Now available on DVD

Close-Up
Dir. Abbas Kiarostami. 1990. N/R. 98mins. In Farsi with subtitles. Mohsen Makhmalbaf.
Using the people involved, Kiarostami re-creates a real incident when a man pretended to be the well-known Iranian filmmaker Makhmalbaf and wormed his way into a family’s house and life. Kiarostami turns the incident into a playful meditation on fame, lies and the illusions of film.

The Last Station
Dir. Michael Hoffman. 2009. R. 112mins. Paul Giamatti, James McAvoy, Christopher Plummer, Helen Mirren.
Plummer and Mirren ham it up deliciously as Leo Tolstoy and his wife, Sofya, in this costumer. Oh, and Giamatti does a bit of hamming it up too. No, really? Who would have guessed? Come on, McAvoy, join the ham party!

Mystery Train
Dir. Jim Jarmusch. 1989. R. 110mins. Masatoshi Nagase, Youki Kudoh, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, Cinque Lee.
Jarmusch tells three interlocking stories tied together by Elvis Presley, fandom and a Memphis hotel. It’s Jarmusch, so you can imagine the enigmatic mix of random weirdness and ennui that ensues.

Stephen Fry in America
Various dirs. 2008. N/R. 6hrs.
The droll, witty Fry goes all Alexis de Tocqueville and sets out to explore America for a BBC series. If you’ve never experienced Fry outside of his film roles, you have a real treat in store; he’s a delightful intellectual, the sort of person with whom you want to spend an evening while he tells amazing stories and recites poetry (something at which he is very good indeed).

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