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Department
of Literature and Philosophy
September 8 Cinema Arts opens the Fall season with last year's masterwork from 84-year-old Sidney Lumet (Twelve Angry Men, Dog Day Afternoon, Network). Before the Devil Knows You're Dead is a tightly constructed, non-linear crime drama in the tradition of Kubrick's The Killing and Lumet's own The Anderson Tapes. Philip Seymour Hoffman plays Andy, an overextended broker who lures his younger brother, Hank (Ethan Hawke), into a larcenous scheme: the pair will rob a suburban mom-and-pop jewelry store that appears to be the quintessential easy target. The problem is that the store owners are Andy and Hank's actual Mom and Pop, and when the seemingly perfect crime goes horribly wrong, everything else that could have gone even worse, actually does. Marisa Tomei plays Hoffman's trophy wife, who is having a clandestine affair with Hawke, and the stellar cast includes Albert Finney as the family patriarch who pursues justice at all costs, completely unaware that the culprits he is hunting are his own sons. Before the Devil Knows You're Dead is filmmaking of the highest order: dynamically shot, perfectly paced, and brilliantly woven. Its plot and performances elevate it to the level of Greek tragedy. 117 minutes. September 22 Marvellous comedy Western, with Jimmy Stewart's pacifist, reputedly wimpy marshal taming the lawless town of Bottleneck by means of words and jokes rather than the gun he is repeatedly provoked to use. The film is remarkable in the way it seamlessly combines humor, romance, suspense, and action. Flawless performances, fluent direction, and a snappy script place it head and shoulders above virtually any other genre spoof. Directed by George Marshall featuring a string of hilarious characters led by Marlene Dietrich. In b/w, 94 minutes. Note: Destry Rides Again continues our tradition of showcasing a classic older film as regular part of every season's program. September 29 This adaptation of Andre Dubus III's best-selling book is a dark look at two people whose desire to live the American dream descends into a fight for everything that they hold dear. After being abandoned by her husband, Kathy (Jennifer Connelly) loses herself in addiction and eventually is evicted from the home where she grew up. Massoud Amir Behrani (Ben Kingsley, in an Oscar-nominated role), a former colonel in the Iranian army, buys the home with plans to sell it to make a large profit in order to bring his family to the United States. Soon, the two become embroiled in desperate clash over the home with shocking consequences. Shohreh Aghdashloo received a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination for her performance. Produced and directed from his own screenplay by the Ukrainian-born first-time director, Vadim Perelman. 126 minutes. Note: Cinema Arts is screening the film to coincide with Andre Dubus' campus visit and reading. October 6 Winner of over 20 international film awards, including top prizes at the Berlin Festival, Head-On is one of the most critically celebrated films of recent years. A marriage of convenience in Hamburg between two troubled Turks changes both their lives in this gritty contemporary love story. Director Fatih Akin dives deep into Turkish culture and explores the slippery slope of identity and cultural pride faced by Turks who either move to or are born in Germany. "Impeccably made, uncompromising in its implacable vision of the deranging power of love, sex and controlled substances, this savage and staggering film knows how to take our breath away."(Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times). In German and Turkish. 122 minutes. October 20 Zoe Heller's dark novel about a teacher who has an affair with one of her 15-year-old students and the coworker who blackmails her is turned into an even darker beast by scriptwriter Patrick Marber (Closer). Set in constantly dreary London, Cate Blanchett plays an unhappily married woman who tries to relive her youth by bedding a student. Judi Dench fills the role of the older, wicked teacher who takes Blanchett under her wing, only to use her knowledge of this illicit affair to destroy the wayward woman. Directed by Richard Eyre, the film was an Academy Award nominee for Best Actress, Supporting Actress, Adapted Screenplay, and Original Score (Philip Glass). 92 minutes. November 3 Adapting her own autobiographical bestselling graphic novel, Marjane Satrapi and co-screenwriter Vincent Paronnaud directed this Oscar-nominated, black-and-white animated film about a free-spirited Iranian girl who is sent to live in Austria when fundamentalists take over her homeland during the Islamic Revolution. In Vienna, she discovers punk rock and boys, as well as moral codes that ultimately conflict with her upbringing. Homesick, she returns to an Iran she barely recognizes. "While so many films about coming of age involve manufactured dilemmas, here is one about a woman who indeed does come of age, and magnificently" (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times). Featuring the voices of Chiara Mastroianni and Catherine Deneuve. In French, English, and Persian with English subtitles. Winner of the 2007 Cannes Jury Prize, multiple French Cesars, New York and Los Angeles Critics' Awards, and international film festivals in Sao Paulo, Vancouver, and Rotterdam, 95 minutes. Note: The screening of Persepolis is part of the annual National French Week. Partial funding has been provided by the Office of the Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and a private contribution of Dr. Clara Krug in the Department of Foreign Languages. November 17 Jackie works as a closed-circuit TV operator. Each day she watches over a small part of the world, protecting the people living their lives under her gaze. One day a man appears on her monitor, a man she thought she would never see again, a man she never wanted to see again. Now she has no choice, she is compelled to confront him. "The kind of sexy, paranoid, creepily atmospheric picture that invades all your senses at once," writes Andrew O'Hehir of Salon.com. A BAFTA (British Oscar) Award for Best New Director (Andrea Arnold) and a Jury Prize Winner of 2006 Cannes Festival. A remarkable first feature by a young Scottish director. 113 minutes. December 1 Office Space continues our new pattern of rounding the season with a contemporary cult film. Although it lost money during its short theatrical run, Mike Judge's comedy has gathered an ever-growing following since its DVD release. His satire of tech-corporate America is spot-on, true and very funny. With well-drawn characters and situations instantly familiar to the white-collar milieu, he captures the joylessness of many a cube denizen's work life to a T. Peter (Ron Livingston) spends each day doing stupefyingly dull computer work in a cubicle. He goes home to a generic thin-walled apartment sparsely furnished by IKEA, and then starts for a maddening commute to work again in the morning. His coworkers in the cube farm are an annoying lot, his boss is a snide, patronizing jerk, his girlfriend wants to leave him, his days consumed with tedium. In desperation, he turns to career hypnotherapy, but when his hypno-induced relaxation takes hold, there's no shutting it off. Layoffs are in the air at his corporation, and with two coworkers (both of whom are slated for the chute) he devises a scheme to skim funds from company accounts. The scheme soon snowballs, however, throwing the three into a panic until the unexpected happens and saves the day. Jennifer Aniston plays Peter's new love interest, a waitress at Chotchkie's (read TGI Fridays or Chili's), Diedrich Bader has a minor but hilarious turn as Peter's mustached, long-haired, drywall-installin' neighbor, and Stephen Root is Milton, a routinely ignored, damaged office drone, a subject of Mike Judge's 1991 animated debut that inspired the script of Office Space. 90 minutes. Program Director: |
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