Screen
john devore
Don’t-Miss Flicks For Film Fans
Fall brings a harvest of good movies
As summer winds down and blockbuster film releases begin to slow to a trickle, the best time of the year for film begins to emerge. Movies with modest budgets and great performances begin to get the recognition they deserve, and the competition for weekend dollars slows down, meaning a quality film might last longer than a week at the Majestic 12 downtown. Chattanooga is luckier than some cities of its size—we are beginning to get screenings of films that can’t be seen anywhere else, thanks to Mise En Scenesters. If you are a film fan and you haven’t been to a MES event, you should re-evaluate your weekend priorities. During the next few months, they are bringing some choice indie fare (including the Frightening Ass Film Festival on Oct. 28—tickets are limited!) to our city, so make sure to drop by the Barking Legs Theater and check one out. But beyond MES, there are a couple of worthwhile flicks that will likely make it into the big screen here. Look out for the following: Computer Chess Sept. 7 – Barking Legs Theater Filmed in very low-fi black and white, “Computer Chess” examines the strange draw of narrow subcultures and the people that participate in them. Despite being a quasi-comedic work of fiction, “Computer Chess” is shot in a documentary style and focuses on a group of programmers striving to create realistic A.I. for computer chess games. Set in the early 1980s, before Deep Blue beat Garry Kasparov, the film aims to create honest characters out of the conference attendees, back at a time when nerds were antisocial, awkward, and unhygienic rather than attractive, chic, and ironic.
As I Lay Dying Sept. 27 This James Franco vehicle has not been especially well received by advance critics, and a film adaptation of a stream-ofconsciousness William Faulkner novel may have something of a limited audience, but this one will almost certainly be worth seeing if only for the performances. Anyone who has seen Franco’s portrayal of the rapper/criminal Alien in Harmony Korine’s “Spring Breakers” knows the lengths to which he’ll go to bring a character to life. While the film may come across as uneven or unfinished, fans of Faulkner and Franco will hopefully be pleased.
chattanoogapulse.com • AUGUST 22-28, 2013 • The Pulse • 45