Movies This Week: Catching Up

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We haven't had a Movies This Week in awhile, so why wait? Let's see what's out there. The film elite may be at Sundance this week, but Austin is a lot warmer and you don't have to rush around to see good movies. A few are even free.

  • The time-travel suspense thriller Timecrimes opens today at Alamo Village. I reviewed this clever, low-budget movie when it played Fantastic Fest in 2007, and enjoyed it very much. That's writer-director Nacho Vigalondo in the above photo, dancing with Tim League at FF '07.
  • Austin Film Society is hosting a free screening of the doc Stranded: I've Come from a Plane That Crashed on the Mountain on Saturday, Jan. 17 at 11 am at Alamo South Lamar. It's first-come, first-served for tickets.
  • Have you heard yet about the Office Space 10th anniversary screening on Sunday, Feb. 8 at the Paramount? Tickets go on sale at noon Saturday through Paramount's ticket service, gettix.net (yay, excessive service charges!). Mike Judge and cast members to be named later -- Gary Cole and David Herman have been confirmed so far -- will be at the event, which is co-sponsored by SXSW and Fantastic Fest. How many chances do you get to see this movie with 1200 other people?
  • More movies still playing in Austin that I'd recommend: The Wrestler (Alamo Ritz, Arbor), Rachel Getting Married (Arbor, Dobie), and Synecdoche, New York (at Dobie).
  • AFS is starting a new series called "First Blood: The Early Films of Brian De Palma." It kicks off Saturday night with Greetings, both showings of which are sold out. Later films in the series are also already sold out, so if you're interested, buy your tickets right away.
  • Alamo South Lamar and The Dobie are still showing Let the Right One In, the vampire thriller that Sweden decided wasn't prestigious enough to be nominated for Best Foreign Film Oscar contention. Go see why they were wrong.
  • Animated filmmaker Ralph Bakshi will be at Alamo Ritz on Sunday for a screening of Wizards and Street Fight, and Monday for American Pop.
  • John Singleton's first film, Boyz in the Hood, screens on Wednesday and Thursday night at Alamo Lake Creek.
  • The Paramount is showing West Side Story in 70mm on Wednesday night, as well as next Friday and Saturday (Jan. 23-24). You now can buy tickets for Paramount movies in advance, online, and at a cheaper price than buying them at the box office that day (and with no added service charges, it seems).