License To Kill
John Glen, 1989, USA/UK, 133 min.
Friday, January 27 at 7:30 pm

When drug lord Franz Sanchez exacts his brutal vengeance on CIA agent Felix Leiter (David Hedison), his British counterpart, 007 (Timothy Dalton in his third and final appearance as Bond) resigns from the British Secret Service and begins a fierce vendetta against Franz Sanchez (Robert Davi) the master criminal. Bond won't be satisfied until Sanchez is defeated, and to accomplish this aim he allies himself with a beautiful pilot and Sanchez's sexy girlfriend (Talisa Soto). In order to bring Sanchez down, Bond must survive a ferocious boat chase, a midair brawl in an out-of-control airplane, and an action-packed confrontation in the Mexico desert.

Goldeneye
Martin Campbell, 1998, USA/UK 131 min
Saturday, January 28 at 7:30 pm

The 18th James Bond adventure was a runaway box-office success when released in 1995, thanks to the arrival of Pierce Brosnan as the fifth actor (following the departure of Timothy Dalton) to play the suave, danger-loving Agent. This James Bond is a bit more vulnerable and psychologically complex--and just a shade more politically correct--but he's still a formally attired playboy at heart, with a lovely Russian beauty (Izabella Scorupco) as his sexy ally against a cadre of renegade Russians bent on--what else? --global domination. There's also a seductive villainess with the suggestive name of Xenia Onatopp (Famke Janssen), and the great actress Judi Dench makes her first appearance as Bond's superior, M, who wisecracks about 007's "dinosaur" status as a globetrotting sexist.

Casino Royale
Martin Campbell, 2006, USA/UK 144 min.
Sunday, January 29 at 7:30 pm

Based on the Ian Fleming novel that introduced Agent 007 into a Cold War world, Casino Royale is the most brutal and viscerally exciting James Bond film since Sean Connery left Her Majesty's Secret Service. Daniel Craig gives a galvanizing performance as the freshly minted double-0 agent. Suave, yes, but also a "blunt instrument," reckless, and possessed with an ego that compromises his judgment during his first mission to root out the mastermind behind an operation that funds international terrorists. In classic Bond film tradition, his global itinerary takes him to far-flung locales, including Uganda, Madagascar, the Bahamas (that's more like it), and Montenegro, where he is pitted against his nemesis in a poker game, with hundreds of millions in the pot. The stakes get even higher when Bond lets down his "armor" and falls in love with Vesper (Eva Green), the ravishing banker's representative fronting him the money.

Barton Fink
Joel Coen, 1991, USA, 115 min.
Wednesday, February 1 at 8 pm - part of Strange Brew: Cult Films at Schlafly Bottleworks

Set in Hollywood during the 1940s, Barton Fink is a darkly surreal satire about creative egos, flashy moguls, a travelling salesman and a nasty case of writer’s block. Barton Fink (John Turturro) is a New York playwright lured to Hollywood to work as a screenwriter. It doesn’t take long for Fink’s life to erupt in complete chaos. His studio boss (Michael Lerner) orders the serious-minded Fink to write a low budget-wrestling movie. Deeply disappointed, Fink returns to his seedy hotel, types one sentence and then nothing. To make matters worse, he is continually inter­rupted by Charlie (John Goodman), a chatty travelling insurance salesman who lives next door. Eventually they become friends and Charlie tries to help Barton by teaching him the finer points of wrestling. As the clock ticks away and the temperature climbs, Bar­ton becomes more desperate as his life spins out of control.

Presented in the lively atmosphere of Schlafly Bottleworks, 7260 Southwest Avenue, Maplewood Mo. There is ample parking and great beer on tap!

Special Admission $4.00

The Bride Wore Black
François Truffaut's, 1968, France, 107 min.
Weekend, February 3, 4 & 5 at 7:30 pm

Francois Truffaut’s dark thriller is based on a novel by William Irish (aka Cornell Woolrich), whose books had been adopted by Alfred Hitchcock on many previous occasions. Jeanne Moreau stars as a woman whose fiancé is nastily murdered by five men. Utilizing a series of disguises, the cool-customer Moreau tracks down all five culprits, sexually enslaves them, and then engineers their deaths. The ominous musical score was written by the great Bernard Herrmann, another frequent Hitchcock collaborator. In French with English subtites

My Reincarnation
Jennifer Fox 2011, USA/China/Tibet/Italy,100 min.
Weekend, February 10, 11 &12 at 7:30 pm

Filmed over twenty years by acclaimed documentarian Jennifer Fox, My Reincarnation chronicles the epic story of the high Tibetan Buddhist Master, Chögyal Namkhai Norbu, and his western-born son, Yeshi. The film follows Namkhai Norbu’s rise to greatness as a Buddhist teacher in the West, while his son, Yeshi, recognized at birth as the reincarnation of a famous spiritual master, breaks away from his father’s tradition to embrace the modern world. Can the father convince his son to keep the family's threatened spiritual legacy alive? Never before has a high Tibetan Master allowed such complete access to his private life and it is doubtful that another ever will. With her signature intimate entry to both family and icons including the Dalai Lama, Fox expertly distills a decades-long drama into a universal story about love, transformation, and destiny. In English, Spanish, Italian and Tibetan with English subtitles.

The Turin Horse
Bela Tar, 2011, Hungary, 146 min.
Weekend, February 17, 18 & 19 at 7:30 pm

On January 3, 1889 in Turin, Italy, Friedrich Nietzsche steps out of the doorway of number six, Via Carlo Albert. Not far from him, a cab driver is having trouble with a stubborn horse. The horse refuses to move, whereupon the driver loses his patience and takes his whip to it. Nietzsche puts an end to the brutal scene, throwing his arms around the horse’s neck, sobbing. After this, he lies motionless and silent for two days on a divan until he mutters the obligatory last words, and lives for another ten years, silent and demented, cared for by his mother and sisters. Somewhere in the countryside, the cab driver lives with his daughter and the overworked horse. Outside, a windstorm rages. The horse refuses to move, and the man and his daughter struggle through their daily schedule. Food and water grow scarce. Beggars and gypsies come to their door. The horse stops eating. Slowly, the apocalypse approaches. Immaculately photographed in Tarr’s renowned long takes, The Turin Horse is the final statement from a master filmmaker. In Hungarian with English Subtitles

General Orders No. 9
Robert Persons, 2011, USA, 72 min.
Weekend, February 24, 25 & 26 at 7:30 pm

One last trip down the rabbit hole before it's paved over. A deep geography. What is above and what is below. What came before and what will come after. Agrarian fantasies, sacrificial rites, and excavations. A story told with maps, dreams, and prayers. A map lesson in three parts. A history of the State of Georgia - or Anywhere. General Orders No. 9 is an epic meditation of the American South, a natural history of flora and fauna, of material culture and public space. It is an articulation of "a world entire", a world of surreal and hermetic atmosphere. It is a prayer of deep emotion and a prophecy of a terminal future.

The Pruitt Igoe Myth
Chad Freidrichs, 2011, USA, 83 min.
Thursday, March 1 at 7:30 pm

Destroyed in a dramatic and highly-publicized implosion, the Pruitt-Igoe public housing complex has become a widespread symbol of failure amongst architects, politicians and policy makers. The Pruitt-Igoe Myth explores the social, economic and legislative issues that led to the decline of conventional public housing in America, and the city centers in which they resided, while tracing the personal and poignant narratives of several of the project's residents. In the post-War years, the American city changed in ways that made it unrecognizable from a generation earlier, privileging some and leaving others in its wake. The next time the city changes, remember Pruitt-Igoe.

(Miss) Representation
Jennifer Siebel Newsom, USA, 2011, 90 min.
Friday, March 2 at 7:30 pm

Like drawing back a curtain to let bright light stream in, Miss Representation uncovers a glaring reality we live with every day but fail to see. The film exposes how mainstream media contribute to the under-representation of women in positions of power and influence in America. The film challenges the media’s limited and often disparaging portrayals of women and girls, which make it difficult for women to achieve leadership positions and for the average woman to feel powerful herself. Stories from teenage girls and provocative interviews with politicians, journalists, entertainers, activists and academics, like Condoleezza Rice, Nancy Pelosi, Katie Couric, Rachel Maddow, Margaret Cho, Rosario Dawson and Gloria Steinem build momentum as Miss Representation accumulates startling facts and statistics that will leave the audience shaken and armed with a new perspective.

Being Elmo
Constance Marks, Philip Shane, USA, 2011, 80 min.
Saturday/Sunday, March 3 at 3:30 pm and 7:30 pm & March 4 at 7:30 pm

Beloved by children of all ages around the world, Elmo is an international icon. Few people know his creator, Kevin Clash, who dreamed of working with his idol, master puppeteer Jim Henson. Displaying his creativity and talent at a young age, Kevin ultimately found a home on Sesame Street. Narrated by Whoopi Goldberg, this documentary includes rare archival footage, interviews with Frank Oz, Rosie O’Donnell, Cheryl Henson, Joan Ganz Cooney and others and offers a behind-the-scenes look at Sesame Street and the Jim Henson Workshop.

Singles
Cameron Crowe, 1992, USA, 87 min.
Wednesday, March 7 at 8:00 pm - part of Strange Brew: Cult Films at Schlafly Bottleworks

The Seattle music scene is the ideal backdrop for Cameron Crowe's chronicle of the lives of single twentysomethings in the 1990s. Linda (Kyra Sedgwick) and Steve (Campbell Scott) are both tired of the singles scene and meeting the wrong people. Just when they are each ready to give up and give in to being alone, they meet each other and begin the delicate process of dating. Steve's apartment complex is also home to his ex-girlfriend, Janet (Bridget Fonda), and Cliff (Matt Dillon), the lead singer of a rock band. Janet imagines that Cliff is her boyfriend while Cliff considers her one of a few casual acquaintances. Debbie (Sheila Kelley), who also lives in the complex, resorts to video dating in her attempt to meet men with humorous but disastrous results. Crowe's script Music is the other main character here, with live performances from Alice in Chains and Soundgarden, cameos by the members of Pearl Jam, and a soundtrack that also includes titles by Paul Westerberg and Mudhoney.

Presented in the lively atmosphere of Schlafly Bottleworks, 7260 Southwest Avenue, Maplewood MO. There is ample parking and great beer on tap!

Special Admission $4.00

Corman's World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel
Alex Stapleton, 2011, USA, 95 min.
Weekend, March 9, 10 & 11 at 7:30 pm

Blue jeans, sock-hops and drive-in movies: the Fifties were America's age of innocence. But stalking the depths of its post-nuclear bliss, mass paranoia became fuel for Joseph McCarthy's brand of Red Scare terror propaganda. Bomb shelters were a deluxe feature in every American home, government-sponsored educational reels promised an imminent nuclear threat from across the Atlantic, and Hollywood, Babylon of the western world, hung on the brink of collapse. It was here, in the last-ditch machinations of a dying juggernaut, that a mild-mannered, civil engineer's son would become the most influential force in modern moviemaking. Corman's World tracks the triumphant rise of Hollywood's most prolific writer-director-producer, the true godfather of independent filmmaking. Featuring interviews with Martin Scorsese, Jack Nicholson, Ron Howard, Jonathan Demme, Pam Grier and others.

Lads & Jockeys
Benjamin Marquet , 2008, France, 100 min
Weekend, March 16, 17 & 18 at 7:30 pm

In a small village near Paris, 14-year-old boys and girls enter the training center for future lads and jockeys. For these young pupils, the transition between the family environment and this new world is brutal. Though sharing the world of teenagers — flirting, cell phones and PlayStation — they enter a world where the comfort of the horses comes before that of the human. This documentary film tells the story of Steve, Florian and Flavien during their first year of apprenticeship. It leads to Flavien’s first race, which officially puts him in the restricted world of jockeys. In French with English subtitles.

In Gandhi's Footsteps
Oystein F. Rakkenes, 2007, India, 50 min.
Tuesday, March 20 at 7:30 pm - Free Screening

Kiran Bedi, India’s first woman police officer, works in the most dangerous and violent parts of Indian society and has become recognized for her untraditional and non-violent approach to her job. She believes that police should help prevent social problems, not wait until they worsen. Bedi also transformed one of the largest prisons in the world, Tihar Central Jail, from a hell hole to a reformatory. Her innovations included meditation sessions and educational programs which helped reduce violence and provide the inmates with tools for rebuilding their lives.

Sponsored by Alternatives With Education (AWE), a prison educational outreach program that operates in several eastern Missouri prisons and jails. Following the movie, two former prison inmates who have re-entered the St. Louis community after serving long sentences will discuss their experiences.

El Mariachi
Robert Rodriguez, 1992, USA/Mexico, 82 min.
Wednesday, April 4 at 8:00 pm - part of Strange Brew: Cult Films at Schlafly Bottleworks

The debut by then twenty-four-year-old Robert Rodriguez was famously made in two weeks for seven thousand dollars, and part of its charm is that it really looks like it was made in two weeks for seven grand. The kind-spirited guitarist El Mariachi (Carlos M. Gallardo) simply wants to wander through life as his father and grandfather did, with a song in his heart and a smile on his lips. He wanders into a small mob-run town, guitar case in hand. It so happens that the local criminal element is awaiting the arrival of vicious hit man Azul (Reinol Martinez), who is well known for carrying his weapons in...a guitar case. Just when you think you've got a lock on what's going to happen next, director Robert Rodriguez throws us for a loop, unexpectedly alternating whimsical comedy with graphic violence.

Presented in the lively atmosphere of Schlafly Bottleworks, 7260 Southwest Avenue, Maplewood MO. There is ample parking and great beer on tap!

Special Admission $4.00

Bombay Beach
Alma Har’el, 2011, USA, 80 min
Weekend, April 13, 14 & 15 at 7:30 pm

Part documentary, part dance-fiction, Israeli-born Alma Har’el’s debut feature Bombay Beach paints a rich and emotional portrait of the lives of some of California’s absolute poorest. Har’el spent months living at the Salton Sea, capturing the surreal beauty and desolation —without financial backing. Perhaps best known for her work directing music videos for Beirut, the film is graced with original music by Zach Condon as well as Bob Dylan and Beruit. Winner of the Best Documentary Feature at the 2011 Tribeca Film Festival.

The Films of Steven James
April 26-29

Hoop Dreams
Steve James & Peter Gilbert, 1994, USA, 171 Minutes
Thursday, April 26 at 7:00 pm

Two ordinary inner-city kids dare to dream the impossible—professional basketball glory—in this epic chronicle of hope and faith. Filmed over a five-year period, Hoop Dreams follows young Arthur Agee and William Gates as they navigate the complex, competitive world of scholastic athletics while striving to overcome the intense pressures of family life and the realities of their Chicago streets. The Criterion Collection is proud to present this landmark documentary chronicling two remarkable families who challenge the American dream.

The Interrupters
Steve James, 2011, USA, 125 min
Friday, April 27 at 7:30 pm

The Interrupters tells the moving and surprising stories of three Violence Interrupters who try to protect their Chicago communities from the violence they once employed. From acclaimed director Steve James and bestselling author Alex Kotlowitz, this film is an unusually intimate journey into the stubborn persistence of violence in our cities. Shot over the course of a year out of Kartemquin Films, The Interrupters captures a period in Chicago when it became a national symbol for the violence in our cities. During that period, the city was besieged by high-profile incidents, most notably the brutal beating of Derrion Albert, a Chicago High School student, whose death was caught on videotape. Director, Steve James will be present for Q&A following the screening.

Saturday, April 28 at 1:00 pm
Filmmaking Workshop with Steve James

Acclaimed filmmaker Steve James will present a workshop/master class on documentary film. James’ award winning films (several of which are screening at the film series April 26 - 29) have played at festivals around the world including Sundance, IDFA and Full Frame, and have been released theatrically throughout the world. Among many awards, James has received an Academy Award®, a Peabody Award and a Directors Guild of America Award. His legendary 1995 film Hoop Dreams was recently selected for the Library of Congress’ National Film Registry. James is a producer with Kartemquin Films, the Chicago based documentary group that has been making films since 1966.

The workshop will be held in Room 123 of the Sverdrup Business & Technology Complex, 8300 Big Bend, Blvd. Admission is FREE.

Space is limited for the workshop. RSVP is required at http://www.kdhx.org/mediaarts This event is co-sponsored by The Webster Film Series, KDHX, The Missouri Arts Council

No Crossover: The Trail of Allen Iverson
Steve James, 2010, USA , 80 min
Saturday, April 28 at 7:30 pm

A Kartemquin Films production for ESPN Films' critically acclaimed "30 for 30" series... On February 13, 1993, 17-year-old Bethel High School basketball star Allen Iverson entered a Hampton, Virginia bowling alley with several classmates. It was supposed to be an ordinary evening, but it became a night that defined Iverson's young life: a quarrel soon erupted into a brawl pitting Iverson's young, black friends against a group of older white men. The fallout from the fight and the handling of the subsequent trial landed the nation's best high school athlete in jail and sharply divided the city along racial lines. James returns to his hometown of Hampton, where he once played basketball, to take a personal look at this still disputed incident and examine its impact on Iverson and the shared community. Director, Steve James will be present for Q&A following the screening.

At the Death House Door
Steve James & Peter Gilbert, 2008, USA, 29 min
Sunday, April 29 at 7:30 pm

At the Death House Door follows the remarkable career journey of Carroll Pickett, who served 15 years as the death house chaplain to the infamous "Walls" prison unit in Huntsville, Texas. During that time he presided over 95 executions, including the very first lethal injection done anywhere in the world. After each execution, Pickett recorded an audiotape account of that fateful day. The film also tells the story of Carlos De Luna, a convict whose execution affected Pickett more than any other. Pickett firmly believed the man was innocent and two Chicago Tribune reporters turn up evidence that strongly suggests he was right.