A new cohort of movies is out in theaters and on cable and streaming platforms.
ICYMI, here’s my tribute to the great director Miloš Forman (One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Amadeus).
OUT NOW
This week’s top picks:
- The wonderfully dark, dark comedy The Death of Stalin.
- A Quiet Place is as satisfyingly scary as any movie I’ve seen in a good long time. Very little gore and splatter, but plenty of thrills. I’m not a big fan of horror movies, but I enjoyed and admired this one.
- Outside In: Now on Netflix (and in one Bay Area theater), this fine Lynn Shelton drama about a man returning to his community after 20 years in prison is an acting showcase for Kaitlin Dever (Justified), Jay Duplass (Transparent) and, especially, Edie Falco. Falco’s performance is stunning.
- Thom Zimny’s excellent HBO documentary Elvis Presley: The Searcher explores Elvis’ artistic journey.
- I liked Al Pacino’s portrayal of Penn State football coach Joe Paterno as his storied career was killed by scandal in HBO’s Paterno.
ON VIDEO
My DVD/Stream of the Week is Art and Craft, a startling documentary about an art fraud. Of prolific scale. And which is apparently legal. By a diagnosed schizophrenic. Art and Craft is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming on Amazon Instant Video, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube nd Google Play.
ON TV
Tomorrow night, Turner Classic Movies will air the enigmatic Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975) by Australian filmmaker Peter Weir. An Australian girls school goes on an outing to a striking geological formation – and some of the girls and a teacher disappear. What happened to them? It’s beautiful and hypnotic and haunting. It’s a film masterpiece, but if you can’t handle ambiguous endings – this ain’t for you.
Weir has gone on to make high quality hits (The Year of Living Dangerously, Witness, Dead Poets Society, The Truman Show, Master and Commander), but Picnic at Hanging Rock – the movie that he made at age 31 – is his most original work. Besides playing periodically on TCM, Picnic at Hanging Rock is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Amazon and Hulu Plus.
