July 21 - July 28, 2005

COMING SOON

8/5 - 8/21
EVERYBODY WAS KUNG FU FIGHTING: THE SHAW BROTHERS
Restored Shaw Brothers films come back to NYC. Nothing here hasn't already been shown, but these flicks are always worth seeing again. Go and worship. At BAM.

IN GENERAL RELEASE

HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE (2004, Japan, 119 minutes)
Playing at Landmark Sunshine, Empire 25 and Loews Lincoln Square
Exclusive engagement starts June 10, then it opens wide on June 17. This is one of Miyazaki's most surreal, ethereal, and strange movies. It's like watching a dream...a wet one. Literally, since it's filled with flowing rivers of slime, sweat, oil, mud and just plain old goop.
Read a review:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/howlsmovingcastle

NOW PLAYING

Angelika Film Center
THE WARRIOR (2001, India/Britian)
Miramax finally releases this well-reviewed, Indian/British period piece about a guy who chops off heads for the big cheese, and then he gets sick of it and stops chopping off heads.
Read a review:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/warrior

Anthology Film Archive
THROWDOWN (2004, Hong Kong)
Friday, July 22 - Thursday, July 28 @ 7PM & 9PM (plus 3PM & 5PM on weekends)
Johnnie To's judo masterpiece doesn't need to be talked about, it just needs to be seen. One of the most unexpected, stylish and startlingly humane movies of the year.
Read a review:
http://www.mrqe.com/lookup?isindex=throwdown

A TRIBUTE TO KINO INTERNATIONAL
NYC's little house of art distributor gets its annual retrospective with lots of Wong Kar-wai and a little John Woo.

DERSU UZALA (1975, Japan, 137 minutes)
Monday, August 8 @ 9:15PM
Akira Kurosawa's comeback project after his suicide attempt in 1971 about good ol' Dersu Uzala, the mystical Russian guide.

THE KILLER (1990, Hong Kong, 119 minutes)
Thursday, August 11 @ 9PM
John Woo's ground-breaking romantic bloodshed flick that opened up the eyes of the West to Hong Kong's considerable charms. Danny Lee and the cha-cha Chow Yun-fat star as a cop and a hitman who don't know whether they want to kill or kiss each other.

DAYS OF BEING WILD (1991, Hong Kong, 94 minutes)
Thursday, August 11 @ 7PM
Wong Kar-wai turned into Wong Kar-wai with his second film that only runs 94 minutes but feels like an eternity of romantic swoons, dripping sweat and sexual torment. Come and get lost in it again in this big purty new print.

FALLEN ANGELS (1995, Hong Kong, 90 minutes)
Friday, August 12 @ 7PM
Wong Kar-wai's pop explosion is every idea he ever had wrapped up in a chewable, neon-streaked package and set to excite every neuron in your brain. Gorgeous to watch, hard to forget.

HAPPY TOGETHER (1997, Hong Kong, 97 minutes)
Friday, August 12 @ 9PM
One of the best romances ever made, HT is more like a scrapbook to all those faded loves of yesterday, giving you a shot of woo with a chaser of loss and longing. Leslie Cheung (RIP) and Tony Leung Chiu-wai go at it, hammer and tongs, whether they're screaming or screwing.

Asia Society
28th Asian American International Film Festival
July 15 - 31
With a presentation of Maggie Cheung's film CLEAN, as well as COMRADES ALMOST A LOVE STORY and CENTER STAGE, as well as the Japanese flick CRYING OUT LOVE IN THE CENTER OF THE WORLD, this festival has a full complement of shorts and documentaries, as well as Asian-American films.
More info:
http://www.aaiff.org/

Cinema Village
THE WORLD (2004, China)
Daily at 1:20PM, 4:10PM, 7PM and 9:45PM
Jia Zhangke, China's chronicler of the modern n' mopey set, has been winning praise for THE WORLD. A look at the tolls and triumphs of China's rapid modernization it's set inside the funhouse freakery of a giant EPCOT-type amusement park where the characters all play the fake inhabitants of other countries.
Read a review:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/world

MEMORIES OF MURDER (2003, Korea)
Daily at 1:15PM, 5:30PM, 9:45PM
This is one of the best movies to come out this year, and no one's going to see it because it's at one theater, and it's not getting much publicity. But it eats the lunch of FANTASTIC FOUR and CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY. Based on the true story of the race to catch Korea's first serial killer, it stars Song Kang-Ho (JSA, SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE, THE FOUL KING) and it will rock your world.
Read a review:
http://www.metacritic.com/video/titles/memoriesofmurder

IFC Center
LATE SPRING (1949, Japan)
Not sure when it's playing since their ads don't have dates on them, but this says it'll be out on Saturday and Sunday at noon.
Another still, quiet, moving classic from Japan's Yasujiro Ozu. Considered one of his best.
Read a review:
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/late_spring/

IZO (2004, Japan, 128 minutes)
Thursday at 10PM
Takashi Miike's super-pretentious, excitingly random "samurai kills everybody" movie. Like a school play with a body count. Part of the AAIFF.
Read a review:
http://www.midnighteye.com/reviews/izo.shtml

AB-NORMAL BEAUTY (2004, Hong Kong)
Wednesday at 10PM and Friday at 12AM
Lesbian horror silliness from Hong Kong's Oxide Pang. Worth a watch, but not a world-rocker. Part of the AAIFF.
Read a review:
http://www.lovehkfilm.com/reviews_2/abnormal_beauty.htm

ImaginAsian Theater
(239 East 59th Street, btwn 2nd and 3rd Ave)
OLDBOY (2003, Korea)
Daily at 10:10PM
Park Chan-Wook's most purely cinematic, chewably pulp, comic book movie. It's got more brains and more nasty secrets and satanic perversions than your average comic book inspired flick, but its cliffhanger plot and hypnotic style are the kind of thing SPIDERMAN 3 wishes it could have a little more of. Oh Dae-Su is an ordinary schlub, abducted and imprisoned for 15 years and suddenly released with a rage-induced hard-on to mess up the guy who locked him up. Then things get really twisted.
read a review:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/oldboy

VIRUDDH (2004, India, 133 minutes)
Daily at 6:30PM
A tear-jerker about Amitabh Bachchan trying to get over the death of his son and move on with his life.

KUNG FU HUSTLE (2005, Hong Kong)
Daily at 3:10PM
Stephen Chow is god, and now you know. Sony Pictures Classic releases the King of Comedy's latest flick in 2,000 theaters nationwide and you owe it to the universe to buy a ticket. Not as funny or as satisfying as 2001's SHAOLIN SOCCER, this is still the most imaginative movie to hit US screens so far this year. Plot? You don't need to know the plot...it's Stephen Chow. Just go!
read a review:
http://www.metacritic.com/film/titles/kungfuhustle

Loew's State Theater
DUS (2005, India, 170 minutes)
1:30PM, 5:15PM, 9:15PM
Abhishek Bachchan (son of Indian icon, Amitabh Bachchan) and Sanjay Dutt in an action flick about a plot to kill the prime minister of India that unfolds in Calgary. Yes, Calgary. Dumb, big, loud and no more harmful to your health than FANTASTIC FOUR.
Read a review:
http://planetbollywood.com/Film/Dus/

MAINE PYAAR KYUN KIYA (2005, India)
Everyone's been waiting for the new Salman Khan film, especially since he's now being sought for questioning for allegedly threatening the life of his ex, Aishwarya Rai. This fast-paced comedy is getting raves for its slick production and lunatic pacing. The plot? Who cares? Identity confusion, role reversals and comic misunderstandings punctuated by musical numbers.
Read a review:
http://planetbollywood.com/Film/MainePyaarKyunKiya/

Museum of Modern Art
ANIME!! (July 10 - September)
A three month celebration of anime, including screenings of the big screen blockbusters like AKIRA, GHOST IN THE SHELL and MIND GAME as well as tv episodes like the great FLCL, HIS AND HER CIRCUMSTANCES and the mind-blowing EVANGELION: END OF EVANGELION.
More info:
http://www.moma.org/exhibitions/film_media/2005/anime.html

Two Boots Pioneer Theater
7/27 - 8/2
If you missed this sweetly nostalgic film at our fest a few years ago (and almost everybody did!) do yourself a favor and go see this. It's one of the best most underrated films to come out of Hong Kong in ages - its a love poem to old Hong Kong films and the stars like Brigitte Lin and Bruce Lee and it will make you giddy with pleasure And it stars the biggest pop duo in Asia - The Twins!

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


Walter Reade Theater
Scanners: The New York Video Festival
July 27-31

This event presents unique videos from all over the world and it includes some good ones from Asia. In particular we would like to recommend something for those who appreciate the weird and strange - it's called "The Glamorous Life of Sachiko Hanai" and is about a female escort who finds Bush's finger that had been cut off and stolen by terrorists so that they could use it to set off the big one. Instead, our heroine finds a much more practical use for his finger which involves . . . well, we'll leave that to your imagination. The director, who came to a number of our recent NYAFF screenings, will be present.

Here's more info about the festival from FilmLinc's press release, including an opportunity to win free tickets:"In this year's SCANNERS: THE NEW YORK VIDEO FESTIVAL, take a peek - actually a full ogle - at Japanese soft-porn films in PINK RIBBON and THE GLAMOROUS LIFE OF SACHIKO HANAI, in which a sex-role-play call girl catches a bullet to the head and finds herself with super-spy powers. She also finds the finger of the U.S. President in her pocket, the most powerful fingerprint in the world, capable of unleashing a nuclear apocalypse!""

And while we're on the subject of Japanese media on the edge, check out COP FESTIVAL and COP FESTIVAL-RELOADED, shot-on-the-fly Japanese cops and robbers shorts - a mini industry there with a cult following around the world. Or if China's your thing, a new documentary YANG BAN XI: THE 8 MODEL WORKS explores how propaganda operas from the Cultural Revolution are being co-opted by today's hipsters."

http://www.filmlinc.com/wrt/programs/7-2005/nyvideofest05.htm

Plus, on a musical note - PUFFY AMIYUMI will be at Irving Plaza on 8/18.