screenings Tagged Articles at Cinematical
The Test Screenings for Dreamgirls Have Started: It's Looking Very, Very Good
Filed under: Drama », Music & Musicals », Fandom »
Oh man. Based on the people involved (well, person -- for me it's all about Bill Condon) and the early footage, I was already having a really hard time waiting until Christmas to see Dreamgirls. And now that the test screenings have started, resulting in reviews (from people who don't even like musicals) that say things like "this movie is F*CKING AMAZING. Definitely the best I've seen for a long, long time.", and "Dreamgirls is virtually flawless", and "probably the best movie I've seen in a couple of years", I'm pretty much totally freaking out. Those quotes comes from the four screening reports that were sent to AICN yesterday, right after the first test screening (those spies work fast). While, yes, the reviews are typically hyperbolic, they also offer a lot of detail to support the raves and are tempered by minor criticism, so I feel pretty confident that they weren't written by Beyoncé's mom, or something. That said, however, the write-ups are so positive that, if you're excited about the movie already, it may be dangerous to read them -- like me, you'll just end up royally pissed off that it's only August.
News from Slackerwood: getting high for the holidays
Filed under: News From Slackerwood »
Friends keep telling me that Christmas Day is a wonderful day to spend in a movie theater, enjoying a new and popular film, and perhaps going for Chinese food afterwards. (Okay, by "friends" I mostly mean my boyfriend.) I keep saying that some year I'm going to try that. It sounds so lovely and relaxing. Instead, I'm hopping on a plane this afternoon to visit relatives and probably won't go anywhere near a theater.
Most local and chain theaters in Austin are open on Christmas Day, with the exception of the single-screen Alamo Drafthouse Downtown. But the other Alamo theaters in town are open and showing a variety of first-run features. It's a good week for catching up on current releases; not many film-related special events are scheduled.
- The biggest film event next week is the Alamo Downtown annual "High for the Holidays" film series, which takes place between Christmas and New Year's Day. Sit back, take a deep breath and enjoy classic and new stoner films on the big screen: Head (12/26 and 1/1), Up in Smoke (12/27 and 12/29), Deep Blue (12/28 and 12/30), and Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle (12/28, 12/30, and 1/1). You know Alamo's going to offer little square burgers on the menu with that last film, although I'm not sure I want to speculate on other refreshments during the series. I'm happy they're showing Head on Jan. 1, after I return from my trip (not that kind of trip, silly), because I've never seen this surreal-sounding Monkees film and Alamo has located a rare 35mm print.
- This Land is Your Land, a 2004 documentary about corporate takeovers in America, will screen at Alamo Downtown on Thursday 12/29. The film is sponsored by the Third Coast Activist Resource Center. Producer Virginia Williams will hold a Q&A after the film.
- Free coffeehouse movies: Austin Java on Barton Springs *and* Austin Java on Parkway are showing The Nightmare Before Christmas tonight (Friday) at 8 pm. Cafe Mundi is even more family-friendly tonight, showing Sesame Street Presents: Follow That Bird at 6 pm. Or maybe Cafe Mundi is just on an avian film-title streak: they're also showing Bird, the 1988 Clint Eastwood-directed biopic of Charlie Parker, on Tuesday 12/27.
- Beerland is showing the crazy 3-D movie from 1981 Comin' at Ya! on Wednesday 12/28 at 7 pm. The movie is free, and Beerland also
will provide free 3-D glases, popcorn, and donuts.
- Holidays don't keep Alamo Downtown from continuing their long and popular Weird Wednesday series, in which they show free movies at midnight on Wednesday nights, movies that you might not ever want to pay to see. This week's film is Street People, a 1976 Italian race-car buddy movie that stars Stacey Keach and Roger Moore. It helps that Alamo serves beer.
Wait until January, when Austin will be hopping with all kinds of film news and events: a Werner Herzog retrospective, an Austin Film Society series on political thrillers, and The Princess Bride at the Paramount.
Sundance is totally gay
Filed under: Gay & Lesbian », Independent », Sundance », Newsstand », Quentin Tarantino », Cinematical Indie »
As Karina reported here, the
lineup for the 2006 Sundance Film Festival was revealed earlier this
month, and there is are a whole lot of movies being shown over the 10 days the festival runs. Thanks to the folks at
QT (totally un-Tarantino
related, as far as I can tell - it seems to stand for Queer Travel), though, we can now easily plan the gay-only
screening schedule that Brokeback Mountain has left us all craving.According to QT's careful research, there are a total of 14 "gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender films" at this year's festival, a number that includes features, documentaries, and shorts. Among the 14 are works from all over the world, including The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros, a comedy from the Philippians about a young petty criminal who falls in love with a cop, the Kevin Smith-produced Small Town Gay Bar, a documentary about gay life in the American South, and documentary short The Tribe, "an unorthodox, unauthorized history of the Jewish people and the Barbie doll in about 15 minutes."
Sundance kicks off on January 19, and Cinematical will be there, frantically posting and desperately trying to stay awake through three screenings a day.
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