Posted By Ethan de Seife on Sun, Nov 16, 2014 at 1:44 PM

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Adult Swim

Smarf, the magical alien robot cat in "Too Many Cooks"

Like so many other internet fun-seekers, I recently watched and was pleasantly astonished by Casper Kelly's short film "Too Many Cooks." First broadcast in the dead of night on the Adult Swim network on October 27 and released online early this month, the short quickly — and deservedly — went viral, attracting coverage not just from the expected host of content-hungry websites but from major news organizations such as the Atlantic, New York Magazine, CNN and the Wall Street Journal.

It's a little difficult to explain exactly what "Too Many Cooks" is. Mostly, it's a parody of some of the most hackneyed clichés of American genre television. A little more specifically, it's a parody of those shows' opening-credits sequences.

I'd hazard that the film's single most important touchstone (right down to its font choice) is the opening-credits sequence of the 1980s sitcom "Full House," but also invoked are those of such shows as "Growing Pains," "Family Matters," "G.I. Joe," "Hill Street Blues," "Hunter" and "ALF," to name a few. "Full House," though, seems to have just about all of the ingredients that "Too Many Cooks" parodies so deftly: heartwarming family situations; zany, good-natured antics; a terrible earworm of a theme song.

Tags: what i'm watching , too many cooks , tv , sitcom , credits , parody , adult swim , Image , Video , Web Only

Posted By Margot Harrison on Fri, Nov 14, 2014 at 3:00 PM

Magnolia

Besides two Jesse Eisenbergs, this world has soup vending machines. Cool!

This week in movies you missed: Are two Jesse Eisenbergs better than one?

What You Missed
Simon James (Eisenberg) is a loser. Total strangers order him to vacate his seat on the subway. His fellow employees at a drab government agency barely recognize him. Hannah (Mia Wasikowska), the depressed, ethereal girl he loves, doesn't know he's alive. He uses a telescope to observe her through her window and carefully retrieves the torn-up artwork she throws in the trash.

Then James Simon (also Eisenberg) enters the picture. The new employee could be Simon's physical twin, but he's outgoing, gregarious, likable, manipulative. In no time at all, James has Simon doing favors for him and Hannah in his bed. He knows how to make her happy — and unhappy, it transpires.

Tags: the double , richard ayoade , jesse eisenberg , Movies you missed , Image , Video , Web Only

Posted By Ethan de Seife on Thu, Nov 13, 2014 at 9:10 AM

Seven Days File Photo

The Strand Theater, mid-renovation

This is a historic week for the arts and film community in Plattsburgh, N.Y. The city's downtown picture palace, the Strand Center for the Arts, has installed state-of-the-art digital projection equipment just in time to welcome the inaugural Lake Champlain Film Festival.

With partial funding from a $78,000 grant from the New York State Council for the Arts, the Strand, which was built as a vaudeville theater in 1924, has installed a digital projection system, a new 16-by-32-foot screen and a surround-sound system.

The new gear will amaze festival attendees as they feast upon a weekend-long program of films of all kinds. Screening at the Strand on Saturday, November 15, and Sunday, November 16, they include features by local filmmakers and short films from around the world.

Tags: strand center for the arts , plattsburgh , film , movie , lake champlain film festival , Image , Web Only

Posted By Ethan de Seife on Tue, Nov 11, 2014 at 9:30 AM

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Magnolia Pictures

Force Majeure

Force Majeure, Sweden's 2014 Oscar submission for Best Foreign Language Film and winner of the Un Certain Regard Jury Prize at the most recent Cannes Film Festival, storms its way into Burlington's Main Street Landing this week, courtesy of the Burlington Film Society.

The critically acclaimed drama, written and directed by Ruben Östlund, concerns the members of a picture-perfect Swedish family whose lives are thrown into utter turmoil when an avalanche hits the ski resort at which they're vacationing. Yet it's not so much the avalanche itself that throws their lives into chaos; rather, it's a choice made by the family patriarch that jeopardizes everything. (Revealing any more would be telling!) 

Tags: movie , film , cinema , force majeure , VTIFF , burlington film society , vermont international film foundation , Image , Video , Web Only

Posted By Ethan de Seife on Mon, Nov 10, 2014 at 4:09 PM

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Sareet Rosenstein | Courtesy of VTIFF

Volunteers Sophia Howatt and Steve Sweeney at the info table

Organizers haven't quite finished tallying up ticket sales, but the recently concluded 29th annual Vermont International Film Festival appears to have been a significant success. Attendance was up, and, more importantly, the festival seems to be on a path of stability and organizational sophistication.

VTIFF's executive director, Orly Yadin, reports a grand total of 4,706 admissions for the 2014 festival. That's a jump of 10 percent from the 2013 figures, which were 20 percent higher than the numbers from 2012.

"About a third" of this year's admissions, Yadin says, were technically unpaid, but that's actually a good thing. VTIFF (the acronym stands for both the festival and its parent organization, the Vermont International Film Foundation) now has about 150 members who pay at one of three levels. "Friends" and "Supporters" get discounts on festival tickets, among other perks, while "Patrons" get all-access passes with their membership payments.

Yadin is eager to attract more members, whose advance, lump-sum payments help the festival achieve greater economic constancy. "Stability is the most crucial thing for us," she says. "Until this year, all of our income had been unstable."

Tags: vtiff , film , movie , vermont international film festival , burlington , cinema , Image , Web Only

Posted By Margot Harrison on Fri, Nov 7, 2014 at 3:37 PM

Phase 4 Films

Matt prepares to fulfill what he believes is his destiny.

This week in movies you missed: Yes, there's a found-footage film about a school shooting. But it's not the sensationalist attention-grab you might expect.

What You Missed
Matt (Matt Johnson, who also directed, produced, cowrote and co-edited) and Owen (Owen Williams) are two Canadian high school students making a movie. It's called The Dirties, and it's a revenge fantasy about destroying the bullies who dog them at school.

Matt, who has a basement full of movie posters, has stuffed his debut auteur effort with swaths of dialogue from Pulp Fiction and obscurer references to films like Irreversible. Owen is happy just to go along for the ride and "shoot" prop guns.

Tags: the dirties , matt johnson , owen williams , found footage , Movies you missed , Image , Video , Web Only

Posted By Ethan de Seife on Mon, Nov 3, 2014 at 4:07 PM

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Courtesy of Cinemania

Cinemania's closing night film, Party Girl

Good news for voracious local cinephiles! If, after the 10-day main course of the Vermont International Film Festival, you still find yourselves with room for cinematic dessert, drive north to Montréal's Cinemania Festival.

Cinemania's 20th anniversary event, which runs November 6-16 at the luxe Imperial Cinema in downtown Montréal, boasts 55 films (a record for the fest) from all over the world, including works by established directors as well as talented newcomers. The festival's selections place an emphasis on French and Québécois cinema — but fear not, non-Francophones: All films will be screened with English subtitles.

Film lovers might recognize the names of François Ozon, Olivier Assayas, Benoît Jacquot or the Dardennes Brothers, all of whose latest films will screen at Cinemania. Also showing, among many others, is Abuse of Weakness, the latest film by the ever-controversial Catherine Breillat, a film that recently played at VTIFF.

Tags: cinemania , film festival , film , cinema , movie , festival , montreal , Image , Web Only

Posted By Ethan de Seife on Sat, Nov 1, 2014 at 8:40 AM

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Paramount Pictures

When Rango came out a few years ago, my friend Pam and I saw it independently and compared notes afterward. We were both surprised by how we liked it. She remarked (and I'm paraphrasing here), "Yeah, who woulda thought that the schmuck who made those stupid Pirates of the Caribbean movies had something like this in him?"

I felt the same. The Pirates movies are, in my opinion, pretty dumb: big, needlessly complicated and bursting with messy and overwrought computer animation. Even the great Bill Nighy couldn't redeem those movies for me. But Rango is smart, funny and exceedingly enjoyable. Not long after seeing it in the theater (which, memorably, had a leak in its roof — a hilarious coincidence, given that the film's story revolves around water), I purchased the film on Blu-Ray, and have watched it several times since.

Tags: what i'm watching , film , movie , rango , blu-ray , high-resolution , resolution , dvd , Image , Web Only

Posted By Margot Harrison on Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 3:00 PM

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IFC Films

Grandma, what big teeth you have!

This Week in Movies You Missed: Of course I have a Halloween movie for you — if you don't mind that this outrageous Spanish import is more funny than scary.

What You Missed
Deep in the woods, three witches are receiving a prophecy about the "chosen one." "A yellow sponge?" one says dubiously, reading the cards. "Jesus Christ? A green soldier?"

It all becomes clear in the next scene, set in Madrid, where we discover a fellow named José (Hugo Silva) robbing a gold dealer dressed as Jesus, complete with loincloth and crown of thorns. His accomplices have equally silly getups, including SpongeBob SquarePants and a green soldier. Oh, and he's brought along his 10-year-old son (Gabriel Delgado) so they can bond while aiming semi-autos at cowering employees.

Tags: alex de la iglesia , witching and bitching , Movies you missed , Image , Video , Web Only

Posted By Margot Harrison on Fri, Oct 24, 2014 at 12:13 PM

This week in movies you might miss: the "first Iranian vampire western."

You can kick off Halloween week in style by catching A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, the debut feature from writer-director Ana Lily Amirpour, on Sunday, October 26, 10 p.m., at Burlington's ArtsRiot as part of the Vermont International Film Festival. (Tickets, $5-10.)

What You Might Miss
Somewhere in Iran, there's a place called Bad City dominated by a gigantic power plant and a fleet of idle oil wells. A place that appears to be inhabited mostly by pimps, whores, drug dealers, addicts and party girls.

Arash (Arash Marandi) is none of the above. He's a gardener with a sports car who likes to wear tight T-shirts and pose like James Dean. When his junkie dad (Marshall Manesh) runs afoul of a vicious dealer (Dominic Rains), he's in danger of losing everything he loves — but not for long.

Because someone else stalks the streets of Bad City. She (Sheila Vand) wears a chador and a Breton-stripe top like Jean Seberg in Breathless. She follows men. Quiet and demure, she invites them home with her. She decides for herself what they deserve. And she executes her judgment — sometimes with fang and talon.