If you look beyond the usual platforms, there are excellent places to find British, Korean and Russian films as well as restored American classics for diverting lockdown viewing.
Also: Mick Jagger stars in a finely crafted slice of suspense opening this week, ‘The Burnt Orange Heresy,’ and ‘Brightness’ offers a magical realist examination of a father-son relationship.
Bartosz Bielenia is outstanding as Daniel, a troubled young man paroled from juvenile hall who ends up impersonating a priest.
Though the supernatural does eventually intrude, the French film is largely a deliberately paced examination of teenage tomfoolery, cultural appropriation, and elitist pedagogy.
Set in a veterans’ hospital in the Soviet Union after World War II, and directed by 28-year old Kantemir Balagov, the film eschews the sort of flag-waving patriotism too frequently exhibited by recent Russian cinema.
This Italian film is about a Cosa Nostra loyalist who willingly assassinates his enemies, only to turn on the Italian Mafia when his two young sons disappear.
This week’s movies encompasses everything from traditional arthouse fare to the ultra-outré.
Landmark Shattuck Cinemas will once again show the shorts in contention for an Oscar. SF IndieFest has a number of films it is worth crossing the bay for.
See two long-unseen films by Fritz Lang, a Frederico Fellini masterpiece, and a Romanian drama set on the eve of the downfall of the government of Nicolae Ceaușescu.
There’s wonderful ensemble acting in a powerful new film about the death penalty. Also opening Friday: the incredible story of a deep thinker and news junkie who was an early adopter of video tech.
Richard Gere, Peter Dinklage, Bradley Whitford, Walter Goggins, Kevin Pollack and Julianna Margulies star in this film that was made a few years ago but failed to find a distributor until recently.
An Italian mob movie, a ‘Hitler comedy,’ a bleak science-fiction film and a drama about Colombia’s indigenous Wayuu people — just four of John Seal’s fave films of the year.
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