Our weekly look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs, and on more distant horizons…

Trailers of new release movies are generally available at the official site links.

IN THEATERS (LIMITED RELEASE):

Your Name (2016): Two teenage strangers randomly and periodically swap bodies in this anime feature. The words “weird” and “bizarre” were briefly spotted in Rotten Tomato excerpts, along with the phrase “Oscar buzz.” Your Name U.S. distributor site.

SCREENINGS – (IFC Center, New York City, Apr.7-13):

David Lynch bonanza: The IFC Center has become so prolific in screening their stockpile of weird midnight movies that we don’t mention them every week anymore; you can just assume something cool is playing there on weekends. This week, however, their lineup is just too stacked to pass up. In conjunction with their screening of the documentary David Lynch: The Art Life, they’ve broken out their Lynch archive, with showings of Blue Velvet, Lost Highway, and Mulholland Drive this weekend, along with Eraserhead playing all week long. And if you get sick of a steady diet of Lynch, there’s The Holy Mountain on Friday and Saturday at midnight to break it up. Don’t overdose, and remember you cannot live on popcorn and soda alone for long. Check the IFC Center homepage for a complete schedule.

SCREENINGS – (The New Parkway Theater, Oakland, CA Apr.9, 10, & 13):

El Topo (1970) and Pink Flamingos (1972): The New Parkway is new to us, but they feature an eclectic lineup of new and repertory movies, highlighted this week by two Certified Weird classics: Alejandro Jodorowsky‘s surrealist spaghetti western El Topo and John Waters‘ classic of filth, Pink Flamingos. Hope the pizza (delivered to your seat as you enjoy the film) is good, too (though we suggest skipping the brownies for Flamingos). The New Parkway calendar.

SCREENINGS – (AFI Silver Theater, Silver Springs, MD, Mon. Apr. 10):

Swiss Army Man (2016): If you’re in the D.C. metro area and you missed our pick for 2016’s second weirdest movie when it was in theaters, here’s your chance to catch it on the big screen, courtesy of AFI’s “second look” series. Swiss Army Man at AFI Silver Theater.

FILM FESTIVALS – San Francisco International Film Festival, (San Francisco, CA, Apr. 5–19 ):

We don’t always mention the second-tier San Francisco International Film Festival, but this year they’re worth noting due to a very special guest programmer and one big, weird U.S. debut. Besides a few international films we’ve seen making the rounds—Iran’s experimental A Dragon Arrives!, João Pedro Rodrigues’s mystical The Ornithologist, the erotic Mexican horror The Untamed, and the Korean doppelganger romance Yourself and Yours—the big items (from our skewed perspective) appear below:

• “Canyon Cinema 50: Guy Maddin Presents ‘The Great Blondino’ and Other Delights” – Four short avant-garde films from Canyon’s catalog, selected by a great Guy and including Daina Krumins “The Divine Miracle.” Happening Apr. 15.
• Endless Poetry – SFIFF’s big get is the U.S. debut of Alejandro Jodorowsky’s second installment in the autobiographical project that began with the Certified Weird The Dance of Reality, now concerning his experiences as a young bohemian artist in Santiago. Premiering Apr. 10, bonus screening on the 19th.
  
• The Green Fog: A San Francisco Fantasia – Guy Maddin is back, along with The Forbidden Room collaborators Galen and Evan Johnson, with a (doubtlessly transformed) collage of San Francisco footage inspired by the storyline of Vertigo, set to a new composition by Jacob Garchik preformed by the Kronos Quartet. No idea if this intriguing collaboration will ever be seen outside this live performance, but it closes the festival on April 16.

San Francisco International Film Festival home page.

IN DEVELOPMENT (rumored):

Donnie Darko sequel: We’re a little bit late in passing on this news, but Richard Kelly suggests that he’s interested in making a “bigger and more ambitious” movie (not necessarily a sequel) set in the Donnie Darko universe. Kelly hasn’t directed since 2009’s The Box, but says he has another project lined up before the Darko film. Nothing shows up on IMDB yet. In more recent Kelly news, he also suggests he might rerelease an “expanded” cut of his post-apocalyptic flop Southland Tales. Come back to us, Richard! The Playlist seems to be first with Kelly news.

IN DEVELOPMENT (currently filming):

Image et Parole (est. late 2017): Speaking of late news, we’re even tardier in telling you about ageless provocateur Jean-Luc Godard‘s latest—but this one will definitely happen, at least. All we know for sure is that its set in the Arab world and be “a mix of fact and fiction”; we assume it will follow the abstract, postmodern pattern of his late work (Film Socialisme and Goodbye to Language, both of which divided critics—we came down on the “insufferably indulgent” bandwagon). Our expectations may be low, but Godard’s distinguished career has earned him a fair hearing. The Film Stage has a few details.

NEW ON DVD:

Tank 432 [AKA Belly of the Bulldog] (2015): Post-apocalyptic mercenaries seek refuge in an abandoned tank that becomes a prison. The feature debut of Ben Wheatley‘s cameraman Nick Gillespie (Wheatley produced); reviews were not good, but it does describe itself as a “mind-bending plunge into hallucinatory terror.” Buy Tank 432.

NEW ON BLU-RAY:

Tank 432 [AKA Belly of the Bulldog] (2015): See description in DVD above. Buy Tank 432 [Blu-ray].

What are you looking forward to? If you have any weird movie leads that I have overlooked, feel free to leave them in the COMMENTS section.