The Roxie Theater concludes its April calendar (4/20-30) with a lovely goulash of seldom-seen, minor art-house classics.
"Dead Man" (1995): Director Jim Jarmusch and Johnny Depp are a creative odd couple in this surreal adult Western. Depp is a mild-mannered accountant from Cleveland whom an Indian friend calling himself "Nobody" (a low-key performance from Native American actor Gary Farmer) considers the reincarnation of the poet William Blake. Shot by Robert Muller in a weather-challenged slice of Nevada and Arizona, the film gets artistic points from its stark B&W visual canvas. "Dead Man" can seen as a kind of homage to Woody Allen imitating Ingmar Bergman. The film's most viable conceit involves the mortally wounded but gorgeous William Blake floating off in a cloud of hippie bliss. Perhaps this is why Jarmusch so loves B&W photography: this scene really wouldn't work in color.
With a very old and scary Robert Mitchum, Crispin Glover, John Hurt, John North, Gibby Haynes, Mili Avital, Peter Schrum, Gabriel Byrne, Lance Henriksen, Gary Farmer, Iggy Pop, Alfred Molina and an unbilled Steve Buscemi. The US box-office totaled $1,037,847, making it one of Depp's weakest-earning performances, but very much in the ballpark for indie avant-garde master Jarmusch. (4/20)
"Purple Rain" (1984): The Minnesota-based film-musician artist known as Prince scored a career high with this moody drama about a black artist bucking the white-dominated music industry. An Oscar winner for the film's score, including Prince's "When Doves Cry." Directed by Albert Magnoli. (4/21)
"The Devil and Father Amorth" (2017): His fans know filmmaker William Friedkin as an eclectic writer/director who has dipped his creative toes in a wide variety of storytelling genres, from the 1971 Oscar-winning cop drama "The French Connection" to taking the breakout gay comedy/drama "The Boys in the Band" from the stage to the screen, to creating an exciting, stomach-churning screen adaptation of William Blatty's early-70s pulp bestseller "The Exorcist."
Friedkin returns with "The Devil and Father Amorth," in which he claims to have filmed an actual exorcism. While the middle-aged woman undergoing the exorcism can't hold a candle to the 1973 film's teen star Linda Blair, the docudrama holds some interest, especially for viewers from Catholic backgrounds.
"Father Amorth begins every exorcism by thumbing his nose at the devil." This quote from Friedkin's narration tells us he retains his credentials as an extraordinary showman. I personally prefer Max von Sydow's performance in the 1973 film. Plays with Friedkin's "The Exorcist: Extended Director's Cut." (4/24)
"Outfitumentary": Filmmaker K8 Hardy provides a diary of her daily clothing choices, trying to describe the relationship between feminist choices and the evolution of lesbian life choices. (4/25)
"Instrument": This portrait of the punk band Fugazi was culled by filmmaker Jem Cohen from 11 years of footage.
"Surrealism in Animation": A provocative compilation of cutting-edge animation from 1908 thru the 50s. (both 4/26)
"The Judge": A brave Muslim woman challenges centuries of anti-female bias in Middle Eastern religious courts. (4/27-5/3)