A look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs, and on more distant horizons…
IN THEATERS (LIMITED RELEASE):
Birdsong [El Cant dels Ocells] (2008): Nearly silent, nearly plotless tale about the Three Kings journey to visit the newborn Jesus. This minimalist approach won’t bring in the punters, but the critics believe it to be a work [...]
“Body piercing. Kinky sex. Dismemberment. The things that made Shakespeare great.” –Tagline for Tromeo and Juliet
DIRECTED BY: Lloyd Kaufman
FEATURING: Will Keenan, Jane Jensen, Lemmy, Debbie Rochon
PLOT: Alcoholic Monty Que and unscrupulous Cappy Capulet have a long running feud dating back to their days as partners in a low-budget sleaze movie studio, and they have passed on [...]
“Something weird is going on here. What is it about us? Even in ‘Nam it was always weird. Are we all crazy or something?” –line in original screenplay to Jacob’s Ladder
DIRECTED BY: Adrian Lyne
FEATURING: Tim Robbins, Elizabeth Peña, Danny Aiello
PLOT: Jacob Singer (nicknamed ”Professor” by his army buddies due to his glasses and Ph.D.) is wounded in Vietnam [...]
A look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs, and on more distant horizons…
NEW ON DVD:
Choke (2008): Black comedy about a sex-addict and his demented dying mom (Angelica Huston) doesn’t sound especially strange, but in a slow week for the weird the fact that it’s another adaptation from cult novelist Chuck (Fight Club) [...]
“And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.”
–Matthew Arnold, “Dover Beach” (quote originally intended to introduce Archangel)
DIRECTED BY: Guy Maddin
FEATURING: Kyle McCulloch, Kathy Marykuca
PLOT: In 1919, one-legged Canadian airman Lt. John Boles finds his way to the Russian port of Archangel in the endless [...]
A look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs, and on more distant horizons…
IN THEATERS (LIMITED RELEASE):
Polanski [Polanski Unauthorized]: The controversial director of Repulsion (and other weird flicks) gets his own limited-release biopic. The trailer makes it look like a hatchet job focusing on Polanski’s sex scandal… not that that’s necessarily an unfair tack to take [...]
DIRECTED BY: Guy Maddin
FEATURING: Alice Krige, Shelley Duvall, Frank Gorshin
PLOT: A prisoner returns to his childhood home on an ostrich farm in a
mythical northern land during the constant daylight of the summer season, where he becomes involved with two mysterious women.
WHY IT WON’T MAKE THE LIST: Twilight of the Ice Nymphs is plenty weird enough to make [...]
DIRECTED BY: Guy Maddin
PLOT: “State scientist” Anna studies “the heart of the world” and learns it is in
desperate shape, all while trying to chose between suitors: brothers Osip (a mortician) and Nicolai (an actor playing Christ in a passion play), along with “dark horse” industrialist Akmatov.
WHAT MAKES IT WEIRD: Maddin pulls out all the stops in [...]
A look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs, and on more distant horizons…
IN THEATERS (WIDE RELEASE):
Coraline: An animated fantasy film about a little girl who discovers a parallel universe in which her childish desires are satisfied, but at a price. Previews look “visually stunning.” Also showing in 3-D in some venues. From Henry Selick, the [...]
