Salesman

Movies to See Right Now

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Isabelle Huppert in ELLE
Isabelle Huppert in ELLE

The best reason to go to the movies is to see Isabelle Huppert in the wowzer Elle, which has opened at the Embarcadero in San Francisco and will open more widely in the Bay Area on the Thanksgiving weekend.  Here are top choices that are easier to find:

  • The Korean period con artist movie The Handmaiden is gorgeous, erotic and extraordinarily entertaining.
  • Sonia Braga is still luminous in the character-driven Brazilian drama Aquarius.
  • John Travolta, Ethan Hawke and Jumpy the dog sparkle in the spaghetti western In a Valley of Violence.
  • Mascots is the latest mockumentary from Christopher Guest (Best in Show) and it’s very funny. Mascots is playing in very few theaters, but it’s streaming on Netflix Instant, too.

Also in theaters or on video:

      • Despite a delicious performance by one of may faves, Michael Shannon, I’m not recommending Nocturnal Animals;  I’m writing about it tomorrow.
      • Arrival with Amy Adams, is real thinking person’s sci-fi. Every viewer will be transfixed by the first 80% of Arrival. How you feel about the finale depends on whether you buy into the disconnected-from-linear-time aspect or you just get confused, like I did.
      • The remarkably sensitive and realistic indie drama Moonlight is at once a coming of age tale, an exploration of addicted parenting and a story of gay awakening. It’s almost universally praised, but I thought that the last act petered out.
      • Not much happens in the talented and idiosyncratic filmmaker Kelly Reichardt’s Certain Women, but it’s well-acted and feels real.
      • If you are entertained by the epically disgusting, you can catch the horror comedy The Greasy Strangler before it hits the midnight cult movie circuit. The Greasy Strangler can be streamed from Amazon Instant, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.
      • The end of the thriller The Girl on the Train (starring Emily Blunt) is indeed thrilling. But the 82 minutes before the Big Plot Twist is murky, confusing and boring.

I’ve written farewells to actor Robert Vaughn and musician Leon Russell, who died earlier this week.

My Stream of the Week is the documentary The Lovers and the Despot, the story of a crazy dictator’s kidnapping of a movie director and his movie star wife – and how they escaped and proved that it really happened.  The Lovers and the Despot is now available streaming from Amazon Instant, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play and cable and satellite TV on demand.

On November 23, Turner Classic Movies plays a groundbreaking cinéma vérité documentary from 1968. Salesman is as revealing a depiction of the sales life as Glengarry Glen Ross, and just as heartbreaking – you can’t have capitalism without winners and losers. Imagine selling Bibles door-to-door.

SALESMAN
SALESMAN

Movies to See Right Now

by
Matthew McConaughey in TRUE DETECTIVE
Matthew McConaughey in TRUE DETECTIVE

My top picks:

  • Ranging from wry to hilarious, the German dark comedy A Coffee in Berlin hits every note perfectly. I love this little movie, and it may only be in theaters for another week, so see it while you can.
  • It’s not up to Clint Eastwood’s usual standard, but Jersey Boys, is mostly fun – and features another jaunty performance by Christopher Walken.
  • If you look for it in theaters, you can still find my top movie of the year so far, the transcendent Polish drama Ida.

Among other movies out now:

My DVD/Stream of the week – perfect for binge-viewing on the holiday weekend – is the eight one-hour episodes of HBO’s True Detective. It’s a dark tale of two mismatched detectives – each tormented by his own demons – obsessed by a whodunit in contemporary back bayou Lousiana. Wood Harrelson is very good, and Matthew McConaughey’s performance may have been the best on TV this year. True Detective is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from HBO GO.

Turner Classic Movies also offers a pretty appetizing movie smorgasbord this week, starting with The Big Steal (1949) on July 8  – Robert Mitchum and Jane Greer are chased all over Mexico by William Bendix.  Then on July 10, we have three great documentaries:

  • The 1968 Salesman – as good of a depiction of the sales life as Glengarry Glen Ross);
  • Harlan County, U.S.A, the 1979 Oscar-winner Filmmaker Barbara Kopple embedded herself among the striking coal miners and got amazing footage – including of herself threatened and shot at.  Also one of my 5 Great Hillbilly Movies.
  • The Times of Harvey Milk  – the Oscar winner from 1984.  The real story behind Milk with the original witnesses.  One of the best political movies ever.