Tonight at Filmfest: Bonecrusher, Cruzando, Megane, and More was originally published on City Desk on Apr. 20, 2009, at 11:27 am
In Cruzando, Manny has daddy issues.
More goodies tonight, including two strong docs, a poignant and hilarious border-crossing flick, and a lapidary, Chaplin-meets-Coen bros. film from Japan. Get off your couch and over to E Street!
YAY!:
Bonecrusher, a documentary about black lung and the Appalachian coal industry. Hilary Crowe calls it a “dust-covered love story…[that] tugs at the heart as much as at the conscience.” 6:30 p.m. at Regal Gallery Place
Cruzando, about a grown son who crosses from Mexico to Texas to visit his absentee dad, now on death row in Huntsville. “[F]irst-rate camera-work and incredible pacing,” writes Mike Riggs. “Every scene in Cruzando is either comically tragic or tragically comic, thanks to a fine balance between deadpan humor, strife, and creeping magical realism.” 8:30 p.m. at E Street Cinema.
The Least of These , a documentary about the T. Don Hutto Residential Center in Taylor, Texas, which “holds illegal immigrant families while they await asylum hearings or deportation.” Riggs gives it a thumbs-up. 6:30 at E Street Cinema.
Megane, about an uptight professor sent to the beach for some mandatory chillaxation. Justin Moyer: “If the Coen brothers made a movie based on a Zen koan, but that movie looked like a Japanese watercolor and had an understated, Chaplinesque sensibility…well, wouldn’t you want to check out the results?” 6:30 at E Street Cinema.
Skin, about a racially ambiguous girl growing up in apartheid-era South Africa. Tricia calls the story “sufficiently gripping to offset the film’s missteps.” 8:45 p.m. at Regal Gallery Place. (Second showing.)
MEH:
Empty Nest, about a playwright’s late-mid-life crisis. Andrew Beaujon calls it “about as satisfying as watching a man in late middle age ignore a production number.” 8:30 p.m. at Regal Gallery Place.
Scratch, about a mysterious videotape that leads Joanna to question the motives of her double-agent husband, Jan. Hilary Crowe calls it “plodding”: “Expect long, artsy shots of the harried heroine smoking, moping, and watering plants in deep contemplation.” 8:45 p.m. at the Avalon.
Seven Days, which (according to Hilary) dissects the “roiling emotions, fragile tempers, and bruised egos” of the family Ohayon. Sounds exhausting! 6:15 p.m. at the Avalon.
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