SXSW Presents: DOGTOOTH – Tuesday 9/7 and Wednesday 9/8 at 7pm, and Sunday 9/12 @10:15pm – @Ritz
Advance tickets available here

The Cannes Film Festival, arguably the world’s fanciest film festival, awards the Prize Un Certain Regard every year to a film they find innovative, daring, and different, promising a bright future for a new filmmaker with fresh vision. Last year, that prize went to a Greek satire titled KYONDONTAS, or in English – DOGTOOTH.

DOGTOOTH is a dreamy film, brilliantly directed and acted, and unfolding a story so bizarre and creepy that it’ll scare you. The parents of a pack of young people intentionally shelter their offspring from the outside world, forbidding them from leaving their home with lies and the threat of danger. So deep is their shielded life that even vocabulary is changed to continue the illusion of isolation (“Zombie” is a yellow flower, “Pussy” a big light, “Telephone” a salt shaker). This project of ignorance seems like a deranged social experiment, but plays as a profound indictment against civilization and its need to condemn itself.

This seemingly bleak scenario is full of the stuff that makes cinema great: the attention to detail in the script and the performances are astounding, the direction and camerawork gorgeous, and the psycho-sexual ideas behind the film (and it cannot be ignored that this is a deeply sexual film) are as poignant as they are socially/politically critical.

The film inspires endless interpretations and discussions, and its perplexing scenario opens up more and more as it moves around in your brain. A.O. Scott of the New York Times calls the film a Conversation Piece: “Are mom and dad conducting some kind of perverse behaviorist experiment? Are they determined to shelter the younger generation in a world gone mad?…“Dogtooth” supplies no such explanation and at times seems as much an exercise in perversity as an examination of it. Mr. Lanthimos’s ends may be obscure, but his means can be seductive.”

Karina Longworth of the Village Voice calls the film “hyperrealist sci-fi detailing an (anti)social experiment gone awry,” and Wesley Morris of the Boston Globe warns, “Nothing in this weird, watchable, blasé black comedy from Greece stays innocent for long.”

The only sure thing about this picture is that it is absolutely great. Director Yorgos Lanthimos is a new filmmaker, but he is already a master. Roger Ebert expresses his take on the style brilliantly: “Lanthimos tells his story with complete command of visuals and performances. His cinematography is like a series of family photographs of a family with something wrong with it. His dialogue sounds composed entirely of sentences memorized from tourist phrase books.”

This is my favorite film of the year, hands down. If that means anything, you need to get to the Ritz next week to see DOGTOOTH as many times as possible. Bring your overprotective parents, your sheltered children, and all of your Greek friends.

Get your tickets for this great show now.

Troublemaker Studios, the Austin Film Society and The Alamo Drafthouse Cinema are excited to announce an explosive sneak preview of MACHETE directed by Robert Rodriguez and Ethan Maniquis, with Danny Trejo and Michelle Rodriguez leading an all-star cast, on Thursday, September 2 at 8 PM at The Paramount Theater (713 Congress Avenue). All tickets include admission to the official explosion-filled after-party at Austin Studios (1901 E 51st Street).

About the film:

He looked like just another day laborer from the streets, and the perfect fall guy for a crooked political assassination. But he turned out to be Machete (Danny Trejo), a legendary ex-federale with a deadly attitude and the skills to match. Left for dead after clashing with notorious Mexican drug kingpin Torrez (Steven Seagal), Machete has escaped to Texas, looking to disappear and forget his tragic past. But what he finds is a web of corruption and deceit that leaves a bullet in a senator and Machete a wanted man.

Machete sets out to clear his name and expose a deep conspiracy. Helping Machete even the odds are Luz (Michelle Rodriguez)—a sexy taco-truck lady with a rebellious spirit and revolutionary heart, and Padre (Cheech Marin)—a priest who’s good with blessings, but better with guns. Carving a path of bullets, blood, and broken hearts, Machete’s quest ultimately leads him back to Torrez for an epic battle of revenge and redemption.

Tickets will go on sale to the general public on at 12 PM Saturday, August 21 through (866) 9PROTIX, protixonline.com or the Paramount Theatre box office. Visit HERE for a direct link to tickets!

All tickets include Q&A with the filmmakers and entrance to the official after-party at Austin Studios.

Special thanks to Troublemaker Studios, The Paramount Theater and The Austin Chronicle.

Proceeds from this event benefit the Texas Filmmakers Production Fund and the Texas Motion Picture Alliance (TXMPA).

CATFISH opens at the Alamo South Lamar September 17.

Hello everyone, Alamo Drafthouse founder and CEO Tim League here. I saw two incredible films at Sundance this year. Both were documentaries and both were wildly unique. The first, EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP starts out as a simple chronicling of the street art scene. What I thought was going to be just a biography of the infamous Bansky turned out to be so much more. The film is itself an art installation as it gleefully dynamites the foundations of modern art criticism. At this point, EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP is my favorite film we have shown at the Alamo all year.

All that may change on September 17th because the other film that I saw at Sundance was CATFISH. Although the subject matter is very different, CATFISH also starts with a straightforward linear documentary premise before completely derailing, sending the audience on a wildly unexpected journey that delivers far more emotional wallop than one could ever imagine from the simple premise of the film.

In CATFISH, filmmakers Ariel Schulman and Henry Joost document a story involving Ariel’s brother, Nev, a 24-year-old New York-based photographer, and Abby, an 8-year-old girl from rural Michigan who contacts Nev via Facebook, asking for permission to make a painting from one of his photographs. Nev is fascinated by this 8-year-old artist and begins to commission and collect her work and get to know her through Facebook. My description ends there. The less you know about the story, the better. Don’t read reviews, don’t ferret around. Just walk in and see it and let the adventure wash over you.

I VERY rarely pound out a heartfelt recommendation for a film, maybe 3-4 times a year max. I’m doing it now. This is a fascinating little film, you have never seen anything like it and I’m pretty sure it might just blow your mind. Like I say, it is a small film, and a challenging one to market, so after you go and see it, please encourage all of your friends (and Facebook friends) to check it out too. If I were running the Oscars, this would be a sure-fire bet to be in the running for best documentary of the year.

Check out the trailer here, and prepare to be haunted by one of the most fascinated movie experiences you’ll ever have.

“THE KILLER INSIDE ME may be the darkest film noir ever made”
-Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly

The haunting new film THE KILLER INSIDE ME has been on our minds for months now.  It inspired some controversial write-ups after its screenings at the Sundance, Berlin, and Tribeca Festivals, and once we saw it we couldn’t forget it.  After some wrangling, we’re finally able to bring this film to Austin the way it deserves, with some late night screenings all throughout next week.  It’s the perfect after-dinner film, played during the dark hours when good seems boring and bad seems…well, not so bad.

THE KILLER INSIDE ME tells the story of a small-town Texas Deputy Sheriff who’s got evil inside him that is just itching to get out. He walks the streets with a quiet cool, a sophisticated but distant man who is gentle but harbors the violence of a serial killer. Although his sadism was dormant for many years, the film begins with the resurfacing of his “sickness,” and his life begins to shake up.

Based on the notorious pulp novel by America’s dime-store Dostoyevsky Jim Thompson, THE KILLER INSIDE is a brutal and fantastic new film starring the dreamy-yet-menacing Casey Affleck. Directed by Michael Winterbottom, the director famous for controversial but beautiful films like TRISTRAM SHANDY: A COCK AND BULL STORY, 9 SONGS, WONDERLAND, and 24 HOUR PARTY PEOPLE, and also starring Jessica Alba and Kate Hudson, the film is a neo-noir with a calculated and striking tone unlike any film this year.

At the premiere at Sundance, this psycho-sexual drama drew controversy when many audience members, including the film’s star Jessica Alba, walked out of the screening due to the graphic violence. You’ve been warned.

Come see THE KILLER INSIDE ME at the Alamo South Lamar starting Friday and playing all week around 10pm. It’ll give you the creeps, but in a good way.

GET LOW opens today at South Lamar. “What in tarnation is this picture all about?!”  (You might wonder aloud in an affected crazy coot hermit voice). Well, it’s about a crazy old codger who decides that after decades living alone in the woods he’s going throw his own funeral, inviting all the townsfolk who’ve been gossiping about him for years already to come and  tell tales about while he takes it all in. A slick funeral home owner gets wind of this plan and decides he’s going win over the old codger’s business. That’s just the jump off, there’s plenty of plot that I won’t spoil here.

As Peter Travers puts it in Rolling Stone, “All you need to know is that GET LOW puts Robert Duvall and Bill Murray in the same movie. Only a fool would want to miss that.”

Director Aaron Schneider’s feature film not only pairs these two elder sweethearts of cinema, it gives them plenty of room to do what they do best: create poignant, sometimes funny, and supremely entertaining characters. A. O. Scott of the New York Times praises the film for “giving [Duvall] time and room to explore the crevices of a wily, wounded soul, [proving] that Mr. Duvall is still able to carry a movie easily and gracefully. And Austin Chronicle’s Marc Savlov  raves, ”this may be Bill Murray’s best role since LOST IN TRANSLATION.”

In short, GET LOW is probably just what you need at this point in the summer. No explosions, no robots, no 3D (not that we don’t love that stuff!), just plain old good acting and a fine story well told.

We are very excited to open THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT Friday at the Alamo South Lamar.  It was a breakout hit at the Sundance Film Festival, where it was one of the most celebrated and sought after pictures on display.  Since then, it’s been knocking the socks off of almost every critic across the country, getting top honors and raves from even the most cynical of reviewers.

Marc Savlov of the Austin Chronicle gives the film four stars, and calls it “one of the most honest and painfully, hilariously accurate portraits of an American marriage and its resultant, tumultuous family ever put on film. It may be the most honest.”  This sums up the film perfectly, but much of the beauty of THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT comes from its individual parts.

The film’s all star cast is led by Annette Bening and Julianne Moore, who play a married lesbian couple with two children.  Their performances are fantastic.  Joe Morgenstern of the Wall Street Journal, who calls the film “thrillingly funny and casually profound,” describes the women as “played to perfection” by the talented actresses.  “Foreign-language films have subtitles; this film has subtexts that enhance every scene between the two women—unspoken anxieties, insecurities, vulnerabilities, comical but corrosive hostilities.”

Into the lives of this happy and distinctly modern family comes the previously-anonymous sperm donor, sought out by the two curious children.  This donor is played by the ever-cool and charming Mark Ruffalo who, according to Ann Hornaday at the Washington Post, “draws on every ounce of his considerable sex appeal to play Paul, a mellow, somewhat feckless restaurateur who can seduce just about everything he sets his sights on.”

Hornaday also notes the very strong performances by the children, newcomers Mia Wasikowska and Josh Hutcherson.  She especially praises Wasikowska, writing, “Within an ensemble of consummate pros, Wasikowska shines as a young woman grappling with the push-and-pull of a lovingly enmeshed family and forging her own fragile identity.”

This film, more than anything, is a refreshing change of pace from the typical heart-warming indie films that clutter the American landscape.  Rather than focusing on the torment/redemption of the severely dysfunctional family, THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT is about a well-adjusted clan with healthy and good natured children whose hearts are in the right places.  The fact that the film is about an alternative family, led by two Sapphic matriarchs, makes it all the more exciting.  In the USA Today, Claudia Puig describes this uplifting quality:  “What makes this story so effective is not that it strives to be relevant in its depiction of a gay couple raising children but that it captures real-life rhythms and sincere concerns — both everyday and existential — experienced by families of all kinds.  Theirs may be an unconventional family, but the quandaries and problems are the same as in most families.”

This is a film for those adults who are looking for an escape from the blockbusters of this season.  Betsy Sharkey of the Los Angeles Times writes, “Whatever your politics, between peerless performances, lyrical direction and an adventurous script, this is the sort of pleasingly grown-up fare all too rare in the mainstream daze of this very dry summer.”

You should see this movie this weekend at the Alamo South Lamar, so that you have a chance to love it and see it again.  We’re opening it at the Lake Creek theatre next Friday for you North Austinites, too.

*%$#LOADS OF VIDEOS with JEFF KRULIK Live!
Sun at Ritz

POP AND NOT-SO-POP CLIPS with CHUCK STATLER Live!
Mon at Ritz

This Sunday and Monday, we’ll be showcasing the work of two of the secretly perfect men of American entertainment!

About JEFF KRULIK: Many consider HEAVY METAL PARKING LOT to be one of the defining works of the ’80s. And it is. Hilarious, unbelievable and 100% REAL, it’s persevered as a truly classic mini doc. But creator Krulik has never stopped chronicling amazing, gut-busting and truly unusual people across the globe. From raging pro wrestlers to Jew-obsessed shut-ins to all-chimpanzee rock bands, Krulik has fearlessly delved into the strangest chasms of the world.

On Sunday, he joins us in person to present selections from his skull-rattling filmography, including monkey manifesto I CREATED LANCELOT LINK, oddball celebrity travelogue ERNEST BORGNINE ON THE BUS, the unstoppable, aforementioned HEAVY METAL PARKING LOT and many more. Buckle in your brainpan for 90 minutes of truer-than-life impossibility!!

About CHUCK STATLER: Devo!! Elvis Costello!! Pere Ubu!! James Chance!! Tiny Tim?? A/V pioneer Chuck Statler has worked with them all, creating the template for music videos before MTV even existed. Beginning with his ambitious work in the ’70s and ’80s, Statler’s vicious dedication to new ideas shines through like a white hot laser, and even his work from 3+ decades ago is STILL ahead of its time. Tonight, he personally brings us a top shelf selection of his most legendary and/or unusual videos. Running the gamut from the beginnings of new wave to the brave new world, Statler is a relentless source of inhuman creativity. You’ll be shocked, amused and completely detonated.

Both shows are cheaper than hell and funner than anything else in the world!
Get your tickets HERE and HERE!!

GARGANTUAN NEWS!

Just announced: The Alamo Drafthouse and Levi’s® have partnered to champion stories of our most celebrated celluloid workers. Throughout Augusts’ hazy summer nights, the Alamo and Levi’s will be taking the Rolling Roadshow to the people under the unified banner of ‘We Are All Workers.’

Rooted by one of the nation’s founding principles, We Are All Workers hits the road with nine seminal screenings proving that everybody’s work is equally important. True to form, each screening will be in the location where the film was shot or set.

Inspired by the spirit of the American worker, the Alamo and Levi’s have curated an eclectic line up that ranges from the the birth of the oil nation in Paul Thomas Anderson’s THERE WILL BE BLOOD to the futuristic corporate nightmare of Paul Verhoven’s ROBOCOP. Championship contenders are crowned and humbled as Sylvester Stallone embarks on an an epic ROCKY-THON on the Liberty Steps, while Marlon Brando is washed-up ON THE WATERFRONT of the New Jersey docks. Law breakers are saluted as DIRTY HARRY takes to San Francisco’s Washington Square Park, Quentin Tarantino with JACKIE BROWN (schedule permitting), and Chicago’s finest, THE BLUES BROTHERS tear their musical mission from God across the country. Closing out the Roadshow is the the defining immigrant worker story of THE GODFATHER PART II which will screen from the rooftops and chimney stacks of New York’s Little Italy.

All Rolling Roadshow ‘We Are All Workers’ screenings are free, open to the public and will be accompanied by related events at each location. For more information and updates on individual shows and their related events, check back on the Alamo’s Rolling Roadshow page or the Levi’s® Facebook group!

In the meantime, here’s the line-up:

Aug. 6 – JACKIE BROWN at Los Angeles’ Del Amo Fashion Mall

Aug. 7 – DIRTY HARRY at San Francisco’s Washington Square Park

Aug. 8 – THERE WILL BE BLOOD at California’s Kern County Museum

Aug. 8 – CONVOY & RED DAWN Double Feature at the Ft. Union Drive-In in Las Vegas, NM

Aug. 13 – THE BLUES BROTHERS at Chicago’s Joliet Prison

Aug. 14 – ROBOCOP at Detroit’s Russell Industrial Center

Aug. 19 – ROCKYTHON! (ROCKY I-III) at the Philadelphia Art Museum

Aug. 20 – ON THE WATERFRONT at Hoboken’s Pier A Park

Aug. 27 – THE GODFATHER Part II on a Manhattan rooftop near Little Italy

As you’ve guessed, these shows will be epic, incredible and 100% unforgettable. See you there!

CROPSEY – Mon thru Wed at The Ritz!

Smash hit of Fantastic Fest 2009!

“On several levels, this film is a real-life horror story that puts most Hollywood movies to shame.” – Lou Lumenick, New York Post

“Perched at the intersection of psychological survey and serial-killer exposé, CROPSEY loosens the girdle of the documentary form to accommodate much more than facts.” – Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times

CROPSEY is a creepy documentary that explores how fact and fiction intersect in a real-life murder case in Staten Island, New York. Like many kids that grew up in the area, directors Joshua Zeman and Barbara Brancaccio were told the story of Cropsey, a lunatic child-killer that escaped from the Willowbrook Mental Institution. Cropsey was treated as just another urban myth until Jennifer Schweiger, a young girl with Down’s syndrome, disappeared from her Staten Island home in 1987.

After Jennifer’s disappearance, three more kids — all of whom suffered from a mental or physical disability — also turned up missing. Jennifer’s corpse was eventually found near the site of the abandoned Willowbrook campus. Andre Rand, a disturbed transient who worked at Willowbrook until it was shut down, was quickly identified as the main suspect. The evidence against Rand was circumstantial at best, but he was convicted and locked away. Twenty-two years after his initial conviction, Rand was convicted of the murder of one of the three remaining missing kids despite the fact that her body was never found.

CROPSEY is built around Zeman and Brancaccio’s detailed investigation of the Rand case. The film presents interviews with family and friends of the victims, police officers who investigated the case, Rand’s associates, and people who claimed to have been witnesses or potential victims to his crimes. The filmmakers also weave the Andre Rand case into the weird, secret underbelly of Staten Island. Through newsreels and new footage, the filmmakers examine the history of Willowbrook, which was famously exposed by Geraldo Rivera as New York City’s dumping ground for the mentally ill. The weed-covered Willowbrook campus was once rumored to be the stomping grounds for transient child-abusing cultists led by Andre Rand. Now, teenagers enticed by rumors of satanic sacrifices visit Willowbrook at night for scary thrills.

The film also details the unsolved disappearances of dozens of kids all over Staten Island, and many people believe that Andre Rand was somehow involved. Cropsey asks a lot of questions, and the answers (or lack of thereof) are very disturbing. (Rodney Perkins)

Don’t miss it! Get your tickets HERE!

CYRUS opens this week and we’d just like to say a word or two about one of our heroes, John C. Reilly.

Reilly is one of the most underrated performers of our time, having significant roles in both BOOGIE and TALADEGA NIGHTS as well as some very inspired oddities like his role as Nikola Tesla in DRUNK HISTORY and as the uncredited Sasquatch in the TENACIOUS D movie. Most recently, he has been causing seizures of laughter in the best television show on TV right now, CHECK IT OUT! WITH DR. STEVE BRULE.

Enough gushing over Mr. Reilly, though. His new film is CYRUS, and it’s costarring GET HIM TO THE GREEK’s JONAH HILL. Written and directed by Austinite indie-auteurs the Duplass Brothers, CYRUS tells the story of a wounded man (Reilly) who falls in love with the perfect woman (Marissa Tomei). Everything is stomach cramps and palm sweat until he discovers her son (Jonah Hill), who seems to be either deranged or sinister. The film focuses on this step-father role within the modern family, with great comedic turns by both Hill and Reilly.

As I said, we’re incredibly excited about this picture. But we’re not alone. Marjorie Baumgarten of the Austin Chronicle writes, “With CYRUS, the transition of the Duplass brothers from their germinal Austin filmmaking roots into full-blown Hollywood filmmakers is complete – even though their new comedy, CYRUS, will not be mistaken for any studio-generated yukfest. However, the addition in their work of an Oscar-tier cast raises the Duplasses’ off-kilter material to a new high.” The Chronicle also ran a great story this week about the film with insight from the cast and filmmakers.

Roger Ebert, like Baumgarten, sees the performances and their non-Hollywood presentation as the key to this film. “Here is a film that uses very good actors and gives them a lot of improvisational freedom to talk their way into, around and out of social discomfort. And it’s not snarky. It doesn’t mock these characters. It understand they have their difficulties and hopes they find a way to work things out. There’s your suspense: How can they?” Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times echoes this sentiment, writing, “CYRUS amuses and unnerves in equal measure. A comedy of discomfort that walks a wonderful line between reality-based emotional honesty and engaging humor, it demonstrates the good things that happen when quirky independent style combines with top-of-the-line acting skill.”

Manohla Dargis, for the New York Times, singles out the accomplishment of young Jonah Hill, writing of his role, “Hill enters with a polite smile that is likely to send a chill straight up your neck, leaving your little hairs aflutter…he looks like the kind of guy who has been setting fire to the neighborhood cats…Mr. Hill taps the spirit of Norman Bates so well he quickly pushes this comedy into horror.”

The nation’s most positive critic, Peter Travers, whose role at Rolling Stone is to like films, offers a great compliment for this film by offering his first vitriol in years, albeit comparatively: “You’ll be laughing till it hurts. In a multiplex crowded with formula rom-coms divorced from genuine feeling (that’s you, Sex and the Shitty), CYRUS brims over with hilarity and heartbreak.”

CYRUS opens this week at the Alamo South Lamar.