Films from 12/20/2024 to 1/5/2025
by Gary Palmucci | 20th December 2024 | Gary's Corner, Uncategorized
New Plaza Cinema will be operating for seventeen consecutive days during the upcoming holiday stretch, from Friday December 20 through January 5, 2025.
Unlike previous years here at Macaulay Honors College where we offered just one or two new, first-run arthouse films, this year will feature a more diverse lineup of current specialty films, several classics and a sneak preview of an upcoming documentary.
Awards season watchers no doubt noticed this week the results of the first round of Oscar-related voting, the ‘short lists’ of documentaries, international features and various other categories that will each be whittled down to five finalists in mid-January balloting. Four of these titles are featured in our holiday lineup:
the beautifully animated Latvian feature Flow (international), the live action short Once Upon a Time in Ukraine from RBG filmmaker (and New Plaza friend) Betsy West, and the documentaries Soundtrack for a Coup d’etat and Porcelain War.
The latter film chronicles a Ukrainian couple’s daily struggles to survive in the midst of the ongoing conflagration. The NY Times’ reviewer describes them as:
“…Slava, who appears in the film, is both a ceramist and a member of a Ukraine special forces unit who gives weapons training to civilians turned soldiers. His partner, Anya, paints the whimsical figurines he creates, and the irrepressible couple weather the war in bombed-out Kharkiv…”
It’s nice to see Picturehouse, distributor of the Oscar-winning La Vie en Rose, Robert Altman’s swan song A Prairie Home Companion and many other quality titles, back in the game with this one.
Another film that seems certain to be in the thick of the Oscar chase joins our lineup this weekend: Conclave, from All Quiet on the Western Front helmer Edward Berger. In her Critic’s Pick review, the NYT’s Manohla Dargis sets the scene:
“Conclave, based on Robert Harris’s 2016 Vatican intrigue of the same title, centers on a British cardinal, Lawrence (a sensational Ralph Fiennes). A cleric of uncertain faith if unwavering convictions about everything else, Lawrence has droopingly sad eyes and refined sensitivities, and serves as the dean of the College of Cardinals, the group charged with selecting the pope, who’s just died. Lawrence is on the move when the story opens, hurrying through dark streets and into a brisk drama filled with whispering, scurrying men, one of whom who will be anointed as the new earthly head of the Catholic Church. There are women, too, though mostly there’s Isabella Rossellini (a supporter of New Plaza Cinema), giving great side-eye as Sister Agnes.”
Quicksilver French actress Isabelle Huppert periodically collaborates with director Hong Sang-soo, a sort of ‘Eric Rohmer’ of Korean cinema. In their latest, A Traveler’s Needs, Huppert plays Iris, an enigmatic French traveler passing through Seoul and leaving mysterious impressions with everyone she encounters. This unique director-actress collaboration is always worth watching.
Other movies holding over this week – Saoirse Ronan in Blitz, Richard Gere in Paul Schrader’s Oh, Canada, Kate Winslet in Lee.
Our sneak preview, on December 26, will be The Catskills, a new documentary chronicle of the legendary upstate New York summer vacation haven.
NPC board member Susanne Rostock’s inspiring portrait of Harry Belafonte, Following Harry, will have an encore screening on December 30.
Classics will be represented this week by Stanley Donen’s Charade with Audrey Hepburn and Cary Grant (hosted by my colleague Max Alvarez) , and Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy in Desk Set, their late 50’s, CinemaScope ‘office comedy’ set in midtown Manhattan at Christmas.
Next weekend, classics continue with two very special screenings:
— the full-length, TV version of Ingmar Bergman’s Fanny and Alexander : Parts 1 & 2 (165 mins) on Saturday December 28; Parts 3 & 4 (147 mins) on Sunday December 29.
Later that same afternoon : Nicholas Ray’s Rebel Without a Cause with James Dean, Natalie Wood and Sal Mineo and a Q&A with some special guests.
And last but not least, opening on January 2, the ravishing new French rendition of The Count of Monte Cristo.
Something for everyone?