May 19 - May 26, 2005

We were MIA last week, and this week's news is late. Why? Because we've just finalized the line-up for the New York Asian Film Festival (June 17 - 30).



It'll be at the Anthology Film Archives and The ImaginAsian theater and advanced tickets will be on sale soon. What are we showing? Try THREE...EXTREMES, GODZILLA: FINAL WARS, Suzuki Seijun's PRINCESS RACCOON with Zhang Ziyi (in its North American premiere), Korea's R-POINT, Hong Kong's ONE NIGHT IN MONGKOK and Japan's A TASTE OF TEA. There's 26 films and you can see some of them on our temporary webpage at www.subwaycinema.com. Full site is coming soon.



We are more than a little hyped with this year's line-up - it's the best we have ever had and we hope you are as excited as we are! We have all kinds for all types - romances, feel good films, horror movies, action to epic - a film with a wheelchair bound serial killer, a low-budget Spiderman imitator that is hilarious, a medical student who has his girlfriend as his cadaver in class, giant robots in a free for all, female bonding films and a husband and father who thinks he is a bird and his loving family just learns to deal with it. This will be fun!



COMING SOON - THEATRICAL RELEASES

6/2 DOLLS, BRIGHT FUTURE
Takeshi Kitano and Kiyoshi Kurosawa's latest films play the Anthology as part of a Palm Pictures weekend

6/10 CAFE LUMIERE
Taiwanese arthouse darling, Hou Hsiao-hsien, crafted this beautiful ode to Japan's master of quiet lyricism, Yasujiro Ozu, that will play a run at the Anthology Film Archives.

6/17 HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE
Hayao Miyazaki's epic animated film is slated for a US release. You know what to expect, and you know it'll be good.

SPECIAL SHOWING:

For those of us who couldn't get tickets to Wong Kar-wai's 2046 at the Tribeca Festival - and that would probably be all of us - Lincoln Center is having a showing on June 15th! A film from Wong Kar-wai is always an event and this one is saturated in his typical ill-fated romantic meanderings that make you wonder why any of us bother to fall in love.
http://www.filmlinc.com/wrt/programs/6-2005/fcs-2046.htm



IN GENERAL RELEASE
5/13 UNLEASHED
Jet Li, Morgan Freeman, Bob Hoskins - isn't that all you need to hear? It's Jet Li's best performance pretty much ever, and it's got great action by Yuen Wo-ping, but more than that it's the most serious, emotional action movie to come along in a long, long time and as over-the-top as it gets it never stops telling its bizarrely compelling story.
Read reviews:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/unleashed

OLDBOY
Empire 25, Angelika Film Center
read a review:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/oldboy

KUNG FU HUSTLE (2005, Hong Kong)
Everywhere
read a review:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/kungfuhustle



NOW PLAYING
Angelika Film Center
OLDBOY

BORN INTO BROTHELS (USA, 2004)
read reviews:
http://www.mrqe.com/lookup?isindex=born+into+brothels

Anthology Film Archive
LAST LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE (Thailand, 2003, 112 minutes)
Starts 5/20
Thailand's madman, Pen-ek Ratanaruang, made this beautiful film with Chris Doyle, Tadanobu Asano and Takashi Miike that played NYC a few months ago. It's worth your time if you didn't see it.
read reviews:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/lastlifeintheuniverse



6IXTYNIN9 (Thailand, 1999, 115 minutes)
starts 5/20
Pen-ek Ratanaruang's film, from 1999, is a fast-paced caper about a secretary who gets in trouble with the mob over a box of instant noodles. Fast paced, deadpan, and as fun as a candy store.
Read reviews:
http://www.metacritic.com/video/titles/6ixtynin9

BAM
KUNG FU HUSTLE (2005, Hong Kong)
May 18 - May 26

Village Voice Best of 2004
June 1 - 29th
Voice critics pick the best movies, and the best undistributed and undiscovered flicks of 2004. Which was last year.

CAFE LUMIERE (2004, Taiwan/Japan, 108 minutes)
Saturday, June 4 @ 7PM

THE BIG DURIAN (2003, Malaysia, 75 minutes)
Tuesday, June 14 @ 7:30PM
Amir Muhammed has been lauded as the best thing to happen to Asian film in a long time and here's your chance to check out the first feature from this fresh n'funky Malaysian funkmaster. It's a mockumentary about an episode in recent Malay history when a soldier ran amuck at rush hour in a city.

THE WORLD (2004, China, 139 minutes)
Friday, June 17 @ 7PM
One show only of Zhang Jiake's latest movie that played last year's New York Film Festival. Zhang looks at modern day China through the prefabricated kaleidoscope of actors at an Epcot "It's a Small World After All" style theme park.

GOODBYE DRAGON INN (2003, Taiwan, 82 minutes)
Monday, June 20 @ 4:30, 6:50 and 9:15PM
Tsai Ming-liang, the other director from Taiwan, sets his latest, water-logged movie in a decaying, haunted cinema screening its last film: King Hu's DRAGON INN.

GHOST IN THE SHELL 2: INNOCENCE (2004, Japan, 99 minutes)
Tuesday, June 21 @ 4:30, 6:50 and 9:15PM
The sequel to the ground-breaking anime, GHOST IN THE SHELL, isn't a patch on its predecessor but everyone agreed: it's gorgeous. See it in a movie theater, the way you should.

WOMAN IS THE FUTURE OF MAN (2004, Korea, 88 minutes)
Thursday, June 23 @ 7PM
Hong Sang-Soo is an acquired taste, but if you love this Korean director, then you REALLY love him. His latest flick is a stone-faced, subtle comedy about two guys looking for the girl they lost a long time ago.

INFERNAL AFFAIRS (2002, Hong Kong, 100 minutes)
Saturday, June 26 @ 2, 4:30, 6:50 and 9:15PM
Hong Kong's gobstopping thriller is the tautest, tightest, most tension-filled 100 minutes you'll experience in a theater: and hardly a single bullet gets fired. The story of a cop who goes undercover in the triads, while a triad member goes undercover in the cops, was from 2002, but it didn't open stateside until 2004. And now Martin Scorsese's remaking it with Leonardo DiCaprio (ugh - the horror, the horor). Forget about it. See the original.

ImaginAsian Theater
(239 East 59th Street, btwn 2nd and 3rd Ave)
CALAMARI WRESTLER (Japan, 2004, 95 minutes)
Daily at 5:30PM and 10:10PM
A Japanese comedy about a professional wrestler who happens to be a giant squid. He has trouble with love and in the ring, but he will learn to fight! He will be the wrestling squid champion!
Read a review:
http://www.mrqe.com/lookup?isindex=calamari+wrestler

2009: LOST MEMORIES (Korea, 2002, 136 minutes)
daily at 2:40PM and 7:30PM
The Korean sci-fi flick about an alternate future where Japan won World War II is now playing. It's a perplexing, confusing, big-budget, good-looking movie. Best thing ever? No. But if you're a sci fi fan there's more than enough to hold your interest in this fascinating misfire.
Read a review:
http://www.koreanfilm.org/kfilm02.html#lostmem

JOKE FALLS (India, 2004, 140 minutes)
Daily at noon
India has several different film industries, not just Bollywood, and this is a comedy entry from Kannada (not our neighbors to the north, but the region to the south). A remake of the Bollywood classic CHUPKE CHUPKE, about a professor of botany who goes in disguise to work in his brother-in-law's house to try to prove to his wife that he's as good as her sister's husband. Confused, yet? Reviews are mixed, but some are raves.
Read a review:
http://www.chitraloka.com/sections/how_is_it/jokefalls.html

Japan Society
OTAKU CINEMA SLAM
March 4 - May 27, 2005
This showcase of Japan’s geekiest movies has some great surprised hidden on the inside. The flicks all deal with obsessions, pop culture, and costume fetishes.

A2 (Japan, 2001, 131 minutes)
Friday, May 20 @ 6:30PM
A sequel to the film (which I think is a documentary) about the struggle to survive of the new incarnation of the Aum cult, who were responsible for the sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system. A2 follows the ex-cult members as they try to fit in.

GAMERA 3: REVENGE OF IRIS (Japan, 1999, 110 minutes)
Friday, May 27 @ 6:30PM
If you're going to see one giant monster movie, make yours GAMERA 3. Introduced by Brian Camp, this is the ultimate kaiju eiga (giant monster movie) and it delivers on the promises made, but never fulfilled, by hundreds of monster movies over the years. GAMERA 3 finally satisfies all your expectations.
Read a review:
http://www.subwaycinema.com/frames/archives/nyaff02/gamera.htm

Korean Film Screening & Discussion:
KOREAN CULTURAL SERVICE
Thursday, May 26 @ 6:30PM
DECONSTRUCTION OF A KOREAN HOUSEWIFE (Korea, 2004) AND THEREAFTER... (Korea, 2004)
Free to the public, but please RSVP to (212) 759-9550
A discussion with Im Hyun-Ock and both directors after the screenings.
Two terrific documentaries, one by Lee Ho-Sup and one by Oscar nominee Christine Choy. Choy's DECONSTRUCTION is the story of a Korean housewife who comes to NYC to convince Choy to make a documentary about her uncle. AND THEREAFTER... (which I've seen) is a movie about the Korean war bride of an American GI currently living in NJ. Doesn't sound too compelling until you see her and realize that after 40 years she still has refused to learn English, her husband has refused to learn Korean, and that the family is hiding some very dark secrets. Really great stuff and worth your time.

Loew's State Theater
JO BOLE SO NIHAAL
Daily at 6:10PM and 9:20PM
The FBI needs a Punjabi cop to track down a terrorist, and so they turn to purveyor of action cheese, Sunny Deol. Mindless. Read a fun review however that talks at length about how "Punjabi" the movie is.
Read it here:
http://www.teenstation.com/movies/bollywood/reviews/index.php?aid=407

KAAL (India, 2005, 170 minutes)
Daily at 6PM and 9:10PM
A laughably inept horror/action movie wherein a former Ms. Universe (Lara Dutta) and a couple of Bolly-Studs get lost in a nature reserve full of man-eating tigers and their master. They must hike out of the wilderness after a tiger attack. High heeled shoes get stuck in the mud. There is much sweating and stubble.
Read reviews:
http://brns.com/bollywood/pages1/bolly96.html
http://planetbollywood.com/Film/Kaal/

Museum of the Moving Image
THROWDOWN (2004, Hong Kong, 95 minutes)
Friday, May 27 @ 7:30PM
Who said pure entertainment couldn't be smart? Johnnie To's ode to judo, standing up for yourself, and figuring out what it is that you actually want, is one of the best movies of 2004. If you missed it, go see it. Guaranteed to be more entertaining than anything else currently playing.

UNKNOWN PLEASURES (2002, China, 113 minutes)
Saturday, June 11 @ 1:30PM
Zhang Jiake's first feature is all about restless youth in modern day China. And boy are they restless.

THE WORLD (2004, China, 139 minutes)
Saturday, June 11 4PM

FALLEN ANGELS (1995, Hong Kong, 95 minutes)
Sunday, June 12 @ 2PM
A much-loved and long-neglected movie by Wong Kar-wai, back when he made films that were pop-fast, and neon-furious, FALLEN ANGELS stars a bunch of Hong Kong heartthrobs (including HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGER's Takeshi Kaneshiro). Heartbreak and hitmen.



MILLENIUM MAMBO (2001, Taiwan, 105 minutes)
Sunday, June 12 @ 4PM
Hou Hsiao-hsien's movie about...who cares? It stars Shu Qi, one of the most beautiful actresses in all of Asia.



QUAD
3 IRON (Korea, 2004)
Director Kim Ki-Duk turns in his best movie since SAMARITAN GIRL with 3-IRON. The story of a guy who breaks into houses and cleans them, then hooks up with a battered wife, it'll drive you crazy if you can't deal with a movie where neither main character speaks for the entire running time. But if you can go with Director Kim's kooky flow, you'll have a grand old time.
Read a review:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/3iron

Pioneer Two Boots Theater
They didn't do that well in theaters, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're bad movies. Otomo's STEAMBOY and Tony Jaa's ONG BAK both have a lot going for them: STEAMBOY is the follow-up anime movie from the director of the ground-breaking AKIRA, and ONG BAK is the best action movie of the past several years. Check them out at midnights at Two Boots in the East Village.

ONG BAK
Midnights: Saturday May 7, Saturday May 14, Saturday May 21, Saturday May 28
read a review:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/ongbak

STEAMBOY
Midnights: Friday May 6, Friday May 13, Friday May 20, Friday May 27
Read a review:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/steamboy