Just Eat It, more restored gems from UCLA, and (hear us out) a Michael Moore documentary
Thursday
Just Eat It (5:00p — High Noon Saloon)
It begins with a challenge to your stomach: Any food you’re served is fair game, but outside of family meals and dinner parties try surviving off of “discarded food” for 6 months straight. That’s the hook in Just Eat It, a diet consciousness documentary screening FREE at High Noon Saloon. Most food waste in America comes directly from households — between 15% and 20% by the film’s estimate — much of which is owed to a comparatively cushy socioeconomic status that allows Americans to impulse shop to our short-sighted hearts’ content. Of course, there’s more to this extremely dense 74 minutes than flag-shaming. Checking in with one couple’s attempt to tackle the 6-month challenge makes for a kind of nutri-sci by way of Man vs. Wild experience, on top of notes on farmer’s markets, grocery store aesthetics, and the usual statistics, and all packaged inside crisp direction at a breakneck speed. A panel discussion will follow with East Madison Community Center, Healthy Food For All and REAP Food Group. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some swiss chard in my fridge that needs some attention.
The Island of St. Matthews (7:00p — Union South Marquee)
Imagine losing everything you have. Director Kevin Jerome Everson didn’t have to. The former recipient of a Guggenheim fellowship went to his parents’ hometown of Westport, Mississippi in the wake of some devastating water damage. The experimental documentary that followed explores themes of ownership, memories and loss through an interesting tangent: our possessions. “Starlight Cinema” presents this 2011 documentary that stays true to the program’s avant-garde focus, with creative digressions in a relatively straightforward genre and an affection for toying with film as a medium. (FREE.)
All freakin’ weekend
Where to Invade Next (Sundance, Point)
Michael Moore has a new movie. Have I lost you yet? Michael Moore has a new movie and its bus-tour-delayed-release finds the controversial filmmaker “invading” other countries on an imagined mission for the U.S. of A. He “annexes” the top-tier lunches in French school cafeterias and extensive paid vacations for Italian workers, all while (rest assured) conveniently ignoring a few counterarguments. Like him, hate him, or just put up with him, Moore might be the best in the game at inserting himself into his productions, a habit that makes for a lively oeuvre of outwardly subjective documentaries — and from a self-professed hater of the genre. This time, his jovial candor seems to be getting the best of him, attracting flies with honey rather than with the vinegar he once so famously slung at the Bush Administration. Whatever your criticisms of Moore, the prospect of cutting him loose on the rest of the globe with self-indulgent glee is too entertaining to ignore.
Saturday
Bachelor’s Affairs + The Big Broadcast + My Best Girl (3:00p + 4:15p + 7:00p — 4070 Vilas Hall)
UCLA’s Film & Television Archive is massive, a fact the second-largest collection of media on planet earth puts to frequent use. For the Archive’s 50th anniversary, UCLA is putting on a preservation tour and partnering with UW Cinematheque for their Wisconsin presentations throughout the month of Feb. The bulk of the restored treasures have been in the first two weeks, and this second triple-feature is a whole black-and-white jumble of Pre-Code romance and screwball comedies, and all on 35mm. Stick around for the evening show and you’ll even hear regionally-renowned pianist David Drazin tickling the ivories while Mary Pickford stumbles her way through an unfortunate love interest. (FREE.)