Local & Repertory

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American Comedy Classics Barbara Stanwyck plays the showgirl on the lam, harbored by an eccentric group of lexicographers (Gary Cooper) among them, in Howard Hawks’ 1941 screwball comedy Ball of Fire. (NR)

Seattle Art Museum, 1300 First Ave., 654-3100, seattleartmuseum.org, $42–$45 series, $8 individual, Thursdays, 7:30 p.m. Through Aug. 15.

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The Films of Ray Harryhausen SEE THE WIRE, PAGE 97.

Frankenstein’s Army From Holland, this new black horror-com imagines that Nazis had a very secret weapon they hoped would turn the tide of WWII. Much gore ensues. (NR)

Grand Illusion, 1403 N.E. 50th St., 523-3935, grandillusioncinema.org, $5-$8, Fri.-Sat., Aug. 9-10, 11 p.m.

Fremont Outdoor Movies The Tesseract—a powerful glowing cube—is captured by Loki (Tom Hiddleston), brother of demigod Thor (Chris Hemsworth). Ass-kicking Girl Friday Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) and eye-patched S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) gather a motley crew to get it back, including Tony Stark/Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Bruce Banner/Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Captain America (Chris Evans), and Thor. Writer/director Joss Whedon effectively creates a sketch of a working universe, but the most Whedon-esque parts of the script are the superheroes’s flippant wisecracks. Yet we never get the sense that any of the heroes might not survive to snark again, and the suspense-free movie amounts to a gallery of masculine neurosis. Outdoor movie screens at dusk. (PG-13) KARINA LONGWORTH 3501 Phinney Ave. N., 781-4230, fremontoutdoormovies.com, $5, Sat., Aug. 10, 7:30 p.m.

Gustafer Yellowgold Musician and animator Morgan Taylor will play songs and show his cartoon about the titular singing elf-like creature. (NR)

Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave., 829-7863, nwfilmforum.org, $9-$12, Sun., Aug. 11, 5 p.m.

Jug Face This new horror flick stars Lauren Ashley Carter as a young teen trying to escape murderous yokels and some sort of pit-dwelling creature. Among her co-stars? Sean Young. Now that’s scary. (R)

Crest, 16505 Fifth Ave. N.E., 781-5755, landmarktheatres.com, $3, Fri., Aug. 9, 11:59 p.m.

Manos: The Hands of Fate This would-be 1966 scare-pic became a cult favorite thanks to its mockery on Mystery Science Theater 3,000. Devil-worshipping cults were never so cheesy. This is a restored new print. If that’s not enough incentive, there’s also a puppet show: Manos: The Hands of Felt. (NR)

SIFF Cinema Uptown, 511 Queen Anne Ave. N., 324-9996, siff.net, $6-$11, Wed., Aug. 7, 9 p.m.

MOHAI Movies in the Park Before he was Sam in the LOTR movies (before he could shave, for that matter), Sean Astin joined fellow child actors including Corey Feldman in the 1985 fantasy-adventure flick The Goonies, hatched by the powerful cartel of Steven Spielberg and Chris Columbus (though directed by Richard Donner). Outdoor screening begins at dusk. (PG)

Lake Union Park, 860 Terry Ave. N., mohai.org, Free, Saturdays. Through Aug. 24.

Moonlight Cinema

The Goonies (see above). Redhook Ale Brewery, 14300 N.E. 145th St. (Woodinville), 425-483-3232, redhook.com, $5, Thursdays, 6 p.m. Through Aug. 29.

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Movie Mondays

The Blues Brothers proved to be a solid and unlikely hit back in 1980, really the first real evidence that Saturday Night Live could create movies. And movie stars: Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi have real chemistry and appeal as the itinerant bluesmen trying to save an orphanage with their all-star concert. (Music comes courtesy of Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, Cab Calloway, and other luminaries.) Director John Landis has a lot of fun with the car chases, and it’s always good to see Illinois Nazis get their due. Ticket price is your drink price. (R)

BRIAN MILLER The Triple Door, 216 Union St., 838-4333, thetripledoor.net, $3, Mondays, 8 p.m. Through Aug. 19.

Movies at Magnuson Park From 1993, The Sandlot has a band of plucky outcasts form a winning Little League team, among other childhood adventures. Outdoor movie screens at dusk. (PG)

Magnuson Park, 7400 Sand Point Way N.E., moviesatmagnuson.com, $5, Thursdays, 7 p.m. Through Aug. 29.

Movies at Marymoor Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew is reconfigured into the setting of “Padua High” (actually Tacoma’s Stadium High School, an amazing neo-gothic structure on Puget Sound that resembles a castle by the sea). Julia Stiles plays Kat, a Sylvia Plath-reading feminist who can’t wait to graduate and get away from her restrictive dad and the stupidity that is high school. Its sharp, fast-paced dialogue makes 10 Things the best teen movie of 1999. And while the film pretends that no teenage guy in his right mind would want to go out with Kat, any viewer can see that she’s all that, and more. Outdoor movie screens at dusk. (PG-13) SOYON IM Marymoor Park, 6046 W. Lake Sammamish Parkway N.E. (Redmond), moviesatmarymoor.com, $5, Wednesdays, 7 p.m. Through Aug. 28.

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My Dinner With Andre SEE THE WIRE, PAGE 97.

A Night at the Roxbury Will Ferrell and Chris Kattan spun off their dim-witted dancing SNL characters into this middling 1998 comedy. If nothing else, they succeeded in sticking Haddaway’s “What Is Love?” in the brains of more Americans than we’d care to count. Note: No show on Tues. (PG-13)

Central Cinema, 1411 21st Ave., 686-6684, central-cinema.com, Aug. 9-14, 9:30 p.m.

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Some Like It Hot Billy Wilder worked with Marilyn Monroe twice, which is twice as much as most directors could stand her. Famously late and unreliable on the set of 1959’s brilliant drag-gangster farce Some Like It Hot, she required countless takes with her more professional co-stars Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis, giving Wilder fits in trying to cut the picture together. And yet. Some Like It Hot represents Monroe’s saddest, greatest, most damaged and vulnerable performance precisely because all her foibles show through in the part of chanteuse Sugar Kane. “It’s the story of my life. I always get the fuzzy end of the lollipop,” she says—and that’s pretty much the way Hollywood treated Monroe, too. Note: No show on Tues. (NR) BRIAN MILLER Central Cinema, $6-$8, Aug. 9-14, 7 p.m.

Spring Breakers The opening montage of Harmony Korine’s Spring Breakers consists of drunken, ripe flesh on the beach, college kids dancing in slo-mo to Skrillex, doing beer bongs and smoking dope, girls flashing their tits. It’s so ridiculously trashy that you know Korine—writer of Kids, director of Gummo and Trash Humpers—is thinking beyond Girls Gone Wild. Then he introduces our four bored heroines (Ashley Benson, Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens, and Rachel Korine, the director’s wife), too broke for spring break, who embark on a crime spree leading to St. Petersburg, a charismatic drug dealer (James Franco), gunfire, blood, and remorse. Franco’s Alien is like some sort of Weimar cabaret figure crossed with Vanilla Ice. Spring Breakers has a welcome, bracing sting to it—the pungent clarity of disgust. (R) BRIAN MILLER Harvard Exit, 807 E. Roy St., 323-0587, landmarktheatres.com, $8.25, Sat., Aug. 10, 11:59 p.m.

Three Dollar Bill Outdoor Cinema The 1966 Batman movie is a spin-off from the original TV series, starring Seattle-raised Adam West. Check out those shorts on Robin. Outdoor movie screened at dusk. (PG)

Cal Anderson Park, 1635 11th Ave., threedollarbillcinema.org, Free, Fri., Aug. 9.

VHS Month The 1970 Beatles documentary Let it Be is screened this weekend. Following on Monday and Tuesday is John Frankenheimer’s 1959 adaptation of Henry James suspense tale The Turn of the Screw, made for TV, starring Ingrid Bergman as the evil governess. Remember that beer and wine are now served, but screening open to all ages. (NR)

Scarecrow Video, 5030 Roosevelt Way N.E., 524-8554, scarecrow.com, Free, Sat., Aug. 10, 8 p.m.; Mon., Aug. 12, 6 p.m.; Tue., Aug. 13.

Ongoing

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The Act of Killing Like Armenia and Rwanda, Indonesia belongs to that second tier of genocides outside modern European borders. During 1965–66, world attention was focused on Vietnam, an oversight that director Joshua Oppenheimer now corrects in the most unsettling fashion. There are no mass graves here dug up by backhoe, no old newsreel footage, no historians or interviews with the families of the bereaved. Instead, Oppenheimer somehow ingratiated himself with Congo and his cohort, convincing them to make a movie that would garishly, heroically re-enact their past misdeeds. His naive yet murderous subjects frequently ask his opinion, off-camera, as if he were a sympathetic participant in the project. It’s celebratory for them, perhaps cathartic on some level, but you could never imagine Nazis being treated in this grotesque, ironic manner. Instead of the banality of evil, we have the kitsch of evil. (NR) BRIAN MILLER Varsity

The Attack A Tel Aviv surgeon is confounded by the torso of a bombing victim in the morgue (one of 18). She’s female. She’s Christian. She’s the suspect, say the police. And she’s his wife. Compounding matters even further, Dr. Jaafari (Ali Suliman) is a Palestinian-born Israeli citizen, a secular scotch drinker, and someone who wants desperately to believe in peaceful assimilation. In flashbacks and ghostly visitations, his wife Sihem (Reymoud Amsalem) doesn’t wear a veil, doesn’t talk politics, so Jaafari is stunned by the cops’ allegations. After a brutal police interrogation, Jaafari decides to launch his own forensic investigation. Directed by Ziad Doueiri, The Attack ends on a frustratingly indecisive note, where notions of blame and balance fall away. It speaks to Jaafari’s awkward position. Sihem stepped through the looking-glass, but he’s forever caught on the threshold. (R) BRIAN MILLER Sundance Cinemas

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Before Midnight

Before-ophiles already know that Celine (Julie Delpy) and Jesse (Ethan Hawke) are now a couple and the parents of adorable twin girls. On vacation in Greece, the Paris-based family is contemplating a move to the U.S., where novelist Jesse’s teen son lives. But Celine has a career back in Paris, and she naturally takes his suggestion as an affront. From the first 10-minute take in the car ride back from the airport, kids snoozing in the rear seats, Before Midnight becomes their on-again/off-again argument about who has to sacrifice what for a relationship, what sexual spark keeps it burning, and how shared romantic history becomes both a burden and a bond. Your tolerance or enthusiasm for the third chapter of Celine and Jesse’s intermittent romance will depend on your feelings about Richard Linklater’s last two talkathons featuring the same duo. (R) BRIAN MILLER Sundance

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Blackfish

Blackfish should be the final word on the subject of keeping orcas in places like SeaWorld, even if it probably won’t be. This relentless documentary circles around the 2010 death of Dawn Brancheau, a supremely experienced SeaWorld trainer who was killed in a performing tank by Tilikum, a 12,000-pound whale. But that death is the starting point for a film that makes a couple of general thrusts: Killer whales should not be kept in captivity, and the sea parks that own them have done a suspiciously incomplete job of informing their trainers and the public about how they operate their businesses. Interviews with former SeaWorld trainers paint a sad picture of a happy-face culture that sugar-coated the containment of giant wild animals; because of the industry’s expert PR spin, the trainers themselves would hear only vague rumors about injuries in marine parks. Director Gabriela Cowperthwaite looks into fatal incidents at Victoria, B.C.’s Sealand of the Pacific and Loro Parque on the Spanish island of Tenerife. If Blackfish outrages people, so much the better. The case is closed, and whales and dolphins are too high on the evolutionary scale to keep captive. (PG-13) ROBERT HORTON Seven Gables

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The East Brit Marling teams once more with Sound of My Voice director Zal Batmanglij for The East, another intense piece that operates on a bigger scale. Hired by a private intelligence agency to infiltrate an eco-terrorist group called The East, Sarah (Marling) rolls into the unwashed ranks of these self-styled environmental avengers. They repay corporate atrocities by visiting similar outcomes on the offending CEOs and their families—an oil company exec might get toxic sludge dumped in his house, for instance. Sarah begins to see things from the other side, and it helps that the nouveau hippies in the crowd are charismatic (Alexander Skarsgård), devoted (Ellen Page), and attractive. Patricia Clarkson adds frost as Sarah’s boss, and her resemblance to Marling is a mirror for the younger woman’s choice: Develop a conscience or become me someday. (R) ROBERT HORTON Sundance

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Fruitvale Station By an accident of timing, if not craft, Ryan Coogler has made one of the most important movies of the year. His docudrama chronicles the last 24 hours in the life of Oscar Grant (played by Michael B. Jordan), a 22-year-old black man shot to death by overzealous transit cops on an Oakland BART platform in 2009. Less covered by the national media than the Trayvon Martin case, his killing was actually witnessed and filmed on cellphones by New Year’s revelers returning home on the same BART train from which he was dragged by the cops. Fruitvale Station leads up to that incident with a day-in-the-life format. It’s overly sentimental and possibly too soft on Grant, who goes out of his way to do favors for everyone he encounters. After showing us the actual cellphone video before the credits, Coogler spends a relaxed hour humanizing Grant; then comes the grim rush of docudrama that loops us back to the fateful railway platform. (R) BRIAN MILLER Guild 45th, Meridian, Ark Lodge, Bainbridge, others

Still Mine Building upon a true incident in New Brunswick, writer/director Michael McGowan posits a gentle entry into the great senescence. Married 60 years, Craig (James Cromwell) and Irene (Genevieve Bujold) live in the same decrepit farmhouse where they raised seven kids. Still spry at 87, Craig fells timber on his 2,000 acres and mills planks in the woodshed. As Irene exhibits signs of memory loss, he decides to retire the cows and crops to build their final dream house—small and efficient on one level, using his land, lumber, and construction know-how. Who’s the villain of Still Mine? The pasty bureaucracy that oversees land use and construction! Cromwell and Bujold create a poignant portrait of marriage under constant, faithful repair. Still Mine gives us stoic marital fidelity, if little drama. (PG-13) BRIAN MILLER Varsity

20 Feet From Stardom Who dreams of being a backup singer? This mostly delightful music doc is tinged with an air of disappointment. Meeting the full-throated likes of Merry Clayton, Claudia Lennear, and Lisa Fischer, we understand these are masters of their craft. But the question nags: If they are masters, why aren’t they stars? The film includes some who made the leap, including Darlene Love and Sheryl Crow, but the focus is mostly on the folks who’ve made a career out of being in the background. Director Morgan Neville doesn’t organize his material in a way that feels entirely intuitive. Despite the choppiness, the prime footage from George Harrison’s 1971 Concert for Bangladesh or Jonathan Demme’s 1984 Talking Heads concert doc Stop Making Sense is exciting. (PG-13) ROBERT HORTON SIFF Cinema Uptown

2 Guns

2 Guns is an average summer action comedy, at best. The script is weak and the action scenes are dried (just like the scorched-and-yellow look of the cinematography). The talents of two of Hollywood’s the most productive tough guys, Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg, are unfortunately wasted. A DEA agent (Washington) and a Navy intelligence operative (Wahlberg) infiltrate a Mexican cartel, each unknown to the other. Then they get fingered for stealing $43 million, and the two form a shaky alliance to fight for their survival. Washington and Wahlberg do have a fair amount of buddy-flick chemistry, there are a few solid laugh lines, but the plot around them is no more distinguished than one of the Bad Boys movies. And Icelandic director Baltasar Kormakur doesn’t help his two stars overcome their shallow characters in this extremely uninteresting story. The plot twists and over-the-top action sequences are the same old things we’ve seen in a ton of other summer movies. 2 Guns may be a good choice for DVD or streaming in a few months. But for now in a theater, not so much. (R) NING LIU Alderwood 16, Cinebarre, Meridian, Thornton Place, Sundance, Lincoln Square, Kirkland Parkplace, others

The Way, Way Back Fourteen-year-old Duncan (Liam James) and his divorced mother Pam (Toni Colette) are dragged to a Massachusetts beach rental by her overbearing new bf Trent (Steve Carell). Trent. There is no way we are going to like a guy named that (and a car salesman, of course), and Duncan emphatically dislikes the bullying Trent. In this awfully broad and familiar tale, unhappy Duncan finds a sympathetic mentor in Owen (Sam Rockwell), the flippant king of the local water park where Duncan lands a summer job. While the drunken adults enjoy “spring break for adults,” Duncan finds new pals and self-confidence. We’ve seen this story a thousand times. But what are its incidental pleasures? Rockwell, Rockwell, and Rockwell. (PG-13) BRIAN MILLER Ark Lodge, Big Picture, Guild 45th, Meridian, Thornton Place, SIFF Cinema Uptown, others

The Wolverine

The Wolverine is surprisingly not a far-fetched addition to the X-Men series. Without excessive reliance on CGI, it features good old-fashioned movie action—not always seen in effects-driven superhero movies nowadays. And Hugh Jackman executes that action adequately enough, as the Wolverine (aka Logan) battles various baddies in Alaska and Japan. Still, the final villain he faces is too much the cliche in his own superpowers—which turn out to be a matter of technology. The minor characters behave in predictably dumb ways, and the story is slow at times. Fortunately, there is some chemistry between Jackman and the Japanese actresses (including Rila Fukushima and Tao Okamoto) to make up for the otherwise tedious pace. A fight atop a speeding bullet train fight scene is the movie’s highlight, but it’s over too soon. The vigorous action scenes and appealing Japanese landscapes are well photographed (by Ross Emery.) James Mangold directs. (PG-13) NING LIU Pacific Place, Cinebarre, Lincoln Square, Majestic Bay, Bainbridge, Thornton Place, Sundance, others