New releases, surfer films and movies at local libraries are on the bill.
The San Francisco Public Library continues to host film programs citywide, all free of charge. Here’s what’s on this week:
Jan. 21, 1 p.m., Chinatown Branch: “The Woman Who Ran” (2020), South Korean filmmaker Hong Sangsoo’s subtle dramedy; subtitled in English
Jan. 21, 3 p.m., North Beach Branch: “Frozen” (2013), the Disney animated adventure
Jan. 21, 5 p.m., North Beach Branch: “Wicked” (2024), the musical fantasy based on the Broadway hit about the witches of Oz
Jan. 21, 5 p.m., Park Branch: “A Street Cat Named Bob” (2016), filmmaker Roger Spottiswoode’s fact-based heartwarmer
Jan. 21, 6 p.m., Glen Park Branch: a presentation by University of California, Berkeley French professor Maya Sidhu about Louis Feuillade’s pioneering French crime serial “Les Vampires” (1915-1916)
Jan. 22, 5:30 p.m., Main Library: “Eastern Promises” (2007), David Cronenberg’s intense mobster thriller
“Shredding: A New Lens in Surf Filmmaking,” a program of nine short films debunking stereotypes about surfers and surf culture, is at the Roxie Theater on Sunday. The films which come from a diverse range of communities and cultures express enthusiasm for surfing and the freedom and elation that it produces. A filmmaker Q&A follows the 12:30 p.m. screening.
“H Is for Hawk,” directed by Philippa Lowthorpe (“Misbehaviour”) and based on the 2014 memoir by British naturalist Helen Macdonald, is a moving dramatization of how Macdonald coped with a devastating loss by forming a bond with a raptor. (Macdonald, who came out as nonbinary in 2022, used she/her pronouns when the memoir was published.) Claire Foy plays the 30-something Helen, a Cambridge academic and nature enthusiast. When her beloved father (Brendan Gleeson), a renowned photojournalist, dies in 2007, Helen sinks into depression, isolating herself from family and friends and losing herself in memories. Inspired by birding trips enjoyed with her dad, Helen takes up falconry. She adopts a goshawk — the “wildest and maddest of raptors,” she’s told — and names her Mabel. As she trains Mabel to hunt and fly free, Helen develops a troubling obsession with the bird. Eventually, the experience helps her heal. The screenplay, by Lowthrope and Emma Donoghue, is weakest when it comes to Gleeson’s character, who appears almost entirely in warmhearted flashbacks, which are inferior to the more emotionally truthful, primary material. Fortunately, the focus is largely on Helen’s lonely, gloomy derailment and slow but hopeful recovery, a journey that is sympathetic and engrossing. Foy is convincing as a practitioner and defender of the ancient art and sport, and amusing as an eccentric walking around Cambridge with a bird of prey on her arm. She is mesmerizing as a portrait of grief and self-rediscovery. Foy’s feathered co-star (reportedly, two birds shared the Mabel role), is a striking creature wisely presented as a wild animal. The trainer and the hawk have a delightfully spontaneous quality. “H Is for Hawk” opens Friday in theaters.
“All You Need Is Kill,” an R-rated animated sci-fi adventure from Japan directed by Kenichiro Akimoto, is based on Hiroshi Sakurazaka’s novel, which also inspired 2014’s “The Edge of Tomorrow” with Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt. In a departure from the book, Akimoto’s film centers on Rita (voiced by Ai Mikami in the Japanese-language version), who is part of a volunteer effort to rebuild an alien-invaded Japan. She finds herself trapped in a “Groundhog Day”–like time loop after an otherworldly flower unleashes monsters into the world. Killed in the attack, she wakes up the next morning, experiences the nightmare anew, and then dies again and again. Hope arises when Rita meets Keiji (Natsuki Hanae), a young man caught in the same loop. They work together, fighting nefarious flora and hoping to break free. Action outweighs character development in this 85-minute fantasy, which, except for a brief passage revealing Rita to be a trauma survivor, says little about the human beings wielding axes on the battlefield. The action consists largely of standard, often violent, hero-versus-villain combat. Yet the material is exhilarating, and, with rainbow colors, psychedelic patterns and exploding flowers that suggest demonic fireworks, the movie is a visual stunner. “All You Need Is Kill,” in subtitled and dubbed versions, is in theaters.
“Atropia,” writer-director Hailey Benton Gates’ feature debut, is a roisterous fact-based satirical comedy set in 2003 in a military role-playing facility in a fake town near Barstow where war-bound U.S. soldiers receive training designed to prepare them for the real Iraq, with Hollywood craftspeople providing effects and actors portraying villagers and insurgents. Alia Shawkat plays Fayruz, the operation’s lead actress. When Fayruz meets Abu Dice (Callum Turner), a soldier cast in the role of an insurgent, genuine feelings develop and threaten to upend the fictional scenarios. The movie, an expansion of a short film, offers chaotic lampoonery and has its moments. But overall, it’s not funny, sharp or cohesive enough to captivate or do justice to its capable cast, which includes Chloe Sevigny, Jane Levy, Timothy Heidecker and Lola Kirke. “Atropia” opens Friday in theaters.