SFist Mihi checks out the mainstream same-sex flick blurbed by SFist Sara! We were forced to sit in the low-oxygen, nose-bleed section of the Castro Theatre last night because the place was packed to the rafters for Frameline's screening of Nina's Heavenly Delights. The plot in short: prodigal, runaway-bride daughter, Nina, returns to Glasgow for her father's funeral and not only saves the family's Indian restaurant but manages to come out of the closet......

There's no better way to celebrate the Frameline GLBT film fest than by entering to win free tickets for you and a friend to a screening tomorrow night! We've got passes to Nina's Heavenly Delights, which SFist Sara found thoroughly enjoyable. A closeted South Asian-Irish lesbian enters a curry cooking contest to save her family's restaurant business, only to fall in love with an old school friend along the way. Cooking, coming out, and......

It's true! We're doing ticket giveaways through the entire Frameline GLBT film fest this and next week! Enter and win! Your next prize package? Passes to El Calentito, which resident cineaste SFist Sara loved! Here's her review: El Calentito is a nostalgic coming of age comedy about punk and fascism in 80’s Madrid. Calentito is what early Almodóvar would be if it were tidier (nostalgia does tidy) and watched girls kissing instead of boys. The......

SFist Sara gives you the lowdown on what to expect from the Frameline GLBT film fest, which starts up TODAY! Starting today, The Frameline LGBT Film Festival will be rolling out its rainbow carpet at the Castro and the lineup of guests is glittery. Besides appearances by RuPaul (for Starrbooty), Alan Cumming (for his directorial debut Suffering Man’s Charity) and Alexis Arquette (for Alexis Arquette: She’s our Brother), the fest is again offering a super......

SFist Sara gets Knocked Up! (the movie -- the movie!) How can mainstream comedy be dead when Knocked Up is all about inventive delivery? (Get it? "Delivery?") Stronger than Judd Apatow’s last bluntly-titled summer comedy (The 40-Year-Old Virgin), Knocked Up stands up to both scrutiny and high expectations. The film is so funny it’s sure to have another life on DVD where you won’t be missing any of the punch lines because of the audience......

This week's Big Movie: Ocean's Thirteen! It’s a real surprise how divided the critics are about this one! Sure it’s franchising, sure it’s full of top shelf men in designer clothes and high-end accoutrement, but we thought it was all kicks and giggles. Groucho Reviews's Peter Cavanese however, says, “the plot of Thirteen is old, old news.” Many, like Roger Ebert, expressed their exhaustion with this trope -- Scott Floundas of the Village Voice......

La Vie En Rose (the Embarcadero) is a full course, all four food groups, soup and cocktails, dinner of a film. (It screened at the SFIFF, and we loved it then too!) And if you haven’t had your fill by the end of Olivier Dahan’s homage to the great Parisian icon Edith Piaf (breathtakingly portrayed by Marion Cotillard), you can always watch it again. The strongest cross-section of decadence and nutrition is the ATA’s Sunday......

SFist Sara says to see the second screening of this movie TONIGHT! 9:30 screening at the Roxie! From the look of it, you'd think the Indiefest Another Hole in the Head movie Blood Car was made using the "First Feature for $10,000" model, and the guys responsible are more than happy to have you believe it. But with a premise that begs slogans like "No Oil, just Blood," you'd have to be daft not to......

SFist Sara surveys the local view of Pirates of the Caribbean 3. Who knew it had a trenchant analysis of constitutional law? The current contribution to the mass spoon-feeding that is the summer blockbuster schedule is Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End. Not as strong as the first film and far stronger than the second (which stunk like dead kraken), World’s End is 168 minutes of pee-inducing ocean battles. Don’t think we’re hacking it;......

SFist Sara's back, with your weekend picks in indie cinema! We are always going to tell you to see Other Cinema. You can set your watch to it, we promise. This week’s Incredibly Strange Music program is packed with punk rock/bad music video genius. We’re particularly into the experimental film Foucault’s Pendulum but there’s oddity for every taste, as curator Craig Baldwin’s program religiously offers. This week, however, the OC schedule has a staunch competitor......

Last week's winner, as picked by SFist Sara L, the East Bay Express! A very deep Dream Cartoon about George Bush getting eaten by a shark. The Oakland military school is not military enough. Inspirational stories of East Bay kids getting scholarships. Cover: A sweet Oakland family stuck in a nightmare bureaucratic lawsuit hell over a mudslide that destroyed their house. Tripe soup in Fruitvale. A soulless book about 90s punk, and more debate about......

Theatrical Releases April 13th, 2007 We haven’t seen everything on the roster for this week but we have seen Hot Fuzz and we strongly suggest it. Hot Fuzz does for cop/buddy action films what Pegg, Wright and Frost’s Shaun of the Dead did for zombie films. Fuzz is every bit as researched and diligent as was Shaun. Afterwards you can hit the pub and discuss which you think is funnier. ...

You already know about The Reaping, and Firehouse Dog and you’d have to live under a rock not to know about Grindhouse but there are two film events starting this week that you MUST NOT MISS. The first is part of PFA’s “Closely Watched Film” series. This week they’ve brought Thai legend Apichatpong Weerasethakul for Q&A after screenings of his films Tropical Malady (Friday) and Blissfully Yours (Saturday). He’s coming from Thailand! You can’t miss that! ...

Theatrical Releases March 30th, 2007 We’ve got some decent choices this week: if you’re in the mood for comedy, it’s all about Blades of Glory, if we have kids Meet the Robinsons (3-D at the Metreon) is better than you’d expect, but if you want something saucy it is all about Joseph Gordon-Levitt and that movie he’s in…The Lookout. I heard someone postulate it was like Brick 2: Outta College but I think that was......

SFist Sara S's got the jujubes! Please don’t mistake us for fans of human suffering but it’s high time a film was made to tell the uninformed public about the genocide in Rwanda. Beyond the Gates, at the Embarcadero, is a smart, engaging, often (rightly) painful view of the conflict from the view of a Catholic training college manned by John Hurt and Hugh Dancy. It’s a tearjerker but it’s really edifying to see how......

SFist Sara S. on this weekend's movie offerings. She tells us "There is nothing good coming out in mainstream movies this weekend," so it's all the little microcinemas around town this week! C'mon, what about Sandra Bullock in "Premonition"? Okay, Sara, point taken. At the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts on Wednesday the 21st, the Film Arts Foundation is presenting a documentary on twenty years of the SF Graffiti scene, called Piece by Piece.......

Your mainstream release pick: The Namesake. The saga of a family that journeys from homeland India to wintry New York, Mira Nair’s newest film is based on the titular bestseller by Jhumpa Lahiri and features Kal Penn (Kumar from Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle), Jacinta Barrett and Indian singer/actress Tabu. It’s a beautiful and sensitive look at identity in the context of a cross-cultural family. Nair’s known for bringing insight to her subject matter and this movie appears to be no different...