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About Eugene weekly. (Eugene, Oregon) 1993-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 15, 2011)
movies BY RICK LEVIN Third Rock from the Sun The amazing is everyday in Another Earth ANOTHER EARTH: Directed, fi lmed and edited by Mike Cahill. Written by Mike Cahill and Brit Marling. Music by Fall on Your Sword. Starring Brit Marling, William Mapother, Matthew-Lee Erlbach. Fox Searchlight, 2011. PG-13. 92 minutes. 44442 T he sprawling slum of science fi ction has always been overrun by big metaphors and grand analogies. The genre itself seems to beg this abuse. Like ten pounds of shit stuffed into a fi ve-pound bag, the category of sci-fi — considered a sub-literate cesspool by the arbiters of high culture — is a yeasty receptacle that causes its fl ood of crazy ideas to bulge into bombastic allegories. Symbolism blooms, parallels multiply and tangle. Among the more recognizable sci-fi tropes are the apocalyptic and prognostic (The Terminator); the manifested destiny (Planet of the Apes); the cautionary and dystopic (Minority Report, Idiocracy); the cowboy crusade (Star Wars, Star Trek); the speculative scientifi c spook (Jurassic Park); the immigrant invader (Alien, District 9); and Eden lost (Avatar), to name but a few. Of course, there is a lot of bleed and cross-pollination among sci-fi ’s standard themes and, oftentimes, grasping critics fall victim to overdetermination and forced fancy; sometimes a light saber is just a light saber. As with any of the more pulpy cinematic genres — Westerns, horror, noir — it seems these days that sci-fi movies are all used up with no place to go. No place to go — except inward, into the infi nite universe of the human psyche and the bottomless abyss of the unconscious. Recently, a smart, daring crop of young fi lmmakers has begun injecting the tired old ways of science fi ction with a new sense of urgency. By paring back or entirely foregoing the phallic gadgetry and overblown imagery of special effects, C I N E M A S 492 East 13 686-2458 ENDS TONIGHT! th bijou-cinemas.com 4:50 7:45 THE TRIP 4:45 7:10 2:20 4:45 7:10 5:10 ANOTHER EARTH 9:30 9:30 7:20 THE RUNNING MAN (1987) LATE NITE PASSES ACCEPTED! 9:45 Another Earth is playing at the Bijou; bijou-cinemas.com 8:45 THE LIFE, ABOVE ALL 1:00 3:30 3:30 DOUBLE 5:45 5:45 5:45 8:00 8:00 8:00 HOUR for Sept 15 - 22 A R T her way into your life as an unidentifi ed good Samaritan, hoping to make things better, then falls in love herself/himself, creating tragic complications of Shakespearean proportions. What saves this hackneyed love story — aside from the subtle, moving performances of Marling as Rhoda, the brilliant stargazer paralyzed by guilt, and William Mapother as John, the widower adrift in a galaxy of grief — is a fi llip worthy of the Twilight Zone: Rhoda writes an essay that wins her a fl ight to Earth 2. Will she go? What will she fi nd? Despite the entirely literal appearance of an alternate reality, Another Earth is a small, modest sleeper of a movie that raises big, eternal questions through the deployment of everyday gestures full of humor and human fallibility — such as the scene where Rhoda, just freed from a four- year prison term, watches as a man wearing a plaid shirt and green alien mask passes her casually on the street. This quiet, grainy, twilit fi lm evokes an intimate atmosphere of melancholy and fl eeting hope, and it develops with the economy and staccato clip of a Raymond Carver short story. Another Earth eschews grandeur, and even when something called the “Broken Mirror Theory” hints at redemption, the movie never grows ponderous. Life is always sad and hope springs eternal, no matter how many Earths dot the horizon. Lessons remain unlearned. As Rhoda tells John when he asks her what she’d say if she were to meet herself on Earth 2: “Better luck next time.” ew Sept 22 Sept 21 Sept 20 Sept 19 Sept 18 Sept 17 Sept 16 Sept 15 THU FRI SAT SUN MON TUES WED THU these directors are replacing spectacle with speculation, swapping their Arthur C. Clarke for Camus. Because sci-fi , almost by defi nition, should be relevant. Director Duncan Jones’ 2009 fi lm Moon, starring the cosmically talented Sam Rockwell, is the best exemplar of this trend: A deeply unnerving study of memory, doubleness, identity and isolation set on a desolate lunar landscape, Moon is a piece of existential theater that portrays limitless space as a prison of solitary confi nement. It treats its sci-fi prop as something more than a device, but less than a raison d’être. The fi lm is quiet, claustrophobic and visually unremarkable, yet it’s as riveting and suspenseful as anything by Cameron or Spielberg. Another Earth, currently playing at the Bijou, is another excellent entry into what might cautiously be termed existential sci-fi . Directed by newcomer Mike Cahill — who co-wrote the fi lm with his lead actor, the stunning Brit Marling — this extraordinary independent fi lm is an exercise in economy and constraint. The premise is simple, and wonderful: An exact replica of our planet suddenly hews into our immediate orbit, hovering as clear as a harvest moon in the daytime sky, and it’s discovered that Earth 2, as it’s cheekily dubbed, is populated by us, our doppelgangers. Meaning, for every you, there is an Earth 2 you. Framing this conceit is one of Hollywood’s most patently ham-fi sted and egregiously overused narratives, the one where the otherwise good person who accidentally kills your family wheedles his/ 5:45 8:00 5:45 8:00 Cinema Pacific Filmmaker Dialogues: 5:45 8:00 LOUDER THAN A BOMB w/director Q & A 2:20 4:45 7:10 12:15 9:30 4:45 7:10 4:45 7:10 4:45 7:10 6:00 4:45 7:10 9:30 9:30 9:30 9:30 LATE-NITE AT THE BIJOU! SCHWARZENEGGER SEPTEMBER: 9/22-24 THE TERMINATOR (1984) 11:30 11:30 9/28-10/2 TERMINATOR 2: JUDGMENT DAY (1991) SOON: TABLOID SNOW FLOWER AND THE SECRET FAN THE ROOM LATE NITE PASSES ACCEPTED! GENERAL ORDERS No. 9 HIGHER GROUND 11:00 PM 11:00 PM MIRANDA JULY’S THE FUTURE PROJECT NIM THE TERMINATOR (1984) LATE NITE PASSES ACCEPTED! 11:30 *Adults—$7*Students w/ID—$6*Seniors—$5*Matinees—$5*Lates—$5*Miser Mondays—$3* Asian Food Market Largest Selection of Asian Groceries Seaweed, rice, noodles, frozen products, deli, snacks, drinks, sauces, spices, produce, housewares, and more. 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