New Films 3/05/21

by Gary Palmucci | 5th March 2021 | Gary's Corner

Hello everyone. In response to Minari’s Golden Globe win for “Best Foreign Language Film” and director Lee Isaac Chung’s poignant acceptance speech, distributor A24 is giving us yet another chance to catch the movie this weekend, with multiple showtimes being offered Friday-Sunday.

We’re also adding two documentaries this week. In The People Vs. Agent Orange, filmmakers Alan Adelson and Kate Taverna make a compelling case for the tragic legacy, and ongoing use-and-abuse, of the notorious chemical introduced during the Vietnam War, and still haunting lives and landscapes across the globe.

Coincidentally, Jane Fonda also made a rousing appearance on the Sunday night “Golden Globes.” Distributor Kino Repertory and restoration specialist Indie Collect have unearthed the half-century-old doc FTA featuring Fonda, Donald Sutherland, and Peter Boyle headlining an anti-war, consciousness-raising roadshow near military bases both in the US and Asia — an antidote to the Bob Hope/USO fare soldiers were accustomed to — in the waning but no less fierce, final years of the Vietnam conflict.

Next week, we’ll introduce two more non-fiction features from other, diverse corners of the world. Strays, a chronicle of canine outcasts roaming the streets of Istanbul with filmmaker Q&As and Still Life in Lodz. Click on the links to watch the trailer for both films.

Gary Palmucci, Film Curator
New Plaza Cinema