January 2016 Movies

The crowning achievement of Orson Welles’s later film career, Chimes at Midnight returns to the screen after being unavailable for decades. This brilliantly crafted Shakespeare adaptation was the culmination of Welles’s lifelong obsession with the Bard’s ultimate rapscallion, Sir John Falstaff, the loyal, often soused childhood friend to King Henry IV’s wayward son Prince Hal.

It’s 1982, and Taeko (voiced by Daisy Ridley) is 27 years old, unmarried, and has lived her whole life in Tokyo. She decides to visit her family in the countryside, and as the train travels through the night, memories flood back of her younger years: the first immature stirrings of romance, the onset of puberty, and the frustrations of math and boys. At the station she is met by young farmer Toshio (voiced by Dev Patel), and the encounters with him begin to reconnect her to forgotten longings. In lyrical switches between the present and the past, Taeko contemplates the arc of her life, and wonders if she has been true to the dreams of her childhood self.

It's the fall of 1985. The intertwining tales of three 5th grade friends, Chris, Joe and Ted, unfold in the suburban paradise of Palo Alto, as the threat of a mountain lion looms over the community.

Sherlock: The Abominable Bride will see Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman reprise their roles as Sherlock Holmes and Dr. John Watson in a one-off episode set in Victorian London in 1895. The episode has been co-written by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss with performances by Rupert Graves, Una Stubbs, Louise Brealey and Amanda Abbington.

In 1823, Hugh Glass, a 36-year-old fur trapper, joins the Rocky Mountain Fur Company on a dangerous expedition with ten other men. While hunting for food for his group, Glass is mauled by a grizzly bear, so the captain enlists two men to stay behind and bury Glass as his death was sure to come. Instead, the men rob Glass, leaving him defenseless in the wilderness, awaiting certain death. However, contrary to the belief of the good-willed captain, and the belief of the ill-willed marauders, Glass does not perish from his wounds. Fueled by anger, Glass vows to survive — and miraculously does, making his way through 350 miles of uncharted wilderness to exact revenge.

Set in the legendary Aokigahara Forest, a real-life place in Japan where people go to end their lives, The Forest tells the story of a young American woman in search of her twin sister, who has mysteriously disappeared. Despite everyone's warnings not to "stray from the path," Sara dares to enter the forest to discover the truth about her sister's fate, only to be confronted by the angry and tormented souls of the dead who now prey on anyone who crosses their paths.

Follows Jackson, a young Civil War veteran who wakes up to find his beautiful wife kidnapped by ruthless bandits.

Starring Brett Granstaff (Vice) as Christopher 'The Saint' Samuels, The Masked Saint follows the journey of former professional wrestler, Chris Samuels (Granstaff) who retires from the ring to settle down as a small town pastor. When Samuels witnesses rampant problems in the community, he decides to moonlight as a masked vigilante fighting the injustice. While facing crises at home and at the church, Samuels must evade the police and somehow reconcile his secret, violent identity with his calling as a pastor.

It's the fall of 1985. The intertwining tales of three 5th grade friends, Chris, Joe and Ted, unfold in the suburban paradise of Palo Alto, as the threat of a mountain lion looms over the community.

Desperate to get her life back on track, the unstable Streak (Louisa Krause) takes a job as a security guard, working the graveyard shift at a once upscale, now abandoned apartment complex. But on her first night on duty, she discovers a horrifying presence lurking deep within the bowels of the decaying building. With her nerves already on edge, Streak must confront demons both real and imagined as she struggles to keep a grip on her sanity.

Costi leads a peaceful life. At night he likes to read his 6-year-old son stories, to help him sleep. Their favorite is Robin Hood. Costi sees himself as the hero – righter of wrongs and defender of the oppressed. One evening, his neighbor pays him an unexpected visit and shares a secret: there’s treasure buried in his grandparents’ garden, he’s sure of it. If Costi will hire a metal detector to help locate it, he’ll give him half of whatever they get. Skeptical at first, in the end Costi can’t resist. He’s on board. The two accomplices have one weekend to locate the loot. Despite every obstacle in their path, Costi refuses to be discouraged. For his wife and son, he’s a real hero – nothing and no one are going to stop him.

Troublemakers unearths the history of land art in the tumultuous late 1960s and early 1970s. The film features a cadre of renegade New York artists that sought to transcend the limitations of painting and sculpture by producing earthworks on a monumental scale in the desolate desert spaces of the American southwest.

When a man meets a young girl in a parking lot he attempts to help her avoid a bleak destiny by initiating her into the beauty of the outside world. The journey shakes them in ways neither expects.

Filmmaker Liz Rogers and director Kevin Flint go to South Dakota following a story on Uranium contamination only to discover that the problem flows much farther than they imagined. Our nuclear legacy began with Uranium. From ‘Fat Man’ and ‘Little Boy’ to ‘Duck and Cover’ we believed it was safe to eat, drink and breathe in the shadow of the Atomic Bomb. The subsequent health and environmental damage will take generations, and in some cases thousands of years to heal. Our ground water, wells, drinking water, air and soil are contaminated with some of the most toxic heavy metals known to man – and yet we still have no firm plan in place for the storage of tons of nuclear materials we produce every year.

While on his way home one evening, Walter Zarrow (Sam Waterston), a popular Columbia University philosophy professor, is violently attacked on the street. There are a domino effect of events that led up to this seemingly senseless assault. Along the way, hidden connections between a seemingly disparate group of people—including a self-destructive student (Kristen Stewart), a hard-drinking suburban housewife (Gretchen Mol), and a desperate junkie (K. Todd Freeman).

Gridiron Heroes is the story of high school football star Chris Canales, who was paralyzed in a championship football game. The film chronicles the work of the Gridiron Heroes Spinal Cord Injury Foundation started by Chris and his father Eddie. Gridiron Heroes is also an examination of the game of football itself. Some of the most famous faces in the game discuss the larger problem of brain damage and spinal cord injuries that occur on the football field and a solution, “Heads up Tackling,” is presented.

The psychological pic centers on four astronauts sent on a simulated mission to a distant planet to test the psychological effects of deep space travel. Locked away for 400 days, the crew’s mental state begins to deteriorate when they lose all communication with the outside world. Forced to exit the ship, they discover that this mission may not have been a simulation after all.

An attack takes place on the U.S. Special Mission Compound and a nearby CIA Annex in Benghazi on the eleventh anniversary of 9/11. Four Americans are killed in the attack, including U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens.

"Norm of the North" tells the story of the titular polar bear and his three Arctic lemming buddies, who are forced out into the world once their icy home begins melting and breaking apart. Landing in New York, Norm begins life anew as a performing corporate mascot, only to discover that his new employers are directly responsible for the destruction of his polar home.

The setting is 1995, “somewhere in the Balkans.” Over the course of 24 breathless hours, Mambrú (Benicio del Toro), leads his team of humanitarians—including hard-bitten, wisecracking veteran B (Tim Robbins) and new recruit Sophie (Melanie Thierry)—as they deal with a most unexpected crisis, layers of bureaucratic red tape, and the reappearance of Mambrú’s old flame (Olga Kurylenko).

A newly married couple (Dakota Fanning and Theo James) are forced to navigate the all-consuming interest of a powerful, mysterious, and possessive philanthropist (Richard Gere).

Anna suffers from agoraphobia so crippling that when a trio of criminals break into her house, she cannot bring herself to flee. But what the intruders don’t realize is that agoraphobia is not her only psychosis.

A comedic adventure that reimagines the characters as grown men, and small-time crooks. When Huck Finn is released from prison, he hopes to leave his criminal life behind, but his lifelong friend, and corrupt cop, Tom Sawyer, has other plans. Not ready to give up on his childhood fantasies, Tom forms the Band of Robbers, recruiting their misfit friends, Joe Harper and Ben Rogers, to join them for an elaborate plan to find a fabled treasure. But the plan soon unravels, thrusting the guys on a wild journey with dangerous consequences…

After failing to locate the legendary Stanley Kubrick, an unstable CIA agent (Ron Perlman) must instead team up with a seedy rock band manager (Rupert Grint) to develop the biggest con of all time—staging the moon landing.

Talented yet suffering from severe stuttering, Qing did not get into the Police Academy. In order to feel better, Qing travels to Thailand to visit his distant relative Tang, who claims to be the “number one detective in Chinatown,” but is in fact a shallow and scheming hooligan. After a night of drinking, Tang becomes the prime suspect of a mysterious murder, and goes on the run with Qing. While trying to evade the police, many colorful characters from Chinatown emerge. How can Tang and Qing clear their names within seven days, while being pursued by both the cops and the mafia?

Miss Shepherd, a vagrant woman, parks her decrepit van outside a man's house and stays living there for 15 years. He eventually allows her to park her vehicle in his drive, sparking an often-strained relationship which ends when she dies in 1989.

In 1931, at the height of his artistic powers, Soviet filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein travels to Mexico to shoot a new film to be titled Que Viva Mexico. Freshly rejected by Hollywood and under increasing pressure to return to Stalinist Russia, Eisenstein arrives at the city of Guanajuato. Chaperoned by his guide Palomino Cañedo, he vulnerably experiences the ties between Eros and Thanatos, sex and death, happy to create their effects in cinema, troubled to suffer them in life.

A pregnant woman moves to the wine country to be with her husband at their vineyard — a move which triggers terrifying visions.

A young woman struggles to survive when she finds herself at the mercy of a psychopathic killer after taking a detour into the backwoods of a remote area outside New York City.

Vivien and Chloe have just inherited their Aunt Isabelle’s bakery, a boulangerie that has been a cornerstone of the neighborhood for years. Chloe wants a new image and product, while Vivien wants to make sure nothing changes. Their clash of ideas leads to a peculiar solution: they split the shop in half with a black line in the middle and each runs her business as she sees fit. Things heat up as they’re forced to fight over every customer who walks in the door. The neighborhood is changing as well, turning into an unlikely blend of young hipsters living alongside elderly people who’ve spent their lives there. But Vivien and Chloe will have to learn to overcome their differences and work together as a team in order to save the bakery and everything that truly matters in their lives.

A teenage girl survives an alien invasion only to then search for her brother, who may or may not have been abducted by human-looking extra-terrestrials. She is helped by a boy who might also be an alien in disguise.

Meet Monty -- a precocious actor, spokesperson and… a talking Capuchin Monkey! He’s the face of the energy drink, ‘Monkey Up,’ but he dreams of becoming the first award-winning monkey movie star. When the greedy owner of Monkey Up has other plans for Monty, the chase is on! He escapes with the help of his new family, the Andrews, and his hilarious primate siblings, Mort, Mooner, and Melody in an uproarious chase that proves Monty really is the ‘fast and the furriest’. Together they help Monty discover that fame and fortune come and go, but family is forever!

Filmmaker Chris Bell's (Bigger Stronger Faster) hard-hitting and thought-provoking expose of Big Pharma, its marketing practices and their impact on the staggering level of addiction to prescription drugs in North America.

When a detective starts to investigate his partner’s shocking death, he uncovers disturbing evidence of police corruption and a dangerous secret involving an unlikely young woman.

Eastern Europe, 1835. Two riders cross a barren landscape in the middle of Wallachia. They are the gendarme Costandin and his son. Together they are searching for a gypsy slave who has run away from his nobleman master and is suspected of having an affair with the noble's wife. While the unflappable Costandin comments on every situation with a cheery aphorism, his son takes a more contemplative view of the world. On their odyssey they encounter people of different nationalities and beliefs: Turks and Russians, Christians and Jews, Romanians and Hungarians. Each harbors prejudices against the others which have been passed down from generation to generation. And even when the slave Carfin is found, the adventure is far from over…

Struggling with drug addiction and heartbreak after his recent separation, Sonny looks to make amends by giving his wife a precious necklace on their anniversary. But when the necklace is stolen, he must delve into the dark corners of a Louisiana town to find it. Sonny faces dangerous drug dealers and truths he may not want to confront, all in a last ditch attempt to save his marriage.

Two American girls on vacation follow a mysterious and handsome anthropology student on a trip to Jerusalem. The party is cut short when the trio are caught in the middle of a biblical apocalypse. Trapped between the ancient walls of the holy city, the three travelers must survive long enough to find a way out as the fury of hell is unleashed upon them.

In a mythical ancient world, monsters rule the land while humans keep to their own kingdom. But when adorable baby monster Wuba is born to a human father and monster queen, mortals and creatures alike set out to capture the newborn, and Wuba’s epic adventure begins.

Blinded by the light of a falling meteor, David has a devastating car accident, leading to a profound discovery: an extra-terrestrial organism that may contain the secret of life itself. When David goes missing for two days, Annabelle searches for her father only to discover him wandering the forest, without so much as a scratch. David’s mysterious reappearance draws the attention of federal authorities and gives Annabelle reason to doubt his sanity. But David has a new sense of purpose, fueled by nightmarish visions. Driven by what he believes is an otherworldly purpose, David must convince Annabelle to believe him and complete his task before government agents can stop him, and before the world destroys itself.

In this third installment of the blockbuster martial arts series, when a band of brutal gangsters led by a crooked property developer (Mike Tyson) make a play to take over the city, Master Ip (Donnie Yen) is forced to take a stand. Fists will fly as some of the most incredible fight scenes ever filmed play out on the big screen in this soon-to-be genre classic.

After their armed bank robbery goes haywire, three criminals take their hostages—a young woman (Virginie Ledoyen), a father (Lambert Wilson), and his sick daughter—on a berserk, blood-spattered road trip.

Daring physicist Jim Beale has invented a machine that can fold space-time and ruthless corporate tycoon Klaus Meisner will stop at nothing to get it. When Jim uses the machine to tear open the fabric of the universe, a rare Dahlia appears from the future. But in order to keep the rights to his invention he must prove that it works by finding the flower's identical match in the present. Jim soon discovers that the Dahlia lies in the hands of the mysterious Abby, who seduces him into revealing his secrets. Convinced that she is in league with Klaus to take ownership of his life’s work, Jim travels back in time to stop the conspiracy before it can happen. But once in the past, Jim uncovers a surprising truth about Abby, the machine, and his own uncertain future.

Martyrs is the story of ten-year-old Lucie who flees from the isolated warehouse where she has been held prisoner. Deeply traumatized, she is plagued by awful night terrors at the orphanage that takes her in. Her only comfort comes from Anna, a girl her own age. Nearly a decade later and still haunted by demons, Lucie finally tracks down the family that tortured her. As she and Anna move closer to the agonizing truth, they find themselves trapped in a nightmare – if they cannot escape, a martyr’s fate awaits them…

After a brutal knife attack in prison, a former gang leader (Arturo Muyshondt) ends up in solitary confinement, where he discovers his faith in God and finds his true purpose as a pastor after being released on parole. He seeks out the underprivileged youth of his predominantly Hispanic community so they may find an alternative path to the dangerous gang lifestyle so rampant around them. He wants to establish a green zone to curb the violence, but is met with resistance from rival gang leaders who threaten him, his family and his community. Fighting his inner demons and violent instincts, the pastor must decide between maintaining his newfound faith or returning to the cold-blooded killer he once was.

Four small-town losers stumble across an alien crash site containing an incredible battle suit. One round of bickering and a quick scuffle later, they each find themselves wearing a piece of the suit, which has genetically bound itself to them. Now, they must to work together as one to save humanity. With the government chasing after them and desperate to remove their new equipment at ANY cost, the foursome must learn to use a strange alien device meant for only one person, train for a battle against an omnipotent enemy, and not kill each other in the process. They may not be strong, smart, or talented... but they’re Lazer Team.

A Coast Guard rescue undertaken after two oil tankers were torn in half by treacherous waves during a deadly nor'easter blizzard off Cape Cod in 1952.

Get ready for an erotic spoof comedy as Fifty Shades of Black takes you through a maze of hard, rough, and pre-mature encounters from inside of Mr. Christian Black's playroom.

Smart, successful, and charming, Elsie is the perfect girlfriend; she also happens to be a serial monogamist, with a long history of broken hearts. When Elsie breaks up with her long-standing girlfriend to pursue another woman, she faces her mother’s disapproval, conflicting advice from friends, and the nagging suspicion that she may have made a big mistake.

Follows a woman whose outlaw husband returns home riddled with bullet wounds and barely alive. When her husband’s gang eventually tracks him down to finish the job, she is forced to reach out to an ex-lover and ask if he will help defend her farm.

True story of middle-class patriarch Arquímedes Puccio who manipulated his family – including his eldest son, a star rugby player for the Pumas national team – to help him carry out a series of kidnaps and murders.

When Jack gets rescued by Maria, a superstitious Portuguese beauty, he has no idea that his life and luck are both about to change. During this accidental "first date", Jack and Maria project idealistic images of themselves -- images that are humorously contradicted through a series of flash-forwards to their future life together.

ShortsHD is once again bringing the OSCAR® Nominated Short Film program (Live Action, Animation, and Documentary) to theaters across the globe beginning January 29th.

For many Israelis, the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995 marked a grim turning point for their country. In the words of the commission set up to investigate the murder, "Israeli society [would] never be the same again. As a democracy, political assassination was not part of our culture." In the eyes of even more people, the murder ended all hope for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process through the Oslo Accords and altered the course of history. But, as Amos Gitai sets out to prove in his brave and provocative new film, Rabin's assassination was not just the act of one fanatic; it was the culmination of a hate campaign that emanated from the rabbis and public figures of Israel's far right.

Follows two estranged brothers, Topher (Tyler Labine of “Deadbeat") and Cooper (Chace Crawford of “Gossip Girl”), as they journey to a remote family cabin in the mountains to evict a squatter. Buried resentment and bruised egos soon derail the plan and when the smoke clears they’ve destroyed their car and burned down the cabin, leaving them stranded in the cold Rocky Mountain winter. With their very survival at stake, they must learn to work together as brothers to get back to civilization.