Local & Repertory

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American Comedy Classics SEE THE WIRE, PAGE 23.

Benny & Joon From 1993, this gentle family tale of mental illness was shot in around Spokane. Mary Stuart Masterson plays the troubled Juniper, Aidan Quinn is her protective brother, and Johnny Depp makes like he’s Buster Keaton. (PG)

Central Cinema, 1411 21st Ave., 686-6684, central-cinema.com, $6-$8, July 12-16, 7 p.m.

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Boogie Nights Paul Thomas Anderson’s Boogie Nights (1997) begins in 1978, when the new sexuality has hardened and been commodified in the porn industry. The film follows the fortunes of Eddie (Mark Wahlberg), a dishwasher with “something wonderful in his pants.” Anderson masterfully handles Eddie’s journey through the age of entitlement, capturing the recklessness and invincibility of the coke-tinged times. But once Dirk Diggler—as Eddie is renamed—finds his new family, he must leave them behind. In a culture that has a hard time dealing with sexual freedom, Anderson has made a film that takes an unflinching look at the business of sexuality. And what’s more, he neither punishes nor rewards his character for their experiments in liberation. (R) CLAIRE DEDERER Central Cinema, $6-$8, July 12-17, 9:30 p.m.

Carlito’s Way Local film-appreciation society The 20/20 Awards presents the 1993 Brian De Palma gangster flick, starring Al Pacino as the ex-con trying to go straight. Sean Penn sports a memorable hairdo as his crooked lawyer. (R)

Grand Illusion, 1403 N.E. 50th St., 523-3935, grandillusioncinema.org, $5-$8, Thu., July 11, 6:30 p.m.

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Czech That Film This seven-film sampler of contemporary Czech cinema includes at least one solid pick, seen at SIFF ‘12: Jan Hrebejk’s Innocence (2 p.m. Sat.), which takes a sneaky, indirect approach to the lurid allegations of child sexual abuse. The accused party, Tomas (Ondrej Vetchý), is a respected orthopedic surgeon with a complicated family life. In his household are an elderly parent, a teen daughter, his wife, her mentally disabled son from a prior marriage, and a sister-in-law. And his wife’s ex is a cop who investigates sex crimes. Tomas, handsome and prosperous, has it all; the cop, an old friend whose wife Tomas stole, has nothing but his miserable case files. Of course he’s assigned to investigate when 14-year-old patient Olinka (Anna Linhartova) says she had consensual sex with her doctor (the Czech age of consent is 15). Innocence is a wrong-man thriller, and it’s very good at that level. But where it’s truly superior is in the slow dissection of Dr. Kotva’s household—like a detective story written by Chekhov. See siff.net for full schedule and details. (NR) BRIAN MILLER SIFF Cinema Uptown, 511 Queen Anne Ave. N., 324-9996, $5-$10, July 12-14.

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Dazed & Confused It’s 1976 all over again in Richard Linklater’s 1993 pot-hazed high-school confidential. Yet beneath the cannabis clouds there’s surprising insight into the inner lives of slackers, stoners, and jocks. Throughout, Linklater’s laid-back observational style reveals all the longing, languor, and half-understood notions of self that define what it means to be 18. And you can’t beat Aerosmith’s “Sweet Emotion.” Keep your (red) eyes peeled for Parker Posey, Ben Affleck, and Matthew McConaughey, whose muscle-car Romeo memorably declares, “That’s what I like about these high school girls: I keep getting older; they stay the same age.” Somehow Linklater almost makes that seem poignant. (R) BRIAN MILLER Harvard Exit, 807 E. Roy St., 323-0587, landmarktheatres.com, $10, Tue., July 16, 7 p.m.

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Fremont Outdoor Movies SEE THE WIRE, PAGE 23.

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In the Loop/The Man Who Wasn’t There SIFF is honoring the recently deceased James Gandolfini with a double-feature. First is the Coen brothers’ rather chilly 2001 noir exercise The Man Who Wasn’t There. Second is 2009’s In the Loop, made by the creative team behind the BBC’s political satire The Thick of It, with a few Yanks added to the cast (Gandolfini plays the Colin Powell role). Thus, the lead-up to the Iraq War—though Iraq is never named—becomes a hyperbolic transatlantic political farce. As directed by Armando Iannucci, government process becomes madness. The movie is talk talk talk, interrupted by a little sex and drinking, then back to the talking, which soon becomes shouting, screaming, and cursing. The Brits are led by Peter Capaldi, who plays a foul-mouthed and thoroughly frightening Scotsman at a British ministry. We’ve all heard of the Boss From Hell, but Capaldi’s Malcolm Tucker is the boss to whom all the underling Bosses From Hell report. Around him swirl doctored intelligence reports, leaks, blunders, and neocon ideologues. The latter fly especially thick when In the Loop jets over to Cheneyland, aka Washington, D.C., where the younger Brit bureaucrats meet their American counterparts. (Look! There’s Anna Chlumsky, the girl from My Girl way back when.) Steve Coogan has a small supporting role, but the movie is Capaldi’s. “Walk the fucking line!” he barks at a polite, weak, idealistic MP (Tom Hollander), who later asks himself, “Is the really brave thing doing what you don’t believe?” In politics, we learn, you can convince yourself of anything. (R) BRIAN MILLER SIFF Cinema Uptown, $5-$10, Thu., July 11, 7 & 9:15 p.m.

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Movie Mondays Fluid, open-ended documentaries that demand more of an audience than foregone assent or fleeting bouts of passive outrage are rare these days, which is what makes Malik Bendjelloul’s Oscar-winning Searching for Sugar Man such a gift. In telling the tale of Sixto Rodriguez, a Mexican-American balladeer from Detroit who cut a couple of tepidly received LPs in the late ‘60s, vanished amid hazy rumors of onstage suicide, and subsequently became an Elvis-sized rock god in South Africa, the Swedish filmmaker sidesteps arthritic VH1-style “where are they now” antics in favor of a more equivocal interrogation of celebrity culture. Bendjelloul interviews pertinent Rodriguez-saga parties in standard rock-doc style, including the hilariously combative former Motown bigwig and Sussex Records (Rodriguez’s label) founder Clarence Avant, as well as the singer-songwriter’s charming, touchingly loyal grown daughters. It’s no huge surprise when Rodriguez himself turns up, still living the same modest existence as before his brush with micro-fame, but it does dispel the impression that Bendjelloul has been punking us. Better still, Rodriguez’s casual disinterest in PR-blitzing his resurrection and apparent contentment with an ordinary working life lets Searching for Sugar Man hold up a mirror to what we’ve come to expect—and cynically refuse to accept—from artists in an age of pervasive, entitled notoriety. Ticket price is your drink price. (R) MARK HOLCOMB The Triple Door, 216 Union St., 838-4333, thetripledoor.net, $3, Mondays, 8 p.m. Through Aug. 19.

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Movies at Magnuson Park SEE THE WIRE, PAGE 23.

Music Craft: Al Green The legendary R&B singer performs an hour-long set in a 1968 studio performance originally broadcast on WNYET’s Soul! series. (NR)

Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave., 829-7863, nwfilmforum.org, $6-$10, Thu., July 11, 7 p.m.

Retro Gaming Movie Nights Geeks will converge to enjoy—or snicker at—Ecstasy of Order: The Tetris Masters (Fri.) and Space Invaders: In Search of Lost Time. (NR)

SIFF Cinema Uptown, $5-$10, Fri., July 12, 9 p.m.; Sat., July 13, 9 p.m.

V/H/S/2 What, you missed the first horror anthology film? Fear not, there’s a new sequel. Among the half-dozen directors is Gareth Evans, who did a pretty good job with The Raid: Redemption. (NR)

Grand Illusion, $5-$8, Fri., July 12, 11 p.m.; Sat., July 13, 11 p.m.

Ongoing

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Before Midnight

Before-ophiles already know that Celine (Julie Delpy) and Jesse (Ethan Hawke) are now a couple and the parents of twin girls. On vacation in Greece, the Paris-based family is contemplating a move to the U.S., where novelist Jesse’s teen son lives. But Celine has a career back in Paris, and she naturally takes his suggestion as an affront. From the first 10-minute take in the car ride back from the airport, kids snoozing in the rear seats, Before Midnight becomes their on-again/off-again argument about who has to sacrifice what for a relationship, what sexual spark keeps it burning, and how shared romantic history becomes both a burden and a bond. Your tolerance or enthusiasm for the third chapter of Celine and Jesse’s intermittent romance will depend on your feelings about Richard Linklater’s last two talkathons featuring the same duo: 1995’s Before Sunrise and 2004’s Before Sunset. That’s really all the guidance you need: If you cherish the first two movies, as I do, the third installment feels necessary—a midlife tonic for all those foolish old romantic yearnings, a trilogy driven by fallible, relatable characters rather than franchise economics. (R) BRIAN MILLER Sundance Cinemas