Laemmle's Royal Theatre

One of the most beguiling of the stories knotted up in Salman Rushdie's 1981 novel Midnight's Children concerns a lovelorn doctor, his beautiful patient, and that timeless exemplar of old-world prudishness: a sheet with a hole in it. That... More »

One of the most beguiling of the stories knotted up in Salman Rushdie's 1981 novel Midnight's Children concerns a lovelorn doctor, his beautiful patient, and that timeless exemplar of old-world prudishness: a sheet with a hole in it. That courtship sings onscreen, too, in Deepa Mehta's adaptation of a novel stubbornly resistant to adaptation. Still, so lavish and unwieldy is the book that a film of it can't help but feel like a helpless reduction, like a bucket of water passed off as an ocean. Or, more to the point: Watching this is like seeing the highlights of Midnight's Children, one at a time, through a hole in a sheet. The doctor, Aadam (Rajat Kapoor), is the grandfather of Saleem (Satya Bhabha), the novel's narrator, a man "handcuffed to history"-- Saleem is born at the stroke of midnight the day India achieved its independence, and his life doubles the experience of his homeland. In Rushdie's novel, Saleem has hundreds of pages to chart the twining, allusive history of him, his country, and the hundreds of other children born on that midnight, all of whom seem to have superpowers and hold meetings in each others' dreams. Also, Saleem has a magic nose and is switched at birth with another baby, a boy who doomed to a life of poverty and resentment while Saleem is given the advantage of wealth. The movie, meanwhile, has just two and a half hours to cram all this in. When you're trying to allegorize some 40 years' worth of history through the experience of a super-snooted child of destiny, is it essential to open with the erotic meet-cute of his grandparents? « Less

(3:40 PM), 9:35 PM

"You use big words to say simple things," says Augustine (Soko), an illiterate kitchen maid, to the esteemed doctor treating her for the distinctly female malady "hysteria." This would be a show of boilerplate feistiness in most films, but in... More »

"You use big words to say simple things," says Augustine (Soko), an illiterate kitchen maid, to the esteemed doctor treating her for the distinctly female malady "hysteria." This would be a show of boilerplate feistiness in most films, but in writer-director Alice Winocour's Augustine, it stands as a subtler, more complex victory. Having been largely silent or monosyllabic for much of the film, subjected to all manner of brutal poking and prodding in the name of science, the fact that she has spoken at all is something of a defiant act, a signal of her emerging sense of self. Augustine was a real life figure, subject of a case-study by Dr. Jean-Martin Charcot, a pioneering 19th-century French neurologist who claimed Freud as a student. The doctor (played by Vincent Lindon) was a formidable man, a celebrity who revolutionized the ways patients were diagnosed and treated while also forging breakthroughs in conceptualizing the workings of the brain itself (thus setting the stage for modern neurology). But according to Winocour's film, his bedside manner was often unthinkingly cruel. Charcot's brusque manner, the way he ignores Augustine's questions and callously manhandles her nude body, underscores an imbalance of power that has everything to do with differences in gender and class. He wields that power in an especially punitive way once his sexual attraction to his star patient gets the better of him. Gorgeously shot, lavishly costumed, and well acted, Augustine is something of a paradox, simultaneously passionate and dispassionate, its ending tethered to both bruised triumph and a sense of things falling apart. « Less

(1:50 PM), (4:30 PM), 7:20 PM, 9:55 PM

A charming display of auto-critique, In the House is a cocktail of one part Shadow of a Doubt, one part Rear Window, and two parts Jacques Derrida: It's not so much a thriller as a playful deconstruction thereof, allowing characters to comment on... More »

A charming display of auto-critique, In the House is a cocktail of one part Shadow of a Doubt, one part Rear Window, and two parts Jacques Derrida: It's not so much a thriller as a playful deconstruction thereof, allowing characters to comment on their own roles in the narrative. Most of the commentary comes from Germain (Fabrice Luchini), who teaches literature at a suburban French high school, where his students might be characterized as barely sentient. But one, Claude (Ernst Umhauer), has a gift for storytelling. Claude's writings detail his increasingly creepy involvement with his friend Rapha's (Bastien Ughetto) family. Claude spies on Rapha's gorgeous mom (Emmanuelle Seigner) and as his behavior approaches stalking, Germain thrills at Claude’s account of all this, urging him to proceed with his story-- and, by proxy, his behavior toward Rapha's family. "It lacks a conflict," Germain tells Claude, sounding like an exasperated filmmaker. In the House creates something far more original than the same old heart-pounding. Germain's meta-narrative commentary ensures an alienating effect, and therein lies the refreshing uniqueness: Since Hitchcock's films are perpetually analyzed by film theorists, why not provide the space for such analysis within a thriller itself? As the narrative gamesmanship ramps up—Germain becomes the audience’s surrogate and advocate, demanding more conflict; Claude begins to criticize Germain's criticism from within the stories themselves-- In the House investigates a far tougher riddle than what makes Claude tick-- it's trying to figure out why, exactly, voyeurism and mystery delight us so. In the process, it delights. « Less

(4:20 PM), 9:40 PM

Serena Williams' post-Olympic Crip Walk victory dance doesn't make it into Maiken Baird and Michelle Major's documentary Venus and Serena, and neither does the subsequent ginned-up controversy. (The film centers on the sisters' 2011 comebacks.)... More »

Serena Williams' post-Olympic Crip Walk victory dance doesn't make it into Maiken Baird and Michelle Major's documentary Venus and Serena, and neither does the subsequent ginned-up controversy. (The film centers on the sisters' 2011 comebacks.) But the outcry (and its analysis by Tumblr's brightest) lays bare the urgency of one of the film's urgent missions: an examination of the toxic reactions that have dogged the siblings since their first tennis-world triumphs. The doc combines rare news footage and home movies with much arresting new material: interviews; clips from their 2011 matches; and footage of them training, recovering from illnesses and goofily singing karaoke (a Venus obsession). The Williams clan is captivating, and best celebrity testimonials are blunt-- Chris Rock says the first time he saw the siblings he recognized that "they weren't country club black. They were black like I was used to"-- or dazzlingly self-serving, as with Bill Clinton's comment, "When I see a great athlete do something self-destructive, I always think we should cut them some slack." (That probably resembles an argument he's made in his own life.) It would take a miniseries to do justice to all the sisters have accomplished in the face of obvious obstacles and naked double standards, but what Venus and Serena does extraordinarily well is capture the work ethic and under-sung smarts of the sisters while taking viewers deep into their enviably close relationship. But the film isn't hagiography. The sisters are never denied their complexity or humanity, and Serena offers a comment that likely sums up her psychology better than volumes of ink ever could: "I hate losing more than I like winning." « Less

(1:10 PM), 7:00 PM

At last! A documentary about that underexposed group: the 1 percenters in their lair. In Scatter My Ashes at Bergdorf's, the storied store is presented in cinematic terms as ex-screenwriter Matthew Miele watches decorator David Hoey madly... More »

At last! A documentary about that underexposed group: the 1 percenters in their lair. In Scatter My Ashes at Bergdorf's, the storied store is presented in cinematic terms as ex-screenwriter Matthew Miele watches decorator David Hoey madly creating window displays of phantasmagorical "installation art" that moves. The film's climax is the famous annual holiday unveiling as the hoi polloi press their noses against the glass. Yet the long-term employees fascinate more than the clothes: They are beautiful gargoyles, true freaks of fashion. We don’t get interviews with non-celeb shoppers of the reticent monied class, but designers Manolo Blahnik, Jason Wu, Patricia Field, and others each give their rendition of "What Bergdorf's Meant to Me." Vera Wang nails it: Being obsessive is a given; the key is how you fit into the market. A one-size-fits-all documentary format includes a mini-history; apparently the founders weren't just in it for the money. Edwin Goodman was a tailor who knew how to cut and cared about quality. Yet this macchiato with 24-karat gold flecks may not be to everyone’s taste. Spending $7,000 on shoes is shrugged off, since here success is affording Bergdorf Goodman's. Without the dueling-divas drama of The September Issue, or the shiny dynamism of Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel, this doc, title taken from a remark by a wealthy European shopper and immortalized in a New Yorker cartoon, is fun and frothy, a fan's mash note. « Less

(1:40 PM), 7:10 PM