Starring: Naomi Watts, Martin Henderson, David Dorfman, Brian Cox, Jane Alexander, Lindsay Frost
A year after her breakthrough performance in Mulholland Drive, Naomi Watts elevated this remake of the 1998 Japanese horror movie Ringu with a committed performance as the journalist aunt seeking answers after the mysterious and horrible death of her niece. Seattle is the gloomy backdrop and the color palette works mostly in grays and blacks, effectively creating an unsettling atmosphere and showing restraint from the usual Hollywood glitzing of the sparse original. There is plenty to captivate the eye – creepy kid drawings, troubled horses, and even a bit of that signature Japanese menacing long black hair. If there was any warning to be heeded from how video infects our brains, in this age of YouTube and TikTok it seems rather quaint that one passed-around VHS could do that kind of damage.
Neo-Tokyo is about to explode! A 35mm presentation of the original theatrical release of AKIRA by Streamline Pictures.
Thirty years after a devastating explosion engulfed all of Tokyo, a new monster looms in its place. Neo-Tokyo, a mega-city inhabited by street thugs and drug pushers; a city in the pocket of corrupt politicians and capitalists. The lifeblood of the city, though, are the bike gangs that crash through its arterial streets, waging a violent war against the the system and each other. Caught up in an everyday turf war with a rival gang, two kids, Kaneda and Tetsuo, fall on the wrong side of the law; but while Kaneda gets churned out by the courts, Tetsuo catches the eye of a group of scientists who awaken in Tetsuo an incredible untapped psychic power. As this power grows, Tetsuo goes rogue and lashes out a society that abused him, all while Kaneda and a group of rebels begin uncovering a secret that could tear Neo-Tokyo apart.
Gorgeously animated — without computers, mind you — Akira is an absolutely essential piece of science fiction. Cool, complex, and epic, Akira is a film that demands attention. An early cross-over success for anime in America, and as genre defining to cyber-punk as Blade Runner and William Gibson’s novel Neuromancer.
Part of Nitehawk’s November ANIME AFTER DARK 2 midnite series.
Watch film’s favorite underachiever get the girl in Cameron Crowe’s Say Anything.
Say Anything changes everything. Since its release, girls have wanted a guy (preferably John Cusack) to stand outside her window blaring a love song on the his boombox. Although the now iconic Lloyd Dobbler is labeled an underachiever in this film, he’s actually an amazingly cool guy: he listens to great music, wears The Clash t-shirts, practices kickboxing and, above all, he’s incredibly considerate and loving. Any lady, including illusive valedictorian Diane Court, would be so lucky to have him. But like the complications of real life, Say Anything reflects the turmoil that comes from love and family. Still, Lloyd Dobbler fights. A must see now and always.
Part of Nitehawk’s February I CHOO-CHOO-CHOOSE YOU brunch series.
Starring: Patrick Swayze, Ben Gazzara, Kelly Lynch, Sam Elliott
Dalton (Patrick Swayze) is the go-to man to clean up dirty bars when they get a little too, well, crazy. Let’s just say that he’s the bouncer’s bouncer. But when he rolls into the Double Deuce for his latest gig, he encounters way more trouble than usual. Besides the lazy and incompetent staff, he notices violence runs throughout the town because of town bully, the rich Brad Wesley (stellar character by Ben Gazzara). As he engages in a battle of principle he also falls in love with nurse (Kelly Lynch). The fight, the love, and the Thai Chi scenes in Road House are pretty much the best things ever.
Starring: Ralph Macchio, Pat Morita, Elisabeth Shue, Martin Kove
The secret to Karate lies in the mind and heart. Not in the hands.
Wax on, wax off. After moving from New Jersey to Southern California, young Italian-American kid Daniel Larusso realizes he doesn’t quite fit into the blonde-hair/surfer mold. But it’s when he falls for the popular girl, Ali Mills, and she falls back, that the resulting bullying sends him into the karate training hands of Mister Miyagi. As Miyagi trains his young apprentice he reveals more than just skills to fend off his attackers, he teaches Larusso valuable life lessons such as patience, balance, believing in one’s self and what true friendship means. A classic coming of age tale for the 80s, The Karate Kid shows that some things are worth smartly fighting for.
FINAL WEEKS: playing at Nitehawk until March 27!
A son of Texas, Ron Woodroof is an electrician and rodeo cowboy. In 1985, he is well into an unexamined existence with a devil-may-care lifestyle. Suddenly, Ron is blindsided by being diagnosed as H.I.V.-positive and given 30 days to live. Yet he will not, and does not, accept a death sentence. His crash course of research reveals a lack of approved treatments and medications in the U.S., so Ron crosses the border into Mexico. With a growing community of friends and clients, Ron fights for dignity, education, and acceptance. In the years following his diagnosis, the embattled Lone Star loner lives life to the fullest like never before.
Starring: Buster Keaton, Ruth Dwyer, T. Roy Barnes
Buster Keaton’s 1925 silent comedy Seven Chances features a young financial broker Jimmie Shannon (Keaton) whose impending bankruptcy may be over when his firm reveals that his grandfather’s will leaves him seven million dollars. The only catch…in order to inherit the money he has to marry before 7pm on his 27th birthday which just happens to be TODAY! When his sweetheart turns down his marriage proposal because she think it’s just for money, Shannon goes on a wild adventure trying to land a bride. Don’t you worry, things all work out.
Before Seven Chances, we’ll be screening a new restoration of the 1920 Keaton short Neighbors: A young couple who live next to each other in tenement apartments do everything they can to be together despite of their feuding families.
Go on a trip of a lifetime with Nitehawk Nasties to see the most controversial film ever made, CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST (a 35mm presentation).
Italian courts, and the rest of the world, might have found Cannibal Holocaust to be distasteful upon its release but this film-within-a-film ignited what we now know as the found-footage genre. In fact, so convincing was Ruggero Deodato’s faux-documentary about New York anthropologist Professor Harold Monroe’s journey ill-fated journey to South America, that audiences believed what they saw to be fact. Ahead of its flesh-eating time, Cannibal Holocaust is two layered. On the one hand, the film shows Monroe’s recon mission to find out what happened to a missing documentary crew who were filming about primitive cannibal tribes in 1979. Then, there’s the only thing that remains of the crew: their film reels that reveal their shockingly brutal fate. Watch this movie and decide who the real cannibals are.
Part of the 2016 Nitehawk Nasties I EAT CANNIBALS program.
Starring: Dolly Parton, Sylvester Stallone, Richard Farnsworth, Ron Leibman
Starring Dolly Parton at peak sparkle and Sylvester Stallone attempting the two-step, Rhinestone is a joyful time capsule of ’80s excess—packed with catchy tunes, fish-out-of-water comedy, and enough bedazzle to light up Broadway.
When a glamorous country queen makes a high-stakes bet that she can turn any New York cabbie into a Nashville star, the twang hits the fan. Enter Nick Martinelli: a tough-talking, rhythm-challenged driver with zero country cred and a whole lot to learn. Cue cowboy boots, honky-tonk hijinks, and a crash course in rhinestones, stage fright, and unlikely friendship.
How the book giveaway works: Purchase your tickets in advance (at least two days before the showtime), and you will be entered into a random lottery drawing. If your name is drawn, we will email you to notify you that you can pick up your book before the screening.
FINAL WEEKS: playing at Nitehawk until March 20! An aging, booze-addled father makes the trip from Montana to Nebraska with his estranged son in order to claim a million-dollar Mega Sweepstakes Marketing prize in Alexander Payne’s Nebraska.
After receiving a sweepstakes letter in the mail, a cantankerous father (Bruce Dern) thinks he’s struck it rich, and wrangles his son (Will Forte) into taking a road trip to claim the fortune. Shot in black and white across four states, Nebraska tells the stories of family life in the heartland of America.
