Landmark Edina 4 Theatre

1:00 PM, 7:00 PM

In Renoir, a languorous look at the last days of the storied painter, we get a view of the artist at odds with a blue-haired lady's notion of her favorite impressionist. It's a pivotal moment of Renoir family history, with father and son both... More »

In Renoir, a languorous look at the last days of the storied painter, we get a view of the artist at odds with a blue-haired lady's notion of her favorite impressionist. It's a pivotal moment of Renoir family history, with father and son both taking creative and sexual inspiration from a shared love object: Pierre-Auguste's last model-muse. Future filmmaker Jean Renoir (a vulnerable Vincent Rottier) is the middle son, recovering from a WWI wound at the family farm at Cagnes-sur-Mer in 1915. Renoir père (affectingly played by Michel Bouquet) is 74, painfully hobbled by arthritis, and grieving the recent death of his wife. Christa Theret plays Andrée, the vibrant, pretty-in-petulance model who revives his creative, if not other, juices; a startling scene reveals he wishes otherwise. Yet the film's real star is the color orange-gold with a touch of russet, making an early appearance as the hair-and-clothing-matched Andrée bicycles in the sunlight to her modeling gig. Renoir's setpiece shows the artist working on a canvas, with Mark Ping Bing Lee's camera gliding to models in soft focus, a kind of live action impressionism and a new take on the familiar Bathers. Wisely, director Gilles Bourdos keeps the pace slow, what with all the tensions beneath the surface: Oedipal conflict, career choices, even class struggle. The ambitious Andrée, aka the future Catherine Hessling of Renoir's silent films, tells Jean she won't marry a "plate painter," but a film director might do. « Less

(5:30 PM), 9:25 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

(2:20 PM), (4:50 PM)

Would you sign on for three months in shark-infested waters on a tippy raft under a captain who can't swim? The shrewdest joke in the surefire Kon-Tiki-- a film about Thor Heyerdahl's 4,000-mile South Pacific expedition to prove that ocean-faring... More »

Would you sign on for three months in shark-infested waters on a tippy raft under a captain who can't swim? The shrewdest joke in the surefire Kon-Tiki-- a film about Thor Heyerdahl's 4,000-mile South Pacific expedition to prove that ocean-faring Incans could have settled Tahiti-- is that practically every character Heyerdahl meets can't wait to join his suicide trip. Co-directors Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg have scared up the kroner to make a handsome Norwegian feature about Heyerdahl's 1947 journey-- and, rather than risk a redubbing, they shot this English-language twin at the same time, with the same actors. As passive drift gives way to seasonal currents, Kon-Tiki works up a nice head of storytelling steam. Still, exciting as they are, we've sailed these sea lanes before. Anybody who owed as much to a loan shark as these filmmakers owe to Steven Spielberg would be dead by now. Tick 'em off as they go by: the shooting star against an inky sky, the claustrophobic shark cage, plus more bristling dorsal fins than your average stegosaurus. Without conspicuously meaning to, Kon-Tiki raises a question that remains ticklish among explorers and filmmakers both: Who, finally, gets the credit? At the climax, the hero galumphs proudly ashore in Polynesia-- with the sailors who risked their lives staggering along behind. Does heroism always have to mean hogging the frame once within reach of the loving cup? As usual, posterity gets the last laugh: Most anthropologists today think Heyerdahl was wrong about the settlement of Polynesia. Won an Oscar, though. « Less

(2:40 PM), 7:30 PM, 9:35 PM

(2:00 PM), (4:30 PM)

It's time, apparently, for the aging ghosts of '60s radicalism to once again take stock of their sins and compromises. Once it gets its walkers moving, Robert Redford's The Company You Keep nearly plays like a green-granola-lefty counterpart to... More »

It's time, apparently, for the aging ghosts of '60s radicalism to once again take stock of their sins and compromises. Once it gets its walkers moving, Robert Redford's The Company You Keep nearly plays like a green-granola-lefty counterpart to The Expendables, a Hollywood Elderhostel reunion crowded with septuagenarian icons looking back on the righteousness and failures of the Nixon–'Nam era with rheumy retirees' eyeballs. The story, from Neil Gordon's novel about the contemporary fate of a few surviving Weather Underground fugitives, all but blows a trumpet for how rad rad used to be. First Susan Sarandon's Vermont housewife, her kids all grown up, throws in the secret-identity towel and surrenders herself to the FBI; from there, the dominoes tumble, leading cub reporter Shia LaBeouf to uncover the similarly fake ID of Redford's upstate lawyer, sending this suede-faced ex-Weatherman running. The FBI closes in, LaBeouf's annoying snoop pesters every single other character motivated only by his journalistic creed, and withering guest-stars (Julie Christie, Sam Elliott, Richard Jenkins, a phlegm-plagued Nick Nolte) emerge to crinkle and wheeze about the good old days of bank robberies and protests. Redford’s noble Methuselah isn't just self-preserving-- he's got an unseasonably preadolescent daughter to worry about, and a case for his own redemption to make. It's little surprise that The Company You Keep turns out to be politically chicken-hearted—the progressive cant we hear sounds idiotic, and political principles are seen as pathetic challenges to the demands of family and law and order. Redford succeeds only in defanging the idea of resistance altogether. Far from engaged, the film surrenders in an arthritic faint. « Less

8:00 PM