Program Notes

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Program Notes

One Week: April 1 -7

Theatrical Premiere (2004, 156 minutes)

Last moments are inherently interesting. What is someone thinking as he greets death? Where are they summoning the courage to face it? What is happening around them? Are they aware of what's going on? And when that person is one of the most notorious, demonic figures of the 20th century, interest is doubled. In DOWNFALL, filmmakers Oliver Hirschbiegel and Bernd Eichinger examine the last few weeks in the life of Adolf Hitler, ensconced in a mammoth and well kitted out bunker in Berlin. Based partially on the memories of Hitler's young secretary Traudl Junge (Alexandra Maria Lara), who was the subject of a documentary, Blind Spot in 1999, and on other sources, DOWNFALL stars Bruno Ganz as the dictator in his last throes of power. The retreats, the fights with his mistress and generals, all culminate in a suicide pact that is presented in horrific detail. By turns riveting and horrific, DOWNFALL is a film that "dramatizes how Hitler tapped the gnashing urge of his anger and built it into a force field, shutting out all that he didn't want to see," according to Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly. Robert W. Butler of the Kansas City Star calls it "a hypnotizing experience" that gives the viewer "the unshakable sensation of having eavesdropped on history." Thomas Delapa of Boulder Weekly says, "Give him a hunchback, and Ganz's Hitler could be Richard III offering his kingdom for a tank." "Ganz seems to find exactly the right pitch: His Hitler feels real and human, yet there's nothing particularly ingratiating or sentimentalized about him. We never forget who he is," adds Stephen Hunter of the Washington Post. Lisa Kennedy of the Denver Post notes that DOWNFALL "provides a compelling glimpse at a nation wrestling with its greatest demon."

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One Week: April 8 - 14

Premiere (2005, 97 minutes)

It's one of the toughest races in the history of motor sports. It's the Baja 1000, the annual off-road race through the silt, rocks, boulders and some public highways held in Baja, Mexico that attracts hundreds of racers, their souped-up machines, including motorcycles, trucks and even old, unmodified VW Beetles, and thousands of fans, some of whom wander into the paths of the racers. Filmmaker Dana Brown (Step Into Liquid), the son of Endless Summer's Bruce Brown, took his cameras to the race in 2002 and captured the world's longest point-to-point race in all its rough edges. Featuring Mario Andretti, Sal Fish, Ricky Johnson, Jimmy N. Roberts, J. N. Roberts, Malcolm Smith, and in archival footage, James Garner Steve McQueen, DUST TO GLORY is a film that Internet reviewer Steve Rhodes says will make you "feel like you are both competitor and spectator." Ross Anthony of the Hollywood Report Card adds that Dust to Glory is "realistic" and "inspirational." The Hollywood Reporter calls it "an adrenaline rush of a film.

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One Week: April 15 - 21

Premiere (2003, 105 minutes)

In the ancient high desert of northern New Mexico, a family embarks on a lyrical journey of self-discovery in Campbell Scott's OFF THE MAP. It's 1974 and the harshly beautiful wilds of Taos are home to 11-year-old Bo Groden (Valentina de Angelis) and her free-thinking family, her mother Arlene (Joan Allen), and her father Charley (Sam Elliott), the embodiment of Old West masculinity. Adapted from the play by Joan Ackermann, OFF THE MAP is a film whose characters are "genuine, fascinating, and extremely likeable," according to Marcy Dermansky at About.com. Peter Travers of Rolling Stone finds OFF THE MAP "funny and heartbreaking," while Desson Thomson of the Washington Post notes that "there's a collective scintillation about its rich, distinctive characters, narrative serendipity and ineffable magic." Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times finds it "one of the year's most unusual and affecting films."

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One Week: April 22 - 28

Premiere (2004, 106 minutes)

Set in a re-imagined Victorian England, the anime Steamboy (from Akira's Katsuhiro Otomo) recounts the adventures of the young inventor Ray Steam, who one day receives a mysterious metal ball containing a new form of energy capable of powering an entire nation. Steamboy must use the device to fight evil, redeem his family, and save London from destruction. Using the voices of Anna Paquin, Alfred Molina, and Patrick Stewart, the American version of STEAMBOY is "a roller-coaster action film that thunders along with top-notch set pieces and studiously researched period settings," according to Richard James Havis of the Hollywood Reporter. Lou Lumenick of the New York Post finds STEAMBOY "loaded with eye candy," and Chris Vognar of the Dallas Morning News calls it "a feast for the eyes." "The movie's true genius lies in the exquisite animation, a blend of hand-drawn and state-of- the-art digital technology that suggests an old world being bullied into a new one," concludes Ella Taylor, of the L.A. Weekly.

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Two Weeks: April 29 - May 12

Premiere (2005, 110 minutes)

Ripped from the headlines, but telling a story known there mostly in small pieces, Alex Gibney's documentary lays out the Enron story in an unbiased but no holds barred fashion. Partially filmed in Portland, and based on Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind's book The Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron), Gibney's film, in the observation of Chris Perry of eFilmcritic.com, incites "a standing ovation and an ongoing cattle call of boos, hisses and visible disgust as regular people who work hard for a living, yell and curse at the screen after learning how a privileged few nearly bankrupted the fifth largest economy in the world." In the end, Enron was a ponzi scheme that required the assistance and blessings of the most powerful men in the American government, and it ended up blowing through tens of billions of dollars for no good reason. The Smartest Guys in the Room features tape-recorded conversations from Enron Electricity traders where they laugh and joke that they’re stealing millions from "Grandma Millie." Concludes Perry, "See it, first chance you get." Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly said, "The Smartest Guys in the Room leaves you with the exhilarated sensation of understanding the defining financial scandal of the era."

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One Week: May 13 - 19

Premiere (2004, 135 minutes)

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Sideways meets The Corporation in this riveting documentary by Jonathan Nossiter (Resident Alien), who takes a long, hard look at the international wine trade. Nossiter traveled to France, California, Italy, and New York, and spoke with winemakers both great and small. Among them are Aime Guibert, of the small firm Mas de Daumas-Gassac, and high-powered consultant Michel Rolland. Nossiter meets the Mondavi family, one of the wine world's largest conglomerates; the de Montille family of Burgundy; the Staglins, who financed their own high-priced vineyard in the Napa Valley; and critics James Suckling and Robert Parker, whose words can make or break a vintage. Nossiter also visits with New York wine importer Neal Rosenthal, Christie's wine director Michael Broadbent, and Chateau Mouton-Rothschild CEOs Patrick Leon and Xavier de Eizaguirre. Although Nossiter set out merely to find the characters behind the wine industry, he ended up with a poignant look at some important issues, including deforestation, the corporation versus the independent company, and even communism. His bouncy handheld camera captured more than he had ever imagined. The result is an entertaining inside examination of a world very few people see, a fascinating exploration of wine and the families who produce it. Boxoffice calls MONDOVINO "an engaging and provocative documentary whose political concerns extend far beyond a beverage," and Variety found the subject to be "fascinating material … A provocative statement against globalization."

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One Week: May 20 - 26

Revival! New Print! (1966, 103 minutes)

"My speech doesn't reflect the depth of my thoughts," confesses Paul (Jean-Pierre Leaud) in Jean-Luc Godard's visionary and still hilarious comic look at the battle between the sexes among "the children of Marx and Coca Cola." Masculin féminin chronicles the love affair between Paul (Leaud), a young zealot with revolutionary leanings, and Madeleine (Chantal Goya), a fetching pop singer. Their relationship gradually breaks down as the two attempt to bridge their differences, albeit unsuccessfully (he likes Bob Dylan, she is only interested in the top 40). Along the way, they discuss current world culture and politics with their friends, and encounter a variety of bizarre individuals who only serve to exacerbate the youthful confusion of both Paul and Madeleine. A. O. Scott of The New York Times notes that "thirty-nine years after it first appeared, Godard's document of youthful confusion has not aged one minute," and David Chute of the L. A. Weekly adds that it is a "withering satire," with David Sterritt of the Christian Science Monitor asserting that the film is "masterly by any measure."

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One Week: May 20 - 26

Premiere (2004, 121 minutes)

A powerful film about sexuality and suicide, Fatih Akin's HEAD-ON (Gegen die wand) focuses on two Turks living in Germany. Drunken loser Cahit (Birol Unel) drives his car into a wall; Sibel (Sibel Kekilli) slashes her wrist because she can't stand living with her traditional Muslim family. The two meet in the hospital and decide to join in a marriage of convenience in which he can get himself a cute young housekeeper and she can finally move away from home. Stephen Whitty of the Newark Star-Ledger finds that " Fatih Akin has made a remarkable film – the first great film of the new year," and Elizabeth Weitzman of the New York Daily News deems it "immensely affecting." Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times judges HEAD-ON to be "impeccably made, uncompromising in its implacable vision of the deranging power of love, sex and controlled substances, this savage and staggering film knows how to take our breath away."

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One Week: May 27 - June 2

Premiere (2003, 83 minutes)

In the most charming stories of recent documentaries, Mark Bittner, a homeless musician from Vancouver,Washington who ended up in San Francisco, becomes an expert on birds. Not just any birds, however. But parrots, specifically wild parrots congregating in the Russian Hill and Telegraph Hill sections of the city. No one knows how they got there, or why there are so many of them, but over the years Bittner observed them, fed them, named them, and removed the barriers that kept the parrots cautious around almost every other human being. In Judy Irving's film, Bittner's story is unfurled with grace and delicacy, as well as drama and yet also some steely eyed realism about life in the wild (not all parrots are nice to each other). Ann Hornaday, of the Washington Post calls THE WILD PARROTS OF TELEGRAPH HILL "quite simply, a beautiful film, in both form and content," while Lisa Rose of the Newark Star Ledger writes that "its allure lies not only in its exotic creatures, but also in its depiction of human kindness." In the end, PARROTS is for Bruce Newman of the San Jose Mercury News "that rare documentary that has romance, comedy and a surprise ending that makes you feel as if you could fly out of the theater like a cherry headed conure."

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One Week: June 3 - 9

Premiere (2003, 120 minutes)

It's unusual to come across a movie these days when you really don't know what is going to happen next. Oldboy is like that. Chan-wook Park's film begins with a man (Min-sik Choi), who has a lovely wife and child, waking up to find that he is locked in a room for reasons he's never told, by someone he doesn't know. Fifteen years later, he is freed. He spends the rest of the film trying to find out who incarcerated him and why in his quest for revenge. Michael Russell of the Oregonian says it is "100 per cent audacious ... it's not for the squeamish, but it's great," and gives it an A+ rating. Derek Elley of Variety notes that "Choi gives a bravura performance that powers the picture." Kevin N. Laforest of the Montreal Film Journal judges it to be "brilliantly crafted with gut-wrenching performances." Jamie Russell of the BBC finds Oldboy "a sadistic masterpiece that confirms Korea's current status as producer of some of the world's most exciting cinema," while D. K. Holm of MoviePoopShoot.com dubs it " one of the most disturbing movies ever made." For mature audiences only.

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One Week: June 10 - 16

Premiere (2004, 106 minutes)

With her award-winning 2001 feature film debut, La Ciénaga (The Swamp) (2001), writer-director Lucrecia Martel emerged as one of the brightest figures of the new Argentinean cinema. Her follow up, The Holy Girl intimately explores the burgeoning sexuality and religious fervor of two teenage girls, Amalia (Maria Alche) and her best friend, Josefina (Juliet Zylberberg). Artfully piecing together a mosaic of nuanced details, fragments of sounds, and small moments, Martel creates a potent and specific portrait of adolescent life. Understanding the temptation of good - and the evil it causes The Holy Girl delicately explores themes of sin, frustration, and desire. Ed Gonzalez of Slant says of that "I can't think of another filmmaker currently working in the genre with her knack for tension." Rich Cline of Shadows on the Wall finds THE HOLY Girl is "almost dreamlike in its examination of obsession, sexual awakening and redemption." A. O. Scott of the New York Times calls it "elusive, feverish and altogether amazing," while Variety dubs THE HOLY GIRL "dreamlike in its examination of obsession, sexual awakening, and redemption."

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Friday-Saturday Nights Starting June 10

Late Shows Only @ 11:30pm

This hilarious collection of bedtime stories for grown-ups is the perfect antidote to the upcoming State of the Union address. In fact, the producer of POONA (2002, 120 minutes) was booted out of a top-level job at the National Endowment for the Arts by the Bush administration. He had the gall to produce this film that The Stranger called "smart, bold and insightful ... not to mention shit-yourself-hysterical!" Follow Poona's twisted path to the Kingdom of Do (where no one does), whose clueless voters elect a TV set as their ruler (any resemblance to recent elections is purely coincidental). Meet The Man Who Could Sell Anything (did you say Karl Rove?) and God (who will answer any question for $5). The Chicago Tribune hailed POONA as "equal parts funny, angry, imaginative, crude and hopelessly over-the top."

Produced by StageDirect, whose work has been recognized in publications ranging from the Wall Street Journal to MovieMaker.

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One Week: June 17 - 23

Premiere (2005, 85 minutes)

Gathering 12 shorts, with six Academy Award winners or nominees such as When the Day Breaks and Guard Dog among them, this latest compilation brings the latest in creative animation together in one easily digestible package. Of THE Animation SHOW Marjorie Baumgarten of the Austin Chronicle has said, "it's such a delight it makes you wonder why there aren’t more compilation programs like this" and Ernest Hardy of the L. A. Weekly said "Animation fans, no matter their stylistic preference (computer-generated, claymation, old-school hand-drawn), will find much to sate their appetites in this collection of award-winning and critically acclaimed work." Andrew Wright of The Stranger says that "for fans of ink and paint, we're talking nirvana." Other titles in the package include Fallen Art, Fireworks, The Man With No Shadow, Rock Fish, Ward 13, Bunnies, and Hello. Animator Don Hertzfeldt is scheduled to introduce the shows and his brand new film The Meaning of Life.

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One Week: June 24 - 30

Premiere (2004, 99 minutes)

"The summer I was eight years old, five hours disappeared from my life. Five hours, lost, gone without a trace." These are the words of Brian Lackey (Brady Corbet), a troubled 18 year-old growing up in the stiflingly small town of Hutchinson, Kansas. Plagued by nightmares, Brian believes that he may have been the victim of an alien abduction. Local Neil McCormick (Joseph Gordon Levitt) however, is the ultimate beautiful outsider. With a loving but promiscuous mother (Elisabeth Shue), Neil is wise beyond his years and curious about his developing sexuality, having found what he perceived to be love from his Little League baseball coach (Hal Hartley veteran Bill Sage). Now, ten years later, Neil is a teenage hustler, nonchalant about the dangerous path his life is taking. Neil's pursuit of love leads him to New York City, while Brian's voyage of self discovery leads him to Neil – who helps him to unlock the dark secrets of their past. Based on the acclaimed novel by Scott Heim, MYSTERIOUS SKIN explores the hearts and minds of two very different boys who come to find the key to their future happiness lies in the exorcism of their collective demons. Rich Cline of Shadows on the Wall finds MYSTERIOUS SKIN to be "deeply provocative and moving." This film is for mature audiences only.

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