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 on the official site links.
FILM FESTIVALS – Slamdance (Park City, UT, Jan 17-23):
If your movie isn’t commercial enough for Sundance (see below), you can try exhibiting it at Slamdance, the punk-ier film festival running contemporaneously to its bigger brother. Although there are a lot of weird-looking works there this year, almost all of them are shorts, except for one feature scoop we’re highlighting below.
- Cheatin’ – Bill Plympton‘s latest weird animated feature is about a woman who, with a magician’s help, takes the shape of her paramour’s ex-girlfriends. Screening tonight, Jan 17, at 8:00 Central (hurry!), or catch it Jan. 20.
FILM FESTIVALS – Sundance (Park City, UT, Jan 16-26):
The 2014 movie season officially kicks off with Sundance, where a hundred hopeful independent movies, some weird, come to vie for a handful of distribution contracts. Here are the one’s we’ll be keeping an eye on:
- The Double – Jesse Eisenberg stars in this comic adaptation of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s novella about a man whose exact double suddenly appears and usurps his life. Screening Jan. 17, 18, 21 & 25.
- Frank – An aspiring musician joins a band led by an artist (Michael Fassbender) who always wears an oversized papier-mâché head. Jan. 17-19, 21, 25.
- The Girl from Nagasaki – An experimental version of “Madame Butterfly” with (judging from the stills) some scenes set in space or underwater. Jan. 21-13, 25.
- A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night – An Iranian vampire romance set in a depraved urban netherworld, stylistically influenced by Spaghetti westerns. Jan. 19, 21-22, 24-25.
- Mr leos caraX – Documentary on the enigmatic Holy Motors auteur. Jan. 20, 22-25.
- Only Lovers Left Alive – Jim Jarmusch’s latest tackles vampires in love; with Tom Hiddleston and Tilda Swinton (as vampires named “Adam” and “Eve”) and Mia Wasikowska in a rare villainous role. Jan. 21-22, 24-25.
- R100 – A sadomasochistic sex comedy from Hitoshi Matsumoto about a businessman who joins a secret club that arranges for dominatrices to attack its members in public places. Jan 18-21.
- The Voices – Marjane Satrapi‘s first American feature is a tale of murder involving a factory worker who takes advice from his talking cat and dog. Jan. 19, 22-23, 25.
- White Bird in a Blizzard – A girl is haunted by her mother’s unexplained disappearance years ago; not sure if this is weird, but director Gregg Araki‘s movies usually are… Jan. 20-21, 24-25.
Sundance Film Festival official site.
NEW ON DVD:
Plus One (2013): Teenagers find their doubles crashing the wildest party of the year in this doppelgänger thriller. From the director of the Last House on the Left remake; it didn’t get a real theatrical release, but The New York Times and the Village Voice both thought it had cult potential. Buy Plus One (+1)
NEW ON BLU-RAY:
Buffalo ’66 (1998): An ex-convict (Vincent Gallo) kidnaps a moody teenage girl (Christina Ricci) to pose as his wife as he visits his family on his way to kill Scott Norwood for missing the field goal that cost the Buffalo Bills Superbowl XXV. This oddball character study with magical realist interludes has been quietly spanning time for the past 15 years, but unfortunately the Blu-ray arrives with no extras. Buy Buffalo ’66 [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.