After helping Laemmle Theatres survive the pandemic and theater closures, the last day to secure a rental on Laemmle Virtual Cinema will be Sunday, October 9. Thank you to everyone who rented movies and brought world cinema home to feel less isolated during dark days. Highlights among the several hundred titles we were proud to feature are Shiva Baby, the Eric Rohmer series A Tale of Springtime, A Tale of Summer, A Tale of Autumn and A Tale of Winter, Berlin Alexanderplatz; The Man Who Sold His Own Skin; and Murina. We continued LVC after reopening in April 2021 for those who enjoyed and found it useful but our core mission is and always has been theatrical exhibition. We firmly believe movies are simply better seen on a big screen with an audience and want to encourage and focus on that.
“A touching, sensory-driven new chapter to the cinema of escape and loss,” Mathieu Amalric and Vicky Krieps’ HOLD ME TIGHT opens September 23.
Laemmle Theatres is pleased to present Mathieu Amalric’s deeply emotional drama Hold Me Tight, a selection of the Cannes International Film Festival, nominated for Best Actress and Best Adapted Screenplay César Awards. We open Hold Me Tight opens Friday, September 23 at the Laemmle Royal. With 1.05 million Americans dead from COVID in the past two-and-a-half years, art about grief is crucial right now, and this film explores the subject brilliantly.
Adapted from a stage play by Claudine Galéa, Hold Me Tight stars Vicky Krieps as Clarisse, a mother coping with great emotional upheaval, and Arieh Worthalter (Girl) as Marc, the husband she leaves behind. Krieps gives a riveting performance as a woman on the run from her family for reasons that aren’t immediately clear. Amalric’s sophisticated narrative alternates between scenes of Clarisse’s road trip and of Marc as he cares for their two children, Paul and Lucie, a pianist prodigy. While giving clues along the way, Amalric keeps viewers uncertain as to the reality of what they’re seeing until the film’s final moments.
With a dual career as an acclaimed actor (The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, My Sex Life…or How I Got into an Argument, The Grand Budapest Hotel) and a writer-director (Barbara, The Blue Room, On Tour), Amalric’s sixth directorial outing is a daring, poignant and unpredictable story about love, absence, grief, and memory. Luxembourg-born actress Vicky Krieps came to international attention with her performance opposite Daniel Day-Lewis in Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread and has since starred in Bergman Island by Mia Hansen-Love and Old by M. Night Shyamalan.
Hold Me Tight’s soundtrack includes piano pieces by Ravel, Debussy, Messiaen, Beethoven, Rameau, Schönberg and Rachmaninov; the film features clips of legendary pianist Martha Argerich performing Ravel, Mozart and Chopin.
“One of the best films of the year…a powerful piece of work with poetic direction and incredible work from Krieps, an actress who increasingly feels like she’s never going to miss.” ~ Brian Tallerico, RogerEbert.com
“Hold Me Tight deftly unsettles what it means to “leave”—emotionally, physically, and spiritually—when staying put may prove impossible to bear.” ~ Eileen G’Sell, Reverse Shot
“A touching, sensory-driven new chapter to the cinema of escape and loss…with Amalric’s alert, empathetic stewardship and Krieps’ gripping portrayal, [Hold Me Tight] sets aside the banality of grief’s burden for something more alive and elusive, but no less affecting.” ~ Robert Abele, The Wrap
Akira Kurosawa’s THRONE OF BLOOD 65th Anniversary Screenings September 21.
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.
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.
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.”
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.”
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!
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!
Vincent D’Onofrio in Person for FULL METAL JACKET 35th Anniversary Screening Sept. 13
Laemmle Theatres and the Anniversary Classics Series present a 35th anniversary screening of Stanley Kubrick’s savage anti-war drama Full Metal Jacket, which scored a box office success in 1987 and also earned an Oscar nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay. Kubrick, celebrated Vietnam author Michael Herr, and Gustav Hasford adapted Hasford’s 1979 novel, The Short-Timers. The acclaimed cast includes Matthew Modine, Vincent D’Onofrio, Adam Baldwin, Dorian Harewood, and R. Lee Ermey. D’Onofrio will join for a Q&A after the 7 PM screening at the Royal on Tuesday, September 13.
Kubrick came late to the Vietnam war movie cycle, after such Oscar-winning films as Coming Home, The Deer Hunter, and Platoon. But he added his own sardonic and biting slant to his dissection of the terrible war. One of Kubrick’s early celebrated movies was his 1957 drama Paths of Glory, set during World War I. And his 1964 Oscar nominee, Dr. Strangelove, took a unique black comic approach to the terrifying subject of nuclear annihilation. Some of the same dark humor freshens Full Metal Jacket, though it also contains deadly serious depictions of brutal basic training as well as the horrors of a misguided, doomed war.
The first section of the film dramatizes the basic training of a platoon of Marine recruits at Parris Island, South Carolina. Former real-life drill instructor R. Lee Ermey portrays the savage sergeant in charge of the soldiers’ training. Ermey improvised much of the scathing and scatological dialogue, based on his own personal experience as a sergeant during the Vietnam War. He bullies and brutalizes all of the recruits but takes special pleasure in tormenting the overweight soldier played by D’Onofrio, whom he nicknames Gomer Pyle. Modine tries to protect D’Onofrio, with little success.
When the action shifts to Vietnam during the Tet offensive, it retains its hard-edged, nihilistic spirit. The entire film was actually shot in England, but Kubrick and his technical crew did an extraordinary job of recreating an American military base and the cities and jungles of Southeast Asia without ever leaving the English countryside.
Critical reactions to the film were very strong. Gene Siskel called Full Metal Jacket “a great piece of filmmaking.” The Los Angeles Times’ Sheila Benson wrote, “Aiming for minds as well as hearts, Kubrick hits his target squarely.” The Chicago Reader’s Jonathan Rosenbaum raved, “This is the most tightly crafted Kubrick film since Dr. Strangelove, as well as the most horrific.” The New York Times’ Vincent Canby called it “a film of immense and very rare imagination.” Canby’s Times colleague Janet Maslin added, “No one who sees Full Metal Jacket will easily put the film’s last glimpse of D’Onofrio, or a great many other things about Kubrick’s latest and most sobering vision, out of mind.”
After his breakthrough performance in Full Metal Jacket, D’Onofrio went on to co-star in such films as Mystic Pizza, JFK, The Player, Ed Wood, The Whole Wide World, Men in Black, Jurassic World, and Steal This Movie, in which he played Abbie Hoffman. He had a ten-year run in Law and Order: Criminal Intent. More recently he has appeared in the series Daredevil, Godfather of Harlem, and Ratched. Last year he had a major role as Jerry Falwell in the Oscar-winning The Eyes of Tammy Faye.
THE STORY OF FILM: A NEW GENERATION, an epic, hopeful tour of today’s most innovative world cinema, opens September 9 at the Royal.
A decade after The Story of Film: An Odyssey, an expansive and influential inquiry into the state of moviemaking in the 20th century, filmmaker Mark Cousins returns with an epic and hopeful tale of cinematic innovation from around the globe. In The Story of Film: A New Generation, Cousins turns his sharp, meticulously honed gaze on world cinema from 2010 to 2021, using a surprising range of works — including Frozen, The Babadook, and Cemetery of Splendour — as launchpads to explore recurring themes and emerging motifs, from the evolution of film language, to technology’s role in moviemaking today, to shifting identities in 21st-century world cinema. Touching on everything from Parasite and The Farewell to Black Panther and Lovers Rock, Cousins seeks out films, filmmakers and communities under represented in traditional film histories, with a particular emphasis on Asian and Middle Eastern works, as well as boundary-pushing documentaries and films that see gender in new ways. And as the recent pandemic recedes, Cousins ponders what comes next in the streaming age: how have we changed as cinephiles, and how moviegoing will continue to transform in the digital century, to our collective joy and wonder.
“Cousins is an omnivore extraordinaire, sharing choice morsels from the far corners of the form. And for those who appreciate the director’s wide-eyed and open-hearted way of looking at cinema, the documentary is brimming with clips sure to expand their horizons.” – Peter Debruge, Variety
“A discursive love letter to cinema. Restless and impassioned. A welcome voice in cacophonous times.” – Sheri Linden, The Hollywood Reporter
“Another engaging documentary [from Mark Cousins], a journey around the cinematic world over 160 minutes that’s clever and informative.” – Brian Tallerico, RogerEbert.com
“Ferociously eclectic, Cousins makes connections as he singles out films we’ve seen and ones we haven’t … He possesses an idiosyncratic cinematic imagination” – Steve Pond, The Wrap
Celebrate moviegoing this Saturday, National Cinema Day: $3 tickets for all films, all day.
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?
Greg Laemmle on summer 2022 word-of-mouth success stories: RRR, MRS. HARRIS GOES TO PARIS, HALLELUJAH, FIRE OF LOVE and more.
From Greg Laemmle:
After an amazing start to the summer box office season, things are going out with more of a whimper than a bang. And I’m OK with that. Ticket sales are only going to be as strong as the films that are in release at any given time. And to borrow the joke from the Catskills, the food isn’t so good …and such small portions. But that joke is only half right. Right now, there is a shortage of new films entering the marketplace. It’s largely another example of the supply chain being interrupted because of how the pandemic impacted the production schedule. Also, some of the films hitting the marketplace aren’t the most “commercial” titles. There are, however, some very worthy films that are currently in theatres. And I want to focus in on these films because they demonstrate one of the silver linings in the current marketplace, and that’s the power of WORD-OF-MOUTH.
Word-of-mouth publicity is the thing that gets people to see a film that they might not otherwise see. Maybe the reviews aren’t through the roof. Or maybe the marketing didn’t make it seem like it was a film that they would enjoy. Or maybe there wasn’t enough advertising support to bring a film to your attention. Whatever the case, we are talking about a film that you were initially not going to see. And then you hear something about the film. Someone tells you how much they enjoyed it. Or perhaps you start seeing posts about the film on your social media feed. Or maybe you talk to an employee at your local theatre and they tell you how much people are enjoying the film. However it gets started, enthusiasm and awareness begins to build. And in an environment (like now) where we theatre operators are searching for films that can draw ticket buyers, the ground is more fertile to allow a word-of-mouth success to grow.
This phenomenon is not limited to arthouse films. This summer alone, we have three legit word-of-mouth winners. Number one in the bunch is TOP GUN: MAVERICK, which has been playing in theatres since Memorial Day weekend. Everyone knew about the film. Everyone knew it would be a hit. But in this day and age, it is amazing for a film to still be in theatres over Labor Day weekend after opening in May. Baz Luhrmann’s ELVIS has also outperformed based on the initial opening numbers. The film started off well enough, with about $30M over the opening weekend. Based on that opening, pundits figured the film would top out well under $100M in total. And yet, the film, now just shy of $150M, showing that word-of-mouth around Luhrmann’s fine direction and Austin Butler’s star-making performance overcame the early focus on Tom Hanks’ less-than-successful supporting turn. Not to be left out is the adaptation of WHERE THE CRAWDAD’S SING, which also looks like it will end up grossing five times its opening weekend, well in excess of the usual multiple.
But this is Laemmle Theatres, and what we care about are the arthouse word-of-mouth successes. And we have several to mention. The most commercial of the bunch is MRS. HARRIS GOES TO PARIS, starring Lesley Manville in a fairy tale story. I’m not saying the film deserves to be part of the Oscar discussion, but it is an utterly charming film. And if you don’t want to take my word for that, consider that this semi-wide release is going to gross five to six times its opening weekend business. So clearly, I’m not the only one who had something nice to say about the film after seeing it.
We also have a couple of long-running documentaries that have been hanging around in theatres for a while. FIRE OF LOVE is perhaps the higher profile film, given its acquisition at the Sundance Film Festival, which set the film up with some early Oscar buzz. But there is another doc which opened even before FIRE OF LOVE, and is now heading into its third month of release. That’s HALLELUJAH: LEONARD COHEN, A JOURNEY, A SONG. I’ll admit to being a huge fan of Leonard Cohen’s music. But this story about his most famous (and most covered) song is something more. It’s a film about the search for meaning in our lives, and how this song seems to capture that searching by Mr. Cohen, by the artists who recorded this song, and by extension, by all of us. HALLELUJAH is just playing one show a day at the Monicas this week, but it is absolutely worth seeking out. And, again, if you don’t want to take my word for that, consider the “votes” of random ticket buyers who keep coming out to see the film, now in its ninth week of consecutive release in L.A.!
Last, but definitely not least, is the word-of-mouth surprise hit of the first half of 2022. This is a film that wasn’t even reviewed by the L.A. Times when it first came out (no surprise there), but ended up at the top of Justin Chang’s list of the best films of the first half of the year. And it absolutely deserved to be there. RRR is a Telegu-language film that has taken the entire film world by storm. It started out playing in theatres that cater to the Southeast Asian expatriate audience. But from there, word spread about the amazing special effects, the incredible stunt work, and the overall fun of the experience of seeing the film. That led to the film coming back into theatres on June 1 for a one-night event cinema #EncoRRRe screening. But that didn’t sate audience demand, so we extended our run for several weeks. And now, with students back from summer break, we want to give you one more chance to see this film in theatres. Yes, it is a bit of a commitment to see a three-hour film. But that’s only 20 minutes longer than ELVIS (which we already established as “worth it”), and I can assure that you’ll love every one of those extra minutes. Maybe you heard about this film, and you started watching a bit on some random streaming service. Sorry, but that’s just not the way to see RRR. This film demands to be seen with an audience so you can share in all the oohing, awwing, and laughter. Who knows, you may even need to get up and dance along during the big dance number.
Yes, we are at the end of a long summer of movies. And there are plenty of stories about the box office being down, and the impact that this may have on certain exhibition companies. But don’t believe that there isn’t anything worth seeing at the movies. If you haven’t already seen these pictures, find a theatre that is playing MRS. HARRIS, FIRE OF LOVE, HALLELUJAH or RRR, and make plans to see them. And don’t just take my word for it. Trust the ticket buyers like you that have made them in word-of-mouth winners.
See you at the movies!
~ GL
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