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Our weekly look at what’s weird in theaters, on hot-off-the-presses DVDs and Blu-rays (and hot off the server VODs), and on more distant horizons…

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

IN THEATERS (LIMITED RELEASE):

My Hindu Friend (2015): A filmmaker, dying of cancer, is visited by death. Despite being made in 2015 and garnering festival awards for Willem Dafoe, the film was never properly released when director Hector Babenco died soon after making it (he survived cancer, then succumbed to a heart attack). Rock Salt Releasing is giving it a second life in specialty venues. My Hindu Friend official Facebook page.

The Wave (2019): Read our review. A corporate lawyer impulsively takes a mysterious drug that, among other disorienting effects, causes him to skip forward randomly in time. In select cinemas and contemporaneously out on video-on-demand; a physical media release should follow later in the year. The Wave official site.

FILM FESTIVALS – Sundance Film Festival (Park City, UT, Jan 23-Feb 2):

The 2020 movie season will officially kick off with Sundance, where a hundred hopeful independent movies, including a few off-the-wall ones, come to vie for a handful of distribution contracts. In recent years, Sundance added the “Next” and “Midnight” screening sections to add some weirdness to the otherwise tame lineup of dramas about privileged white people and their problems. There is usually at least one memorably strange film that sneaks by the screeners: 2019 brought us the Groundhogian grief nightmare Koko-di, Koko-da. Here are a few titles we’ll be keeping our eyes on this year:

• The Nowhere Inn – Singer St. Vincent creates a fictional documentary described as “distorted and bizarre” and slated for the Midnight category. Screens 1/25-26, 1/30-2/1.
• Omniboat: A Fast Boat Fantasia – Portmanteau feature centered around a Miami speedboat; it counts Swiss Army Man directing team Daniels among the contributors. On 1/26, 28-29, 31, or 2/1.
• Wendy – Benh Zeitlin‘s second feature film comes 8 years after Beasts of the Southern Wild; it’s a retelling of Peter Pan set in Neverland and told from Wendy’s perspective. 1/26-28, 2/1-2.

Sundance Film Festival official site.

NEW ON HOME VIDEO:

Iron Sky: The Coming Race (2019): Read Giles Edwards’ review. The Nazis-on-the-moon sequel is now on Blu-ray after being strictly VOD. Buy Iron Sky: The Coming Race.

CERTIFIED WEIRD (AND OTHER) REPERTORY SCREENINGS:

The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975). We’ll only list irregularly scheduled one-time screenings of this audience-participation classic below. You can use this page to find a regular weekly screening near you.

• Chicago, IL
  • Gene Siskel Film Center – Millennium Actress (2001) (1/17, 23)
  • The Music Box – Mandy (2018) (1/17-18) (midnights)
• Dallas, TX
  • Texas Theatre
    • Santa Sangre (1989) (1/17-18)
    • Metropolis (1927), with live score by David DiDonato (1/18)
• Los Angeles, CA
  • The Nuart – Pink Floyd the Wall (1982) (1/18) (midnight)
• Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN
  • The Uptown – Fantastic Planet [La Planète Sauvage] (1973) (1/17-18) (midnights)
• New York City, NY
  • IFC Center
    • The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972) (1/17-20)
    • Eraserhead (1977) (1/17-19) (midnights)
    • Mulholland Drive (2001) (1/17-19) (midnights)
  • Lincoln Center – mother! (2017) (1/17)
  • The Metrograph – Branded to Kill (1967) (1/17-19)
• Oakland, CA
  • The New Parkway – Repo Man (1984) (1/17)
• San Francisco, CA
  • The Castro – A Woman Is a Woman (1961) with Pierrot le Fou (1965) (double feature) (1/23)
• Seattle, WA
  • Central Cinema – Freaks (1932) (1/17-22)
• Tuscon, AZ
  • The Loft – Mulholland Drive (2001) (1/17-18)
• Vancouver, BC
  • The Rio – Blue Velvet (1986) (1/17) (midnight)

WHAT’S IN THE PIPELINE: Before announcing next week’s lineup, we’ll remind you to vote in our 2019 Weirdcademy Awards poll (and also in the Weirdest Short Film of 2019 poll). These polls usually show some separation early, and this year it’s The Lighthouse that’s pulled far ahead in the Weirdest Actor and Weirdest Scene races, and also leading (though not necessarily dominating) the Weirdest Movie category. Weirdest Actress is still a contest, however, and Weirdest Short is anyone’s game. Polls close February 9.

Moving on, we’ll have a busy week of reviews next week as we give you the scoop on the highly anticipated Richard Stanley–H.P. Lovecraft–Nicolas Cage collaboration The Color out of Space. We’ll also have reviews of a couple of not-quite-as-fresh-but-still-newish offerings as El Rob Hubbard enters The Shasta Triangle and Shane Wilson finds I Lost My Hand. We’ll even throw in one from the reader-suggestion queue, as Giles Edwards celebrates the post-apocalyptic punk madness of Derek Jarman‘s Jubilee. That’s a pretty busy week for us. Onward and weirdward!

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