Wicked Queer, the Boston area’s preeminent LGBTQ+ film festival, continues this weekend at the Brattle Theatre and the Somerville Theatre (as well as the Coolidge and other venues across the river). As always, the festival’s selections range from the outrageous (“Blowie,” screening Friday at the Brattle, about a killer blow-up doll stalking a cast of real-life sex workers) to the tender (Tara Thorne’s ensemble hangout comedy “Lakeview,” Sunday at the Somerville). Perhaps most exciting are a pair of premieres at the Brattle. Saturday brings the world premiere of Sergio Tovar Velarde’s “The Divine Tragedy,” about a former telenovela star (Artús Chávez) copes with the departure of his wealthy husband of 24 years. Then, on Sunday, catch the US premiere of the wonderfully titled “Castration Movie Chapter iii. Junior Ghosts—Premorphic Drift; a fragmentary passage,” the latest installment of director Louise Weard’s sprawling, experimental trans opus. For the complete schedule and ticket info, check out the festival’s website.
On Friday, the Harvard Film Archive continues its “Crime Scenes as History” series of Korean films with one of the best movies of the past decade. In “Decision to Leave” (2022), maverick director Park Chan-wook (“Oldboy”) channels Hitchcockian obsession into a sleek, modern thriller. A homicide detective (Park Hae-il) is called to investigate the suspicious death of a mountain climber, only to be transfixed by the victim’s widow (Chinese movie star Tang Wei). Park suffuses “Decision” with blackly comic flourishes (in an early scene, we see a fly landing on an eyeball from the point of view of the corpse), but the film is as rich and nuanced as any in recent memory, thanks in no small part to the monumental performances of its two leads. Though it perhaps lacks the flamboyance of “Oldboy,” “Decision” cements Park’s status as one of our master filmmakers.
The HFA on Saturday also kicks off a new repertory series titled “Tarr/Krasznahorkai,” celebrating the decades-long collaboration between Hungarian “slow cinema” titan Béla Tarr and the acclaimed novelist László Krasznahorkai. The series is marked by bittersweet serendipity: it was programmed last year in celebration of Krasznahorkai’s Nobel Prize in Literature, well in advance of Tarr’s passing in January. In any case, it’s a richly deserved retrospective of two masters. The series begins with “Werckmeister Harmonies” (2000), written by the duo and adapted from Krasznahorkai’s 1989 novel “The Melancholy of Resistance.” It’s followed on Sunday by Tarr and Krasznahorkai’s first collaboration, “Damnation” (1988). The series continues through the end of the month, including some very rarely screened masterpieces.
On Wednesday, the Somerville Theatre‘s “Feel Good Films” series continues with one of the great sleeper hits of the ’90s. Based on a (non-horror) novella by Stephen King, “The Shawshank Redemption” (1994) stars Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins as a pair of convicts with a plan to tunnel out of a state prison in 1940s Maine. Though the film underperformed at the box office, it slowly built up a devoted following via home video, repeated cable airings, and good old-fashioned word of mouth. Today, it ranks among the most beloved films of all time, perpetually sitting at the top of the Internet Movie Database’s user-generated Top 250 list. It’s a good bet the Somerville’s screening will be better attended than just about any in “Shawshank’s” original run. Now, get busy living, or get busy dying.
Though the box office may belong to “Project Hail Mary” and “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie,” there’s no shortage of exciting new independent releases at our local indie cinemas. On Monday, filmmaker Courtney Stephens will be present at the Brattle to introduce her new documentary “John Lilly and the Earth Coincidence Control Office,” about the life and work of the maverick scientist and self-described “psychonaut.” On Thursday, the Somerville presents a 35mm screening of Julie Pacino’s psychological thriller “I Live Here Now,” starring Lucy Fry as an aspiring actress on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Also on Thursday, the Brattle kicks off local premiere runs of a pair of acclaimed international films: “My Father’s Shadow,” by Nigerian filmmaker Akinola Davies, Jr., and Mascha Schilinski’s German-language stunner “Sound of Falling” (watch this space in the coming week for the Day’s reviews of the latter two). The next time someone tells you they don’t make any interesting movies anymore, tell them they aren’t looking hard enough.
A stronger
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