San Diego Unseen: An Urban Portrait
IP Man 2
The San Diego Asian Film Festival takes over much of the UltraStar Mission Valley location for a week, starting Thursday, Oct. 21. It’s the 11th year of the festival, and, again, it’s a massive collection of movies from around the globe. All told, there’s more than 140 films from more than 20 countries. Highlights include opening-night feature Legend of the Fist, IP Man 2 (which has garnered plenty of buzz), The Red Chapel (which is sort of like a Danish Borat, wherein a Danish comedian hoodwinks, um, North Korea) and Colin Hearts Kay (a stylish, sweet-looking rom-com.
This year, the festival has a focus on films about trans-racial adoption, and there’ll be a number of parties and celebrity appearances. The one that caught my eye is the Asians in Hollywood discussion, whose participants include Daniel Dae Kim, formerly of Lost and currently of Hawaii 5-0; Glee’s Harry Shum Jr.; Ellen Wong, who stole all her scenes in Scott Pilgrim vs. the World; and Aaron Yoo. Oh, one other bonus: At 4 p.m. every day, the festival will offer a free film to the public.
A complete lineup and ticket info can be found at sdaff.org.
A day after all that begins, on Friday, Oct. 22, the San Diego Italian Film Festival kicks things off with a 6 p.m. party at the Museum of Photographic Arts in Balboa Park. At 7:30, KPBS film critic Beth Accomondo will introduce Il Divo, one of last year’s best movies in any language. Then the festival will run nightly through Friday, Nov. 5.
Several films from legendary director Marco Bellocchio will screen, including Enrico IV and La Condanna (The Conviction), one of the four films he made with the help of his psychoanalyst. The closing-night picture, Claudio Cupellini’s Lezioni di Cioccolato (Chocolate Lessons), will be accompanied by the festival’s annual gala, which, if history serves, is not to be missed. Swing by sandiegoitalianfilmfestival.com for a complete rundown and ticket info.
OPENING
Conviction: Hilary Swank stars as Betty Ann Waters, who spent almost 20 years trying to prove her brother (Sam Rockwell) didn’t commit the murder he went to jail for. Moving story, predictable film.
Enter the Void: Drug dealer Oscar (Nathaniel Brown) and his stripper sister Linda (Paz de la Huerta) have just arrived in Tokyo. When Oscar is shot and killed, his ghost sticks around to look after Linda.
Hereafter: Is Clint Eastwood pondering his mortality? Possibly—his new movie looks at what happens when we die, and it does so through three disparate storylines. There’s the French journalist who sees the afterlife as she barely survives a tsunami, the British boy pining for his brother and Matt Damon, who plays a psychic who hates the fact that he can talk to the dead.
Howl: The filmmakers try to put Allen Ginsberg’s landmark poem into context by presenting James Franco as the young poet and re-creating publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti obscenity trial. See our review on Page 22.
Inside Job: Matt Damon narrates Charles Ferguson’s exhaustive documentary about which people, exactly, were responsible for the recent global finance crisis.
Paranormal Activity 2: Because one just wasn’t enough.
Stone: Edward Norton is a convicted arsonist who sends his wife (Milla Jovovich) to seduce parole officer Robert De Niro in the hopes of getting out early.
Tamara Drewe: Gemma Arterton is an ugly duckling who becomes a swan and returns to the town where she was born, only to raise hell with the luminaries attending an artists conference there.
ONE TIME ONLY
Carrie: Note to self: Don’t drop bucket of pig’s blood on prom queen’s head. Presented by FilmOut at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 20, at the Birch North Park Theatre.
Kingpin: Woody Harrelson is a onearmed bowler who enlists an Amish prodigy (Randy Quaid) to help him defeat his nemesis, Bill Murray, who has a deadly comb-over. Screens at 8 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 20, at The Pearl Hotel in Point Loma. Free.
Tijuaneados Anonymous: A Teardrop, a Smile: Documentary about how the violence in our border neighbor affects the day-to-day lives of its citizens. Screens at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 21, at the Little Theater at SDSU.
Labyrinth: Gotta love any movie that stars David Bowie as a goblin king. Part of the Museum of Photographic Arts’ POP Thursdays event, it screens at 8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 21, at MoPA in Balboa Park. More details on Page 13.
Next: A Primer on Urban Painting: The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego kicks off its Viva La Revolucion film series with this up-closeand-personal look at the people who make that street art you like so much. Screens at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 21, at MCASD’s La Jolla branch.
Corey Feldman’s Lost Boys Ball: To celebrate the straight-to-DVD second sequel to Lost Boys, Corey Feldman will present the original and a set from his Pink Floyd-influenced band, The Truth Movement. Starts at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 21, at House of Blues.
Rear Window: These days, James Stewart never would have seen what was going on in his creepy neighbor’s house, because he’d have been online. Screens at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 21, at Reading Cinemas Town Square.
An Evening with Independent Filmmaker Zeinabu Irene Davis: This program of three shorts from the UCSD prof starts at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 22, at the City Heights Library. Free.
Young Frankenstein: The Mel Brooks comedy starring Gene Wilder screens at 8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 21, through Saturday, Oct. 23, at Cinema Under the Stars in Mission Hills.
Exit Through the Gift Shop: This brilliant documentary from street artist Banksy, all about a Frenchman’s failed attempt to make a documentary about street art, is actually about the nature of art itself. And the entire thing might be fake. Which makes it even better. Screens at 7 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 23, at the Activist Center in City Heights.
Spike & Mike’s New Festival of Animation: More highbrow than the standard sick and twisted stuff you’ve come to expect from the animation powerhouse—but just as entertaining. Screens at 7:15 and 9:15 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 23, at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego’s La Jolla branch.
White on Rice: Fresh off his divorce, Jimmy moves in with his sister and has to share his 10-year-old nephew’s room while he hunts for a new wife. Screens at 6:30 p.m. Monday, Oct. 25, at the Central Library, Downtown. Free.
10 Tactics: This documentary calls on 25 different activists to describe ways to create positive change. Screens at 7 p.m. Monday, Oct. 25, at the Joyce Beers Community Center in Hillcrest. Free.
The American Astronaut: It’s tough to explain just how weird and wonderful this sci-fi western musical actually is. You’ll just have to see for yourself, over drinks, when it screens at 9 p.m. Monday, Oct. 25, at Whistle Stop Bar in South Park. Free.
Vertigo: Don’t look down. The Hitchcock classic screens at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 26, at the Reading Gaslamp.
The Sound of Music sing-along: Sing goodbye in so many different ways in this encore presentation. It goes down at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 26, at several local theaters. Hit up fathomevents.com for details.
Ghostbusters: Who you gonna call? We’ll go with Bill Murray. Screens at 8 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 27, at The Pearl Hotel in Point Loma. Free.
NOW PLAYING
Gerrymandering: Documentary about political parties stacking the election deck.
Jackass 3-D: Shit is flying in 3-D. Literally.
Nowhere Boy: A portrait of an adolescent John Lennon, played by Kick-Ass’ Aaron Johnson. turns out all he needed was love.
Red: Action-comedy starring Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman, John Malkovich and, best of all, Helen Mirren, as retired spies some young whippersnappers are trying to kill.
Waiting for “Superman”: You may not agree with all of Davis Guggenheim’s (An Inconvenient Truth) assertions about education, but you should watch his new documentary, because it’s a discussion we need to have.
It’s Kind of a Funny Story: Zach Galifianakis is pretty good, but this coming-of-age story set in a mental hospital feels exploitative once you’ve been discharged.
Life as We Know It: Katherine Heigl and Josh Duhamel are polar opposites forced to move in together and take care of an orphaned baby girl. We’re guessing it all works out.
My Soul to Take: Wes Craven’s latest hacks apart a bunch of teenagers in 3-D!
Never Let Me Go: Mark Romanek and Alex Garland’s adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro’s beloved novel is a sci-fi tragedy starring Carey Mulligan, Andrew Garfield and Keira Knightley as clones bred for organ donations. It’s intense stuff, but perhaps more to be admired than enjoyed.
Secretariat: Thoroughly family-friendly PG version of how one of history’s most famous racehorses got his start.
The Social Network: David Fincher’s new film about the early days of Facebook is more entertaining than 99.9 percent of status updates.
You Will Meet a Tall, Dark Stranger: The latest one from Woody Allen is a cynical look at marriage. Anthony Hopkins, Naomi Watts, Josh Brolin, Freida Pinto, Antonio Banderas and a host of others are linked together in some way, and none of them is very happy about it.
Catfish: When a New York City photographer finally visits a Michigan family he’s gotten to know via Facebook, he finds something entirely different than what he expected. This documentary about internet deception has some viewers wondering if the entire movie is a faade—the filmmakers, however, insist it’s all true.
Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole: Animated, PG-rated owl film directed by Zack Snyder, the guy behind Watchmen and 300.
Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps: It’s been 23 years since Oliver Stone told us that greed was good. Yes, Gordon Gecko is back, but he’s almost extraneous, as green energy Wall Streeter Shia LaBeouf dukes it out with sleazy megatrader Josh Brolin. It’s simplistic and sporadically entertaining.
Alpha and Omega: Because there just aren’t enough 3-D animated movies about animals. Justin Long and Hayden Panettiere are a pair of wolves who have to learn whether love can overcome the pack’s social order. We’re guessing it can.
Easy A: Emma Stone finally gets a starring role in this about-face turn on The Scarlet Letter. She’s Olive, a non-promiscuous high-schooler who gets a reputation for being easy—and proceeds to use it to get ahead.
The Town: Ben Affleck directs himself (not a euphemism). He’s a Boston thug torn between bad-guy buddy Jeremy Renner and Blake Lively, a bank manager he once stuck up (also not a euphemism). Oh, and FBI man Jon Hamm is hot on his trail (still no euphemism).
Resident Evil: Afterlife: In 3-D. Yep.
The Tillman Story: Steady-handed and depressing documentary about the cover-up over the friendly-fire death of the football player turned Army Ranger. Playing at La Paloma Theatre in Encinitas.
The American: George Clooney is a sensitive hit man who has to pull One Last Job.
Machete: Danny Trejo finally gets his own movie. Robert Rodriguez turns him into a Mexican killing machine by adapting the faux trailer the duo made for Grindhouse.
Lewis & Clark: Follow the famed adventurers adventures. In IMAX! Screens Fridays at the Reuben H. Fleet Science Center in Balboa Park.
Lebanon: The entire film takes place inside a tank that four young Israeli soldiers are piloting through the early days of the 1982 Lebanon war, and everything you see outside the armored shell is from their point of view. Playing at La Paloma Theatre in Encinitas.
Mao’s Last Dancer: Bruce Beresford directs this biopic of Li Cunxin, who was chosen by the Chinese government to become a world-class ballet dancer.
The Expendables: Stallone, Willis, Schwarzenegger, Lundgren and some wrestlers kill people.
Get Low: Robert Duvall does crotchety old man better than anyone, and this crotchety old man wants to throw himself a funeral party while he’s still alive. Ends Oct. 21 at La Paloma Theatre in Encinitas.
The Other Guys: Mark Ferrell and Will Wahlberg team up as cops. Or is it the other way around?
Inception: Christopher Nolan’s follow-up to The Dark Knight is epic, complex and beautiful. In short, it’s the stuff that dreams are made of.
The Girl Who Played with Fire: The second film in the massively successful Millennium trilogy gives us more of Lisbeth Salander, the ass-kicking female hacker heroine, and less originality. Ends Oct. 21 at La Paloma Theatre in Encinitas.
The Living Sea: The latest IMAX film at the Reuben H. Fleet Science Center looks at all the creepy crawlies that live down in the deep blue.
The Ultimate Wave Tahiti: The latest IMAX entry at the Reuben H. Fleet Science Center in Balboa Park follows super surfer Kelly Slater as he does his thing on some massive waves.
Hubble: Leonardo DiCaprio lends his pipes to this IMAX film, which uses CGI and real footage to take a close look at saturn’s rings. Just stay away from Uranus. At the Reuben H. Fleet Science Center in Balboa Park.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show: The camp classic continues its ongoing run, Fridays at midnight at La Paloma Theatre in Encinitas.
