What I’m Seeing This Week: Lots of possibilities, but I think I’m going with Hundreds of Beavers at Cinemapolis unless I audible to Problemista, which is playing there as well.
Also in Theaters: Deserving Best Animated Feature Oscar winner The Boy and the Heron is back at the Regal Ithaca Mall in dubbed and subtitled versions, both with “bonus content.” The next best new movie that I’ve already seen is the satisfyingly epic Dune: Part Two, which is there and at Cinemapolis. Love Lies Bleeding is at both of these theaters as well, and if you saw its trailer and thought “that’s my kind of movie,” you won’t be disappointed–it’s absolutely bonkers! The “immersive feature documentary and profound sensory experience” 32 Sounds that I mentioned last week is back at Cornell Cinema on Saturday and Sunday. If none of that sounds good, there are quite a few choice repertory options this week, including a 50th anniversary screening of Chinatown at the Regal on Wednesday, a screening of Wings of Desire at Cinemapolis that same night co-sponsored by Buffalo Street Books as part of their “Stories to Explore” series, and a screening of Babette’s Feast at Cornell Cinema on Tuesday which is accompanied by lectures on the “science of taste” and a “special tasting.”
Home Video: In my “Top Ten Movies of 2023” post earlier this month I mentioned that I had not yet seen John Wick: Chapter Four because my loving wife and I were saving it for a movie marathon. That day came sooner rather than later when Jason Bailey of the New York Times alerted us to the fact that the first three films leave Netflix on March 30. Long story short, we enjoyed them all immensely! As someone who can’t watch high-rise collapse in an action movie without thinking of all the people who live in it who might not have renter’s insurance, I appreciate the fact that there is astonishingly little collateral damage in these films. I counted a handful of parked cars that will need some body work and any number of buildings end up with bullet holes in them, but civilians are conspicuously absent from most of the major fight sequences, which tend to take place in spaces that are coded as either abandoned or belonging to the bad guys. And my goodness, what a riot of color, grace, and inventiveness they are! My favorite installments in the saga are the original John Wick, which takes its sweet time coming to a simmer, and the last, which spends nearly its entire 170 minute runtime at full boil. I believe these will be regarded as classic movies of our era and I look forward to watching them again in a few years, at which time I might even dare to try to say something original about why.
Previous “Now Playing in Ithaca, NY” posts can be found here.
The Prodigal Cinephile 