If you’re looking for something different in your film diet, check out what’s on offer at the independent cinema Carbon Arc (where I do some programming) this weekend.
We’re showing sharp indie pictures both Friday and Saturday night: Sundance darling Tangerine (Friday at 7pm, Saturday at 9pm), and Court (Friday at 9pm, Saturday at 7pm), an Indian legal drama that won awards at the Venice Film Festival in 2014.
Also, happening right now in Wolfville is the Devour Food Film Fest, a great excuse (like you needed one) to head out to the valley and enjoy all things to do with eating and cinema. Buses will take you there and back for $20! Click on their name above for all the details.
Spectre is Bond’s first outing since his biggest box office success, the world-crushing Skyfall, released in North America almost exactly three years ago. The title of the new one comes from the sinister terrorist organization that proved to be the greatest foil for Sean Connery’s Bond back in the 1960s. Then it was an acronym: S.P.E.C.T.R.E stood for SPecial Executive for Counter-Intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion. This time it’s just a name. A very evil name.
My favourite film at this year’s Atlantic Film Festival was Room, a powerful picture about a young woman who escapes captivity with her five-year-old, a boy who’s never known anything but the walls of the shed they’ve been kept in.
The film’s emotional peak is mid-movie, but the second half is the important part, where freedom brings a whole new collection of challenges. Look for Room to garner huge acclaim come awards time. It’ll be well-deserved. This is one of the year’s best films, now in at the Oxford.
A big-screen revival of Charles Shultz’s long-running comic strip and popular animated TV specials, The Peanuts Movie has been getting pretty positive reviews. But I can’t help but think that maybe Bill Watterson was right, that some things should just stay what they are, that Charlie Brown was never better than when he was on the page. (That recognition won’t necessarily keep me from seeing the movie, mind you.)
Opening with very little fanfare, a weepie called Miss You Already. Toni Colette and Drew Barrymore are lifelong friends when one of them gets sick. I remember when this was called Beaches.
