Naturally Native
Naturally Native follows the lives, loves, pain, joy and relationships of three sisters as they attempt to start their own business. Of American Indian ancestry, but adopted by white foster parents as young children, each sister has her own identity issues and each has chosen a very different career path. Now dedicated to starting a Native cosmetic business, they attempt to overcome obstacles both in the business world and in the home. A touching love story of family and culture, Naturally Native also interweaves a subtle, but strong wake-up call regarding the treatment of Native people in corporate America. Naturally Native also provides some insight into tribal infrastructure and gaming issues. A Red-Horse Native production, Naturally Native is the first film about Native American women written, directed, produced and starring Native American women. Co-directed by Valerie Red-Horse and Jennifer Wynne Farmer ("Pumpkin Man"), the film stars Valerie Red-Horse ("The Secret of Lizard Woman"), Irene Bedard ("Lakota Woman: Siege at Wounded Knee"), Kimberly Norris (TNT's Geronimo), Pato Hoffmann (TNT's Geronimo), Mark Abbott ("Squanto: A Warrior's Tale"), Collin Bernsen (Cover Me) and Mary Kay Place (The Rainmaker). The film was written and produced by Valerie Red-Horse, executive produced by Dawn Jackson and Co-produced by Yvonne Russo. US, 1999. Color, in English, 107 mins, 35mm. Rated PG-13.

Nightmare Alley
There's something strangely endearing and nostalgic about a carnival setting. And there is kind of a sleazy family quality to the carny workers Ð like low-rent Italian mobsters. There are few great movies about carnivalsÐ Tod Browning's Freaks is one of them Ð and Nightmare Alley is another. Nightmare Alley has been elevated to cult status mostly out of its unavailability. It has been out of circulation for fifty years due to some argument over rights. Newly rereleased, you can now experience this rare gem. (Jeffrey M. Anderson, Combustible Celluloid) USA, 1947, English, B&W, 110 min., 35mm.

Not One Less
The teacher in a rural village's primary school has to leave his job temporarily to tend to his ailing mother, but the only willing substitute teacher that the village mayor can find turns out to be a 13-year-old girl, Wei Minzhi. Barley older then the students she's supposed to teach, Wei soon finds that the experience will challenge and affect he-and her students-in ways she could never have imagined. Utilizing an extraordinary cast of non-professionals, director Zhang Yimou (Raise the Red Lantern) has fashioned one of his most eloquent and surprisingly powerful tales. Grand Prize, Venice Film Festival. China, 1999, color, in Mandarin with English Subtitles, 106 mins, 35mm, Not Rated

Nowhere to Hide
Director Lee Myung-Se's noirish story of a hardnosed detective and an elusive drug lord.

Once Upon a Time in the West
In Sergio Leone's epic western, a revenge story becomes an epic contemplation of the Western past. To get his hands on prime railroad land in Sweetwater, crippled railroad baron Morton (Gabriele Ferzetti) hires killers, led by blue-eyed sadist Frank (Henry Fonda), who wipe out property owner Brett McBain (Frank Wolff) and his family. McBain's newly arrived bride Jill (Claudia Cardinale), however, inherits it instead. Both outlaw Cheyenne (Jason Robards) and lethally mysterious Harmonica (Charles Bronson) take it upon themselves to look after Jill and thwart Frank's plans to seize her land. As alliances and betrayals mutate, it soon becomes clear that Harmonica wants to get Frank for another reason. Leone transforms the standard Western plot through the visual impact of widescreen landscapes and the figures who populate them, as Harmonica appears out of nowhere and Frank chillingly commands the center of the frame. Once Upon a Time in the West is Leone's operatic masterwork, worthy of its legend-making title.-Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide Italy/USA, 1969, Technicolor, Italian w/English subtitles, 165 min., 35mm, rated PG.

Open Your Eyes
Winner of seven Goya Awards (Spanish Oscars), this sophomore feature by Amenábar is a deeply complex psychological mind warp of a film that begs to be viewed more than once, if only to unpeel the multiple layers of meaning that drench every scene like the webbing surrounding an arachnid's lunchtime fix. To say that this is a "thriller" hardly does Amenábar or his cast justice; Open Your Eyes is a brilliant puzzlebox caught on celluloid, beautiful to look at but difficult to figure out. Amenábar combines elements of science fiction, horror, and German Expressionism with the more traditional elements of a love story and Hitchcockian "wrong man" turns, and then somehow manages to make it all fit into a skewed sort of logic. You may not get it at first, but the effort is well worth it when you do. Eduardo Noriega plays César, a wealthy young Madrid gadabout who values his looks and his libido above all else. (Marc Savlov, Austin Chronicle) Spain, 1997. Color, in Spanish, with English subtitles. 117 mins., 35 mm. Rated R.

PASSENGER / FOREST OF BLISS
Passenger is the title of a painting by Sean Scully, the well-known American artist. A friend, the filmmaker Robert Gardner, made what he calls an "observation in four movements. The intent of the piece is to impart an experience of the engagement by Scully with the work in question, an engagement which is both physical and emotional. The only sounds are those made by the artist as he works and, occasionally, by musical passages from tapes Scully plays while he is painting. Forest of Bliss grew out of a moment of shock; anthropologist/filmmaker Robert Gardner’s first encounter with the Great Cremation Ground at Benares, India. It conveys that shock to its audience with economy and precision, beauty and horror. This is a gorgeous, but uncompromising, study of the city where every human activity  eating and drinking, bathing, socializing, disposing of waste, working, dying is centered around the holy Ganges River. The film is unique in the world of documentaries. It supplies no voice-over explanations and makes no commentary; simply letting viewers become submerged in the subject and experience it as if they were there themselves... Probably no film yet has come as close to capturing the essence of the religion, of consciousness and unconsciousness, of the alternating rhythms of life and death. Robert Gardner will be on-hand to introduce his films and do a Q&A afterwards.

PI (¹)
Now and again a film comes along that knocks you on your heels and reminds you of the power of movies to astonish, disturb and provoke. p is one of those movies, a churning, piercing, inventive film of dazzling textures and challenging ideas... Max Cohen (Sean Gullette) is a brilliant New York mathematician obsessed with the possibility of describing natural phenomena and human behavior through numbers. In particular, he thinks he can discover patterns in and impose predictions on that most mercurial of number sets, the stock market... As Max, Gullette (who co-wrote the original story with Darren Aronofsky) is a credibly fiery genius. Beset by fits of anger, delusion and absorption, he makes his way through Manhattan like a purposeful ferret, his eyes hooded, his pace deliberate. His visual inventions and rapid-fire edits keep reminding us, there's no place inside Max's head where Max's mind can rest. In this light, and given his almost complete lack of film experience, Gullette pulls of a major debut. (Portland Oregonian) USA., 1998. B&W, in English. 84 mins., 35mm.

A PLACE CALLED CHIAPAS
Poor Mexico  so far from God, so close to the United States. It’s an oft-quoted aphorism south of the border in response to the passage of NAFTA, the Zapatista National Liberation Army seized five villages and 500 ranches in the state of Chiapas on January 1, 1994. The Zapatistas claimed that the treaty was "A death sentence for the Indian peoples of Mexico. And as Canadian filmmaker Nettie Wild reveals in her fascinating documentary, a flood of cheap U.S. corn did indeed arrive in NAFTA’S wake, stripping 1.6 million campesinos of their livelihood. Chiapas examines the uprising and uses the event to show how the Internet and the global media can help the disenfranchised perform an end run around a repressive system. Led by the charismatic and mysterious Subcomandante Marcos, the Zapatistas have spent much of the past four-plus years in a state of cease-fire with the Mexican army, a situation that is convincingly presented as evidence of their good intentions. This wasn’t about spilling blood or seizing power  it was about wishing to be heard. says Bishop Samuel Ruis Garcia. But while Zapatista sympathizers are shown as the victims of brutal persecution by paramilitary groups, Wild readily offers opposing views. One of the most fascinating moments is an interview with a bourgeois family who lost their farm to the Zapatistas and consider themselves victims of Marcos’s formidable PR skills. (Andrew Johnston) Canada, 1998. Color, in English & Spanish with English subtitles. 93 minutes, 35mm.

Pola X
Léos Carax (LOVERS ON THE BRIDGE) turns this loose adaptation of Herman Melville's PIERRE, or THE AMBIGUITIES into an exceedingly morbid and incest-laden variant of VERTIGO ­ complete with a near-necrophilic sex scene. It involves a well-off writer (Guillaume Depardieu) who turns his back on his wealth when he meets a mysterious woman who may be his half sister (Katerina Golubeva), and begins to wander with her through the French countryside as if in a trance. Ultimately, POLA X charts the direct opposite trajectory of Carax's earlier film, whose homeless lovers rather implausibly turned into yuppies; here the leisure class goes slumming toward self-destruction. The movie isn't the least bit commercial (downward mobility isn't too sexy these days), but its breathtaking images are often thrillingly weird. ­Rob Nelson, City Pages. France, 1999, color, French w/English subtitles,134 mins, 35mm, not rated (no one under 18 admitted).

Pollock
As an actor portraying the inner turmoil of Jackson Pollock ­ the revolutionary abstractionist known for his splatter-and-drip painting style ­ Ed Harris gives a commanding, potent performance in Pollock that is a torrential mix of the artist's chaotic talent and his more chaotic psyche. As a director depicting Jackson Pollock's world, Ed Harris captures with vivid, lively authenticity both the astute yet pretentious buzz of the 1940s Manhattan art scene and his subject's tumultuous personal life, marked by hard drinking and a stormy long-term affair with fellow painter Lee Krasner (Marcia Gay Harden). Harris creates an imposing, invigorating cinematic biography fueled by its subject's stubborn, manic energy and his strangely uncommunicative charisma. Harris does a startlingly affecting job of drawing the viewer into Pollock's realm, sharing with us the sensation of his artistic epiphanies and the evolution of his provocative, avant-garde style. Harris's performance is never more intense or credible than when he's bent over a painting in progress. Harris's directorial debut is a sturdy, compelling accomplishment from its dramatic imagery to its spectacularly dynamic, ironically upbeat score to its cast full of memorable performances. ­Rob Blackwelder, SPLICEDWIRE. 2000, USA, English, Color, 117mins, Rated R.

POST COITUM
Brigitte Rouan's first feature as director, Outremer ('90), dealt with familial and romantic problems in a post-colonial setting. Her second feature is set in Paris with the director herself taking the central role of Diane Clovier, a 40-ish wife and mother who works for a small publishing house. She loves her lawyer husband, Philippe (Patrick Chesnais), and her sons, and she's good at her work. But everything falls apart when she meets 20-something Emilio (Boris Terral), a handsome, outgoing, utterly charming and quite amoral type who works for an aid agency... Rarely has amour fou been as graphically and deliriously played onscreen as in this handsomely produced film, and Rouana herself participates in some fairly steamy sexual encounters with her lithe co-star. Yet the film's in-depth analysis of this woman's needs and long-repressed yearnings ensures that pic isn't exploitative. Diane may be foolhardy, and blind to the hurt she's causing her family, but she's also terribly human, and Rouan's fine, warts-and-all performance explores every nuance of the character. France, 1997. Color, in French with English subtitles. 97 mins., 35mm.

The Princess and the Warrior
Once upon a time in a stone castle on an ocean bluff, a woman wrote a letter. Its content was almost incidental. What's important, however, is that, once delivered, the letter set off an unexpected chain of events. Although it is often fantastic and absurd, the chronicle of these events, The Princess and the Warrior is no fairy tale. Rather, it is a love story about how chance and coincidence change the lives of two traumatized people. The theme is a recurring one in the films of German director Tom Tykwer, best known for his international hit Run Lola Run which starred Franka Potente. A blond Potente stars this time as a psychiatric nurse walking mannequin-like through life, barely registering events around her. A gaunt, wispy-bearded Benno Furmann is a thief, sleepwalking and self-destructively while awake. Princess is a dreamlike, formless creation, but is just as intricately plotted and intelligently imagined as LOLA. The result is a trance-like puzzle whose pieces mesh together like the gears on a time machine. It is a ghostly, lyrical portrait of things happening accidentally on purpose.-Duane Dudek, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Germany, 2001, Color, German w/English subtitles, 130 min., 35mm, rated R.

The Puppet Masters
The second installment of Hou Hsiao-hsien's trilogy of Taiwanese history is based on the memoirs of puppeteer Li Tien-lu, one of Taiwan's official "national treasures" and one of Hou's perennial treasures (he also appears in A City of Sadness and A Time to Live and A Time to Die). First-person recollections of Li Tien-lu's troubled childhood and early days on the road with a traveling troupe are punctuated by elaborate sequences of puppet performances, forming a dramatic retelling of events both epic in scope and rich in atmosphere. The Puppetmaster consists of meticulously composed tableaux that creatively interweave reenactments of the fateful shifts in his life and segments with Li himself serving as narrator. Drawing on traditions of Chinese landscape painting and theater, Hou explores oblique staging devices, long takes, deep perspective, distanced and zigzagged action. As a consequence, his films are densely textured, stylized, rich in detail, and emotionally nuanced. The portrait that emerges captures both the tragic sweep of Taiwan's fate throughout much of the 20th century and the puppeteer's own hardships attached to the strings of that history. -National Gallery of Art Program. (Taiwan, 1993, Mandarin and Taiwanese with English subtitles, 142 mins, color, not rated)

RAISE THE RED LANTERN
Color isn't just important to Zhang Yimou. It's his leading lady. In "Raise the Red Lantern," the Chinese director selects from a stirring palette of glowing reds, subtle yellows and twilight grays. There isn't an arbitrary hue in the movie. In purely aesthetic terms, "Raise the Red Lantern" is breathtaking. Whether color -- and other aesthetics -- can carry an entire picture has been raised before in connection with Zhang's work (which includes "Red Sorghum" and "Ju Dou"). In "Lantern" he comes close to pulling it off. Passion for the spectrum (particularly the redder end) suffuses -- and completely informs -- this tale of a power struggle in 1920s China. Chief among things vermilion are the titular lanterns. In this movie, they represent the pinnacle of power. When Gong Li (Zhang's other regular leading lady) becomes the fourth bride of an aging, wealthy patriarch, she enters a forbidding, repressive world. Cloistered in her own quarters with a personal servant, she undergoes a series of daily rituals. She's also forced into bitter rivalry with the three other wives. (Excerpt by Desson Howe, WASHINGTON POST)China, 1991. Color, in Mandarin with English subtitles, 125 mins., 35mm. Not rated.

Ran
Akira Kurosawa has been called the "Shakespeare of cinema. "RAN, which melds an ancient samurai legend with King Lear, reaffirms Kurosawa's greatness both as an interpreter of Shakespeare and as a master of the medium of film. RAN shows us an ancient Japanese Lord, nearing the end of his life, trying to sort out his affairs. He wants to divide his lands between three sons, but lacks the humility to realize two of his children are disloyal, while the one son who refuses to play bootlicking games is banished. As the two remaining sons move inevitably toward civil war, their father is stripped of his power, prestige and pride. It is only then that he is able to see the truth. But is it too late? A venerable 75 years old when he made the film, Kurosawa's eyesight was apparently very poor, which might account for the orgy of color that greets us in RAN. Blazing reds, yellows and blues assault us during some of the most exciting and energetic battle scenes ever filmed. ­Dan Jardine, Apollo Movie Guide.
Japan/France, 1985, color, Japanese w/English subtitles, 160 mins, 35mm, rated R.

Ratcatcher
This is an insightful, beautifully made film about hope and hopelessness. It's not uplifting, comforting entertainment, but it is certainly unforgettable. The story is told through the eyes of 12-year-old James (William Eadie), who lives with his family on a grotty housing estate, an environment made even worse by a dustbin strike. So mountains of rubbish surround the dingy buildings, creating a breeding ground for rats and other critters. While James' troubled parents (Tommy Flanagan and Mandy Matthews) wait to hear whether the council will give them a larger home with an indoor toilet, James and his sisters (Michelle Stewart and Lynne Ramsay Jr) play in the rubbish-strewn yards and along a dangerous canal. But James' troubles go far deeper, as he blames himself for his friend's drowning ... and even for his family's misfortune. ­Rich Cline, Cinezine; France, French w/ English Subtitles, Color, 93 min

REAR WINDOW
"We've become a race of peeping Toms," says Stella (Thelma Ritter), the nurse who comes to take care of injured photographer L.B. "Jeff" Jeffries (James Stewart) and finds him spying on his neighbors. Not only is Hitchcock's most overtly voyeuristic film even more timely today, in an age where people's private lives are aired on television and the Internet every hour, but it's been given a fresh restoration by Robert A. Harris and James C. Katz, the same team that saved the master's Vertigo from fading into celluloid oblivion. The result is a color-saturated new print of 1954's Rear Window that only highlights its complex and thoroughly unsettling themes. Jeffries, confined to a wheelchair with a broken leg, has nothing to do while his leg heals but watch little snippets of life through his neighbors' windows and begins to suspect that one of them, a salesman named Thorwald (Raymond Burr), has murdered his ailing wife. He soon drags Stella into his obsession, as well as girlfriend Lisa (Grace Kelly, ravishing and electrifyingly erotic), although a detective friend (Wendell Corey) does his best to come up with an alternate explanation for Thorwald's suspicious actions. (Excerpt by Don Kave, ROUGH CUT) USA, 1954. Color, in English, 112 mins., 35mm. Rated PG.

RED
``Red'' is the best of the lot: warmer, more accessible, unusually generous toward its characters. A mystical tale of chance encounters and unexpected connections, ``Red'' uses a traffic accident as a springboard to discovery… The most spiritual of contemporary film makers, Kieslowski seems to watch over his characters with kind, paternal regard -- waiting for them to connect, capturing their reactions with his slow, patient camera. There's a father-daughter quality to the relationship (between the characters played by Irene Jacob and Jean-Louis Trintignant), but also the suggestion that had Valentine only been born 40 years earlier, the two of them might have had a long and happy marriage. Whereas ``The Double Life of Veronique'' suggested that each of us has a spiritual twin somewhere in the world, who sees and experiences the world exactly as we do, ``Red'' believes that our perfect partner exists, although often in a physical form we can't recognize. Kieslowski builds toward a surprise ending and reinforces his philosophy of connectedness: that things happen for a reason, that we are not alone. (Excerpt by Edward Guthmann, SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE) France/Poland/Switzerland, 1994. Color, in French with English subtitles, 96 mins., 35mm. Rated R.

The Red Violin & The Composer

Requiem for a Dream
Everyone who matters in Requiem for a Dream is addicted to something: chocolate, television, diet pills, heroin, you name it. Director Darren Aronofsky, fortunately, is addicted to images. He has put together a phantasmagoria of self-destructive obsession that is so visually astounding it becomes its own saving grace. Otherwise, we might not be able to bear it. This unrelenting film presents some of the most wrenching images conceivable, yet never for a single moment is there anything exploitive about them. Aronofsky's artistry extends to compassion for the self-deluded, doomed characters. Sara Goldfarb is a lonely woman who has a junkie son and whose closest relationship is with the television set and the host of a bizarre show she watches. She is played by veteran actress Ellen Burstyn, whose grueling, vulnerable performance exists in a place beyond praise. The entire cast is extraordinary. Jared Leto is Sara's wraithlike son, Jennifer Connelly his would-be-designer girlfriend and Marlon Wayans his drug-dealing buddy. ­Bob Graham, SF Chronicle. USA, 2000, color, English, 102 mins, 35mm, not rated. No one under 17 admitted.

Rififi
In 1955, Jules Dassin, an American director in exile in Paris, made this flat-out perfect piece of cinema. RIFIFI became unquestionably his most loved work. Telling the story of a newly sprung bank robber who engineers the perfect caper, the film is a delirious fantasia of gangster ethics and underworld locales, artfully framed in a baroque, twisting plot and hung lovingly against the gorgeous backdrop of Parisian streets. Dazzling, ornate, and artfully crafted, Rififi is, it cannot be disputed, a work of perfection. Like a diamond, each facet of the film gleams as brightly: The performances are quite excellent. The cinematography is stunning, the music, by famed composer Georges Auric, is dead on, restrained and somber, occasionally breaking into dance. The plot is an economic wonder: three succinct acts that unfold with the dedication of an opera, building to a glorious, melodramatic finish. ­ Jamie Hook, The Stranger.France, 1956, B&W, French w/English subtitles, 115 mins, 35mm, not rated.

The Road Home
In the touching The Road Home, a man returns to the village of his birth after his father's death. His mother insists on following ancient custom: She wants men from the village to carry the body home from the hospital on foot so the soul of the departed is shown the way back home. This Chinese film, directed by Zhang Yimou, (Raise the Red Lantern) has a novelistic structure and feel. At first the viewer expects the story to focus on the son and his return home at this difficult time. But, in a long flashback, he tells how his parents met and fell in love. Zhang Ziyi (CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON) portrays the mother as a teen-ager who falls in love with the village's first permanent schoolteacher. Theirs is a difficult courtship, hampered by barely glimpsed politics and class expectations. The film is laced with gentle humor, and its simple story is built on a sure foundation of humaneness. There is no trumped-up drama, no mustache-twirling bad guys. There are no bad guys at all. We come to love these characters. We care what happens to them. That is enough to make us want to take this journey with them.-Eric Harrison, Houston Chronicle China, 1999, b&w/color, Mandarin w/English subtitles, 89 min., 35mm, rated G.

Romance
This movie's audacity holds you and builds to a startling daydream about the abyss separating sex from romance.  Newcomer Caroline Ducey plays Marie who conjures up a surreal bordello in which women's lower bodies are callously plundered by strangers while their upper bodies adoringly embrace the men they love.  Director Catherine Breillat doesn't have a sentimental bone in her body and she laces the action with snippets of X-rated footage.  But her aim is not pornographic.  She believes that if you're serious about examining sexual desire, you can't shy away from showing the flesh it inspires; nor, for that matter, can you ignore the babies that lovemaking creates.  For all her desire to create a scandal, what's most disarming about Breillat is her matter-of-fact treatment of risky topics that other filmmakers are afraid even to mention.  Watching Romance, many women will feel a shock of relieved recognition -a film that isn't terrified of female desire! -while most men will simply be shocked.  After all, women aren't supposed to think, behave, or make movies like this. (Excerpt by J. Powers, Vogue) France, 1999, Color, in French with English subtitles, 95 min., 35mm. Not Rated

Run Lola Run
Jeden Tag, jede Sekunde triffst Du eine Entscheidung, die Dein Leben verandern kann.
(English translation: Every second of every day you're faced with a decision that can change your life.)  Run Lola Run is an extremely clever concoction that explodes in an escalating series of interlocking visual tricks from the wily mind of German writer/director Tom Tykwer. What is so unexpected is that this seemingly serious story races along with a merry heart.  Three different journeys begin and end in the same place. Common premise: Lola's boyfriend, Manni (Herbert Knaup), will be killed by the Mob in twenty minutes if he doesn't pay his debt of 100,000 marks. Far across town Lola (Franka Potente) hurls the red telephone that brought the bad news into the air and races out to help Manni. With no help from Manni and no plan of her own, she knows only that she must get to him, that somehow the money will materialize.  Mr. Tykwer fits every single act and gesture into a perfect blueprint that he manipulates at the desperate pace of a runner on a savior's mission.  In Ms. Potente he has the perfect heroine. She is as obsessed with Lola's race as he is with the timing of the story he has written. This movie is his game, a sustained fireworks finale that never fizzles for a moment. (Excerpt by Joan Ellis, Nebbadoon.) Germany, 1998, Color, in German with English subtitles, 79 min., 35mm. Rated R

Same Old Song
French master Alain Resnais has been making movies that are at once mischievous and magnificent for nearly half a century (a list that includes Hiroshima Mon Amour, Last Year at Marienbad, Muriel and My American Uncle), and what is perhaps most extraordinary about this extraordinary filmmaker is that at the age of 76 anyone would be capable of making a movie as light yet complicated, as sly yet spry, as the thoroughly enjoyable divertissement Same Old Song. Fans of The Singing Detective will recognize this premise immediately, and Resnais short-circuits that potential criticism by dedicating the film to the late Dennis Potter. The story involves a group of people in and around Paris and their tangled commitments, a narrative that is punctuated frequently by characters breaking into straight-faced snippets of classic French pop songs (Jane Birkin even pops up in one scene and does, you guessed it, a Jane Birkin song). While potential American distributors are bound to be nervous due to the limited appeal of the music clips, they're just the frosting on this delicious confection of miscommunication and yearning, as the lyrics of each song manage to be far more eloquent than the often banal but never boring characters. Delightfully unique, Same Old Song is a joy from beginning to end. (Excerpt by Eddie Cockrell, Nitrate Online) France, 1997, in French with English subtitles, 120 min., 35mm. Not Rated

The Sanguinaires and Life on Earth
The "2000 SEEN BY..." series presents seven independent filmmakers who each represent seven different countries and seven different perspectives on the issue of what will happen when we enter the next millennium – be it the second coming, the end of the world, or an unlikely romantic encounter that cuts across social boundaries. "The Sanguinares" is the first feature film by Laurent Cantet, a prize-winning short film director. The story: To escape the global hysteria and the final countdown to the new millennium, a group of friends decide to flee Paris and exile themselves on a remote Mediterranean island called "The Sanguinaires." France, 1997. Color, in French with English subtitles. 68 mins., 35mm, unrated. Director Abderrahmane Sissako’s work has covered fiction, documentary, the political, the poetic, and presents one of the strongest and most candid views of the African continent in years. Story: On the eve of the year 1000, Sissako goes home to visit his father in a small village in Mali, where he films stunning landscapes and encounters a young woman. Mali, 1998. Color, in French & Bambara with English subtitles. 61 mins., 35mm, unrated.

Seconds
Seconds, like Point Blank or Blow-up, is classic Sixties ­ the cinematography is consistently far-out, the parties are frantically groovy, and The Man lurks around every corner. Still, anyone who grokked John Frankenheimer's The Manchurian Candidate will love this bleakly comic horror story. Our protagonist (John Randolph) is a middle-aged square who's hounded by some shadowy corporation and a friend who "died" years ago. They convince him to surgically alter his appearance and disappear into a new life. When the bandages come off, he weeps with joy to see a handsome new face under all of the hideous stitches and sutures: Randolph has transformed into Rock Hudson. Though casting this mediocre screen hunk as an uptight businessman's alter ego was a stroke of pop genius for director Frankenheimer, it was Hudson's idea to have two actors play the lead, and his surprisingly thoughtful performance galvanizes this harrowing, cerebral thriller (and suggest Hudson's talents were under-utilized). A remake is currently underway, but it doesn't look promising ­ they don't make 'em this "heavy" anymore. ­Chris Baker, USA, English, 107 min

Series VII
Sometimes the most astonishing thing about a movie is hidden right in plain sight. Series 7: The Contenders is a satire on reality TV, taking the world of Survivor and Temptation Island to its logical extension with a TV show where the contestants kill one another. The classic short story The Most Dangerous Game is also lurking somewhere in its history. No, it's not the idea that people will kill each other for entertainment that makes Series 7 jolting. What the movie correctly perceives is that somewhere along the line we've lost all sense of shame in our society. It's not what people will do, but what they'll say--what they eagerly reveal about themselves ­ that Series 7 assimilates without even being aware of it. The killing part is the satire, and we expect that to be exaggerated. The dialogue, I suspect, is not intended as satirical at all, but simply reflects the way people think these days. There are still many Americans who chooseº not to reveal every detail of their private lives the moment a camera is pointed at them, but they don't get on TV much. ­Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun Times; 2001, USA, English, Color, 86 min

Set Me Free
French Canadian director Léa Pool gets the balance just right in her tenacious but elegiac "Set Me Free" (its French title is "Emporte-moi"). Set in Montreal in 1963, the picture tells the story of 13-year-old Hanna, who becomes entranced with Anna Karina's character, prostitute Nana, in Jean-Luc Godard's "Vivre Sa Vie" ("My Life to Live") and tentatively sets out to build her own adult life, suddenly having an idea of the kind of woman she wants to be. What makes "Set Me Free" so wonderful is that there's no preciousness, no condescension, attached to the fact that a 13-year-old might fixate on a fictional prostitute (especially one who dies tragically) as a role model. Hanna, played with an astonishing amount of delicacy and perception by Karine Vanasse, is of course attracted to Nana's glamour and beauty, but the magnetism of the character runs deeper than that. When Hanna, charming with her girlish freckles and pixie haircut, drags on her cigarette in direct imitation of Nana, it's like a small love letter not just to the resonance of certain movie images but to a certain kind of womanly sophistication, an angle of feminine mystery and beauty that Hanna's reaching toward without really knowing why. (Excerpt by Stephanie Zacharek, SALON.COM) France / Canada / Switzerland, 1999, Color and B&W, in French with English subtitles, 94 min, 35 mm, not-rated. This program was made possible with the support of the Cultural Services of the French Embassy and the French Ministry of Culture (CNC).

Shadow of the Vampire
Willem Dafoe and John Malkovitch create a vampire film that you can sink your teeth into. In the darkly comic Shadow of the Vampire, we spy on the production of one of the most famous films of the silent era, F.W. Murnau's legendary 1922 movie, Nosferatu. At one point between shots, the director, producer and writer talk with Max Schreck, the obscure, rat-faced performer who plays the vampire. They've noted how he stays in character when the camera stops. Now, while they discuss the script, Schreck reaches quickly into the night air, grabs a bat and devours it with relish. "What an actor!" says the startled writer. That, of course, is the joke of Shadow of the Vampire. In this fictionalized variation, the "actor" playing the vampire isn't acting. He is a vampire. And he's played with robust humor, flamboyant style and astonishing makeup by Willem Dafoe, in a performance that deserves its Oscar buzz. Schreck has been hired by Murnau (John Malkovich), an obsessive, willful director. Much of the black humor is then generated by Murnau's race to finish the film before his spooky star devours everyone. Shadow of the Vampire is the clever creation of director E. Elias Merhige and writer Steven Katz. Hard-core film buffs will truly sink their teeth into this film. -Jack Garner, Democrat & Chronicle. (USA, 2000, English, 89 mins, color, rated R.)

SLAM
The first time we see Ray Joshua, the young black hero of director Marc Levin's impressive feature debut Slam, we get a vivid taste of the conflicting forces that rule him... Like love Jones, last year's look at creative black twentysomethings in Chicago, Slam tells the world that poetry is cool. It's not only cool, Ray comes to believe, but it's a reason for being, a reason to get out and go straight. Convincing an audience - any audience - of that in 1998 is a pretty tall order. But Levin has chosen just the right actor to bring it off. On the screen, the noted New York City performance poet Saul Williams embodies two Rays: The lean, cat-quick one we first meet, full of sinew and wile, knows the ways of the street; the starved-looking, acetic Ray we come to know later, artistic and vulnerable, aspires to heaven. Even the timbre of his voice - an uncanny aural double for the young Sidney Poitier - suggests transcendence. In his tortured journey from one kind of "slam" (the city jail) to another (the poetry reading in a nightclub that transforms his destiny), we find the saga of everyone who looks and looks and eventually sees the light. (Bill Gallo, Westword) US, 1998. Color, in English. 103 minutes, 35mm.

Smell of Camphor, Fragrence of Jasmine
In 1978, Bahman Farmanara was one of the brightest young lights of Iranian cinema, the director of two internationally acclaimed features -- "House of Ghamar Khanoom" and "Prince Ehtajab" -- and head of his own film studio. But the following year's Islamic Revolution cut his career short just as he had finished his third feature, "Tall Shadows of the Wind." Its release was halted, Farmanara was barred from making further films, and he soon fled to Canada. He eventually returned to Iran, and now, at age 59, the loosening political grip there has finally allowed him to direct -- and star in -- "Smell of Camphor, Fragrance of Jasmine," an absorbing, if melancholy, drama that is his first film in more than two decades. He more or less plays himself: an overweight, chain-smoking, long frustrated director with serious heart problems who obsessively feels the presence of death not far around the corner, but can't get past the injury done his life and career by the zealots of Tehran. The film also communicates, with great clarity and precision, the specific dilemma of Farmanara's own "futile" existence: the quiet horror of the artist who is denied the aching personal need and basic human right of self-expression. (Excerpt by William Arnold, Seattle Post Intelligencer.)(Iran; 2000; Farsi w/ English subtitles; Color; 93 min.; NR)

SMOKE SIGNALS
In 1994, filmmaker Chris Eyre made a "cold call" to novelist Sherman Alexie, asking for permission to reshape some of the short stories from Alexie's collection The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven into what Eyre hoped would become his first feature project. Four years later Eyre and Alexie produced Smoke Signals, a laconically paced, vibrantly humane little filmic fable about learning to love your neighbor while deciding whether or not to forgive your father... a theme whose cultural resonance, as Eyre hastens to point out, is hardly restricted to North America's indigenous peoples. "The strength of this story lies in the fact that it's about universals, not specifics," he says. "It's also not a political movie, although it does have political baggage, because I didn't want to make any kind of statement about 'the plight of the American Indian,' or any of that crap. I just wanted to get away from some white person's interpretation of us, and show us the way we really are: people, like any other people in any other movie – funny, sad, strange, interesting. Except in this case, everybody's got names like Lester Fallsapart and Thomas Builds-The-Fire." (Gemma Files) US, 1998. Color, in English. 88 mins., 35mm., PG-13.

SNATCH
Guy Ritchie's Snatch is another slapsticky, ghoulishly amusing, incredibly violent underworld comedy. It's a round-robin farce with everyone after, or influenced by someone after, a gigantic diamond that's snatched in the opening sequence by a gang of thieves led by a Neanderthal hood named Franky Four Fingers (Benicio Del Toro). The main character and narrator is Turkish (Jason Stratham), a London slot-machine-arcade owner and illegal fight promoter who tells us the long, meandering, flash-back story of how he, his sidekick Tommy (Robbie Gee) and seemingly half the London underworld become involved with the stone after Franky manages to lose it. There's also One-Punch Mickey O'Neil (Brad Pitt), the Irish Gypsy bare-knuckle champion; Bullet Tooth Tony (Vinnie Jones), a sociopathic killer; and an unnamed but unusually stupid dog with a penchant for swallowing diamonds, squeaky toys and other large objects. Ritchie has a likably fast-paced visual style, a gift for grungy atmosphere and an unshakably jolly affection for his menagerie of low-life characters that's fairly infectious. ­William Arnold, Seattle Post Intelligencer. 2000, UK, English,100 min, Rated R

A SOLDIER'S DAUGHTER NEVER CRIES
The movie is told through the eyes of Channe, a girl whose father is a famous American novelist. In the 1960's, the family lives in Paris, on the Ile St. Louis in the Seine. Bill Willis (Kris Kristofferson) and his wife, Marcella (Barbara Hershey), move in expatriate circles ("We're Euro-trash"), and the kids go to a school where the students come from wildly different backgrounds. At home, dad writes, but doesn't tyrannize the family with the importance of his work, which he treats as a job ("typing is the one thing I learned in high school of any use to me"). There is a younger brother, Billy, who was adopted under quasi-legal circumstances, and a nanny, Candida, who turns down a marriage proposal to stay with the family. All of this is somewhat inspired by fact. The movie is based on an autobiographical novel by Kaylie Jones, whose father, James Jones, was the author of From Here to Eternity, The Thin Red Line and Whistle... The movie was directed by James Ivory and produced by Ismail Merchant, from a screenplay by their longtime collaborator, the novelist Ruth Prawer Jhabvala. [A Soldier's Daughter] is one of their best films. (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times) UK, 1998. Color, in English. 124 mins, 35mm

SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES
What price would you pay to have your deepest desires come true? That is the question posed to the citizens of Green Town, Illinois by a seductive stranger named Mr. Dark, proprietor of Dark's Pandemonium Carnival  - a traveling fair fueled by the greed of the average person, by the torment of dreams grown old. It's the centerpiece of the screen adaptation of Ray Bradbury's soul-searching  fantasy, Something Wicked This Way Comes. First published in 1962, Bradbury's best-selling book was inspired by the author's childhood memories of magicians and sideshows. The heroes of the story are two young boys who stumble onto the carnival's destructive secret, and an aging librarian (played by Oscar-winner Jason Robards) who must confront the evil Mr. Dark. Directed by Jack Clayton (The Innocents) from a screenplay by Bradbury, the film also features the talents of Pam Grier (Coffy, Jackie Brown), Diane Ladd and Jonathan Pryce (Brazil) as Mr. Dark. Steeped in the mystery and  poetry that distinguishes Bradbury's finest work, Something Wicked This Way Comes is a bewitching carnival of darkness and light. US, 1983. Color, in English. 95 mins., 35mm, rated PG.

The Sorrow and The Pity
From the moment it was first released at a tiny Left Bank theater in Paris, Marcel Ophuls' epic account of France under Nazi occupation during World War II has been acclaimed as one of the most moving and influential films of all time. Refused by French TV for more than a decade, the film garnered international success and acclaim- including an Oscar nomination for Best Documentary and a recurring homage in Woody Allen's Annie Hall - while shattering the myth of an undivided and universally resistant France. Ophuls interviews the residents of Clermont-Ferrand who remember the time and would speak of it; as well as French, German, and British government officials, writers, farmers, members of the Maquis, spies, artists, and German veterans. The result is a staggeringly clear portrait of how people conducted themselves under the most extreme of circumstances. Ophuls constantly invites us to put ourselves in the position of these witnesses: what would we have done under the same circumstances? A triumph of humanist filmmaking, The Sorrow and The Pity leaves us with a great awareness of the power and responsibility that each of us possesses. By turns gripping, appalling, and exhilarating, the film is one of the most powerful achievements in the history of cinema. West Germany/France/Switzerland, 1971, B&W, French with English subtitles, 260 min, 35 mm, not-rated.

Sound and Fury
SOUND AND FURY centers on two branches of a Long Island, N.Y., family. One of the fathers is deaf, the other can hear, and both have young children diagnosed with hearing disorders. Searching their consciences and discussing the issue with their wives and others, they wrestle with the question of whether to accept a surgical procedure that may allow their youngsters to hear. Two of the parents lean toward giving their offspring greater chances of a normal life. But the others feel differently, arguing that deafness is not a handicap or limitation at all, and that choosing to hear betrays the "deaf culture" they and their friends have learned to cherish. Josh Aronson's straightforward filmmaking conveys the complexity of the social, political, and medical issues connected with these matters; and just as important, it etches a vivid portrait of the bedrock human emotions aroused by endless debates involving a wide range of family members and outside experts. The result is gripping, touching, and enlightening. ­Joseph Sinnot, Christian Science Monitor. USA, 2000, English, 80 mins, color, not rated.

The Source
The so-called Beat Generation seems like ancient history until you realize how many of its founding members are still around to talk about it.  Or at least were around when Chuck Workman began collecting material for his enthusiastic paean to the heroes of that post-war social rebellion. The film traces the roots of the counterculture back to the 1940s, when Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, and William S. Burroughs first hooked up.  Johnny Depp, John Turturro and Dennis Hopper are among those who read from the essential Beat writings.  Bob Dylan, Norman Mailer and Ken Kesey appear on camera to illuminate decades of bohemian activism. Jack Kerouac and his free-spirited on-the-road buddy Neal Cassady, the names most romantically associated with the Beat Generation, are long gone, appearing here via old TV clips, filmed readings, and home movies.  But Workman got to poet Allen Ginsberg and novelist William Burroughs before they went to the Big Coffee House in the Sky, and they offer telling reminiscences from the early days of outlaw lit. Workman has created a nostalgic summary of a curious band who used their pens to thumb their noses -and had a hell of a time while they were at it. US, 1999, Color/B&W, in English, 88 min., 35mm. Not Rated

South: Ernest Shackleton & the Endurance
Caroline Alexander's best-seller Endurance has created a cult following that is storming the nation's media. South is the remarkable chronicle of Ernest Shackleton's 1912-1914 Endurance expedition. En route to Antarctica, the explorer's ship was trapped in pack ice. The ice finally crushed and sunk her and the crew camped on dangerously fragile ice floes for months. Filmed as it was happening, South is the greatest epic in the history of exploration. (Antarctica, 1919, silent, 88 min)

State and Main
State and Main, David Mamet's ensemble comedy about a Hollywood movie crew's invasion of a picturesque Vermont town, is as smart, witty and nasty as anything you'd expect from the artist. After being shaken down and out of their original New Hampshire location, the cast and crew of the serious (but sexy!) period drama "The Old Mill" take their business to the supposedly more hospitable Waterford, Vt. Director Walt Price (William H. Macy) doesn't appear to be a very good filmmaker, but he's something of a genius when it comes to situational manipulation. Whether breaking it to his earnest playwright-turned-novice-screenwriter Joseph Turner White (Phillip Seymore Hoffman) that the new location lacks a few amenities -- such as, oh, an old mill -- or trying to convince neurotic leading lady Claire Wellesly (Sarah Jessica Parker) that she wasn't hired for her breasts but needs to show them anyway, Price is arguably the finest actor in the whole production. Local teen-ager Carla Taylor (Julia Stiles), who has read up studiously on star Bob Barrenger's (Alec Baldwin) abiding interest in statutory romance. After vehicular irresponsibility, embarrassing arrests and vandalism in the name of art grow out of these and other wayward liaisons, the film's incomparably profane producer, arrives to set things straight ... or at least to try and buy everybody out of trouble. -Bob Strauss, Los Angeles Daily News. France/USA, 2000, English, 105 mins, color, rated R.

Stockpile
An uncommonly potent take on a subject of major global importance, Stephen Trombley's STOCKPILE is a bracingly smart/funny/scary history of the U.S.-U.S.S.R. nuclear arms race, the scientists behind it and its enduring legacy of thousands of stockpiled, past-their-prime nuclear weapons. Chock-full of scientific minutiae, never-before-seen archival footage and crackling gallows humor, STOCKPILE opens a bold dialogue on nuclear disarmament without adhering to any perceived standards of political correctness. It looks with equal amounts of reverence and terror at mankind's mastery of nuclear fission and fusion. By enormous good fortune, Trombley and his crew obtained permission to shoot inside the famed nuclear laboratory at Los Alamos, N.M., and to interview its past and present employees. But even more stunningly, a pre-Putin Russian government granted Trombley the same access to Arzamas-16, the secret "nuclear city" that is the Russian equivalent of Los Alamos, and which to this day has never been identified on a Russian map. Narrated by Martin Sheen. (Netherlands/Switzerland/USA; 2001; English; Color; 102 min.; NR)-- Excerpt by Scott Foundas, Variety.

The Straight Story
On the surface, David Lynch and writer John Roach have made a splendidly simple family picture. But any fan of Lynch knows that the surface is only the beginning. The Straight Story is filled with subtle details and subtle moments that will escape those not paying attention. The tale of Alvin Straight (based on a true story) is not just the story of a man and his lawn mower; it is the story of a man finally coming to grips with his life and his mistakesÉ David Lynch may have left behind the vibrant, affecting colors and stark imagery, but don't let the sweeping cornfields of Iowa fool you into thinking Lynch has left behind his love for secrets and all things dwelling just underneath. Alvin Straight is not a simple man and that is where the power in this film comes through. The Straight Story is not meant to be an in-depth examination of a stubborn, imperfect man. It is an observation of realization, penance, and forgiveness that seems to have the same personality when it comes to details (stubborn and proud) as the man who is the subject. It also seems as if David Lynch is the only man who could bring this project together in such an unforgettable way. It may be the quietest masterpiece ever to grace the silver screen. (Excerpt by Christian T. Escobar, Cinezine) US, 1999. Color, in English. 111 mins, 35mm. Rated G.

Sunshine
Sunshine, a rare film of sweeping ambition and creativity, is a true epic. It is directed by the Academy Award-winning Hungarian master, Istvan Szabo (Mephisto), one of the foremost filmmakers of the postwar period. The entire 20th century is the backdrop for this elegantly told, deeply moving account of the fortunes of a Jewish family as its members try to survive in a world undergoing massive changes. Three generations of one Hungarian family pass through this eloquent film, and Ralph Fiennes plays a different role in each generation, proving beyond the shadow of a doubt that he is one of the finest actors currently working in cinema. What makes Sunshine such a moving and powerful experience is the intimacy of the stories told and the sheer vitality of the personalities explored. Szabo and his magnificent international cast transport us back through the events that shaped this century. However, they never lose sight of the personal details that shape the legacy of this resilient family. The Sonnenscheins must endure hardship and suffering before finally emerging into the safety of the present. Despite the tragedy of 20th century Jewry, this is a heroic film of redemptive power. (Excerpted from the TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL program notes.) Austria, 1999, color, English, 179 min, 35 mm, Rated R.

SUSPIRIA
With Profondo Rosso, Argento began to push his slasher movies into gorier terrain, verging on the splatter genre. Suspiria, which established him as Italy’s most efficient engineer of shock-horror pictures, is his best effort in the genre to date and looks both back to his earlier exercises in the mystery thriller, such as Quattro Mosche di Velluto Grigio, for its highly wrought, decorative manner, and forward to his later work in the genre for its narrative design of an individual arriving in a strange locale and being plunged into a labyrinth of murders and sinister occurrences. Here, the heroine (Jessica Harper) is a new student at a ballet school in Freiburg which was the home of a witch, the "Black Widow." Not too surprisingly, a coven still exists there, headed by the two principal teachers (Alida Valli and Joan Bennett)… Argento’s exceptionally skilful use of colour, jagged cutting and good sense of décor, as well as the recourse to a shower of maggots, traps of steel mesh to exsanguinate their victims, razors, and so on, combine to create a hallucinatory atmosphere of terror. The score, composed by the director and as usual performed by The Goblins rock group adds to the claustrophobia. Valli’s performance is appropriately hieratic and the entire picture culminates in one of the most chillingly efficient sequences of the terror subgenre’s brief history.  (Phil Hardy) Italy, 1976. Color, dubbed in English. 95 mins., 35mm Not rated ("R" equivalent).

The Swindle
In his 50th film, Chabrol borrows a little from his idol Alfred Hitchcock, pays homage to his fellow cinematic revolutionists Francois Truffaut and Louis Malle, and even swipes a little from the new kids on the block like Quentin Tarantino. Refusing to be just another who's-conning-who thriller, The Swindle smartly combines a comic twinge and film noir sensibility to play out an uncertain relationship between aging con-man Victor (Michel Serrault), 40something seductress Betty (Isabelle Huppert) and her would-be lover Maurice (Francois Cluzet). When hotel convention con-artists Victor and Betty come across an unexpectedly big score, they find that the road to the easy life is not without its share of distrust and faltering allegiances. The highlights: Huppert and Serrault, two of France's most renowned stars, are great together; and Jean-Francois Balmer as Monsieur K is the most entertaining psychopath I've seen since Man Bites Dog. Chabrol's prowess as a veteran writer-director is obvious, as he breathes new life into a re-hashed premise. (Brian Sites, Rough Cut) France, 1997. Color, in French with English subtitles. 101 mins., 35mm, Rated R.