Zal Batmanglij's film, “Sound of My Voice,” could serve as a useful primer for a person who doesn't understand the psychology of how cults (religious or otherwise) snare their followers. It's playing downtown on K Street at the Crest Theater.This debut film, by a young director who's hardly written-up online, also keeps you focused with an added possibility of creeping you out not just a little bit.  Creep is common to movies with youth appeal. Batmanglij has help from co-writer Brit Marling, who takes a leading role in “Sound of My Voice” as well as producing.  Marling had the lead in another slightly off-center 2011 film called “Another Earth.” Maggie is Marling's character in “Sound o

“The Avengers” movie review by Gary Chew I stopped reading comic books in about 1950. Superman, Batman and Captain Marvel were my favorites. I was stoked when George Reeves as Superman and Adam West as Batman made it to pictures that move instead of merely being drawn (frozen in time) onto those colorful panels on paper. The narratives changed little. The good guy or guys and the badass or asses who wanted to take over Metropolis, Gotham City or the Earth were always there to give the story the conflict it needed: right and wrong clearly delineated. If the two were really only that easily discerned. It is about the same thing with “The Avengers,” a new film with action-packed serialized

“Bully” film review – Gary Chew   Another polemic documentary film is here.  It's called “Bully.”  You can see it at the Tower Theater, Land Park Drive and Broadway, Sacramento.   Why would “Bully” not bring a feud with it? The opposing parties are those incensed by suicides of youngsters bullied into taking their lives, and another incensed faction that believes some victims being   followed in the documentary are targets of harassment due to being gay.  The latter group's conclusion is that director Lee Hirsch's blunt but not excessive film promotes a homosexual life style.   To think that it's more important that people should not hear about homosexuality than knowing there are pers

“Blue Like Jazz”  film review by Gary Chew You may ask yourself after watching a few minutes of “Blue Like Jazz” what a nice college-aged Houston boy and devout Baptist is doing driving his beat up car to Portland, Oregon to enroll at Reed College. His name is Donald (Marshall Allman). The movie opened Friday at the UA Market Square, 17434 Arden Way and the UA Laguna Village 12 at 8755 Center Parkway, Sacramento. Donald is not what most people think a young Christian man from Texas would be like. Donald's pretty hip and glib with one-liners. Since it's the lead, is probably why director Steve Taylor has Allman playing Donald as an agreeable nice guy who shows hardly any bad feelings tow

  “Salmon Fishing in the Yemen” film review by Gary Chew “Salmon Fishing in the Yemen” is a movie about fishing that's not about fishing. It opened Friday at Tower Theater in Sacramento. In fact, it's a good deal like another Lasse Halstrőm's film, "The Cider House Rules,” even though each film has a story totally unlike the other. Go figure. Hallstrőm has his main characters (from Paul Torday's novel and Oscar-winner Simon Beaufoy's screenplay) in this 2011 film living in a contemporary world much like it is, except that those characters, although not perfect, are wholly decent. Yes, “decent” would be the right word to describe them. Characters with such decency also appeared in Hall

  “The Hunger Games” film review by Gary Chew There is no doubt as I looked at the expression on Donald Sutherland's face in the final shot of Gary Ross's mucho promo-ed film, “The Hunger Games,” that it's Franchise City for this sci-fi in the woods teen caper that reviewers in my town were not offered an opportunity to see before it opened. The heroine of the piece, Katniss Everdeen, is played by Jennifer Lawrence. Lawrence earned her way to prominence running beautiful Ozark Mountains in the picture, “Winter's Bone.” As Katniss, Jennifer is nearly a carbon copy of the hardscrabble Ree she played in the 2010 movie. Katniss can also kick ass with the best of them while maintaining a b

“A Dangerous Method” A Film Review by Gary Chew Not being a student of Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung or Sabina Spielrein (not to mention Otto Gross), it's difficult knowing to what extent accuracy has been taken in David Cronenberg's “A Dangerous Method.” But suppose that what's depicted in this really chatty film is what happened, starting - as it did - one century and eight years ago. Right now, the film is playing at Sacramento's Tower Theater, Broadway at Land Park Drive. Let's begin with a line spoken by Viggo Mortensen (as Dr. Sigmund Freud). With the soaring phrase of the sentence being “...the black mud of superstition,” it's easy to infer that Cronenberg continues his intellectual-l

Surely destined for cable on Lifetime or Oxygen, “Albert Nobbs” is now playing downtown at the Crest Theater on K Street in Sacramento. The movie is a longtime project of the renowned film actor Glenn Close. She just took an Oscar nomination for her lead performance in the film. Ms. Close is one of its producer and also co-wrote the screenplay with John Banville. “Albert Nobbs” was adapted from a 1927 novella by the Irish Realist George Moore, a male* literary figure who influenced the work of James Joyce. It was a friend of mine who jokingly mentioned once that cable TV channels marketing entertainment for women should be lumped into a single category, and also offered up a name for such

“Carnage”  A Film Review by Gary Chew Sacramento, California  January 20, 2012 Occasionally a play is good enough that it will eek itself into a motion picture. Since plays tend to be rather static, it's common that when they're made for cinema, people who seldom go to the Theater complain about the movie being different from most other films they see. That can be said of Roman Polanski's new film, “Carnage.”  As a play, it won the 2009 Best Play Tony. On stage it was known as “Le Dieu du Carnage” (“God of Carnage”), written by Yasmina Reza, the Paris-born Jewish playwright/actress/screenwriter of Iranian/Hungarian parentage.  Ms. Reza and Polanski wrote the screenplay. The first 10 min

“Shame”  a Film Review by Gary Chew Sacramento, California  January 7, 2012 You’d think seeing this film way back in 2011 that I’d probably forgotten most of it by now, but since it has such an out-of-the ordinary theme, it’s kept itself more clearly in my mind than maybe I’d really like for it to.  The movie is now playing downtown on K Street at Sacramento’s Crest Theater.   Its title is, “Shame.” No, I said “Shame,” not “Shane.” “Shame” is rated NC-17. And nowhere do you ever see an image of Alan Ladd on a horse. And how could it be directed by anyone else except David Cronenberg? ...the man who also gave us such heart-warming motion pictures as the first film titled, “Crash,” “A Hi

  “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy”   A Film Review by Gary Chew Sacramento   November 14, 2011 The film had run only five minutes duration when something in my head told me that, before getting too comfy in my seat, maybe I should have become a member of  the “mens club” sponsoring this movie screening.  There was nothing to indicate such a club, and if there were, I certainly wasn't part “it.  No one had asked me to leave yet.  But that silent, but nagging voice persevered throughout “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.”  If you might not remember, it's the durable story taken from the same-titled novel by John le Carré.  This new edition of TTSS outclassed me by a least two polo fields. It's

The Sacramento French Film Festival will celebrate its 10th year in June 2011 and has just unveiled its exhilarating film selection and its inspired and original poster created, as were the nine previous SFFF posters, by talented Sacramento photographer Kent Lacin. See the complete poster collection here. To be held June 17-26, 2011 at the Crest Theatre in Downtown Sacramento, the 10th Sacramento French Film Festival will present nine new premieres, two Saturday Midnight Movies, three classics, and one Short Film Program. This year the SFFF is also introducing a new category, entitled "The One That Almost Got Away" and aimed to highlight recent films that the SFFF team wished to show in p

The new, locally owned and operated, Blue Oaks Cinema 16 in Rocklin opened its doors today to a waiting crowd. The state-of-the-art megaplex features 16 all digital theaters with high-end Klipsch surround sound. The Theater also features a UDC theater with a wall-to-wall screen, 13.1 surround sound, leather seats and more leg room. The owner, Dan Tocchini, stated that the theater is the first in the world to feature elevated digital projectors that do not require any projection booth. The technology allows them to maximize usable space and give the audience a better experience. Continuing with the advanced features in the theater, Tocchini stated that every aspect of each theater is contr

The start of the 10th annual Trash Film Orgy film festival adds to this month's Second Saturday events. The festival will have a showing every Saturday at midnight, starting July 10. It runs through Aug. 14 with a special showing on Halloween. "It's a midnight movie festival," TFO Producer Christy Savage said. "A lot of people think it's the most terrible movies out there, but we're about the best exploitation horror movies." Saturday's inaugural film, "Evil Dead 2," will be preceded by a Zombie Walk beginning at Sub-Q at 7 p.m. Participants of all ages dressed as zombies will roam Second Saturday, stop at Pyramid Alehouse for happy hour and watch zombie band Children of the Grave perfo

 If you live anywhere near the Roseville area then you know that not only this town, but this entire region shuts down around 7 o'clock. For year's your evening "hang out" choices consisted of A) Denny's, B) Mel's, C) the random bar or D) your own living room. Residents of this area seem to be forever relegated to driving all the way Downtown Sac for some type of nightlife that isn't the above mentioned choices. That is, until now. Recently, a ragtag group of people under the leadership of Hector Marquez (A local filmmaker native to Roseville) have decided to start screening classic films in Roseville's iconic Tower Theater (not to be confused with Downtown Sacramento's Tower Theater). Th