Thinking Outside the Multiplex in Indiana (February 11, 2011)
by MIKE MACCOLLUM
It’s another busy week- more Academy Award nominated films make their way to at least one theater in Indiana, while another nominated film (Blue Valentine) goes for a little walk across the state… and a dizzying variety of films will be shown at theaters and other venues across the state as well. So without further delay, let’s dive in to this week’s offerings…. Read more 
Movie Review – Another Year (2010)
by HELEN GEIB
Another Year offers a sympathetic and penetrating portrayal of ordinary unhappiness, but is most remarkable as a study of ordinary happiness, a state seldom depicted realistically in movies. Read more
Rewind: Films of the 60s, 70s, 80s – The Landlord (1970)
by RICHARD WINTERS
Elgar Enders (Beau Bridges) is a spoiled 29 year old from a wealthy family who is still living at home with his parents in an affluent suburb of New York. He decides it is time to “make his mark” by purchasing a rundown building in a black neighborhood in inner-city Brooklyn. He plans to evict the tenants and have the building renovated into posh flats. He starts having second thoughts though as he gets to know the people and learns of their struggles. He begins a relationship with one of the women (Diana Sands) and soon he is working to upgrade the building as well as trying to enlighten his racist, snobbish parents (Walter Brooke, Lee Grant). Read more
Movie Review – Centurion (2010)
by HELEN GEIB
The “lost Ninth” has fired imaginations for centuries. Legion IX Hispana was a Roman legion (an infantry unit of several thousand men) stationed in Britain after the successful Claudian invasion of 43 AD. The legion is known to have constructed a fortress at what became York, a city in northern England, around 70 AD. Geographically speaking, York is not far south of the northern limit of Roman conquest of the island, symbolized- although not literally defined- by Hadrian’s Wall. Legend plausibly places the Ninth at the outermost frontier of the Roman Empire, in the area that would become the borderlands between England and Scotland, and was then Pictland. Read more
Thinking Outside the Multiplex in Indiana (February 4, 2011)
by MIKE MACCOLLUM
LIMITED RELEASE THEATRICAL FILMS OPENING IN INDIANA THIS WEEK
Another Year- Mike Leigh’s latest drama follows a year in the life of happily married couple Tom and Gerri (Jim Broadbent and Ruth Sheen) and their desperately unhappy friend Mary (Lesley Manville). Another Year- which has already received a Best Actress award for Lesley Manville from the National Board of Review, and now has been nominated for an Academy Award in the Best Original Screenplay category-starts at the Keystone Art Cinema in Indianapolis on Friday, February 4. Read more
DVD of the Week – Review of A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop (2009)
by HELEN GEIB
Somewhere in western China, in a province of deserts and mountains. Sometime in the 19th century, or thereabouts. An isolated roadside teahouse serving travelers, although we never actually see any; only a merchant caravan that sells the lady of the house a revolver and a company of soldiers on patrol from the nearest town. The proprietor is an old skinflint with a young wife he bought a few years before as a child-bride. Alienated by his constant abuse and terribly lonely, she’s having an affair with a weak-willed young man who works for them. The owner hires one of the soldiers to first investigate the affair, and then to kill his wife. Meanwhile, the soldier has his eye on the safe…. Read more
Free-Talking on Cinema, Movies, and Film (February, 2011)
by HELEN GEIB
Free-Talking Series: Next Post
[Note: The monthly Free-Talking post is updated every five days, give or take a day every now and then.]
FEBRUARY 26, 2011- AND MY LEAST FAVORITE MONTH OF THE YEAR DRAWS TO A CLOSE
Last night I saw Memento at the IMA. I hadn’t seen it since it was new and had forgotten all but the broad outline. That’s not a memory joke, but a preface to saying how much I enjoyed being taken by surprise again by the plot twists. It was the closing film of the “Winter Nights” series, theme: noir and neo-noir, and also gave my group our best post-movie discussion of the series. We sat around for well more than an hour (until the Starbucks kicked us out) deconstructing the plot, analyzing the themes, teasing out noir tropes and influences…. Read more
DVD of the Week – Disc Commentary Track for The Shining (1980)
by NIR SHALEV
I’ve chosen to dedicate my first review of a commentary track in 2011 to a Stanley Kubrick classic. The Shining is one of the greatest horror films of all times; a film that revolutionized the use of the steadicam and one that has masterful compositions showing Kubrick’s vision and genius as a filmmaker. Read more