THE TRIBE
Winner of multiple 2014 Cannes Film Festival Awards (including the coveted Critics’ Week Grand Prix), Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy’s The Tribe is an undeniably original and intense feature debut set in the insular world of a Ukranian high school for the deaf. The Tribe unfolds through the non-verbal acting and sign language from a cast of deaf, non-professional actors—with no need for subtitles or voice over––resulting in a unique, never-before-experienced cinematic event that engages the audience on a new sensory level.
Teenage Sergey (Grigoriy Fesenko), a new student at the boarding school, realizes immediately that he must prove himself worthy to be brought under the protective wing of the school gang’s leader to survive unscathed. After an indoctrination of harmless initiation pranks and rites, Sergey’s new-found clique soon introduces him to their common activities of robbery, bribery and prostitution. At first assimilating seamlessly into his new role in the tribe, he finds himself compromised as he begins to fall in love with his female classmate—and one of the gang’s escorts—triggering a sequence of stunningly diabolical events.
INSIDE OUT
Do you ever look at someone and wonder what is going on inside their head? Disney•Pixar’s original new film “Inside Out” ventures inside the mind to find out.
Based in Headquarters, the control center inside 11-year-old Riley’s mind, five Emotions are hard at work, led by lighthearted optimist Joy (voice of Amy Poehler), whose mission is to make sure Riley stays happy. Fear (voice of Bill Hader) heads up safety, Anger (voice of Lewis Black) ensures all is fair and Disgust (voice of Mindy Kaling) prevents Riley from getting poisoned—both physically and socially. Sadness (voice of Phyllis Smith) isn’t exactly sure what her role is, and frankly, neither is anyone else.
When Riley’s family relocates to a scary new city, the Emotions are on the job, eager to help guide her through the difficult transition. But when Joy and Sadness are inadvertently swept into the far reaches of Riley’s mind—taking some of her core memories with them—Fear, Anger and Disgust are left reluctantly in charge. Joy and Sadness must venture through unfamiliar places—Long Term Memory, Imagination Land, Abstract Thought and Dream Productions—in a desperate effort to get back to Headquarters, and Riley.
MANGLEHORN
Reclusive small town locksmith A.J. Manglehorn (Al Pacino) has never recovered from losing the love of his life, Clara. Fixated on her memory, he feels closer to his beloved cat than the people around him. Still, he forges on with his tenuous human connections, maintaining intermittent contact with his son (Chris Messina) and taking misplaced pride in a former protégé gone astray, and establishing a cautious friendship with a kind woman from the local bank. As this solitary man approaches the possibility of new love, he finds himself at a crossroads between staying mired in the past and embracing the present. Instilled with director David Gordon Green’s unique brand of eccentricity and anchored by a remarkably rich, understated performance from Pacino, Manglehorn is a movingly humanistic portrait of a man rendered with unsentimental simplicity and idiosyncratic humor.
EDEN
Based on the experiences of Hansen-Løve’s brother (and co-writer) Sven, EDEN follows Paul (Félix de Givry), a teenager in the underground scene of early-nineties Paris. Rave parties dominate that culture, but he’s drawn to the more soulful rhythms of Chicago’s garage house. He forms a DJ collective named Cheers (in a parallel storyline, two of his friends form Daft Punk, who float throughout the movie), and together he and his friends plunge into the ephemeral nightlife of sex, drugs, and endless music. Featuring memorable appearances from Greta Gerwig and Brady Corbet (and shot by cinematographer Denis Lenoir), Hansen-Løve’s film is a shimmering swirl of color, light and baselines – an intoxicating cocktail of euphoria and melancholy as alive as any nightclub.
THE OVERNIGHT
Alex, Emily, and their son, RJ, have recently moved to Los Angeles’ Eastside from Seattle. Feeling lost in a new city, they are desperate to find their first new friends. After a chance meeting with Kurt at the neighborhood park, they gladly agree to join family pizza night at the home. But as it gets later and the kids go to bed, the family “playdate” becomes increasingly more revealing and bizarre as the couples begin to open up.
Writer/director Patrick Brice’s second feature is a painfully funny take on thirty something sexual frustration and parenthood. Featuring memorable lead performances by Taylor Schilling, Adam Scott, Jason Schwartzman, and Judith Godrèche, each actor nimbly balances the script’s sudden emotional turns from surprising honesty to complete embarrassment. Produced by Gettin’ Rad and the Duplass Brothers, THEOVERNIGHT tells a complex story of universal inadequacies.
DOPE
A critical hit and audience favorite out of the Sundance Film Festival, in DOPE, Malcolm (Shameik Moore) is carefully surviving life in a tough neighborhood in Los Angeles while juggling college applications, academic interviews, and the SAT. A chance invitation to an underground party leads him into an adventure that could allow him to go from being a geek, to being dope, to ultimately being himself.
3 1/2 MINUTES, TEN BULLETS
In 3 1⁄2 MINUTES, TEN BULLETS, two lives intersected and were forever altered. On Black Friday in 2012, two cars parked next to each other at a Florida gas station. A white middle-aged male and a black teenager exchanged angry words over the volume of the music in the boy’s car. A gun entered the exchange, and one of them was left dead.
Michael Dunn fired 10 bullets at a car full of unarmed teenagers and then fled. Three of those bullets hit 17-year-old Jordan Davis, who died at the scene. Arrested the next day, Dunn claimed he shot in self-defense. Thus began the long journey of unraveling the truth. 3 1⁄2 MINUTES, TEN BULLETS follows that journey, reconstructing the night of the murder and revealing how hidden racial prejudice can result in tragedy.
Directed by Marc Silver (Who is Dayani Cristal?), the documentary intercuts powerful exclusive footage from a riveting trial with intimate, observational scenes of Jordan’s parents, Ron and Lucy. We see firsthand how difficult it is for them to grapple with unimaginable loss while fighting for justice for their son. The film integrates police interrogation footage, prison phone recordings and interviews with the others at the scene that night. The result is a powerful story about the devastating effects of racial bias, and the search for justice within the judicial system.