This Week in Cinema Tropical, November 19-25
Following an incredibly successful festival run, Alfonso Cuarón‘s Roma is hitting big screens right on time for family, friends, and Thanksgiving break. A glorious cinematic feast that Cuarón himself considers his “most essential film,” Roma is kicking off its limited theatrical release this Wednesday at the IFC Center and The Landmark at 57 West. Mexico’s Oscar submission is a film that deserves to be seen on the silver screen.
You still have time to catch the Argentine Oscar submission El Ángel by Luis Ortega in its theatrical run at the Angelika over the holiday. “Highly entertaining and seductive” (Variety), the crime drama was inspired by the true story of serial killer Carlos Robledo Puch.
And the week right after the holiday starts with a very special pairing of films by award-winning documentarian Beztabé García—winner of the award for Best Director and Best Documentary Film at the 6th annual Cinema Tropical Awards. Join us at Anthology Film Archives on Monday, November 27 for Unsilenced and King of Nowhere, presented as part of the Flaherty NYC Series.
ROMA
‘THEATRICAL RELEASE’
Opens Wednesday, November 21
IFC Center and The Landmark at 57 West
(Alfonso Cuarón, Mexico/USA, 2018, 135 min. In Spanish with English subtitles.)
In Alfonso Cuarón’s autobiographically inspired film, set in Mexico City in the early ’70s, we are placed within the physical and emotional terrain of a middle-class family whose center is quietly and unassumingly held by its beloved live-in nanny and housekeeper (Yalitza Aparicio). The cast is uniformly magnificent, but the real star of Roma is the world itself, fully present and vibrantly alive, from sudden life-changing events to the slightest shifts in mood and atmosphere. Cuarón tells us an epic story of everyday life while also gently sweeping us into a vast cinematic experience, in which time and space breathe and majestically unfold. Shot in breathtaking black and white and featuring a sound design that represents something new in the medium, Roma is a truly visionary work.
EL ÁNGEL
‘THEATRICAL RELEASE’
Now Playing
Angelika Theater
(Luis Ortega, Argentina/Spain, 2018, 118 minutes. In Spanish with English subtitles)
Buenos Aires, 1971. Carlitos (Lorenzo Ferro) is a seventeen-year-old with movie star swagger, blond curls and a baby face. As a young boy, he coveted other people’s things, but it wasn’t until his early adolescence that his true calling — to be a thief — manifested itself. When he meets Ramon at his new school, Carlitos is immediately drawn to him and starts showing off to get his attention. Together they will embark on a journey of discovery, love and crime. Killing is just a random offshoot of the violence, which continues to escalate until Carlitos is finally apprehended. Because of his angelic appearance, the press dubs Carlitos “The Angel of Death.” Showered with attention because of his beauty, he becomes an overnight celebrity. Altogether, he is believed to have committed over forty thefts and eleven homicides.