â means we recommend it.
Abbas Kiarostami: A Retrospective
A sprawling survey of the Iranian filmmakerâs work. Current screenings include Taste of Cherry; Close-Up; Ten; and Shirin. (Through Mon Oct 28, Northwest Film Centerâs Whitsell Auditorium)
Basket Case
Ah, the â80s. When the coke flowed like wine, the electronics were still wood-paneled, and you could pay a couple bucks to catch movies like Basket Case at the local theater and nobody would stop you, or really even question the idea that such a repugnant nug of shit could just splatter itself all over a theater screen like that. âOh, you mean that nasty little movie about the murderous backwoods idiot hauling his hawked loogie of a little brother around in a giant picnic basket? Sure! Iâll sell you a ticket!â (Fri Oct 11-Thurs Oct 17, Academy Theater) BOBBY ROBERTS
The Blair Witch Project
As a theatrical experience, Blair Witch is as close as any movieâs ever gotten to the elemental fear mined from a perfectly told campfire story at the most impressionable age. Those giggling children. The snapping twigs. The tent assaultâJesus, people still canât agree, after 20 years, on just what the fuck is in that swaddled bundle of blood and hair. (Fri Oct 18, Hollywood Theatre) BOBBY ROBERTS
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Despite the fact that writer and creator Joss Whedon practically disowned this movie the second it was finished, even die-hard Whedonites (if such a thing still exists) have to admit the movie is worth a watch or two. Itâs better than that âBeer Badâ episode, at least. (Sun Oct 13, Northwest Film Centerâs Whitsell Auditorium) BOBBY ROBERTS
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Candyman
Slashers arenât particularly known for things like nuance, or thoughtfulness, or tendencies towards social progressivism and empathyâso seeing all those elements foregrounded in Bernard Roseâs adaptation of horror master Clive Barkerâs short story is startlingâand thatâs before you get to the macabre artistry lent to the numerous (and harrowing) kills, perfectly underscored by the stark compositions of Philip Glass. (Fri Oct 18-Thurs Oct 24, Academy Theater) BOBBY ROBERTS
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Carrie
Horror movies, even the most transgressive ones, tend to mellow a little as time and norms progress. Yet Brian De Palmaâs adaptation of Stephen Kingâs debut novel is, somehow, even more disturbing now than it was upon release. (Fri Oct 11-Thurs Oct 17, Academy Theater) BOBBY ROBERTS
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Dolemite Is My Name
Of the many stars of the Blaxploitation genre of the early â70s, Rudy Ray Moore may not be the most famous, but he was certainly the most original. After recording several comedy albums, he used the money to self-produce his starring vehicle, 1975âs Dolemiteâabout a rhyming pimp trained in kung fu who takes revenge on the rival who put him in jail. In Dolemite Is My Name, Eddie Murphy plays Moore from his days as a struggling comedian/singer/dancer who worked as a record store manager, to making comedy albums and eventually willing his cinematic visions to life. The film deftly captures the hardship of inner-urban life in the â70s, where classism and privilege kept Black entertainers who were unwilling to play the game out of the mainstream. Dolemite Is My Name is a bittersweet, filthy-mouthed comedy that also sneakily educates its audience in the Black experience. See full review, this issue. (Opens Fri Oct 18, Hollywood Theatre; streams Fri Oct 25, Netflix) WM. STEVEN HUMPHREY
El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie
I don't know what writer/director Vince Gillgan is planning on doing with this movie, but I do know one thing: Jesse Pinkman better get a happy fucking ending. Bitch. (Opens Fri Oct 11, Cinema 21; streams Fri Oct 11, Netflix)
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The Evil Dead
The first Evil Dead is a film thatâs been a little misunderstood over the years. Its sequels veered strongly towards black comedy and splatstick, so people would go back to that first movie and not quite get itâwhy isnât it funny? Itâs supposed to be funny, right? No. Sam Raimi wasnât trying to do anything but scar you with that first film, and once you stop looking for all the winks and nods that arenât there, The Evil Dead reveals itself as the irresponsible and mean-spirited little poison pill it is. That pill will go down a little smoother tonight, thanks to a new restoration that makes all Raimiâs inventive gore look brand new, while giving composer Joe LoDuca 5.1 channels of sound to play in as opposed to squishing his music into a single mono channel. (Sun Oct 20, Hollywood Theatre) BOBBY ROBERTS
Gemini Man
There used to be a time when even a bad Will Smith movie was a good movie because it had Will Smith in it, but not even two Will Smiths can save this one. (Opens Thurs Oct 10, various theaters) BEN COLEMAN
The I Never Trilogy
Oregon filmmakers Mig Windows and Rory Owensâ anthology horror film, âexploring themes of heartbreak, infidelity, suicide, and the supernatural.â Director Mig Windows in attendance. (Thurs Oct 24, Northwest Film Centerâs Whitsell Auditorium)
Isnât She Great: Hocus Pocus
The 1993 Disney family comedy that starts at âsugar highâ and ends somewhere past âdiabetic shockâ on the saccharine scale. Hey, at least itâs not Teen Witch. (Fri Oct 11, Hollywood Theatre)
Joker
Iâm not ready to label Joker, The Hangover director Todd Phillipsâ gritty look at Batmanâs arch-nemesis, something as simple as âgood.â Joker is problematic, transgressive, insulting, and itâs also probably art. At the risk of hyperbole, Joker might represent a new approach to popular cinema: This is a movie that works both for people who see it to luxuriate in the fearsome power of the Jokerâs violence, and those who will instead see the character as pitiable. The fact that Joker works for both has me wondering if, going forward, more films will abandon a singular viewpoint. Phillipsâ approach feels like a perfect fit for our current, polarized culture. See full review, this issue. (Now playing, various theaters) SUZETTE SMITH
The Laundromat
See review. (Opens Fri Oct 11, Hollywood Theatre; streams Fri Oct 18, Netflix)
Loro
The most terrifying grin youâll see at the movies this year doesnât belong to the Joker or Pennywise. Itâs affixed to the face of Silvio Berlusconi, the former prime minister of Italy, as portrayed by Toni Servillo in Loro, the new film from Paolo Sorrentino. Berlusconi's grin is clownish and rictus-like, and he wields it as a tool of seduction. Whether heâs trying to woo a senator or a dewy young woman in a short skirt, his smile floats through this fizzy, caustic satire like the Cheshire Cat. You get so distracted by it, you donât feel his claws sinking into your flesh. (Now playing, Living Room Theaters) ROBERT HAM
Lucy in the Sky
Lucy in the Sky is not good, but itâs a little hard to pinpoint why. Itâs based on the story of Lisa Nowak, the astronaut who, in 2007, drove from Houston to Orlando wearing a diaper, chased down the guy she had an extramarital affair with, and attempted to kidnap his new girlfriend. Sounds like it should make for a pretty good movie, right? The diaperâs not in the movie, and Nowak here is called Lucy Cola; sheâs played by Natalie Portman in a Dorothy Hamill bob and a stretchy Southern accent. Lucy drives to the San Diego airport, not Orlandoâs, and there are other changes, tooârather than rehashing a tabloid scandal, Lucy in the Sky would rather use it as a jumping-off point to explore character and interiority. In the right hands, this would be a good sign for a smart movie. And the hands seem to be right. Lucyâs directed by Noah Hawley, whose track record on television has some exceptional high notes (Fargo), and even his lower ones (Legion) are usually because of an excess of ambitionâtoo many good ideas rather than a lack of them. Hawleyâs a terrific writer and a remarkable visual stylist; his debut feature film should be something worth leaving the house for. And yet. Lucy in the Sky is flat and cold and terribly dull. (Opens Fri Oct 11, various theaters) NED LANNAMANN
Maleficent: Mistress of Evil
See review at portlandmercury.com/film (Opens Thurs Oct 17, various theaters)
Monos
Monos follows a team of teenaged guerrilla soldiers somewhere in South America, but weâre told nothing about them. Instead, weâre embedded with themâwe watch them squabble and laugh and wrestle in the dirt; we see them try to keep warm at night; we see them fire off their rifles in the morning. Directed by Colombian-Ecuadorian filmmaker Alejandro Landes, the movie is split in two halves. The first takes place on top of a cloud-shrouded mountain, amid abandoned structures of concrete and rebar. Itâs a gorgeous, forbidding place, and most of the filmâs pleasures come from the lustrous scenery paired with the minimal power of composer Mica Leviâs score. The second half of Monos is a descent into the jungle, a claustrophobically verdant maze of mud, leaves, and rivers swollen with rain. By now the team has begun to fray, although their mission and their individual desires are never fully articulated. That lack of specificity hurts Monos: The hypnotic first half simply doesnât give the audience enough to latch onto. (Opens Fri Oct 11, Cinema 21) NED LANNAMANN
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OMSIâs 2019 Sci-Fi Film Fest
OMSIâs annual collection of science-fiction classics and favorites is coming out strong this year, with a phenomenal lineup that includes two from Stanley Kubrick (2001 and A Clockwork Orange), two from Denis Villeneuve (Arrival and Blade Runner 2049) and a slew of other must-sees like Under the Skin, Children of Men, and Fantastic Planet. More at omsi.edu. (Through Wed Nov 6, Empirical Theatre at OMSI) ERIK HENRIKSEN
Portland Latin American Film Festival: The Good Girls
Director Alejandra MĂĄrquez Abellaâs study of a very affluent woman at the dawn of the â80s in Mexico City and how she copes with an economic crash. (Wed Oct 16, Hollywood Theatre)
Portland Unknown Film Festival
A fest that shines the spotlight on low-budget and analog filmmaking, bringing you a full weekend of curated works. More at portlandunknown.com. (Fri Oct 11-Sun Oct 13, Disjecta)
Psycho
Of all the things this Hitchcock classic is often championed for, maybe the most notable achievement is how completely it manipulates an audienceâs empathy. Hitchcock has made better films, but never any as sneaky as Psycho. (Fri Oct 18-Thurs Oct 24, Academy Theater) BOBBY ROBERTS
Re-Run Theater: Wes Cravenâs Summer of Fear
The Hollywood Theatreâs monthly TV party screens Wes Cravenâs TV movie Stranger in Our House, an adaptation of Lois Duncanâs novel Summer of Fear. It premiered on Halloween night, 1978, and stars Linda Blair as a high school girl whose weird cousin moves into her house and is immediately suspected of being a goddamn witch. (Wed Oct 23, Hollywood Theatre)
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Slumber Party Massacre
Slumber Party Massacre is queer activist Rita Mae Brownâs subversive, satirical, and yes, inspirational feminist revenge story about a party full of high-school girls fighting off a homicidal maniac whose (Freudian) weapon of choice is a power drill. (Sun Oct 20, Northwest Film Centerâs Whitsell Auditorium) BOBBY ROBERTS
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They Live
There are more than a few theaters across the country that semi-regularly screen 1984 as a response to the continued tenure of our corrupt, racist, slumlord sex offender of a president. But John Carpenterâs last bona fide classicâ1989âs paranoid, left-wing, grindhouse sci-fi satire They Liveâis a much more appropriate film for the strange, bewildering time we occupy. (Sun Oct 13, Northwest Film Centerâs Whitsell Auditorium) BOBBY ROBERTS
Whereâs My Roy Cohn?
The once-famous Roy Cohn has faded from the public consciousness, but the lawyer had a hell of a career, beginning with doing his part to destroy America alongside Joseph McCarthy and ending with doing his part to destroy America by representing a young Donald Trump. The documentary Whereâs My Roy Cohn? spends much of its runtime examining Cohnâs arrogant, confrontational, and self-promoting public image, making a strong case that Cohnâs shiftiness and shittiness paved the way for todayâs political belligerence. Cohn was also gay, though he never came out (he died from AIDS-related causes in 1986, shortly after being disbarred for unethical conduct), and his relationship with Ronald Reagan, even as Reagan ignored the AIDS crisis, is just one of a dozen eye-widening, stomach-sinking elements in director Matt Tyrnauerâs film. But by the time Cohnâs crazy, furious tale ends, oneâs feeling isnât of enlightenment so much as weary resignation: Terrible people have always existed, and theyâve always helped other terrible people be terrible, and a whole lot of these terrible people are also very powerful. Ugh. Sigh. Fuck all these motherfuckers. (Opens Fri Oct 18, Regal Fox Tower 10) ERIK HENRIKSENÂ
Wrinkles the Clown
Director Michael Beach Nicholsâ documentary about the internetâs favorite creepy clown has a few tricks up its polka-dotted sleeve. According to Wrinkles the Clown, the man beneath the Wrinkles mask is a 65-year-old retiree who lives in a van; enjoys fishing, Natty Ice, and strip clubs; and occasionally terrorizes both random Floridians and naughty kids whose parents hire him to provide âbehavioral services.â (Those services, a developmental psychologist says in Wrinkles, are âreally misguided,â while another interviewee, the very earnest Funky the Clown, mourns that thanks in part to Wrinkles, âthereâs a whole generation growing up with no positive image of a clown whatsoever.â) âYou gotta problem with it, you can take it up with mom and dad, âcause Iâm just doinâ my job!â Wrinkles growls from behind the wheel of his van. But a little more than midway through, Wrinkles takes a turn and starts digging into the shakiness of online celebrity and the spread of digital folklore; while everyone can agree Wrinkles is creepy as fuck, opinions will differ about the effectiveness of his movie. (Opens Fri Oct 11, Cinema 21) ERIK HENRIKSENÂ
Zombieland: Double Tap
Woody Harrelson, Jesse Eisenberg, Abigail Breslin, and Emma Stone all return to banter and blast zombies, and their wry camaraderie speaks a seemingly genuine desire to play in this viscera-splattered sandbox again (rather than, as with many long-delayed sequels, simply the desire for a new beach house). It's more a live-action cartoon than a serious entry in the zombie canon, but as a low-key genre comedy, it totally works. (Opens Thurs Oct 17, various theaters) BEN COLEMAN