Institute for Intellectual Development of Children & Young Adults, up until present times!
Based on folk tales, dreams, modern art and political nightmares, this beautiful set provides an eye-popping sample of the Iranian avant-garde through the last 50 years. Including the work of animation geniuses Noureddin Zarrinkelk and Ali Akbar Sadeghi, with classics like Amir Hamzeh & the Dancing Zebra (1977) and the Flower Storm (1972), and much, much more!”
Also Playing:
Dead Mountaineer’s Hotel (1979). Directed by Grigori Kromanov. Starring Uldis Pūcītis, Jüri Järvet, Lembit Peterson.
Playing at the Hollywood on April 3rd. This is a wonderful locked room murder mystery that also involves an alien and some killer Estonian prog rock. Church of Film played this last year, or the year before (I don’t experience time linearly), and the good people at Deaf Crocodile recently restored it.
This Week:
Ikiru plays at Cinemagic this week (April 5th and 9th) as their Kurosawa series continues. It was inspired from The Death of Ivan Ilyich which you all probably read in a literary survey class decades ago. This is about a dying man trying to find meaning while dealing with bureaucracy. It’s one of Kurosawa’s more personal and humanistic films and is great.
At 5th Ave: check the website! Hopefully it’s updated. Programming is supposed to start again.
At the Academy:
2001: A Space Odyssey opens for a run. This is the movie that Kubrick made to prove that he could fake the moon landing. I think that the moon landing video looks like shit and I could have done a better job directing it. Someone call the Philadelphia Project and send me back in time to do so. Or maybe it’s already happened?!
Legend opens for a run. This is the Tom Cruise/Tim Curry demon movie. I didn’t grow up watching this so I don’t have the fondness that everyone has for it. I grew up watching real movies like Beethoven, which I watch every night with my dog.
After Hours opens for a run. A great comedy. One of Marty’s best. One of the best New York City movies ever made. It’s about a yuppie being menaced by downtown women. Featuring the great Catherine O’Hara.
April 14th: Cadence Video Poetry: a current wells inside: “Presented in partnership with Cadence Video Poetry, a literary media organization in Seattle, WA and the only festival of its kind in the region. This night of shorts also serves as a satellite screening for their fest.
What is the object of your reaching, searching, and longing? A tidal wave of Pacific Northwest screendance, video poetry, and avant-garde cinema, these homegrown shorts invite introspection. Including outcomes of Cadence workshops and new work from past Cadence artists in residence, this showcase features works about a Palestinian beekeeper, the trans-Atlantic slave trade, a post-feline society, and a world liberated from gender, to revel in the many lineages of our region and the importance of diversity to our culture. Satire, speculation, and surrealism, these films are a sampling of the swell of video poetry emerging from this area of coastal convergence.”
April 26th, “Films of Beryl Sokoloff presented by Jessica Daugherty.”
At Cinema 21:
Be seduced by The Graduate on April 4th at 11 AM so you can take an erotic nap afterwards.
The Napa Boys plays on April 7th. This is a new comedy that looks pretty funny but I have no idea if it’s good. I’m going to see it because since Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie I have been dying for new comedies. For some reason comedies don’t seem to play well in this town. I GUESS WE DON’T LIKE TO LAUGH. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go review Canadian Meat Cleaver Three, an obscure Canadian exploitation film shot exclusively in a Tim Horton’s bathroom.
At Cinemagic:
VHS Night returns with Dark Angel: The Ascent on Good Friday (today) so you can celebrate with what purports to be a romantic supernatural horror movie about a scantily clad demon and the dweeb who loves her.
There is a 2000s horror festival this week. I am not the target audience for this but you can go see Drag Me to Hell (which I thought was pretty good), Wrong Turn, The Descent, and Slither, which are all groovy ghoulies that people in their 30s and 40s have seen. I have not. In fact, I have avoided most of these movies.
The Being plays on Easter, which is a not very good Jackie Kong monster movie. They should have just played The Long Good Friday today. How come no one is playing that? Go watch The Long Good Friday, it’s a great British crime movie with Bob Hoskins and Helen Mirren. It’s streaming for free on Plex and Pluto TV.
At the Clinton:
Ferngully: The Last Rain Forest plays on April 4th.
It is happening again. The first three episodes of Twin Peaks play on April 6th. I am very excited to see The Return in a theater and glad that someone is finally doing this here in Portland. Theaters across the country had been playing Twin Peaks since David died.
Eclipse plays on April 9th. I am assuming that people grew up with the Twilight Movies and this is a weird nostalgia thing?
Check out Church of Film for any non-Clinton Street Theater shows during the week.
From Below is a microcinema with neat showings. They are doing god’s work and playing ape themed movies for Ape-ril. This week: Fire on the Plain plays next.
At the Hollywood:
Angel marathon plays on April 5th. “Experience all FOUR installments of the notorious exploitation franchise ANGEL in mind-numbing chronological order on Easter Sunday. First film starts at 4:00pm.” Sorry, I will be spending my Easter Sunday with my FAMILY who LOVES me (to not be home).
Koln 75 plays on April 5th. “Koln 75 tells the true story behind one of the best-selling jazz records of all time, Keith Jarrett’s “Koln Concert” from 1975.”
Brokeback Mountain plays on April 6th because you can’t quit me.
B-Movie Bingo returns on April 7th with Killer Angels. “Three female cops form a special unit to get their main witness out of the clutches of a gang. The witness holds the key to Chu Chung Sing, a gang lord who runs a nightclub. They will have to face a ruthless but sentimental killer.” A pitch: play Jerry Seinfeld’s Bee Movie for B-Movie Bingo.
Black Film: A History of Black Representation and Participation in the Movies plays on April 8th. “Writer, filmmaker, and educator David F. Walker invites you to join him for a double celebration. First, there is the release of his new book, Black Film: A History of Black Representation and Participation in the Movies, and examination of more than 100 years of film history and racial identity. There will also be a special screening marking the 30th anniversary of Walker’s documentary on history of blaxploitation cinema, Macked, Hammered, Slaughtered & Shafted.”
Fashion in Film returns with Annie on April 8th and you are required to dress as Annie to attend. If you aren’t dressed as fashion icon Annie you, and your children, will be banned from the Hollywood Theater for six months.
The Portland EcoFilm Festival returns with To the West, In Zapata on April 9th. “The Regional premiere of David Bim’s stirring documentary about a family living in the Cuban wilderness during the COVID pandemic. Preceded by the short film The Last Island.”
At Joy: Weird Wednesday—is it back? Probably. I don’t know. Keep checking.
At the Kiggins:
Enjoy your steaks, The Matrix opens for a run.
Spectrum Between’s next show is April 15th. “Spectrum Between presents … in partnership with Portland Panorama Film Festival … HAND/EYE: Manual Processes in 16mm.
This program of experimental short films celebrates the many material possibilities of working with celluloid. In keeping with the spirit of Panorama, we’re bringing together an assortment of PNW/west coast and international filmmakers to showcase various traditions of hand-processing –– techniques like scratching, dying, direct animation, found footage collage, optical printing, and more are represented in this diverse group of films. As always, all films are projected on 16mm.”
Outer Space Micro Cinema is another micro cinema. They play “surrealist cinematheque in the service of revolution “portland,” “oregon””
Word Virus Books: I don’t see any films for this week but sometimes they update their social media late. They played Salo last week, which is…. uh…. a movie.
At the Tomorrow Theater (the Hub for Cultural Snackers)—please bug them if you haven’t. Keep bugging them if you have.
Mubi, who has recently come under fire for taking Sequoia Capital investment money, has been partnering with the Tomorrow Theater and they are doing another screening in October. Sequoia has ties to the Israeli army. Mubi has released a bunch of mealy mouthed statements. Filmmakers are urging Mubi to cut ties. If the Los Angeles Festival of Movies can cut ties with Mubi so can PAM. You can contact the Tomorrow Theater here through this link and let them know that they should’t partner with organizations like this.
Again, if the Tomorrow Theater working with a company that has direct ties to the Israeli military bothers you please let them know.
Please do not let the bastards win. Let them know you care about genocide.
We’re not talking chump change for the Sequoia investment: $100 million.
There was a good article about Mubi in Vulture recently behind their paywall.
The tip jar is open if you are so inclined. All tips go towards my beautiful bimbofication.