“Girlfriends”
1
Northwest Chicago Film Society
(Music Box; NEIU)
Three knockout attractions this month: at the Music Box on July 9, Robert Altman’s “Short Cuts” on 70mm with magnetic sound; Kevin Brownlow and Andrew Mollo’s 1964 newsreel-like imagining of life in Britain if Hitler had invaded after Dunkirk, “It Happened Here,” July 12 at NEIU; and July 19 at NEIU, Claudia Weill’s 1978 “Girlfriends” with Melanie Mayron as a modern woman imposing herself onto the patterns of Manhattan. chicagofilmsociety.org.
2
A Ghost Story
(July 14)
David Lowery’s pause between “Pete’s Dragon” and “Old Man And The Gun,” a micro-budget meditation on time and loss includes Casey Affleck, Rooney Mara and a ghost that is under a white bedsheet.
3
The B-Side: Elsa Dorfman’s Portrait Photography
(Music Box, July 7)
One of Errol Morris’ simplest, yet most profound features is a visit with his Cambridge friend and neighbor, pioneering Polaroid portraitist Elsa Dorfman. Bittersweet and melancholy.
4
Valerian And The City of A Thousand Planets
(July 21)
For the future of his EuropaCorp production company and for himself as a big, bold filmmaker, aging Gallic wunderkind Luc Besson goes the full Besson for the first time since “The Fifth Element.”
5
70mm Film Fest
(Music Box, June 30-July 13)
Nine features lead up to the 70mm presentation of Christopher Nolan’s “Dunkirk,” including a newly struck 70mm DTS print of Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey,” commissioned by the Music Box. Other films include “West Side Story,” “Top Gun,” “Spartacus,” “Interstellar,” Disney’s animated “Sleeping Beauty” and “Kong: Skull Island.”
Ray Pride is Newcity’s film critic and a contributing editor to Filmmaker magazine.
His history of Chicago “Ghost Signs” in words and images is in the works. Previews on Twitter (twitter.com/chighostsigns) as well as photography on Instagram: instagram.com/raypride.
Twitter: twitter.com/RayPride.
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