* The Black House
Japan, 1999. Director: Yoshimitsu Morita
Wed, May 24, 9:30pm, Egyptian
Sat, May 27, 12:30pm, Pacific Place
Meek, mild-mannered insurance agency underling Wakatsuki works in an eerie office environment that's disrupted by an unusual claim. His tedious routine and off-kilter surroundings are presented in such a slow, deliberately odd style that director Yoshimitsu Morita—best known for 1984's The Family Game—soon sends his hero headlong into David Lynch territory. Wakatsuki discovers how "every person is a different, complicated, endless void," and his investigation becomes creepier and creepier, leading to disturbing discoveries. For the patient viewer, this is an involving, worthwhile psychological thriller with some fairly graphic content. And it certainly gives bowling a fresh new spin.—Brian Miller
* Blood Simple
USA, 1983. Director: Joel Coen. Cast: Francis McDormand, M. Emmet Walsh, John Getz, and Dan Hedaya
Mon, June 5, 7:15pm, Cinerama
Joel and Ethan Coen's Blood had its US premiere at SIFF in '84, where the film's flashy technique and morbid humor went over pretty well. Sixteen years later, they've since earned an Oscar for writing Fargo—which also brought Joel's wife Frances McDormand a statuette—but never strayed far from Blood's dark, caustic wit. The plot is pure pulpy film noir: A bar owner hires sleazy detective M. Emmet Walsh to kill his wife (McDormand); various double-crosses and complications ensue. The classic burying-the-not-quite-dead-body scene finds its snowy parallel in Fargo. Both films surely prove that if you believe the worst in human nature, you'll never go wrong.—B.R.M.
Bossa Nova
Brazil, 2000. Director: Bruno Barreto
Sat, May 20, 9:15pm, Egyptian
Sun, May 21, 3:30pm, Egyptian
Welcome to Rio de Janeiro. You'll be staying exactly 95 minutes, and in that time you'll feel tropical breezes against your skin, brush up on your Tai-Chi, relearn English grammar (and even a few expletive packages), swim, visit the tailor, receive a legal consultation, and eavesdrop in an Internet chat room. With an infectious soundtrack that makes you want to kick off your shoes and watch beach soccer, Bossa Nova spins a pleasantly tangled web of love and misunderstandings that, like Rio itself, is just breezy enough without getting uncomfortably serious. Amy Irving stars as a widowed expat English teacher who's swept up by a local attorney—and also hit on by her hunky private student (the country's biggest soccer star). Like any good vacation in an exotic locale, this one is short and mindless enough to enjoy without guilt.—E.B.R.
Bride of Fire
Iran, 2000. Director: Khosrow Sinai
Thu, June 1, 7:15pm, Pacific Place
Sat, June 3, 3:30pm, Cinerama
Winner of the Audience Prize for Best Film at this year's Fajr Festival, Bride explores many of the critical social issues in Iran today via a love story. Ahlam is a beautiful young doctor-in-training, deeply in love with her professor but promised by family law to her illiterate cousin. Her struggle to assert herself and designate her own choices drives the film.—SIFF
The Bridge Between Two Shores
France, 1999. Directors: G鲡rd Depardieu and Frederic Auburtin
Wed, June 7, 7:15pm, Cinerama
Fri, June 9, 5pm, Cinerama
Adultery? Whats the big deal? The classic love triangle is greeted with a typically Gallic shrug in this nicely observed, well-detailed, but rather flat French import co-directed by G鲡rd Depardieu. He plays the lunkish (but not loutish) husband of lively Carole Bouquet, who falls for a man she meets at the cinema. We know hes a good guy because he gets teary during a dubbed showing of West Side Story, but Bridge doesnt doom its lovers to tragedy or its marriage to a forced confrontation. Bouquet adores Jules and Jim (the storys set in the early 60s), which is a more obvious influence upon Bridges plot, yet unlike Truffauts tale, this m鮡ge ࠴rois leaves one person feeling excluded and injured—namely Depardieu, who plays his stoic characters hurt beautifully. While Bridge takes a sober, sympathetic, and understated look at an unraveling marriage, the writing isnt strong enough to lift it above similar films on the subject.—B.R.M
Burning Man—The Burning Sensation
USA, 2000. Director: Alex Nohe
Wed, June 7, 9:30pm, Harvard Exit
Fri, June 9, noon, Cinerama
A fascinating look inside what is perhaps the most famous countercultural event in existence today, Burning Man captures the joyful anarchy of this massive annual happening, played out deep in the arid Nevada desert. Deemed "bracingly original, wacky, and ingenious" by Variety, this eye-of-the-storm view on the 1999 gathering promises one of the wildest, raunchiest rides of the festival.—SIFF
But Forever In My Mind
Italy, 1999. Director: Gabriele Muccino
Tue, May 30, 9:30pm, Broadway Perf. Hall
Mon, June 5, 2:30pm, Pacific Place
For those of you already nostalgic for the uproar and excitement of the WTO protests, this fun romantic comedy about a group of Italian teenagers taking over their school may be precisely what you're looking for. Director and writer Gabriele Muccino had some help with his script from some teenagers and there's an authentic feel of adolescent fever to his story, in which a furtive kiss between a boy and a girl sets off an emotional chaos much more intense than the students' rather vague political struggle. ("We're against regimentation!" they repeatedly shout.) There's a little too much subplot involving the disdainful parents of the young revolutionaries, but the misunderstandings and pangs of young love are brought to a lyrical and satisfying conclusion.—John Longenbaugh
