Teaching audiences to view films actively
By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 3.25
Director: Laura Poitras | Linda Goode Bryant
Michael says: “Filmed over four years in Columbus, Ohio, FLAG WARS presents a disturbing look at gentrification and class structure in our country. Linda Goode Bryant and Laura Poitras are both first-time directors, and they present the many views clearly
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Rating: 3 cats
Director: Jørgen Leth | Lars Von Trier
Bruce says: “THE FIVE OBSTRUCTIONS is not the film it was purported to be nor was it at all what I had anticipated. The film is billed as a ‘battle of the minds’ between Lars von Trier and Jørgen Leth,
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Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Marc Forster
Starring: Dustin Hoffman | Freddie Highmore | Ian Hart | Johnny Depp | Julie Christie | Kate Winslet | Radha Mitchell
Michael says: “You can feel the Miramax hand on Marc Foster’s FINDING NEVERLAND, which is a shame, although doesn’t disrupt the film all that much. One suspects that it would have had a lot of the same sentimental elements because
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Bob Smeaton
Robert says: “Historically overshadowed by Woodstock is the series of rock shows that toured Canada by train in 1970. The brainchild of promoters Ken Walker and Thor Eaton, the shows featured acts like Janis Joplin, The Grateful Dead and The
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Rating: 4.3 cats
Director: Aleksandr Sokurov
Bruce says: “FATHER AND SON opens with a close-up of two men, one holding the other. There are no immediate clues but as the scene unfolds we learn that it is a father and his son, who is having a
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Rating: 3 cats
Director: Michael Moore
Bruce says: “If you still think that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, that there was a link between Al Qaida and Iraq before 9/11 or that George Bush has been telling us the truth, please see this
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Ferzan Ozpetek
Starring: Giovanna Mezzogiorno | Massimo Girotti | Raoul Bova
Bruce says: “Ferzan Ozpetek keeps growing with each film; first STEAM, then HIS SECRET LIFE and now FACING WINDOWS. I’ve felt each of his films has had problems which get in the way of achieving anything resembling perfection. Perfection, however,
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Rating: 2.5 cats
Director: Michael Gondry
Starring: Elijah Wood | Jane Adams | Jim Carrey | Kate Winslet | Kirsten Dunst | Mark Ruffalo | Thomas Jay Ryan | Tom Wilkinson
Bruce says: “For starters, I’m a big Jim Carrey fan. Let me qualify that. I think that he is one of the most talented actors alive. He needs a strong director. His performances too often have traces of juvenilia, mugging
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Benoît Cohen
Starring: Laurence Côte | Mathieu Demy | Romane Bohringer
Georgette says: “NOS ENFANTS CHÉRIS was a light romantic comedy about three couples who spend a vacation together in the South of France. As the movie goes on it’s obvious that there is much shared history and much that still
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Rating: 2.9 cats
Director: Roger Michell
Starring: Daniel Craig | Rhys Ifans | Samantha Morton
Michael says: “What could have been fascinating and unusual turned out to be fairly pedestrian, beautifully filmed, and occasionally over-the-top. ENDURING LOVE, based on the novel by Ian McEwan, was directed by Roger Michell, whose unusual career includes such films
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Rating: 3.25
Director: Jim Fields | Michael Gramaglia
Chris says: “Well, now that this is being held over at the Kendall for another week, I can encourage all you Boston folk to check it out. Music films should be seen in a theater with an appreciative audience, dagnabit!
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Xavier Giannoli
Starring: Catherine Salviat | Julian Bouvard | Laura Smet | Marie Denarnaud | Maurice Antoni | Nicolas Duvauchelle
Bruce says: “EAGER BODIES is an uncomfortable film to watch yet I can’t get it out of my mind. Charlotte (Laura Smet) is twenty and not feeling well. When she goes to the doctor he performs routine tests. The doctor
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Rating: 0 cats
Director: Bernardo Bertolucci
Hilary says: “Just a few words on Bernardo Bertolucci’s latest effort, THE DREAMERS: silly, pretentious, and unsexy.” Janet says: “I had not intended to see this film, but today was so gray, and I was numbingly bored with both
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Rating: 2.9 cats
Director: Tod Williams
Starring: Bijou Phillips | Elle Fanning | Jeff Bridges | Jon Foster | Kim Basinger | Mimi Rogers
Bruce says: “Beware, spoilers. There is something very off about THE DOOR IN THE FLOOR; I think it’s the writing. And the money. It is very difficult to have bundles of sympathy for those who live in a gorgeous house
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Lars Von Trier
Starring: Ben Gazzara | Blair Brown | Chloe Sevigny | Harriet Andersson | James Caan | Lauren Bacall | Nicole Kidman | Patricia Clarkson | Paul Bettany | Philip Baker Hall | Stellan Skarsgård
Ivy says: “I caught this last night at the Brattle. I am so glad I saw it on the big screen! I have felt for years that Von Trier is a talented filmmaker and DOGVILLE just reconfirms this belief. “It
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Rating: 3.5 cats
Director: Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Starring: Emin Toprak | Muzaffer Özdemir | Nazan Kesal | Zuhal Gencer Erkaya
Bruce says: “Mahmut (Muzaffer Ozdemir) and Yusuf (Emin Toprak ) both hail from the same mountain village. Mahmut, who is the elder by at least a dozen years, is a self-made man. He is educated, a successful photographer in both
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Rating: 2 cats
Director: John Waters
Starring: Chris Isaak | Johnny Knoxville | Mink Stole | Patricia Hearst | Selma Blair | Suzanne Shepherd | Tracey Ullman
Chris says: “A DIRTY SHAME is an intermittently amusing but generally trite film. NC-17 rating and all, I wasn’t expecting John Waters to make another PINK FLAMINGOS, but there’s absolutely nothing shocking or subversive going on here. Like every other
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Rating: 4 cats
Director: Ondi Timoner
Chris says: “This frenzied documentary is worthy of the hype lavished upon it. A chronicle of seven years in the lives of two bands (The Dandy Warhols and The Brian Jonestown Massacre) who start out as friends and end up
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Rating: 1.75
Director: Irwin Winkler
Starring: Ashley Judd | Jonathan Pryce | Kevin Kline
Scot says: “To everyone who wanted to take the extra pass Michael had for the new biopic of Cole Porter’s life, but couldn’t, I say, ‘Consider yourselves lucky.’ It was de-lousy. “I hate to discourage *anyone* from seeing more musicals,
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Rating: 2 cats
Director: Frank Matter | Robert Margolis
Starring: Frank Krias | Kelli Barnett | Robert Margolis
Bruce says: “This bleak piece of filmmaking is the story of Robert, an unemployed actor who has been making the rounds in New York for a decade or so. He has a childish optimism that keeps him going in spite
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