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“A genre work of superior, silken craftsmanship, so sinister, serpentine and sexy as to be downright swoon-worthy,” DECISION TO LEAVE opens Friday.

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What happens when an object of suspicion becomes a case of obsession? Winner of the Best Director prize earlier this year at Cannes, Park Chan-wook (Oldboy, The Handmaiden) returns with Decision to Leave, a seductive romantic thriller that takes his renowned stylistic flair to dizzying new heights. As of this writing the film’s Rotten Tomatoes’ score is 93%, with the most sophisticated critics kvelling about the film’s artistry and suggesting repeat viewings. We open the film Friday at the NoHo and Glendale with additional engagements planned in the subsequent weeks around town.

“Even the most expositional passages of this elegant, tricky murder mystery brim with quietly stunning craft.” ~ A.A. Dowd, Chron
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“The film is a box of secret compartments; just when you think you’ve got it all figured out, one more panel springs open.” ~
Stephanie Zacharek, TIME Magazine
"A genre work of superior, silken craftsmanship, so sinister, serpentine and sexy as to be downright swoon-worthy," DECISION TO LEAVE opens Friday.
“A genre work of superior, silken craftsmanship, so sinister, serpentine and sexy as to be downright swoon-worthy.” ~ Nick Schager, The Daily Beast
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“[Park Chan-wook’s] perspective is unmistakable in exploring the dark and twisted ways in which people relate to each other… So sumptuous, wrong, and fun.” ~ Christy Lemire, FilmWeek (KPCC – NPR Los Angeles)
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“The ambiguity of what is really going on is what makes the film so tantalizing…. Decision to Leave is a stunning achievement that ends by deliberately raising more questions than it answers.” ~ Gary M. Kramer, Salon.com
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"A genre work of superior, silken craftsmanship, so sinister, serpentine and sexy as to be downright swoon-worthy," DECISION TO LEAVE opens Friday.

“If the erotic thrillers of the past explored the dangers of lust, Park Chan-wook explores the risks of longing. His take on the genre isn’t just sexy; it’s playful and mordant and convoluted — and it begs to be rewatched.” ~ Shirley Li, The Atlantic

“In a world fraught with corporate values and shareholders, this was a family business that…understood the importance of planting a tree for the next generation.” Director Raphael Sbarge on his documentary ONLY IN THEATERS.

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Only in Theaters filmmaker Raphael Sbarge kindly penned a director’s statement to share with you:

“I grew up in New York City, which at the time felt like a city filled with artists and colorful, intellectual, people. My father was an artist and a filmmaker, my mother, a Broadway costume designer. When I met the Laemmle family, they felt very familiar to me—their caring for one another, their openness and curiosity, their shared passion for art, music and culture, and their recognition that those things make life richer. 

“It was always the Laemmle family that drew me to this story. 

"In a world fraught with corporate values and shareholders, this was a family business that...understood the importance of planting a tree for the next generation." Director Raphael Sbarge on his documentary ONLY IN THEATERS.
Greg & Tish Laemmle

“Our plan was to highlight the Laemmle family’s unbelievable legacy and impact on the motion picture industry and set it against the slowly changing landscape. What we didn’t realize was the extent to which we were poised to witness history unfold. Not long after we started, we realized the story was much bigger than we had imagined. 

“We ended up following the family for over two-and-a-half years, during which the Laemmle story became a microcosm of the macrocosm. The question was, where was it all headed? 

"In a world fraught with corporate values and shareholders, this was a family business that...understood the importance of planting a tree for the next generation." Director Raphael Sbarge on his documentary ONLY IN THEATERS.
Greg Laemmle

“Multiple generations of a family had built a business on the core principle of celebrating artists. There was something so innate, so essential about the Laemmle family mission, which was ever more remarkable in a world that often undervalues artists, even though artists help us see the world, interpret it, and give it meaning. 

“In a world fraught with corporate values and shareholders, this was a family business that wasn’t driven only by money, but by people who understood the importance of planting a tree for the next generation. 

"In a world fraught with corporate values and shareholders, this was a family business that...understood the importance of planting a tree for the next generation." Director Raphael Sbarge on his documentary ONLY IN THEATERS.
Greg & Tish Laemmle

“We feel quite privileged to have been there, during what was the most tumultuous 24-month period in the theater’s history. We found ourselves quite suddenly in the “hot part of the flame,” witnessing the Laemmle’s’ challenges, which were echoed over and over by theaters around the country and around the world.” ~ Raphael Sbarge

Mr. Sbarge and cast member Greg Laemmle will participate in a Q&A following the 7 o’clock screening of Only in Theaters at the Monica Film Center on November 14 as part of the Reel Talk with Stephen Farber series. The regular engagements begin November 18 at the Royal and other Laemmle venues.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=er1BIUWv3MA

Documentary about Laemmle ONLY IN THEATERS plays Saturday at the Newport Beach Film Festival.

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     This Saturday presents a chance for an advance screening of the documentary Only in Theaters at the Newport Beach Film Festival. The filmmaker and some cast members will be there for a Q&A. We’ve been in business since 1938 but this is the first time we’ve been the subject of a film. Director Raphael Sbarge started filming a few months before the pandemic started and it was an opportune moment in terms of dramatic content because of course COVID-19 shut us down for a year, but he kept on filming. Variety Magazine described the film as “2022’s most emotional theatrical experience so far…watching Greg Laemmle struggle with the fate of his family’s eponymous arthouse business.”
     Synopsis: The Laemmle Theatres, a beloved 84-year-old art house cinema chain in Los Angeles, is facing seismic change. The family members behind this multigenerational business—whose sole mission has been to support the art of film—remain determined, despite enormous challenges.
     Some of the people interviewed for Only in Theaters include Ava DuVernay, Cameron Crowe, James Ivory, Nicole Holofcener, Kevin Thomas, Leonard Maltin, Kenneth Turran, Allison Anders, and Greg Laemmle.
     If you want to wait to see Only in Theaters at a Laemmle Theatre, we’ll open it on 11/18 at the Royal and other venues.

“A much-appreciated record of resistance,” FOUR WINTERS opens Friday at the Royal, Town Center and Newhall.

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Torn from their families by the ravages of Hitler’s armies, men and women, many barely in their teens, escaped into the forests, banding together in partisan brigades; engaging in treacherous acts of sabotage, blowing up trains, burning electric stations, and attacking armed enemy headquarters. Against extraordinary odds, over 25,000 Jewish partisans courageously fought back against the Nazis and their collaborators from deep within the forests of WWII’s Belarus, Ukraine and Eastern Europe.

"A much-appreciated record of resistance," FOUR WINTERS opens Friday at the Royal, Town Center and Newhall.
Sara Ginaite during the war.

The last surviving partisans relive their journey in Four Winters, sharing their stories of resistance. Director Julia Mintz shines a spotlight on their transformation from young innocents raised in closely knit Jewish communities and families, to becoming fierce partisan soldiers with enduring hope, grit, magnificent courage and deep humanity.

Featuring the photography of Faye Schulman, partisan photographer clad in her signature leopard coat, and through a fusion of inspiring and powerful first-person interviews with stunning archival footage, Four Winters uncovers secrets held for lifetimes, revealing a heartfelt narrative of heroism, determination and resilience.

"A much-appreciated record of resistance," FOUR WINTERS opens Friday at the Royal, Town Center and Newhall.
Sara Ginaite being interviewed for the film.

“Four Winters offers an enduring warning amid today’s global struggle with authoritarian forces: As one speaker explains, her neighbors were already anti-Semitic before the war, but with power, they became vicious.” ~ Nicolas Rapold, New York Times

“Strikes a harrowing chord … Four Winters is an absorbing and emotional testament to a little-known aspect of the Holocaust, and a much-appreciated record of resistance.” ~ Valerie Kalfrin, AWFJ Women on Film

Luis Buñuel’s THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL 60th Anniversary Screenings October 12 at Three Laemmle Locations

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Continuing the 60th anniversary celebration of the milestone film year 1962, Laemmle Theatres and the Anniversary Classics Abroad Series present Luis Buñuel’s scathing surreal satire, THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL. The film plays one night only, Wednesday, October 12 at 7:00 PM at three Laemmle locations: The Royal in West Los Angeles, the Laemmle Glendale, and the Laemmle Newhall in Santa Clarita.
Luis Buñuel's THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL 60th Anniversary Screenings October 12 at Three Laemmle Locations

Buñuel, a Spanish-born iconoclast and provocateur, spent most of his career working outside his native country. In 1962, at the age of 62, Bunuel was enjoying international acclaim after being coaxed out of Mexican exile the year before to make ‘Viridiana,’ which was suffused with his characteristic caustic wit and anti-religious sentiment. The film’s notoriety revived his career and placed him at the center of international film culture for the remainder of his career. THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL, made in Mexico, further cemented his credentials as a mordant satirist. The story, written by Buñuel and Luis Alcoriza, deals with a lavish dinner party at the home of wealthy opera patrons in which the upper-class guests find themselves unable to leave after the meal. After a few days a rescue party is organized but the would-be rescuers cannot enter the house, and chaos ensues. During the ordeal the guests find their veneer of civilization slowly stripped away.

Luis Buñuel's THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL 60th Anniversary Screenings October 12 at Three Laemmle Locations

Critics were struck by Buñuel’s unrepentant approach to skewering the ruling elites.Andrew Sarris, the esteemed film critic of The Village Voice, called Buñuel “The last of the classic surrealists of the screen,” and was impressed with his “stylistic serenity. Where he was once merely profane, he is now eminently profound.” Leonard Maltin called it a “wry assault on bourgeois manners,” while Roger Ebert more exuberantly cited it as “a macabre comedy, a mordant view of human nature that suggests we harbor savage instincts and unspeakable secrets.” Although a curmudgeonly Bosley Crowther of the New York Times gave it an unfavorable review upon its  delayed U.S. release in 1967 after years of legal issues over distribution rights, the film’s stature and influence were fully recognized by its inclusion in The New York Times publication, “The  Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made” in 2004.
Luis Buñuel's THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL 60th Anniversary Screenings October 12 at Three Laemmle Locations

THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL premiered at the 1962 Cannes Film Festival and was selected as the  opening night entry of the first New York Film Festival the following year. Buñuel was propelled into the most successful phase of his long career, and he followed it with a number of  memorable films, ‘Belle de Jour’ (1967), ‘The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie’ (1972), and his final film, ‘That Obscure Object of Desire’ (1977) among them. Later, THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL’s influence extended beyond the screen—in 2016 it was adapted as an opera of the same name by composer Thomas Ades.

Akira Kurosawa’s THRONE OF BLOOD 65th Anniversary Screenings September 21.

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Laemmle Theatres and the Anniversary Classics Series are proud to present this month’s installment in our popular Anniversary Classics Abroad program: Akira Kurosawa’s unique Shakespearean adaptation, Throne of Blood. The Japanese auteur was always an admirer of the Bard. His late film Ran offered a variation on King Lear. The power, majesty and craftsmanship of a film like Throne of Blood can only fully appreciated in a theatrical setting: with an audience, with a big screen, and sound you can feel. We’ll be showing a DCP.

Akira Kurosawa’s THRONE OF BLOOD 65th Anniversary Screenings September 21.

For many years Kurosawa dreamed of adapting Macbeth, and he put the film together in 1957, with his favorite actor Toshiro Mifune starring as the ambitious, murderous leader. Isuzu Yamada co-stars as the Lady Macbeth character, with Takashi Shimura as the equivalent of Shakespeare’s Macduff. Kurosawa wrote the screenplay with Hideo Oguni, Shinobu Hashimoto, and Ryuzo Kikushima. They transposed the story from medieval Scotland to feudal Japan and Kurosawa came up with striking visual concepts to revitalize the classic story. The castle exteriors were filmed on the slopes of Mount Fuji and the memorable climax—with a massive array of arrows aimed at the deranged protagonist—remains one of the greatest images in any Kurosawa movie.

Akira Kurosawa’s THRONE OF BLOOD 65th Anniversary Screenings September 21.

Writing of this climactic scene, The New Yorker’s Anthony Lane declared,“No stage production could match Kurosawa’s Birnam Wood, and, in his final framing of the hero — a human hedgehog, stuck with arrows — he conjures a tragedy not laden with grandeur but pierced, like a dream, by the absurd.” British critic Derek Malcolm of the Guardian acclaimed Throne of Blood as “a landmark of visual strength… possibly the finest Shakespearean adaptation ever committed to the screen.”

Akira Kurosawa’s THRONE OF BLOOD 65th Anniversary Screenings September 21.

On its original American release, Time magazine praised the film as “a visual descent into the hell of greed and superstition.” In his four-star review, Leonard Maltin called the film a “graphic, powerful adaptation of Macbeth in a samurai setting.” It was not simply film critics who endorsed the film. Renowned literary critic Harold Bloom said that Throne of Blood was “the most successful film version of Macbeth.”

Akira Kurosawa’s THRONE OF BLOOD 65th Anniversary Screenings September 21.

Laemmle Theatres will screen Throne of Blood on September 21 at our Glendale, Newhall and Royal theaters on Wednesday, September 21 at 7 o’clock.

Watch Laemmle Theatres’ Isaac Wade on Spectrum News 1 for National Cinema Day + a Cinema Day poll!

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     Saturday’s National Cinema Day was such a success, drawing more than eight million moviegoers for the best moviegoing weekend of 2022, that it might become an annual event. Laemmle Royal and Monica Film Center General Manager Isaac Wade and a theater customer even got interviewed by journalist Nathalie Basha of local station Spectrum News 1. Isaac spoke about the experience of welcoming big crowds back to his theater: “To see people back and in line and excited to be here and wanting to support the industry, I think…that’s incredible. It’s exciting, it’s moving.”
     We are so pleased about the day’s results that we want to learn more, so here’s a poll. Did you take advantage of National Cinema Day? What movie did you see? Was Saturday your first return to the movies since before the pandemic? Inquiring minds want to know! Thank you and see you at the movies!

Celebrate moviegoing this Saturday, National Cinema Day: $3 tickets for all films, all day.

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Celebrate moviegoing and enjoy some monetary time travel this Saturday, September 3 by participating in National Cinema Day when movie theaters across the nation will charge prices circa 1980 — three bucks per ticket! This applies to any film at any time on Saturday, from François Ozon’s latest, Peter Von Kant, to Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man: No Way Home – The More Fun Stuff Version, from the new A24 comedy about the underground comics scene, Funny Pages, to Javier Bardem’s Goya-winning The Good Boss. Catch the summer sleepers Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris, Fire of Love, RRR or Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song while they’re still on big screens.

They say you can’t get something for nothing, but National Cinema Day is close! Super cheap movie tickets and, oh, did we mention the air conditioning?