Wuzzardo and Martorana lead the post-film discussion.
When you invite librarians somewhere, expect to walk away with more than what you started with.
A partnership between New Haven’s Shubert Theater and PBS ended up becoming a citywide library pop-up movie screening tour this month, hitting all five branches of the New Haven Free Public Library with the not-yet-released documentary film Free For All: The Public Library. I caught up with the tour’s third stop Saturday afternoon, at the library’s Ives branch downtown.
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Brian Slattery |
Apr 3, 2025 2:31 pm
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Cai Emmons, in the advanced stages of a degenerative disease, has just gotten off a Zoom call with a doctor to discuss end-of-life options. She’s on a small couch, bathed in her home’s warm light. Her walker, which she can use to get around the house, is within reach. But she can’t stand up to be able to use it. She tries to push herself off the couch and fails. She gets a hold of one handle of the walker, but it’s not enough. She tries again and again, for a full minute, determined, but can’t do it. Her husband Paul re-enters the room. He hasn’t seen how long Emmons has been trying to get up, but a couple seconds later he understands, and goes to her, putting his arms around her. With his help, Emmons is able to rise. Standing upright, she looks straight into the camera. She doesn’t speak but her intentions seem as clear as day: You saw me, right?
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Karen Ponzio |
Mar 31, 2025 11:36 am
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A still from "Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du commerce, 1080 Bruxelles."
Voulez-vous French 75? No, I’m not asking about the gin-based cocktail, but rather the latest series from the Yale Film Archive, which celebrates a trio of French films made in 1975 that are in turn celebrating their 50th anniversary this year.
The first of the series was shown Friday night in all of its three-hour and 22-minute glory. Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du commerce, 1080 Bruxelles brought forth cinephiles who filled nearly every seat of the theater in the Humanities Quadrangle on York Street to experience the film Sight & Sound magazine ranked number one in their “Greatest Films of All Time” poll in 2022.
It would be uncouth for me to tell you what two movies I saw Thursday night at the monthly gathering of Best Video’s Secret Music Documentary Society.
The group is secret, after all. Their policy is that you can’t ask about previous titles; if you miss a screening, you have to live knowing you may never find out what the group watched in your absence. What happened there was a secret.
Thursday night’s gathering was the latest edition of the monthly society, which Faith Marek and Gorman Bechard founded this January to share unreleased, suppressed, or otherwise underground documentaries about the musicians we know and love. The group meets on the fourth Thursday of every month (except next month’s meeting, which is on Wednesday, April 23) to screen secret films and discuss secret thoughts over pizza and beer. (You can check Best Video’s event calendar for updates.)
Without mentioning any film titles or main characters, I’ll tell you what I can about the sights and sounds of the films playing Thursday evening. The first short film of the night was “compelling, even though it was Barbies,” according to audience member Jeremy Hudson.
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Jamil Ragland |
Mar 21, 2025 7:00 am
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Jack Quaid stars as Nate in Novocaine.
Novocaine Apple Cinema Xtreme Hartford March 19, 2025
Bank assistant Nate (Jack Quaid) is a typical everyday guy, except that he suffers from a rare condition called congenital insensitivity to pain and anhidrosis, or CIPA. He hits it off one day with his coworker Sherry (Amber Midthunder), and after a great date, the next day the bank is robbed and Sherry is taken hostage. It’s up to Nate and his small but stalwart group of allies to save her from the murderous bandits.
That’s the standard plot in the new comedy Novocaine. There are one or two twists to keep things interesting, but nothing major. Instead of plot machinations, Novocaine relies on the charisma of its stars, and a genuinely funny script.
165 Years of House, the documentary that New Haven teacher and filmmaker Raven Mitchell is carefully constructing, describes concentric circles of community working together to support young people’s development. Mitchell uses this lens, based on a model called Bronfrenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory, to describe the importance of Hillhouse High School over its 165 years of existence.
From interpersonal bonds in the family to parent-teacher relationships, connections to media and beyond, according to this model, each circle of community has an impact on the other levels and, ultimately, the child at the center.
On Saturday afternoon at NXTHVN art gallery in Dixwell, several of these circles were at play as Mitchell presented a sneak peek of her documentary-in-progress to a room full of intergenerational love, support, and family of all kinds.
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Karen Ponzio |
Mar 13, 2025 1:55 pm
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Karen Ponzio Photo
The Neighborhood Watch Party Committtee: Travis Carbonella, Lizzy Donius, Noe Jimenez.
While the conversation about needing a new movie theater in New Haven continues ad infinitum, three Westville friends have been busy converting a beloved neighborhood space into a temporary theater to help bridge the gap left by the closing of the Criterion and to foster community by gathering and watching a film together on a big screen.
Their project, Pop-Up Cinema, presented by The Neighborhood Watch Party, screened its inaugural film in its newest series at Lotta Studios Wednesday night, the first of six different films that will be shown over the next seven days.
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Jamil Ragland |
Mar 13, 2025 8:00 am
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Two Mickeys? Double the trouble.
Mickey 17 Apple Cinemas Xtreme Hartford March 11, 2025
I finally made it to the theater to see Mickey 17, a sci-fi comedy written and directed by Bong Joon Ho of Parasite fame.
For those who want a spoiler-free mini-review, Mickey 17 is a messy movie with many different layers that don’t always mesh perfectly together, and the third act betrays the more philosophical movie that comes before it for a (somewhat) standard action ending. Still, Robert Pattinson and Naomi Ackie are wonderful together, and the sci-fi premise is at least an entertaining thought experiment, even if it doesn’t all come together.
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Jamil Ragland |
Mar 10, 2025 7:58 am
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Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) dons the red, white and blue in Captain America: Brave New World
Captain America: Brave New World Apple Cinemas Xtreme Hartford March 7, 2025
I intended to go to the theater and watch Mickey 17, but I misread the schedule and arrived just in time for a showing of Captain America: Brave New World. I decided to go with it; one of the most enjoyable aspects of writing reviews has been the happy surprises I discover along the way.
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Karen Ponzio |
Mar 3, 2025 9:08 am
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Karen Ponzio Photos.
Party time at Best Video!
While the big winner of Sunday night’s Oscars at the Dolby Theater in Hollywood was the film Anora, the Sean Baker-written-directed-produced-and-edited film about a Brooklyn sex worker who meets and marries the son of a Russian oligarch, there were a host of winners here at home too: the attendees of Best Video’s Oscar viewing party. They got to dress up in their fancy clothes, enjoy a delicious spread of snacks, and cheer on (or not) the movie magic makers, creators, and stars of the best of last year’s films.
Elphaba, Sen. Kissel: This bill is wicked. So to speak.
Hartford — Should Connecticut movie theaters have to publish accurate start times for films and previews — or else face $1,000 false-advertising fines?
New Haven State Sen. Martin Looney says yes. Cinema owners say no. And an Enfield lawmaker was embarrassed that such a question would even be asked.
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Lisa Reisman |
Feb 10, 2025 11:00 am
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Andrius Banevicious photo
Marcus Harvin (right), with Ray Boyd, at Manson Youth Institution.
“Less than three years ago, I was called a number just like you,” Marcus Harvin began. “From this moment on, never call yourself a number. Never accept that.”
In the words of local queer and trans organization East Rock House’s Ashley LaRue, “The world is too freaking wild right now.” Sometimes you just need to share a snowy February moment watching women in cowboy boots and rhinestoned button-downs fall in love. This month’s Queer Film Club pick, presented by East Rock House at Best Video in Hamden Thursday night, was the 1985 classic romance Desert Hearts.
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Karen Ponzio |
Feb 4, 2025 10:00 am
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A still from "The Social Network."
The Yale Film Archive’s spring semester film series has been in full swing for a couple of weeks now, and in true form they have brought their A‑game with a variety of screenings that honor the all-time classics and the more recent additions to the canon of must-see films.
Never was that more evident than at their Saturday night screening of a 35mm print of David Fincher’s “The Social Network,” the 2010 film about Facebook’s origin and the resulting drama, from Harvard’s campus to the shores of Palo Alto and the dorm rooms and boardrooms in between.
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Jamil Ragland |
Jan 15, 2025 12:07 pm
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Stephanie Hsu, Michelle Yeoh and Ke Huy Quan in Everything Everywhere All at Once
Everything Everywhere All at Once Cinestudio Trinity College Hartford Jan. 14, 2025
I never got the chance to see Everything Everywhere All at Once, the 2022 winner of the Oscar for Best Picture. It also won awards for several of the actors, so its reputation has only grown since then.
“The Green is big enough, gracious enough, generous enough to tolerate many different people.”
And public space — well, “public space is not always fun.” That’s kind of the point.
So argues Elihu Rubin, a Yale architecture professor and documentarian of the Green, as he cautioned against too many permanent changes to the city’s great public square at a time when a redesign is on the horizon.
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Nora Grace-Flood, Jamil Ragland, Sarah Bass and Alicia Chesser |
Jan 2, 2025 9:28 am
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Timothée Chalamet as Dylan recording the Highway 61 album, in A Complete Unknown.
Baby-boomer critics have spent the past week reliving halcyon memories and lauding the new Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown. It turns out that critics born long after Bob Dylan exploded popular culture and released generation-defining music have their own takes on the film, which adopts an historical fiction approach to capturing the moment when the folkie plugged in and blasted “Like A Rolling Stone” at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival.
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Jamil Ragland |
Dec 24, 2024 8:45 am
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Sonic (Ben Schwartz) and Dr. Robotnik (Jim Carrey) in Sonic the Hedgehog 3.
Sonic the Hedgehog 3 Cinemark Buckland Hills 18 XD and IMAX Manchester Dec. 23, 2024
This review contains spoilers
Sonic the Hedgehog 3 had great expectations to live up to given the bar the previous two movies set. Not only does it clear that bar — it sets a new standard for family moviesl.
Interstellar is a movie of layers. It tells the story of the end of the world, the main character’s redemption and the relationship between a father and daughter all simultaneously. The main gist is that Earth is becoming uninhabitable, and Cooper (Matthew McConaughey, showing exactly why he’s a leading man) must undertake an impossible mission to find a new home for humanity. Meanwhile, his daughter Murph (played by several incredibly talented actresses-young Murph is Mackenzie Foy; middle Murph is Jessica Chastain; old Murph is Ellen Burstyn) is attempting to save the world in her own way.
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Jamil Ragland |
Dec 5, 2024 11:28 am
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Cardinals Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes) and Bellini (Stanley Tucci) talk before the conclave begins.
Conclave Real Art Ways Hartford Dec. 4, 2024
I was excited to see that Conclave had returned to Real Art Ways for a second run in their theater. I missed it the first time it was available, and was determined to see favorite actors like John Lithgow and Stanley Tucci on the big screen.
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Jamil Ragland |
Dec 2, 2024 10:30 am
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Moana (Auli'i Cravalho) looks out towards her destiny
Moana 2 Cinemark Buckland Hills 18 XD and IMAX Manchester December 1, 2024
THISREVIEWCONTAINSSPOILERS
Moana 2 picks up three years after the events of the first movie. The titular hero (Auli’i Cravalho returns, just as good as the first time) is now a Wayfinder for her people, and must team up with her demigod friend Maui (Dwyane Johnson, always a pleasure) and crew of misfits to find a lost island hidden by the vengeful god Nalo.
