Of all the ethnic/religious/sexual identity film festivals in the Bay Area, the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival is my favorite. What do you expect, I’m Jewish? For a few weeks every summer, I’m not the only person in the congregation who wants to talk about movies. It’s an anniversary, this time, the 25th San Francisco … Continue reading San Francisco Jewish Film Festival

First of all, I’d like to thank all of you who sent their condolences on the death in my family. I appreciated your kindness. I had just started writing last week’s newsletter—about the Balboa’s Human/Nature Festival and the just-announced San Francisco Jewish Film Festival—when my brother called with the news that our mother’s husband was … Continue reading A Death in the Family

It's summer, time for Shakespeare in the park, blockbusters at the multiplex, and best of all, silent movies with live musical accompaniment. In case you never noticed, your opportunities to enjoy this sublime hybrid of canned and live entertainment increase when the kids are out of school. We have two weekend-long silent film festivals every … Continue reading The Silent Summer Season

Every so often, someone complains about remakes. Not only are they sacrilege--"How dare they fiddle with that masterpiece?"--but they're proof of Hollywood's decline: "No one is capable of an original idea." A lack of original ideas has nothing to do with it. It's far cheaper to rip off an old plot than to buy it … Continue reading Remakes

They're low-brow popular entertainment, but in many ways the original Star Wars movies are about as good as motion pictures get. We can talk all we want to about cinema as fine art, but in a very primal way, we go to the movies to thrill at the beautiful and the exciting, cheer the hero, … Continue reading Revenge of the Sith

These are grim days for Bay Area movie lovers. First Anita Monga, then Edith Kramer. And now the future of the Roxie looks dark. The Mission District’s wonderful little revival/art/anything left-wing movie house is up for sale. According to an article by Jesse Hamlin in Monday’s Chronicle, the theater can’t cover $140,000 in debts, and … Continue reading The Roxie in Danger

There are plenty of interesting films playing this week. Unfortunately, I don't have time to write about them (let alone see any), so I'll just draw your attention to the Irish and San Francisco Documentary Film Festivals showing at the Roxie (the Documentary fest is also at the Woman's Building). They both have interesting line-ups. … Continue reading Movies for the Week of May 13, 2005

We leave the house and open our wallets because we expect a better movie experience in a theater than we could get on TV. But what creates that experience? Is it film’s superior visual properties? Or is it the thrill of sitting in the dark, surrounded by strangers, without benefit of a pause button? This … Continue reading TV at the Movies

Let’s start with the festival report. Brad Bird’s talk Sunday night was every bit as good as I’d hoped. It was amusing, thoughtful, and intelligent. In other words, he used funny voices and said almost nothing with which I didn’t agree. He talked mostly about the death of showmanship, decrying such trends as smaller theaters … Continue reading Festival Report