Grab a cold one and enjoy one of two FREE advance screenings of Joe Swanberg’s “Drinking Buddies” this week at the Union South Marquee.
Thursday
Fahrenheit-451 (6:30p — Madison Central Public Library, Rm 302)
The brand spankin’ new Central Public Library on West Mifflin Street begins three film series this month. The first, “Central Cinema,” kicks off with François Truffaut’s Fahrenheit-451, his first color feature and only English language film. All screenings are FREE and open to the public.
Drinking Buddies (7:00p — Union South Marquee)
The UW Cinematheque and WUD Film have combined their powers to bring two FREE advance screenings of Joe Swanberg’s romantic comedy, Drinking Buddies, to the Marquee Theater at Union South. Olivia Wilde and Jake Johnston are flirtatious co-workers who find themselves questioning their existing relationships with other people. Anna Kendrick and Ron Livingston co-star in Swanberg’s Chicago brewery-set breakout film.
Holy Motors (9:30p — Union South Marquee)
Unless you were lucky enough to catch it through MMoCA’s “Spotlight Cinema” last year, chances are Holy Motors slipped by a lot of Madison cinephiles. Fortunately, WUD Film is screening Leos Carax’s wild, experimental treatise on cinema’s bountiful potential. Denis Lavant dazzles in eleven separate performances, each one as transformative and unique as the next. In a week packed with terrific films, Holy Motors remains a stand out selection.
Friday
Holy Motors (7:00p — Union South Marquee)
Kwaidan (7:00p — 4070 Vilas Hall)
Before Three… Extremes, Asian horror anthologies had Masaki Kobayashi’s Kwaidan, a 1964 collection of four Japanese folk tales. Relying less on jump scares and more on atmosphere and tension, Kwaidan is the first film in the Cinematheque’s FREE “International Horror Classics” series this October.
Annie Hall (9:30p — Union South Marquee)
Blue Jasmine has already earned Woody Allen significant praise, but WUD Film invites you to revisit one of the director’s earlier hits in Annie Hall, where Allen’s New York comedian falls in love with Diane Keaton’s doofy singer, Annie — well, you know the name. FREE.
The Fly (11:59p — Union South Marquee)
David Cronenberg’s terrifying, disgusting, fascinating cautionary tale of scientific curiosity and a Brundle who would become a “Brundlefly” is WUD Film’s FREE midnight screening this week. Be excited. Be very excited.
All freakin’ weekend
Oshkosh Horror Film Festival (Time Community Theater, Oshkosh)
In the mood for some light driving this weekend? Oshkosh’s annual horror festival starts Friday with a FREE inaugural screening of Night of the Living Dead at 8pm. From then on, Saturday and Sunday are filled with all kinds of short and feature-length horror films. The entire schedule, which you can find here, includes the baseball-themed thriller Billy Club and Appleton-based Slasher Studios’ ode to slashers, Don’t Go To The Reunion. Day passes are $5 and weekend passes are $7, with all tickets available for purchase at the door.
Short Term 12 (Sundance)
Those who attended this year’s Milwaukee Film Festival were treated to a “Secret Screening” of Short Term 12 last night. But why should those guys have all the fun? The drama, which stars Brie Larson as a foster home supervisor and John Gallagher, Jr. as her co-worker and boyfriend, made quite the splash at SXSW this year, earning Grand Jury and Audience prizes.
Parkland (Sundance, AMC Star)
I was born a few years after President John F. Kennedy’s assassination in 1963, so I have no frame of reference for such a historical turning point. Luckily, Zac Efron, Paul Giamatti, Jacki Weaver, and Billy Bob Thornton are here with Parkland to provide some dramatized context. Parkland, named after the hospital where JFK was rushed to and subsequently expired in, presents a mosaic of seemingly ordinary people whose lives were instantly changed on a single day in November. No word yet on who plays the second gunman.
Gravity (Sundance, AMC Star, Point, Eastgate)
Hypothetical: Two astronauts (Sandra Bullock, George Clooney) walk into a bar. The bar is on a space shuttle. The space shuttle collides with an asteroid. The astronauts hurtle uncontrollably through space. Seven years after Children of Men, Alfonso Cuarón is back, and he’s bringing IMAX 3D and more long takes than ever before.
Runner Runner (AMC Star, Point, Eastgate)
More ridiculous than the plot of Runner Runner, in which college student Justin Timberlake pursues the entrepreneur who may have screwed him out of his winnings (Ben Affleck), is the idea that Justin Timberlake can still pass for a college student. Gemma Arterton and Anthony Mackie co-star.
Besharam (AMC Star)
In this Bollywood action comedy, Ranbir Kapoor plays a charming car thief who must change his ways if he hopes to evade the angry police inspectors pursuing him and win the affections of Pallavi Sharda.
Saturday
Puss in Boots (10:00a — Point, Eastgate)
Catch Antonio Banderas in all of his animated swagger with Puss in Boots, Marcus Theatres’ newest addition in its “Pop 3D” family film series. Tickets are only $3.
Aguirre: The Wrath of God (7:00p — 4070 Vilas Hall)
The first of Cinematheque’s FREE “Four from Herzog” series in October, Aguirre: The Wrath of God stars Klaus Kinsky as a crazed Spanish conqueror who leads a mutiny to find the lost city of “El Dorado” deep in the heart of the Amazon. In addition to being one of Werner Herzog’s masterworks, the film is infamous for its troubled production history. Untrained actors performed their own dangerous stunts in relatively unexplored parts of the Peruvian rainforest, and Herzog himself allegedly threatened to kill Kinski and then himself if the actor made good on his threats to depart the picture. Good times.
Annie Hall (7:00p — Union South Marquee)
Drinking Buddies (9:30p — Union South Marquee)
The Fly (11:59p — Union South Marquee)
Sunday
Puss in Boots (11:00a — Point, Eastgate)
The Man Who Never Was (2:00p — Chazen Art Museum)
Clifton Webb plays a British lieutenant commander who devises a scheme to trick Nazi forces in this World War II thriller. Cinematheque’s FREE “Cinemascope at 60” series plays Sundays at the Chazen Art Museum.
Annie Hall (3:00p — Union South Marquee)
Escape From Tomorrow (7:00p — 4070 Vilas Hall)
One of the Cinematheque’s FREE “Special Presentations,” Escape From Tomorrow is an entry that earns the “special.” Shot in black and white and completely under the radar at Disneyland and World Disney World, Escape From Tomorrow finds a man experiencing increasingly surreal horrors while vacationing with his family at the Mouse House’s Florida theme park.
Monday
The Lesser Blessed (3:00p, 5:15p — Point; 3:00p, 5:10p — Eastgate)
Joel Evans stars as a Canadian Aboriginal Indian living in the Northwest Territories in this adaptation of Richard Van Camp’s novel on Native American life. Benjamin Bratt co-stars.
The Shining (7:15p, 10:20p — Point, Eastgate)
After screening John Carpenter’s The Thing last week, Marcus Theatres pick up where they left off with Stanley Kubrick’s classic, The Shining. There’s no better opportunity to test out all of those Room 237 theories you picked up on at this year’s Wisconsin Film Festival. My own hypothesis: The Shining is a tacit example of why Stephen King doesn’t enjoy people tampering with his stories.
Tuesday
The Lesser Blessed (3:50p, 5:55p — Point; 3:00p, 5:55p — Eastgate)
The Shining (10:35p — Point, Eastgate)
Wednesday
The Shining (2:45p — Point, Eastgate)
Terms and Conditions May Apply (7:00p — Union South Marquee)
Social media is more than ubiquitous in today’s communication landscape, but does anyone ever read those short-story’s worth of user agreements? The documentary Terms and Conditions May Apply combs through the fine language and discovers just how much Google and Facebook know about you. In this FREE exclusive screening courtesy of WUD Film, Cullen Hoback’s documentary looks to be a more straightforward version of what “HumancentiPad” did on South Park, likely with fewer human centipedes.