9/17
Once (Ireland; 2006; d.
John Carney)
Once is
a Sundance Audience Award winning Irish romance that tells the story of two
people creating music together as they fall in love. This sounds like tired
ground for a movie plot, but the story is mere background to a deeply moving
study of the creative passions that make life worth living. Writer and director
John Carney is a former musician who presents the art of music-making with great
insight. "Once transcends even its own ambitions, becoming a complex
meditation on relationships, Irish culture, and music," says Austin
Chronicle critic Toddy Burton. (R;
85 min.)
9/24
Offside (Iran; 2006; d. Jafar Panahi)
Best known for darkly existential films such as The Circle and
The Mirror, director Jafar Panahi uses the context of soccer to present
a more humorous, yet still poignant view of gender relations in contemporary
Iran. Filmed at an actual World Cup qualifying match in 2006, Offside
chronicles the attempts of six young female fans to attend the match in person
despite the government's edict prohibiting women from doing so. Predictably,
the women are discovered. Kenneth Turan of T
10/1
Sicko (US; 2007; d. Michael Moore)
Critics are
nearly unanimous in praising Michael Moore's new film, Sicko, as his
best to date. This film is a diagnosis of the failing healthcare system in the
United States, which Moore portrays as more interested in turning a profit than
providing care for the sick and injured. Systemic issues are illuminated by
comparisons with national healthcare systems in Canada, England, France, and,
yes, Cuba. This plea for universal healthcare is tragic, poignant, and very
funny. Sicko, writes Roger Ebert of The Chicago Sun-Times,
"is likely to strike home with anyone, left or right, who has had a serious
illness in the family." (PG-13; 113 min.)
10/15
Talk to Me (US; 2007; d. Kasi Lemmons)
Don
Cheadle (Hotel Rwanda) stars as Ralph Waldo "Petey" Greene
Jr., an outspoken and controversial media figure and social activist in Washington
D.C. during the tumult of the 60s and 70s. Director Kasi Lemmons (Eve's
Bayou) traces Greene's career following his release from a term in prison
for armed robbery, focusing especially on his relationship with fellow disc
jockey Dewey Hughes (Chiwetel Ejiofor, Children of Men). The
provocative Greene and the ambitious Hughes represent contrasting examples of
what purposes the bully pulpit of mass media can serve and the audience is asked
to consider the merits and shortcomings of both. A.O. Scott of The New York
Times writes that the film "offers uplift without phoniness, history
without undue didacticism and a fair number of funny, dirty jokes." (R;
118 min.)
10/22
Paprika (Japan; 2007; d. Satoshi Kon)
"This
is your brain on anime." That is the tagline for Paprika, a wildly
inventive Japanese animated sci/fi film that Elizabeth Weitzman of The New
York Daily News called "a jaw-dropping feat of imagination."
The story is about what happens when technology permits research therapists
to enter into their patients' dreams. Paprika is the code name for a young and
beautiful "dream detective." When one of the dream machines goes missing,
along with a research assistant, Paprika must prevent the technology from falling
into the hands of those who would abuse its power. (R; 90 min.)
10/29
Paris, Je T'aime
(France; 2006; Various Directors)
"Bittersweet, funny, sad and invariably romantic" (Jack Mathews, The
New York Daily News), Paris, Je T'aime is comprised of eighteen
short films that are beautifully blended into a single narrative about love
in Paris. Each segment is set in a different Parisian neighborhood, and each
was written and directed by a different filmmaker, including Walter Salles,
Gus Van Zant, Wes Craven, and the Coen brothers. "A wondrous ensemble package
of a film," says Michael Wilmington, The Chicago Tribune; "Paris
couldn't have asked for a more sweetly jaundiced love letter," notes Wesley
Morris, The Boston Globe. (R; 120 min.)
11/5 The Namesake (India; 2006; d. Mira
Nair)
Mira Nair's (Monsoon
Wedding, Mississippi Masala) adaptation of Jumpa Lahiri's novel
is "profound and beautiful," brimming with "intelligence, compassion
and sensuous delight," says Michael Wilmington, The Chicago Tribune.
At the center of the film's success are powerful performances by its three central
characters: Gogol Ganguli (Kal Penn, Harold & Kumar Go to White
Castle) and his parents Ashoke (Irrfan Khan) and Ashima (Bollywood actress
Tabu). This "deeply moving saga" of a Bengali family in their less
than easy transition from India to New York, has universal appeal, poignantly
chronicling what could be "the clash between any immigrant parents and
their US born offspring." (Ruthe Stein, The San Francisco Chronicle)
(PG-13; 122 min.)
10/12
Ten Canoes (Australia; 2006; d. Rolf
de heer and Peter Djigirr)
Similar in its approach to The Fast Runner (Atanarjuat)
and The Story of the Weeping Camel, this film is the first to be produced
entirely in the language of an Australian aboriginal people and uses only actors
drawn from the Yolngu people of northern Australia. Two timeframes intermingle
to tell an archetypal story of lust and murder, while simultaneously providing
a glimpse into the way of life and the stories of the Yolngu in the time before
white settlement on the continent. Andrew O'Hehir of Salon.com calls it "a
fascinating immersion within a highly ritualized Stone Age oral culture"
that "feels completely authentic, never forced or sanctimonious."(NR;
90 min.)
11/26
Eagle Vs Shark (New Zealand; 2007;
d. Taika Cohen)
What
animal is the more dangerous predator, the eagle or the shark? Can one find
love and companionship with the other? New Zealand is the setting for this romantic
comedy that is compared favorably with Napoleon Dynamite and other
films featuring society's eccentrics and nerds. Stephen Hunter, critic for The
Washington Post, says of Eagle vs. Shark, "You believe in
it, because you believe in the small but decent lives of its characters."
(R; 88 min.)
12/3
La Vie en Rose (France; 2007; d. Oliver
Dahan)
Described as "one
of the best biopcs I've ever seen" by Roger Ebert of The Chicago Sun-Times,
this film by Olivier Dahan is a mosaic of the life of "The Little Sparrow,"
the renowned French chanteuse Edith Piaf. Marion Cotillard stars as the prodigiously
talented and self-destructive singer, and the film depicts many of the defining
moments in Piaf's brief but tumultuous life, including her difficult childhood,
her ascent to fame as a teenager, her numerous high-profile romantic entanglements,
and her premature death at the age of 47. Sean Axmaker of The Seattle Post-Intelligencer
raved that this "sprawling portrait of the life of Edith Piaf is the
kind of grand, passionate historical drama that no one seems to be able to pull
off any more." (PG-13;
140 min.)
Cinema 10 is a non-profit, volunteer group which presents alternative film programming. We work to bring the best in American independent and foreign films to North Country audiences. If you have a suggestion or would like to get involved, please e-mail Holly Chambers. The Cinema 10 Board members are Chris Affre, Fran Bailey, Holly Chambers, Ed Clark, Viki Levitt, Anne Malone, Hilary Oak, Celine Philibert, Chris Robinson, Eric Schultze, David Sommerstein, Christino Tamon, and Donna Williamson.
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