:: FRIDAY, JULY 25 - THURSDAY, JULY 31 ::

📽️ CRUCIAL VIEWING

Robert Altman Centennial

Gene Siskel Film Center – See below for showtimes

Robert Altman's POPEYE (US)
Saturday, 2pm
What, exactly, was producer Robert Evans thinking? After Paramount lost the bidding for the film rights to the mega-smash Broadway musical Annie, he and his execs settled on producing a musical version of Popeye, to which the studio already owned film rights. But Popeye in 1980 was no Annie; E.C. Segar’s comic strip creation, which enjoyed wide popularity in newspapers and in the Fleischer brothers’ animated theatrical shorts in the 1930s, had become pure kid-stuff, lingering on only in comic books and television cartoons. Yes, the character had become culturally iconic, but who was the audience for this?  Evans’ decision to move ahead with this project feels like the moviemaking equivalent of rebound sex. Still, it’s hard to argue with the results. Evans and team made a series of inspired hiring choices. Robert Altman as director was certainly a curious choice, but his felicity with ensemble casts, period filmmaking, and quirky characters, and his strong love of music served him well. Screenwriter Jules Feiffer turned in a nuanced script and songwriter Harry Nilsson crafted a set of lovely and eccentric songs; both carefully straddle the line between sincerity and playful parody. Cinematographer Guiseppe Rotunno brought his eye for filming busy, dark sets and mise-en-scene from his work for Fellini (including FELLINI’S SATYRICON and FELLINI’S CASANOVA) and Visconti (especially THE LEOPARD), and had just shot Bob Fosse’s ALL THAT JAZZ. Evans’ original casting choices, Dustin Hoffman and Lily Tomlin, thankfully fell by the wayside. Instead, we got Shelley Duvall, who had been a frequent presence in Altman’s 1970s films, and Robin Williams, then in the middle of his star-making run on Mork and Mindy. In retrospect, it’s hard to imagine anyone else in these roles. Duvall’s waif-like appearance and lingering shell-shocked expressions from her experience shooting Kubrick’s THE SHINING are made-to-order for Olive Oyl. And, somehow, Williams contains his explosive energy but retains his considerable improvisational and mimicry talents in a deft, and moving, portrayal of Popeye. Both actors inhabit their characters with an uncanny physicality. The pieces all fit together. Evans lucked out. The film did well, earning less than hoped for but still three times its $20 million budget. It received mixed reviews, but has only grown in esteem since its release, attracting some die-hard admirers along the way (yours truly included). And the film Paramount lost out on? The less said about the 1982 John Huston film ANNIE the better. (1980, 114 min, 35mm) [Patrick Friel]
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Robert Altman's COME BACK TO THE 5 & DIME, JIMMY DEAN, JIMMY DEAN (US)
Wednesday, 6pm
A forgotten mid-period gem from Robert Altman's nearly fifty-year career, COME BACK TO THE 5 & DIME receives a well-deserved restoration and revival. A middling story, adapted from Ed Graczyk's play—which Altman directed on Broadway to poor reviews—COME BACK is a curious hybrid of film, theater, and television that takes the best Altman offers to each. Set entirely in a Woolworth's that's near the filming location of George Stevens' GIANT, a nearly all-female James Dean fan club reunites 20 years after the actor's death. After the sole male member of the fan club returns as a woman, the story coalesces around soap opera secrets and their hammy revelations, befores and afters, literal mirrors and their reflected transformations. Altman's "roaming camera" of orchestrated pans and zooms makes the claustrophobic space open and lively, and the flashbacks to 1955 are shown through the general store's theatrical two-way mirrors. Genuine and artful performances (Pauline Kael wrote of the actresses: "They bring conviction to their looneytunes characters") builds meaning and helps draw out the cause and effect of Graczyk's text through Altman's craft. The two are meant for each other: both peddle in pop culture iconography, religio-hyperbole, and insular, provincial groups of deeply flawed people. However, where Graczyk turns to nostalgia and melodrama, Altman elicits a complex mix of sentimentality and cynicism. (1982, 109 min, DCP Digital) [Brian Welesko]

Rouben Mamoulian's LOVE ME TONIGHT (US)

Doc Films (at the University of Chicago) – Friday, 4pm

Before Jeanette MacDonald paired up with Nelson Eddy, she made several films with that prototype of French bon vivants, Maurice Chevalier. Most of these films were made with the fabled touch of director Ernst Lubitsch; the final mating of this threesome, scored by the great operetta compositions of Franz Lehar, is the most sublime of them all: THE MERRY WIDOW (1934). Somewhere in the middle, Rouben Mamoulian, whose knockout debut as a director was the melodrama APPLAUSE (1929), was given his chance with these appealing stars and fashioned LOVE ME TONIGHT, one of their stock stories of an aristocratic woman and her common courter. The film is rightly famous for its opening scene, which give a panoramic view of the Paris skyline and then moves in to listen to the rhythms by which the city wakes up, finally landing on Maurice Courtelin (Chevalier), a Parisian tailor singing of the noise of Paris in “That’s the Song of Paree.” This is the first of several delightful, often memorable songs by Lorenz Hart and Richard Rodgers, perhaps the most famous of which, “Isn’t It Romantic,” foreshadows the romance of Maurice and Princess Jeanette (MacDonald). The pair is brought together when Maurice sets off to collect payment for the wardrobe he made for the notorious freeloader, the Viscount Gilbert de Varèze (Charlie Ruggles). On the way, he hears a woman singing (“Lover”). It is the princess. When she stops, he declares his love for her in the impertinent and naughty tune, “Mimi” (“I’d like to have a little son of a Mimi by and by!”). We watch her full face assume an insulted but gauzily romantic look in the camera of Victor Milner, who shot several films for Lubitsch and knew how to get just the right touch. For a pre-Code film, this one’s attempts at suggestiveness are pretty tame. Maurice insults Jeanette’s seamstress for building her a dowdy riding habit and bets that he can do better. Then we get to see him remove Jeanette’s unfinished riding jacket and take a tape measure to her every body part. It could have been sexy, but Maurice is all efficiency and Jeanette doesn’t melt even a little at his ministrations. Seeing her flirty, womanly performance in THE MERRY WIDOW, this was, for me, like seeing an entirely different actress, and again, with Chevalier. Thus, the tepid romance may be on Mamoulian. Still, between the meeting and the inevitable clinch, much hilarity ensues, delivered by such comic stalwarts as Ruggles; Charles Butterworth, as Jeanette’s nebbishy suitor; and Myrna Loy, as a man-crazy countess. While Mamoulian falls short of the waltz-like grace and romantic sensuality of Lubitsch, his humor more than makes up for it. Screening as part of the Pre-Code Musicals on Film series. (1932, 89 min, 35mm) [Marilyn Ferdinand]

Jess Franco x2

See below for Venues and showtimes

Jess Franco's VAMPYROS LESBOS (West Germany/Spain)
Davis Theater – Sunday, 7pm
In VAMPYROS LESBOS, magical connections between women are constantly being interrupted by men. Linda (Ewa Strömberg) has been having erotic dreams about a beautiful woman. When she travels to an island to meet someone about an inheritance, she’s seduced by the woman, a vampire called Nadine (a spellbinding Soledad Miranda). Their passionate relationship is interrupted by a variety of professional men who think they can unravel and control what’s happening. Franco’s psychedelic score is mesmerizing in its eclectic style; it’s been referenced, remixed, and re-released often since. His cinematography, too, is stunning, both in its sparseness and in the saturation of red found in not just images of blood but decor and costuming. His camera also never feels exploitative and often holds extensively on the faces of the women, zooming in to highlight their interiority as much as their naked bodies. But it is extremely sexy, particularly long scenes of Nadine’s erotic, candelabra-assisted performance art. It also feels completely sincere, dreamlike in its exploration of female sexuality. (1971, 89 min, New 4K DCP Digital Restoration) [Megan Fariello]
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Jess Franco’s MANSION OF THE LIVING DEAD (Spain)
Alamo Drafthouse – Tuesday, 9:30pm
In MANSION OF THE LIVING DEAD, Jess Franco meshes a bouncy beach sex comedy with a sinister erotic horror. There’s a playful humor that descends into a surreally melancholic film, each wave containing flashes of Franco’s signature odd but beautiful imagery. Four topless cocktail waitresses—led by Franco mainstay Lena Romay (though here credited as Candy Coster)—are on a much-anticipated vacation in the Canary Islands. They’re on the lookout for some hot men but also thrilled to be pairing off to hook up with one another. When they arrive, however, they find they’re the resort’s only guests, continually convincing themselves that everyone must just be at the beach. The lack of people might have something to do with the monastery nearby, where long-dead monks are now very much undead and part of a satanic cult; combined with their disturbing intentions, the low-budget makeup becomes even more unsettling. As the women begin to disappear, the cruel reality of their vacation unfolds. The empty interior of MANSION OF THE LIVING DEAD’s hotel setting resembles a cold abandoned hospital, while the exterior is a vacant paradise; the characters move between them as if traveling to different worlds. Franco’s films so often resemble dreamscapes, grounded in his unique way of unhurriedly capturing distinct, often unoccupied, interior and exterior spaces, while his camera closes in on scenes of frenzied lust and violence. But here, that bizarre and singular quality is propelled by his shifts from genre to genre, from humor to violence, from erotic dream to sadistic nightmare. Screening as part of the Terror Tuesday series. (1982, 93 min, DCP Digital) [Megan Fariello

George A. Romero's THE AMUSEMENT PARK (US)

Music Box Theatre – Saturday and Sunday, 11:45am

In 1973 George Romero was hired by The Lutheran Society to make an educational film about ageism. When he turned the final product in it was, unsurprisingly, turned away for being too terrifying for its audience. For the next four decades the film was considered lost, until a single print was found and given a 4k restoration. Knowing the background of THE AMUSEMENT PARK definitely helps elevate the film. With a feel more like a visually cinematic episode of The Twilight Zone (replete with direct to camera introduction and epilogue) than a traditional Romero film, THE AMUSEMENT PARK plays out like a tone poem nightmare than a plot driven horror movie. Following an older man around an amusement park we get glimpses into how society and time relentlessly chip away at both his sanity and physical well-being. Even though this was a work for hire, Romero’s thumbprint is still clear on the film. Made only a few years before his classic DAWN OF THE DEAD, you can see how Romero is already angry with the cultural shifts his generation was taking. While DAWN OF THE DEAD points its finger directly at the ashes of the post-hippie, consumer driven, “me” culture, THE AMUSEMENT PARK taps the shoulder of the same generation to remind them that even if their elders are old and out of touch, one day they will be too. And that one day they will be just as disgusting and grotesque as they believe these people to be. Romero uses THE AMUSEMENT PARK to show that the one true horror we have is time. Time will come for us all. So, while the context as an “educational” film presents the message a bit heavy handedly, Romero still manages to deliver his patented existential horror of society and man. This is a great reminder of how a truly revolutionary and independent filmmaker will cast their shadow over any type of film that they decide to make. (1973, 54 min, DCP Digital) [Raphael Jose Martinez]

Fabulous Fleischer Cartoons (US/Animation)

Music Box Theatre – Saturday, 11:30am

When discussing the immensely influential realm of early twentieth century cartoons in the United States, the work of Max and Dave Fleischer can too often feel like a footnote, resting in the shadow of the cultural and commercial behemoths of Walt Disney's animated shorts and Warner Bros.’ Looney Tunes. Where Disney’s shorts revel in uncomplicated charm and the Looney Tunes mastered slapstick comedy in the medium of animation, Fleischer Studios shorts have a more rough, anarchic sense to them; the characters have designs that feel similar to Disney cartoons, but whose behaviors and gestures lean more towards the absurd. Felix the Cat and Bimbo might as well be cousins to Mickey Mouse, but they inhabit much stranger environments and adventures more in line with the style of Salvador Dalí than Grant Wood. The humor, similarly, leans more towards the dark and abstract, taking advantage of animation’s innate sense of irreality. A notable gag in “Betty Boop and Grampy” sees a firefighter gleefully joining a gaggle of singing characters heading over to Grampy’s house for a party and abandoning a woman in a burning building in the process. Fleischer Studios was also distinctive for how varied their styles and stories were, allowing for inventive experimentation across styles, be it the interplay between animation and live action seen in the Koko the Clown “Inkwell Imps” shorts, or the shift to comic-book realism seen in the studio's later “Superman” shorts. Along that line, the studio also had an exciting symbiotic relationship with the comics industry, with many of their shorts adapting popular comic strip characters. The “Mutt & Jeff” shorts are as comically aligned with the Three Stooges as much as anything, and Popeye the Sailor gave the studio a chance to give traditional adventure films a delightfully elastic and comic sensibility. If the studio did have a mascot, it would undeniably be Betty Boop, a sex symbol with expert comic timing whose adventures ranged from the industrial (e.g., Betty’s adventures operating a diner in “Betty Boop’s Bizzy Bee”) to the fantastical (e.g., Betty cavorting with fairy tale characters in “Mother Goose Land”). Her shorts exemplify the studio at its most powerful, short films that were entertaining and strange and fun and artful, all in one brilliant package. (Total approx. 80 min, DCP Digital) [Ben Kaye]

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Éric Rohmer’s LA COLLECTIONNEUSE (France)

Doc Films (at the University of Chicago) – Thursday, 4pm

The first feature-length film of Éric Rohmer’s “Six Moral Tales” was also the director’s first work in color, and boy does he ever take advantage of it. Working with master cinematographer Nestor Almendros, Rohmer creates an intoxicating portrait of a world in bloom. The imagery is relatively simple—grass, stones, water, and sand are recurring motifs—yet vividly rendered; many of the shots achieve a transcendent beauty. In classical fashion, form mirrors content, with characters musing and acting on their notions of the beautiful. (As always, Rohmer creates the impression that he would have been very much at home in the late 18th century.) Adrien (Patrick Bauchau) is a 30-ish art collector who gets left alone when his fashion model girlfriend leaves for London for six weeks one summer. He decides to idle away the time at the country manor of a distant acquaintance; joining him are another dandyish friend, Daniel (Daniel Pommereulle), and Haydée (Haydée Politoff), a gaminish woman about ten years their junior. Haydée likes to sleep around, and Adrien, who has little else to do, amuses himself by wondering whether she’ll sleep with him. Adrien narrates LA COLLECTIONNEUSE, and the film is subtly modernist in how it draws attention to the subjective viewpoint behind the images. Consider a conversation between Adrien and Haydée on a beach; as the latter talks, Rohmer cuts to a flattering shot of the young woman’s bare legs—clearly a reflection of what Adrien is thinking about. Subjectivity informs the images in subtler ways, as when Adrien’s self-aggrandizing narration undercuts the natural beauty that’s all around him. And then there’s the dialogue, which Rohmer wrote in collaboration with the three leads. Few filmmakers make conversation seem as erotic as Rohmer did; the discussions of beauty are delivered so sensuously and suggestively that they intimate physical pleasure better than almost any literal rendering of lovemaking in cinema. Screening as part of the Éric Rohmer: Four Summer Films series. (1967, 87 min, DCP Digital) [Ben Sachs]

Roman Polanski's CHINATOWN (US)

Gene Siskel Film Center – Tuesday, 7:45pm

In the words of Karl Marx, “California is very important for me because nowhere else has the upheaval most shamelessly caused by capitalist centralization taken with such speed.” Roman Polanski’s CHINATOWN works like a doctored photograph, replicating a moment of California’s lineage of bloodshed for the sake of market expansion; the faces and dates are artificial but not far from the truth. No other film so aptly captures the transgressions of the thirty-first state. While Muybridge’s sequential photographs developed and Hollywood boomed, an ungodly underbelly festered with genocide, corruption, and (in the case of CHINATOWN) incest. In Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World, Malcom Harris describes a West coast formula: “Anglos rule; all natives are Indians; all land and water is just gold waiting to happen.” Militantly researched by screenwriter Robert Towne, CHINATOWN borrows some traits from civil engineer William Mulholland, the first superintendent of the Los Angeles water system and tasked with creating the aqueduct to ensure the city had a sufficient water supply. Noah Cross’ scheme is a carbon copy of the real life 1913 “water wars," with Mulholland’s plan to divert water from Owens Valley, east of the Sierra Nevada mountains. Producer Robert Evans described the first draft, which spanned 178 pages, as “brilliant but incomprehensible.” After almost a year of outlines, Towne cranked out an intriguing but half-coherent text. Having previously left Los Angeles after the murder of his wife, Polanski returned to the United States to direct the picture. With the auteur’s eye, the duo delivered a taut final draft that puts the audience in the shoes of the PI, J.J. Gittes; as he connects the dots, so do we. Heralded by every screenwriting institution of the last forty years, CHINATOWN reflects some of the best writing in the history of cinema. As Polanski stated, “There are no loose ends. Each scene answers three questions instead of one.” Polanski claims the tragic conclusion of Of Mice and Men profoundly affected him for years, ultimately influencing this film’s grim ending. Jerry Goldsmith composed this haunting love theme in under ten days, instructing the trumpet soloist in recording sessions to “play it sexy—but like it's not good sex!" How can CHINATOWN speak to an audience fifty years later? It tells the story of the wealthy sexual sadists manipulating the environment to obtain government contracts, furthering their riches and influence with no regard for the pain and suffering of others. Described by friend Orson Welles as an "amicable Dracula," John Huston’s embodiment of Cross makes skin crawl from the jump. If the films of John Ford operate as American myth, perhaps CHINATOWN has earned the status of an American parable, ghost story even. The title represents a powerlessness and futile pursuit for justice, the way Jake felt when he used to work the beat. In the end, evil prevails and there’s nothing a snitch-nosed PI can do but walk away. CHINATOWN doesn’t offer any solutions; it shows the world as it is. Screening as part of the Spoiler Alert series. (1974, 131 min, 35mm) [Ray Ebarb]

Chuck Russell's A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 3: DREAM WARRIORS (US)

Music Box Theatre – Saturday, 11:30pm

While horror enthusiasts eagerly flock to Damien Leone’s TERRIFIER films featuring Art the Clown, this fascination with gory, inventive, and humorous killings can be traced back to Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund). Art’s pantomime behavior may be more akin to Harpo Marx, but both Krueger and Art share a love of artistic murder. Freddy wasn’t always the wisecracking humorist audiences know him as today. He was a scary force that attacked teens when they were most vulnerable—in bed, asleep. A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET (1984) builds itself on surrealist gags: Freddy’s tongue coming out of the phone, stairs transforming into marshmallow fluff, and Johnny Depp sinking into his bed and exploding into a geyser of blood. Each practical effects gag provided an unnerving sight for audiences. Freddy was scary. New Line Cinema, who distributed the first film, decided to dive headfirst into a sequel and the quick result didn’t excite audiences. It would be a few decades before FREDDY’S REVENGE (1985) would find its cult audience in the LGBTQ+ community. In the meantime, Freddy Krueger became a household name. In two films he had clawed himself into the ranks of slasher stardom, but it was his third film that made him a cultural phenomenon. New Line wanted to give NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET another shot, believing the IP could produce profits, and the result was DREAM WARRIORS. A perfect sequel to the first film, complete with a returning Heather Langenkamp as Nancy and John Saxon as Nancy’s dad. When NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 3: DREAM WARRIORS begins, it has been six years since the first film and Nancy is returning to Springwood to assist at Westin Hills Psychiatric Hospital. She’s a therapist who specializes in dream disorders and the troubled teens there have been having terrible nightmares as of late. The teenagers here are different from the normal stock of '80s slasher fodder; these teens each bare emotional scars from past trauma and are far from helpless victims. Nancy learns that Freddy’s back and targeting one of the teens specifically, Kristen—screen debut for Patricia Arquette—who can pull people into her dreams. This opened the film’s world to increasingly fantastic realms of horror and humor. The enduring impact of DREAM WARRIORS is attributable to the collaboration of a talented ensemble of creators. Wes Craven contributed to the screenplay, ensuring narrative continuity by reintroducing Nancy. He later revived her character in the meta-slasher NEW NIGHTMARE (1994), completing an unofficial trilogy. The film also showcased Chicago artists Frank Darabont and Chuck Russell, who first met on the set of HELL NIGHT (1981). Before they partnered on the remake of THE BLOB, they were presented with the opportunity to craft a Freddy Krueger sequel. Their film would establish a formula that future installments would strive to emulate—a blend of supernatural horror, imaginative world-building, brutal killings, dark humor, and a head-banging soundtrack by Dokken. The team behind DREAM WARRIORS mirrors the eclectic group of teenagers depicted in the filmm as the emphasis on teamwork and resilience in the face of obstruction is a core theme within the film. Nancy empowers the teens to harness their unique abilities within their dreams, including a mohawk-wearing punk armed with switchblades, a mute pervert wielding a reality-bending voice, a wheelchair-bound wizard channeling the magic of Dungeons & Dragons, and a chair bending strongman. This motley crew of warriors have to go head-to-head with the "Bastard son of a hundred maniacs." The amalgamation of fantastical sets, special effects, character depth, and macabre comedy produced a perfect storm for New Line Cinema. DREAM WARRIORS is still considered the most popular film of the NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET series. Freddy’s famous pre-kill quip, “Welcome to prime time, bitch!” became more than a one-liner; it was a herald. Freddy was no longer just a monster—he was a brand, a cultural icon who had slashed his way into a generation’s nightmares and merchandising shelves alike. Co-presented by the Horror House. Every person who pre-orders their ticket will get one entry into a raffle to win a signed 8x10 from Robert Englund (with Certificate of Authenticity) as well as an event tee, collectors cup and a gift card for the Horror House. (1987, 96 min, 35mm) [Shaun Huhn]

Gary Sherman’s VICE SQUAD (US)

Alamo Drafthouse – Wednesday, 9:30pm

In the gutter of early '80s Sunset Strip, survival meant hustling through a concrete jungle steeped in sleaze. Gary Sherman’s VICE SQUAD doesn’t unfold as a moralistic tale about sex work; it blasts onto the screen as a raw argument for the necessity of the World Charter for Prostitutes’ Rights, which would be globally adopted in 1985. Originally conceived as a documentary, the film morphed into a narrative thriller rooted in real LAPD vice cases, shot largely on location with police cooperation. The result is an unvarnished, street-level portrait of 1982 Los Angeles that prioritizes lived detail over genre formula. The heroes here are the sex workers, navigating a gauntlet between weary, ineffective cops and violent, misogynistic pimps. At the center of that violence is Wings Hauser’s Ramrod as a wire-hanger-wielding maniac and one of the most unforgettable villains of the '80s. In his first leading role, Hauser rants, snarls, and even sings the film’s theme, “Neon Slime.” His brutal murder of a sex worker is a moment so shocking it was later featured in TERROR IN THE AISLES (1984) and cemented Ramrod’s legacy in the exploitation canon. His counterweight is Princess, played by Season Hubley, a single mother and sex worker coerced by police into wearing a wire to trap Ramrod after he kills her friend Ginger (portrayed by future MTV VJ Nina Blackwood). The sting works, but Princess reveals her betrayal, triggering a relentless cat-and-mouse pursuit through a grimy nocturnal L.A. that evokes a neon-drenched purgatory. The film’s lurid tone is elevated by cinematographer John Alcott, known for his work on Stanley Kubrick’s BARRY LYNDON (1975) and THE SHINING (1980). He lends an unexpected sheen to the squalor. Rarely does exploitation look this polished. VICE SQUAD might be the most prestige exploitation film of the era, occupying a strange nexus where grime meets gloss. It sits in conversation with other '80s films about sex work, such as STREETWALKIN’ (1985) with its chaotic energy, ANGEL (1984) and its schoolgirl/hooker duality, or RISKY BUSINESS (1983) reimagining sex work as capitalist aspiration. But where those films flirt with metaphor or morality, VICE SQUAD is about survival. There's no fantasy here, no romantic ideal, just a desire to see another dawn. While PRETTY WOMAN (1990) would later dress up sex work with commercial fairy dust, Sherman’s film remains unflinching and unsentimental. The script, by Kenneth Peters, Sandy Howard, and Robert Vincent O’Neil (who would go on to expand the ANGEL universe), depicts police as inept and the system as transactional. One detective’s dialogue lands like gallows poetry: "You’ll never change the streets." The film, initially intended as an anthology of real-life interviews, instead distills its despair into one punishing night that’s simultaneously exploitative and empathetic. Even its moments of levity, such as a paperclip-obsessed detective having a mental breakdown in the middle of the police station, lands with nervous laughter as it masks deeper themes of burnout and institutional failure. In the volatile space between documentary grit and exploitation flair, VICE SQUAD finds a pulse. It’s the sound of Ramrod’s boots echoing down an alley, Princess’s ragged breath, and neon light glinting off blood-slick pavement. It is a symphony of sleaze, cue the theme song, sing it loud Hauser, “Bang, Bang, Shoot 'em up, talking bout crime, Everybody's swimming in the neon slime!" (1982, 97 min, DCP Digital) [Shaun Huhn]

Toby Jones’ AJ GOES TO THE DOG PARK (US)

Music Box Theatre – Thursday, 7pm

For those looking to chase the zany high they received from HUNDREDS OF BEAVERS (2024), director Toby Jones arrives with a work that's slightly more realistic but still delivers a joyous sense of lunacy and idiosyncrasy. Jones cut his teeth in the world of television animation, working as a writer and storyboard artist on a myriad of Cartoon Network series, where non sequiturs and expert visual humor reign supreme. It’s no surprise then that his live-action feature debut retains a jokes-first mentality that guides all artistic decisions, with its best moments feeling akin to a live-action transliteration of the humor of The Simpsons and the visual palette of Regular Show. Jones starts things off in a place of seeming normalcy; the eponymous AJ (played by AJ Thompson) takes his twin chihuahuas to the local dog park where, upon learning it has been transformed into a “blog park,” the stakes are raised at an exponential rate. Jones’ world operates with gorgeous cartoon logic, characters getting blown offscreen by leaf blowers, knocking person-shaped holes through doors, popping up from thin air, all amidst a sea of goofy fisherman, elbow-centric wrestlers, and a scheming mayor simply known as “Mayor.” As in the realm of animation, the world of AJ GOES TO THE DOG PARK operates on fluid rules of physics, the necessity of the gag being the only motivator for sense and logic in any given scene. Jones’ visual ambition is only matched by the film’s charming lo-fi qualities, proudly marketing itself as a “no-budget” feature, using green-screens, puppetry, and elaborate props work to carry out most of the outlandish effects. This is coupled with the film being populated primarily with the people and places of Fargo, North Dakota, making AJ GOES TO THE DOG PARK sometimes feel more like a loving community-building project than a major motion picture. But it is this home-grown quality that gives Jones’ feature that extra oomph, the feeling that genuine love and excitement propelled this wonderfully silly work to the finish line. Special Art House Theater Day screening featuring a post-film Q&A with Toby Jones, actor AJ Thompson, and Demon Lord Krogloch (aka producer Ben Hanson). (2024, 79 min, DCP Digital) [Ben Kaye]

Pedro Almodovar's WOMEN ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN (Spain)

Davis Theater – Monday, 7pm

WOMEN ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN was Pedro Almodóvar’s break-out hit, the film that introduced him to a wider audience and secured widespread distribution of his work for the rest of his career. It isn’t as provocative as the Almodóvar films that immediately preceded it (WHAT HAVE I DONE TO DESERVE THIS?, MATADOR, LAW OF DESIRE), yet it reflects a breathtaking fluency in all aspects of cinematic art that hadn’t been achieved to such a degree in his work until then. WOMEN is gorgeously designed; the costumes, decors, and camera movements are not only impressive on their own, they interact sumptuously. Favoring bold colors and ostentatious bric-a-brac, Almodóvar creates something like a live-action cartoon or pop art painting. It’s so easy to get wrapped up in the mise-en-scene, in fact, that the rapidly escalating plot developments can seem like a blur on a first (or even a second) viewing. The tone oscillates between melodrama and farce, charting a few calamitous days in the life of a frustrated actress (Almodóvar’s first muse, Carmen Maura) who can’t get in touch with her married lover, whom she suspects is going to leave her. Almodóvar shows great sympathy towards his characters’ desires and vulnerabilities while making light of hard drug use, terrorism, and the mentally ill, and the galvanic mixtures of good and bad taste match the visual design splendidly. If the film doesn’t add up to more than the sum of its parts, that may be because Almodóvar hadn’t yet developed the melancholy undertones that would enrich his work from THE FLOWER OF MY SECRET on. The mastery may be superficial here, but it’s still mastery. Screening as part of the Big Screen Classics series. (1988, 89 min, DCP Digital) [Ben Sachs]

Éric Rohmer’s A TALE OF SUMMER (France)

Doc Films (at the University of Chicago) – Friday, 7pm

A TALE OF SUMMER, French director Éric Rohmer’s third in his “Tales of the Four Seasons” series, might be called quintessential Rohmer. Following a young man named Gaspard (Melvil Poupaud), the film uses the beachy, sunny landscape of Brittany, creating a “walk and talk” of sorts, as Gaspard meets various women over the course of his pre-career-starting vacation. Sans a soundtrack, with Rohmer’s characteristically simple, yet stunning visuals, A TALE OF SUMMER revels in Gaspard’s inability to choose between three women: Margot (Amanda Langlet), Solène (Gwenaëlle Simon), and Léna (Aurelia Nolin). While waiting for Léna, his on-and-off again girlfriend, Rohmer’s just-graduated, curly-haired protagonist meets local waitress Margot, spending his days meandering on the beach, chatting about her interest in ethnology, his musical ramblings, and the ideas surrounding a summer fling. Despite its affinity for romantics, the light drama is baked in a dose of reality, unwilling to flatter Gaspard, but rather taking every moment as a stroke of luck in his life. It harkens back to the freedom and levity of summer, before your career, family, and responsibilities fill your days. A level of uncertainty and opportunity feel limitless for Gaspard in this way, in that each chance encounter could lead to something as beautiful as love. As with some of us, when bouts of lust or passion come, we feel like they’re bound for destruction. Gaspard is no different, enacting a woeful tone with the innate knowledge that none of these romances will likely work out. Like several other Rohmer dramas, A TALE OF SUMMER focuses on the flaky nature of young love in all of its hopefulness and hopelessness. As Gaspard’s situations becomes hazier, by meeting the more-excitable Solène and the return of the less-committed Léna, he begins thinking and deciding in each moment what he will do next, with little to no concern for the girls’ well-being. Still, Margot remains a constant, a smile that seems to shine a bit brighter, a friendship that has more stakes than his two strictly romantic dealings. And this relationship swells into one of many points in A TALE OF SUMMER: friendship is as, if not more, serious than romance. Screening as part of the Éric Rohmer: Four Summer Films series. (1996, 113 min, DCP Digital) [Michael Frank]

Anime Club Presents

FACETS – See showtimes below

Juzo Itami's TAMPOPO (Japan)
Saturday, 7pm
Frequently billed as a ‘ramen western,’ the satirical TAMPOPO follows the SHANE-esque Goro who decides to help the bubbly Tampopo turn around her struggling noodle shop. Tampopo wants to learn the secret to making the perfect ramen. Although Jûzô Itami’s film was only marginally successful in Japan upon first release, it has since been received with almost universal praise thanks to its delightfully whimsical interweaving of food, sex, and death. TAMPOPO is episodic in nature: Itami’s free flowing narrative draws influence from the work of Luis Buñuel. Each humorous sequence flows freely into the other, often aided by sheer preposterousness that works charmingly well. The real star here is the food. Dish after dish, meal after meal, it’s impossible not to feel hungry when watching this film. A foodie’s ultimate dream, the impressive showcase of culinary offerings is staggering, and their preparations are shown in great detail. There’s a prevailing sense of joy permeating the entire film that delights in simple pleasures like cooking, lovemaking, and sometimes the two combined. Like some of the tantalizing ramen presented onscreen, TAMPOPO is a hearty visual feast best enjoyed in the company of others and with a ferocious appetite. (1985, 114 min, Digital Projection) [Kyle Cubr]
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Toshio Matsumoto's FUNERAL PARADE OF ROSES (Japan)
Saturday, 9:30pm
“She loved roses, and they had to be artificial ones.” Our lives are surrounded by replicas and fakes, CGI and special effects masking our day-to-day reality. FUNERAL PARADE OF ROSES questions the artifice that pervades our tumultuous society. In the opening third of the film, Eddie, a young transgender woman, walks through an art museum with a voiceover explaining the sociological concept of masks. The idea is that a person utilizes a mask or costume to hide their “true” personality. The film itself has a commendable amount of nuance, and it raises questions of what our “true” personalities might even be. The line about artificial roses ends up being the most important, as it alters our judgment on whether the masks we wear are inherently good or bad and on which of our personae is the real one. Matsumoto might not know the answers himself, which is a perfectly fine position to take, but he makes it clear that an artificial rose is just as beautiful as a real one. The film is quite explosive, and its radical form matches its radical subject matter. Equal parts funny, cool, gross, and erotic, FUNERAL PARADE OF ROSES jumps around chronologically and intercuts between fictional and documentary sequences. The nonfiction scenes feature interviews with the cast of the film; they give us insights into their lifestyles as well as their thoughts on the picture they're currently shooting. The film, frequently cited as an inspiration for Stanley Kubrick’s A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, deserves the same recognition and notoriety that its offspring got. Luckily, unlike the story’s Oedipal trajectory, this parent film can’t be killed by its successor's fame; in fact, it's only cemented itself as a cult classic as time has passed. (1969, 105 min, DCP Digital) [Drew Van Weelden]

Constance Tsang’s BLUE SUN PALACE (US)

FACETS – Thursday, 6:30pm

Filmed almost entirely indoors and in tight medium shots, BLUE SUN PALACE is a markedly claustrophobic movie. Writer-director Constance Tsang, making her feature debut, denies the spectator views of the city, or even the neighborhood, the characters inhabit, despite the fact that her film takes place in Flushing Chinatown, a rapidly growing (and presumably bustling) community in Queens, New York. This dichotomy between setting and formal approach does a lot in the way of characterization, allowing Tsang to dive into her subjects’ lives without having to provide much explicit exposition. The viewer senses right away the characters’ disconnect from American culture—from much of anything, really, beyond their work, their apartments, and the people in the immediate vicinity. Amy and Didi are middle-aged women from Taiwan and mainland China, respectively, who work at a NYC massage parlor; Didi is also involved with Cheung, a Taiwanese emigré presently working in construction. Tsang presents the relationships between these three characters delicately and sympathetically, finding humanity where many other filmmakers would see nothing but dehumanization. She's aided to no end by Lee Kang-sheng, one of contemporary cinema’s great presences, who plays Cheung. For those who know Lee only from his work with Tsai Ming-liang, his performance in BLUE SUN PALACE may come as a shock; he speaks and moves his body much more than he ever does in Tsai’s films and installations. At the same time, Lee can’t help but maintain the opacity he’s kept up for decades with Tsai—no matter how much Tsang or Amy or Didi want to get to know Cheung, he remains in some ways unknowable. The viewer doesn’t even learn when or why Cheung came to the United States until halfway into the film, another sad reflection of how these characters’ value as cheap labor precedes their identities. (2024, 117 min, DCP Digital) [Ben Sachs]

Robert Weine's THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI (Germany/Silent)

Gene Siskel Film Center – Sunday, 1pm

THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI is the definitive German Expressionist film, one in which all the elements of the mise-en-scene (lighting, set design, costume design, makeup, props, the movement of figures within the frame, etc.) have been deliberately distorted and exaggerated for expressive purposes. The end result, a view of the world as seen through the eyes of a madman, single-handedly inaugurated Expressionism in the movies in 1920, a movement that would then go on to dominate German cinema screens for most of the rest of the decade. No mere museum piece, the influence of THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI is happily still very much with us today (Martin Scorsese's SHUTTER ISLAND, John Carpenter's THE WARD, and Tim Burton's entire career would be unthinkable without it), and if you care at all about film history then you need to see this. Long seen only in faded, scratched and often incomplete prints, this new digital restoration—based on the original camera negative—runs 75 minutes and renders a ridiculous amount of never-before-seen detail in the film's striking visual design, including even paint brush strokes on the intentionally artificial-looking sets that surround the actors. (The first reel of the camera negative is missing so note how the image quality makes a leap around the 10-minute mark from looking merely excellent to looking as if it were shot yesterday.) Screening as part of the Spoiler Alert series. (1920, 75 min, DCP Digital) [Michael Glover Smith]

Wim Wenders' WINGS OF DESIRE (West Germany/France)

Gene Siskel Film Center – Wednesday, 9am

In 1971, Wim Wenders and other luminaries of New German Cinema (including Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Werner Herzog, and Alexander Kluge) founded the famous Filmverlag der Autoren to produce and distribute their own films, and Wenders and Austrian novelist and playwright Peter Handke completed their first feature film collaboration, THE GOALIE'S ANXIETY AT THE PENALTY KICK (1971). Nearly twenty years later, they co-wrote WINGS OF DESIRE, a beautiful film in the tradition of the German fairytale and dedicated to the angels and to master directors Yasujiro Ozu, François Truffaut, and Andrei Tarkovsky. Wenders tells the story of an angel, Damiel (Bruno Ganz), falling in love with trapeze artist Marion (Solveig Dommartin), who flies through the air at the Circus Alekan (named in honor of the film's cinematographer, Henri Alekan). Damiel fervently desires to abandon his spiritual existence to become a human being and experience the pleasures and pains of life, particularly that of love, which can be both. He and the other angels experience the world in black and white, but Wenders uses bursts of color to indicate the magnificent difference in the way humans see it. WINGS OF DESIRE is also an ode to Berlin, recalling the city films of the early twentieth century, such as Walter Ruttmann's BERLIN: SYMPHONY OF A GREAT CITY (1927) and Dziga Vertov's MAN WITH THE MOVIE CAMERA (1929). The original German title is DER HIMMEL UBER BERLIN, meaning ‘The Sky, or Heaven, over Berlin.’ Wenders begins shooting the city from an angel's point of view in the sky, and his camera later descends to the streets, looking at or out of cars, buses, and trains. He concerns himself with Berlin's history and the stories of its people, particularly since World War II. Recurring shots of the Berlin Wall covered in decorative graffiti figure prominently as does old war footage of air raids and of the victims they claimed lying amidst the rubble. Ultimately, WINGS OF DESIRE is a story about time—as longed for by angels, as lived by Berliners, and as experienced by us in watching the film unfold. Screening as part of the Rise & Shine series. (1987, 128 min, DCP Digital) [Candace Wirt]

Alfred Hitchcock's PSYCHO (US)

Gene Siskel Film Center – Friday, 6pm

So much ink has been spilled over PSYCHO that it might have been best if nothing had been written about it at all. More than any other Hitchcock film it deserves a fresh pair of eyes (perhaps the kind we'd find in a kid with hands that barely reach the ticket window and then cling to the armrest as he loses the main character less than half way in, as a lucky few recount). Even if the infamous shower scene has lost its surprise and shock value (but watch it closely anyway), there's still a great deal to enjoy: a black and white pallet fine-tuned down to Vera Miles' bra; Hitchcock's bizarre infatuation with the Oedipus Complex; Bernard Herrmann's superb score. From the outside it's a film we've become accustomed to, but in a dark theater it becomes hauntingly unfamiliar again. Screening as part of the Spoiler Alert series. (1960, 109 min, DCP Digital) [Julian Antos]

📽️ ALSO SCREENING

⚫ Chicago Public Library
View all screenings taking place at Chicago Public Library branches here.

⚫ Cinema/Chicago
Pavlo Ostrikov’s 2024 film U ARE THE UNIVERSE (101 min, Digital Projection) screens Wednesday, 6:30pm, at the Chicago History Museum. Free admission with registration.

A members’ screening of Victor Kossakovsky’s 2024 documentary ARCHITECTON (98 min, DCP Digital) takes place Tuesday, 7pm, at the AMC NEWCITY 14. More info on all screenings here.

⚫ Comfort Station
Comfort Film, in partnership with Terror Vision, presents Young Min Kim’s 2022 film DAWNING (73 min, Digital Projection) on Wednesday at 7pm. Free admission. More info here.

⚫ Doc Films (at the University of Chicago)
Ernst Lubitsch’s 1931 film THE SMILING LIEUTENANT (93 min, 35mm) screens Thursday, 7pm, as part of the Pre-Code Musicals on Film series. More info here.

⚫ FACETS
Join Full Spectrum Features for CYBERSLIME, a night of video, installation, performance, and goo. Choose between two versions of the screening on Friday—one that will be followed by a filmmaker Q&A, at 7:30pm, or one that will immerse you in the scent of CYBERSLIME’s official fragrance, cero by agar olfactory, at 10:15pm. There will be live music from We Need a Taylor Swift From Another Dimension (WNTSAD) between screenings.

The International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago presents Klaudia Reynicke’s 2024 film REINAS (104 min, Digital Projection) screens Tuesday, 7pm, as part of the Reel Film Club, preceded by a reception at 6pm.

The Big Teeth Small Shorts Film Festival takes place Wednesday at 7pm.

Stephen Sayadian’s 1982 film CAFÉ FLESH (74 min, DCP Digital) screens Thursday, 9pm, preceded by FACETS Film Trivia and followed by a Q&A with Sayadian. More info on all screenings here.

⚫ Gene Siskel Film Center
Jem Cohen’s 2024 film LITTLE, BIG, AND FAR (121 min, DCP Digital) and Dag Johan Haugerud’s 2024 film LOVE (119 min, DCP Digital) begin and Embeth Davidtz’s  2024 film DON’T LET’S GO TO THE DOGS TONIGHT (98 min, DCP Digital) continues screening. See Venue website for showtimes.

Reid Davenport’s 2025 documentary LIFE AFTER (99 min, DCP Digital) screens Sunday at 3pm. Davenport in attendance for a post-screening discussion with Ryan McGraw from Access Living and Keidra Chaney of Disability Culture Lab, moderated by Cassidy Dimon, Executive Director of FWD-Doc. There are also virtual companion screenings taking place on Thursday at 7pm and Saturday, August 2 at 3pm.

Billy Wilder’s 1957 film WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION (116 min, DCP Digital) screens Monday, 6pm, as part of the Spoiler Alert series. More info on all screenings here. 

⚫ Music Box Theatre
It’s officially Music Box Garden Movies season! See Venue website for lineup and showtimes.

Ari Aster’s 2025 film EDDINGTON (148 min, DCP Digital) continues. See Venue website for showtimes.

Raymond Martino’s 1996 film SKYSCRAPER (96 min, DCP Digital) screens Friday around midnight, preceded by a vinyl DJ set by Gaudy God at 11pm and a performance by Grelley Duvall at 11:30pm.

Arthur J. Bressan, Jr.’s 1984 film JUICE (72 min, 2K DCP Digital Restoration) screens Friday and Saturday at 11:45pm. Note that both screenings are sold out.

Mye Hoang’s 2025 documentary 25 CATS FROM QATAR (95 min, DCP Digital) screens Sunday, 7pm, with Hoang and subject Katy McHugh in attendance for a post-film Q&A.

Sean Baker’s 2015 film TANGERINE (88 min, 35mm) screens Monday, 7pm, for Music Box members only. Baker in attendance for a post-film Q&A. More info on all screenings and events here.

⚫ Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts (915 E. 60th St.)
“The Act of Recording is an Act of Love: The South Side Home Movie Project” exhibition is on display in the Gallery through Sunday, August 24.

Haile Gerima’s 1979 film BUSH MAMA (97 min, Digital Projection) screens Sunday, 5pm, as part of the Mothering on Screen: Film + Discussion series. More info on all screenings and events here.

⚫ VDB TV (Virtual)
“Dog Days: Superimposing the Canine,” programmed by Cine-File contributor Elise Schierbeek and with films by Jesse McLean, Ken Kobland, and Matthew Lax, streams free on VDB TV. More info here.

CINE-LIST: June 25, 2025 - July 31, 2025

MANAGING EDITORS // Ben and Kat Sachs

CONTRIBUTORS // Julian Antos, Kyle Cubr, Ray Ebarb, Megan Fariello, Marilyn Ferdinand, Michael Frank, Patrick Friel, Shaun Huhn, Ben Kaye, Raphael Jose Martinez, Michael Glover Smith, Drew Van Weelden, Candace Wirt, Brian Welesko