Thursday
Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence (6:30p — Central Library, Rm 302)
To borrow from an old post:
“Apart from its title, very little in Nagisa Ôshima’s Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence has anything to do with the Christmas holiday. Set in wartime Java in the mid-1940s, his is a picture filled with death, depression, and isolation. Through the struggles in a British POW camp however, Ôshima teases ideas of nostalgia and memory, neither of which exclusively belong to Christmas but both of which are indelibly part of it.” FREE.
RiffTrax Live presents Santa Claus (7:00p — Point, Eastgate)
Who knew Santa was so chaste? The former MST3K crew skewers K. Gordon Murray’s bizarre holiday film in which Kris Kringle thwarts Lucifer’s plans to turn every child against him. FREE.
Good Will Hunting (7:00p — Union South Marquee)
FREE.
The Passenger (9:30p — Union South Marquee)
Jack Nicholson’s journalist can neither pry himself away from Maria Schneider nor an overseas terrorist plot after taking the identity of a dead man. Dick Whitman called, and he has a few tips. FREE.
All freakin’ weekend
The Homesman (Sundance)
It’s mid-19th century America and Hilary Swank must escort three mentally disturbed women by covered wagon with the help of Tommy Lee Jones.
The Pyramid (Eastgate)
This under-everyone’s-radar horror movie about a pyramid, appropriately titled The Pyramid, features a gang of archaeologists who are slowly picked off by mysterious creatures. The plot sounds like we’re in for The Descent, but the lack of enthusiasm sounds like we’re in for The Descent 2.
National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (Point, Eastgate)
If you haven’t already seen this Chevy Chase classic you’re no better than a cheap, lying, no-good, rotten, four-flushing, low-life, snake-licking, dirt-eating, inbred, overstuffed, ignorant, blood-sucking, dog-kissing, brainless, dickless, hopeless, heartless, fat-ass, bug-eyed, stiff-legged, spotty-lipped, worm-headed sack of monkey shit. Ahem, to put it simply.
Friday
McConkey (5:00p — Grainger Hall, Rm 1100)
A documentary about the life of Shane McConkey, a freestyle skier and BASE jumper, who died in 2009 after his parachute failed to deploy during a trick in free fall. Co-presented FREE by Hoofers SnS and Hollywood Badgers.
The Passenger (6:00p — Union South Marquee)
FREE.
Blueberry Soup (6:30p — Sewell Social Sciences, Rm 5208)
After a crippling economic recession, Iceland’s citizens, activists, and politicians formed the “People’s Movement,” a grassroots effort to incite radical governmental change in 2008. The party would eventually disintegrate in 2009, but a full year seems like plenty of time for documentary fodder. FREE.
Repo Man (6:30p — Pinney Branch Library)
Emilio Estevez gets a night job after he’s fired from his day job in Alex Cox’s science-fiction comedy. FREE.
Life of Riley (7:00p — 4070 Vilas Hall)
The final film of the late Alain Resnais gets its only Madison theatrical presentation and according to Rob Thomas, this “comic piffle” is true to Resnais’ preference for humorous absurdities. Blending theatrical and cinematic conventions with his diegesis and allegedly featuring an animatronic mole, Life of Riley follows a group of longtime friends who stage a play for their terminally-ill (and terminally-unseen) friend. You had me at “animatronic mole.” FREE.
Burn After Reading (7:00p — Alicia Ashman Branch Library)
FREE.
Apocalypse Now (8:30p — Union South Marquee)
“They told me that you had gone totally insane, that your methods were unsound and that you preferred Full Metal Jacket.” (FREE)
Tropic Thunder (11:30p — Union South Marquee)
FREE.
Saturday
Polish Film Festival Day #2 (1:00p, 3:00p — Union South Marquee)
The second weekend of the FREE Polish Film Festival features Jack Strong (1:00p), based on the exploits of Polish Cold War spy and Western sympathizer Ryszard Kuklinski, and Life Feels Good (3:00p), a “feel good” movie about a young man (Dawid Ogrodnik) with cerebral palsy.
Good Will Hunting (6:00p — Union South Marquee)
FREE.
The Conformist (7:00p — 4070 Vilas Hall)
Set in the years leading up to World War II, Bernardo Bertolucci’s gorgeous 1970 political drama is 115 minutes of Jean-Louis Trintignant convincing himself he’s an Italian fascist at heart. FREE.
The Passenger (8:30p — Union South Marquee)
FREE.
Tropic Thunder (11:00p — Union South Marquee)
FREE.
Sunday
Spellbound (2:00p — Chazen Art Museum)
In Hitch’s psychological thriller, Ingrid Bergman’s psychoanalyst begins to suspect that the insane asylum’s new head doctor (Gregory Peck) is not who he claims to be. Of course he’s not. He’s Gregory Peck. FREE.
A Christmas Carol (1938) & Christmas in Connecticut (2:00p, 7:00p — Point, Eastgate)
Apocalypse Now (3:00p — Union South Marquee)
FREE.
Wednesday
A Christmas Carol (1938) & Christmas in Connecticut (1:25p, 6:45p — Sundance)
Il peggior Natale della mia vita (7:10p — UW Education Building, Rm L196)
UW’s La Cineteca Italia film club wraps its fall schedule with The Worst Christmas of My Life, a comedic showcase for the talents of Fabio De Luigi. FREE.