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I’m certain I don’t need to tell you this, but: Shit sucks. Are you taking care of yourself right now? One reliable method is through the poetry and dissociative capacity of good cinema. This month, options abound with screenings of Picnic at Hanging Rock (romance is cryptic), You’ve Got Mail (romance is online), and In the Mood for Love (romance is a dance of restraint and unspoken longing). Nonplatonic attraction aside, films by François Truffaut and Andrei Tarkovsky—plus a Le Guin adaptation—lean existential. Ready?
The 400 Blows
For fans of Vittori De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves (1948), Louis Malle’s Au Revoir les Enfants (1988), Richard Linklater.
Childhood is rough, particularly if you are a tormented little Parisian boy with a penchant for writing on walls and stealing typewriters. François Truffaut’s semi-autobiographical film The 400 Blows (1959)—which pulls its title from the French idiom faire les quatre cents coups, meaning something like “to raise hell”—takes an episodic approach that eschews elaborate narrative in favor of studying its child protagonist. Antoine’s (Jean-Pierre Léaud) small world falls apart as he lies and runs from every adult’s (often unjust) rules and expectations. But when he’s sent to a youth detention center, his final escape is also his most transcendent.
The film revisits what we all experienced as children at one point or another: the weight of feeling confused, unwanted, and full of frustration with nowhere to put it. Kids reliably know more than they let on, and Antoine’s no different; his big feelings are clearly driven by the violence, anger, and infidelity of his parents’ world. If you haven’t seen The 400 Blows, you’ve heard of it—the film placed Truffaut at the crest of the French New Wave, and its realist perspective has inspired many coming-of-age films since. Of the film’s many beautiful aspects, Jean Constantin’s score stands out—it’s silvery, haunting, and quite childlike. (Cinema 21, 616 NW 21st, Sat Feb 7, 11 am, $9, more info, not rated)
You’ve Got Mail
For fans of the AOL dial-up sound, literary types, ’90s New York.
“Sometimes I wonder about my life. I lead a small life… Do I do it because I like it? Or because I haven’t been brave?” Kathleen Kelly (Meg Ryan) asks herself in Nora Ephron’s 1995 film You’ve Got Mail. It’s a puzzling line at first. Kathleen’s life seems fairly idyllic. She owns a beloved children’s bookstore in New York’s Upper East Side. She goes to Starbucks, back when that was a kind of cool thing to do. She attends elegant parties with caviar and bookish people.
But Kathleen’s worries ring true. Like many, she moves the goalposts for herself, yet clings to the aspects of her identity that are grounded in familiarity and obligation. And things inevitably fall apart. In her case, she falls in love with the nuclear option, Joe (Tom Hanks)—a bookstore magnate who’s actively putting her out of business.
Should Kathleen have stolen Joe’s hot and bitchy editor girlfriend Patricia (Parker Posey) instead? Well, yes. But You’ve Got Mail is really charming, even if its central premise is flawed. It offers the best cinematic depiction of the thrill of receiving an email in the mid-’90s, the Cranberries and Harry Nilsson command the soundtrack, and the film references Foucault, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, and Francisco Franco. How many romantic comedies can say the same? (PAM CUT’s Tomorrow Theater, 3530 SE Division St, Thurs Feb 12, 7 pm, $15, more info, PG)
Picnic at Hanging Rock
For fans of Sophia Coppola’s The Virgin Suicides (2000), Robert Altman’s 3 Women (1977), Daphne Du Maurier.
Track down your rose water and your candelabra, because nothing says “Valentine’s Day approaches” quite like a clique of ribbon- and lace-clad boarding schoolers gone missing in the Victorian-era Australian Outback. Based on Joan Lindsay’s 1967 novel, Peter Weir’s eerie dreamhouse melded panpipes and parasols into a lasting aesthetic vision—Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975) has become a mood board for those entranced by its pastoral, impressionist sensibility. The film served as a progenitor for soft femme subcultures and inspired the tonal similarities found in Sophia Coppola’s films. Chloë Sevigny once cited it as one of her favorites, too.
Picnic at Hanging Rock requires an acceptance of unsolved mystery. Its open-ended conclusion and gauzy plot rely heavily on vibes. But one could interpret the film as an exploration of sexual awakening, lesbian tension, and surrender in the most elemental sense. (In the words of one Letterboxd reviewer, “horror doesn’t always have to be normal.”) The story’s “horror” is conjured through the strange hypnosis of one sun-drenched day, as an ancient volcanic rock formation towers above a group of girls on the brink of adulthood. A central question emerges: Would it be so wrong to loosen your corset, duck behind a boulder, and disappear? (Academy Theater, 7818 SE Stark, Feb 13-19, showtimes vary, $6.50-$9.50, more info, PG)
Also worth it:
Waiting to Exhale with Grand Gesture Books
Forest Whitaker directed a warm, messy portrait of female friendship in which Angela Bassett torches her ex’s car. Local bodice-ripper purveyors Grand Gesture Books promise all attendees a “delectable” goodie bag with face masks and chocolate, because you’re worth it!! (PAM CUT’s Tomorrow Theater, 3530 SE Division, Fri Feb 6, more info)
Muriel’s Wedding
Muriel (Toni Collette) escapes her politico father, bops over to the big city (Sydney, AU), and finally starts shaping her dream life in this ’94 rom-com, which is perfectly framed by its ABBA soundtrack. (Hollywood Theatre, 4122 NE Sandy, Sat Feb 7, more info)
The Lathe of Heaven
Based on Ursula K. Le Guin’s ’71 novel of the same name, The Lathe of Heaven (1980) imagines dystopian consequences when a psychiatrist manipulates his client’s dreams. See it after catching A Larger Reality: Ursula K. Le Guin at Oregon Contemporary (closing Feb 8), which includes an interactive Lathe of Heaven installation. (PAM CUT’s Tomorrow Theater, 3530 SE Division, Sun Feb 8, more info)
In the Mood for Love
A lonely married journalist meets a similarly isolated woman in Wong Kar-wai’s 2000 romance, set in ’60s Hong Kong. Christopher Doyle’s cinematography—candid-feeling, and lush with symbolic color—helped cement In the Mood for Love as a major stylistic influence on the last 25 years of film. (PAM CUT’s Tomorrow Theater, 3530 SE Division, Sat Feb 14, more info)
Stalker
Cinemagic’s month-long exploration of Andrei Tarkovsky’s filmography offers several opportunities to sit with deep existential queries. Among their picks are two sci-fi films with distinct takes: the misty wasteland of Stalker (1979) screens on February 15 and 18, and space-age Solaris (1972) screens on February 22. (Cinemagic, 2021 SE Hawthorne, $7-$9, multiple dates through March 1, more info)
La Ciénaga
Argentine director Lucrecia Martel’s 2001 feature debut follows a wealthy family’s languid summer; a quiet plot unfolds amid the creeping, heat-struck malaise. La Ciénaga introduced the hallmarks of Martel’s later films, with nuance found in class-informed atmospheres. (5th Avenue Cinema, 510 SW Hall, Feb 20-22, more info)
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Lindsay Costello
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