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New Plaza Cinema will be closed this Friday night for a previously scheduled CUNY student event.
Last weekend was a brisk and exciting one here — four of the nine scheduled shows sold out: Farewell Mr. Haffmann (twice), Perfect Days, and Ran. While this is very gratifying to us, we know that sell outs can create some disappointment and frustration among our loyal patrons, many of whom have been following New Plaza’s journey since summer 2018.
I can only offer two suggestions, but welcome any others you may have. The best way to secure seats for a popular film is to purchase tickets online as far in advance as possible. We know this isn’t always feasible in our complicated lives, but I would also say that we’ll always endeavor to schedule additional shows of the most popular titles on subsequent weekends — Daniel Auteuil in Farewell Mr Haffmann and Wim Wenders’ Perfect Days will be back this Saturday and Sunday, and Kurosawa’s tumultuous epic Ran will return on Saturday, April 13.
I’d also recommend that you follow us on social media, where screenings are often announced in advance. We’re @NewPlazaCinema on Facebook and Twitter and @new_plaza_cinema on Instagram.
Also on this weekend’s schedule:
- Martin Scorsese’s 1988 classic The Last Temptation of Christ, featuring Willem Dafoe, Barbara Hershey, and Harvey Keitel, with Peter Gabriel’s incandescent musical score. Scorsese biographer Mary Pat Kelly, a close collaborator on the film during its various incarnations in the ’80s, will join me for what I’m sure will be a spirited discussion.
- Our new movie addition for the week is the acclaimed Mexican family drama Totem. In her NY Times Critic’s Pick review, Manohla Dargis writes “Totem is a coming into consciousness story about a child navigating realms – human and animal, spiritual and material – that exist around her like overlapping concentric circles. Yet even as the story’s focus sharpens, what matters here are the characters…how they hold it together and fall apart, their individual habits and shared habitat…set largely in a rambling house on a single momentous day.” Totem reached last year’s Oscar shortlist for Best International Feature Film.
- An encore screening of Ennio, the lovingly comprehensive documentary on the great film composer Ennio Morricone, with Max Alvarez and I hosting a discussion and Q&A on his amazingly protean output.
- Another showing of Make Me Famous, nearing the first anniversary of its New Plaza premiere, with — as usual — filmmakers Brian Vincent and Heather Spore here for an after-talk.
- An encore screening of the Cannes Palme d’or winner Anatomy of a Fall, starring the luminous Sandra Huller.
And next weekend:
- Kiss Me, Kosher, a subversive new Israeli comedy featuring acclaimed actor John Carroll Lynch (Zodiac, Gran Torino,The Americans) who’ll join us for Q&As.
- By popular demand, Remembering Gene Wilder, as well as a 50th anniversary screening of Mel Brooks’ uproarious, Gene-starring Blazing Saddles.
- The return of Kurosawa’s “blood-and-thunder” Ran. Get those tickets early!
Gary Palmucci, Film Curator
New Plaza Cinema
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