Odeon Original Sound
Piazza Strozzi, 2
tel. 055/214068
*For showtimes see events listing
Mon, June 6
MACHETE
Left for dead after clashing with notorious Mexican
drug kingpin Torrez, Machete has escaped to Texas, hoping to disappear and
forget his tragic past. Instead, he finds is a web of corruption and deceit
that leaves a bullet in Senator McLaughlin and Machete a wanted man. Brutally
violent, hard, action-packed revenge thriller: ‘Forget modulation, nuance or
storytelling, this is a movie that hits hard from first to last, no questions
asked or logic followed’ (Movieline). ‘Machete is exactly what you expect. There’s
ridiculously over-the-top violence, plenty of nudity, and lots of grisly humor.
It’s mostly enjoyable, but isn’t likely to be anyone’s top 5 anything’ (Premiere).
Tues, June 7
THE SOCIAL NETWORK
You don’t get to 500,000,000 friends without making a
few enemies. The story of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s development from a
geeky Harvard undergraduate through shady business deals and betrayals to
becoming the world’s youngest billionaire is the subject of this landmark movie
delivering the very best of contemporary Hollywood. ‘The film comes down to a
mesmerizing portrait of a man who in any other age would perhaps be deemed nuts
or useless, but in the Internet age has this mental agility to transform an
idea into an empire’ (Hollywood
Reporter). ‘With a thieves den of
borderline-Shakespearian characters, a wickedly literate screenplay, potent
direction by David Fincher, an exceptional ensemble cast and subject matter
that speaks to a generation and well beyond, The Social Network is mesmerizing’
(Box Office).
Mon, June 13
Tues, June 14
X-MEN: FIRST CLASS
Prequel. The back story: Before arch-enemies Charles
Xavier and Erik Lensherr took the names Professor X and Magneto, they were two
young men discovering their powers for the first time, working together with
other Mutants (some familiar, some new), to stop the greatest threat the world
has ever known. But a rift between them opens and so begins the eternal war
between Magneto’s Brotherhood and Professor X’s X-Men. ‘It’s a brilliant idea
to transplant superhero stories onto the details of actual history-especially a
political quagmire like the Cuban Missile Crisis-but X-Men: First Class seldom
manages to make its universe feel real, much less really exciting … What the
film does well, however, is grasp the tone and rhythm of the original comic
books’ (Box Office Magazine).
Tues, June 14
REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE
Nicholas Ray’s classic 1955 drama launched James
Dean’s short-lived but emphatic career. Teenagers had recently been invented,
and Dean’s portrayal of Jim Stark as the troubled new arrival in town almost
defines the angst and ‘delinquency’ of the period. A wrong-side-of-the-tracks
romance blossoms but ends in futile tragedy for one of the protagonists.
Essential viewing. ‘Like its hero, “Rebel Without a Cause” desperately wants to
say something and doesn’t know what it is. If it did know, it would lose its
fascination. More perhaps than it realized, it is a subversive document of its
time’ (Roger Ebert). ‘A fine script, dynamic direction, doomed romantic
idealism and telling performances make this the most timeless of Ray’s
gripping, socially aware dramas’ (Empire).
The British
Institute
Lungarno
Guicciardini, 9
tel. 055/267781
http://www.britishinstitute.it
Nicolas Roeg Retrospective
Wed, June 8
INSIGNIFICANCE
‘Knowledge isn’t truth. It’s just mindless agreement.
You agree with me, I agree with someone else-we all have knowledge. We haven’t
come any closer to the truth. You can never understand anything by agreeing, by
making definitions. Only by turning over the possibilities. That’s called thinking.
If I say I know, I stop thinking. As long as I keep thinking, I come to
understand. That way, I might approach some truth.’ Cognitive relativity? Set partly in a hotel room in 1954,
four characters-the Actress, the Senator, the Ballplayer and the Professor-sit
around and talk. They may resemble cultural icons of the period: Marilyn
Monroe, Joseph McCarthy, Joe DiMaggio and Albert Einstein. They do. Roeg’s
flashbacks and fantasy sequences enrich this quirky and implausible but
truthful comic drama.
Wed, June 1
THE WITCHES
Roeg’s return to mainstream film retains
characteristic elements. It’s a Roald Dahl children’s story of witchcraft and
its customary cruelties with Dahl’s black side to the fore and Roeg’s now
rather subdued black comedy clearly still effective. Jim Henson’s puppetry
might seem like an odd addition, but it was critically applauded. ‘What emerged
from the combination of these divergent gifts is utterly magical: a film that
appeals to both young and old without condescending to either. The wit is
highly sophisticated, but there’s also action, suspense, adventure-to say
nothing of the spectacular visual effects’ (Entertainment
Weekly). . . and super-witch Anjelica
Huston.
