more ›

We welcomed the return of DocFest, your local indie documentary festival, last night with . It wasn’t clear we were actually going to make it in to the theater until about two minutes before it began. There was a long line for the film, which was showing in the Little Roxie, where seats are at a premium. We were pretty psyched to score our folding chair, one of the final two seats in the sold-out theater. more ›

more ›

We headed to the Castro on Sunday evening for the SFJFF's , featuring four women, some single, some married, some divorced, but all Jewish and all uniquely Parisienne. more ›

Who woulda thought. . . . we weren’t the only ones not completely immersed in isolation with the final Harry Potter book this weekend... although we did see a couple books neatly tucked under the seats at the Castro Theater on Saturday at the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival. If you weren’t there, well, then you missed out on a couple of good romantic comedies and one hilarious kiss-off -- and not the kind of kiss-off you might think we’re talking about. more ›

We headed back to the Roxie this week for a little sci-fi at the Indiefest Another Hole in the Head festival, courtesy of director Richard Schenkman and writer Jerome Bixby, who’s known also for the Twilight Zone and Star Trek. more ›

Well, it was no thrust shy hippie college student, Will, directly into the battlefront of a neverending war between the vampires and their sentry slayers. more ›

And on to Mezzanine Thursday night for the SFIFF closing night party -- with a surprise performer . . . . but before the final sendoff, we headed over to the Castro Theater for what turned out to be one of the best films that we think we’ve ever seen, French or otherwise – (which means “little sparrow”). The “little sparrow” is Edith Piaf, and the film by director Olivier Dahan, is intended to present more of a portrait of Piaf’s life rather than a biography, according to Dahan. more ›

At the SFIFF, we waited out the line on Wednesday to “go green” with local bands Halou (video above) and Tarentel at the Mighty, at the Greenworld event. Having seen Halou before, we knew it’d be worth the wait. more ›

It doesn’t get any better than this. Really. We headed to the Clay Sunday night, very relaxed and content as it was, having spent one of the most beautiful days ever up at Stinson Beach (never mind all the flies, anyone know what the story was with those flies!?), and now happily anticipating the latest SFIFF romance , featuring Glen Hansard, the lead singer of the Irish indie folk-rock band The Frames. more ›

This weekend we took in a couple of French dramas at the SFIFF, but because at least one of them is slated for distribution in the near future, we’ve been asked not to give too many details. Not surprisingly, both films shared a fair amount of angst, lust, passion, and sexual tension -- they are French, after all. more ›

We’ll start off this review by saying we love Stella Artois…or more specifically the free Stellas we had at the mini-beer garden before the midnight horror movie screening of at the SFIFF. more ›

, at the SFIFF, is the story of Tati, from Pozo Azul, a small town in the Northeast Argentinian Misiones province (between Paraguay and Brazil), who embarks on a spiritual quest to deliver a timber statue of his hero and idol, the notorious soccer player, Diego Maradona, to Maradona himself. more ›

We were pumped to be headed to the SFIFF again this year with our friend, Liana, who’s from Brazil. We’ve seen several Brazilian films together at the festival over the years, and this year we had a number of good options, but decided on , a film by Ricardo Elias. more ›

- the travails of a spurned mushroom-shaped suitor, who can’t win to lose when it comes to wooing his mushroom-shaped princess. more ›

Who needs Coachella when there’s Oppikoppi, a rock music festival held in South Africa every year? Really, we would have loved to have been at Coachella this weekend, but if you couldn’t be there, the SF International Film Festival was a great place to be instead. more ›

Sorry for the delay in reading your alt-weeklies this week; there was a comical mixup in our attempts to implement the weekly switchoff between us and SFist Sarah L. We'll try again in a few weeks, and we also briefly considered just not doing something this week, and then we thought, . So here we are! more ›

more ›

This was a good weekend, thanks in large part to the Asian-American film festival. We spent part of the past two days at the Castro checking out a couple of remarkably different films: Lou Ye’s , a Bollywoodesque adaptation of Chitra Divakaruni’s novel, featuring the ever-stunning Aishwarya Rai, aka “the world’s most beautiful woman.” Both films packed the theater. more ›

more ›

Last week we attended the premiere of Lunafest, a festival of films “by, for, about women” at the Herbst Theater. Lunafest proceeds went to the Breast Cancer Fund. more ›

We were treated to performances on Monday night at the Palace of Fine Arts by Zach Rogue, Dave Eggers, Mark Kozelek, Sarah Vowell and Patton Oswalt (also the host), and Aimee Mann, during Bookeaters, a benefit for 826 Writing Centers nationwide. more ›

. The latter translates into “potluck” or “Euro pudding” and literally involved a potluck of 20somethings from all over the EU, living and hanging out together in Barcelona. more ›

, and we’d been forewarned that it wasn’t for the squeamish. more ›

(it seemed like it took forever). more ›

hungry. Boy were we glad we'd had that burrito (but we must admit, that didn't prevent us from stopping off for a slice after the film). Even if you don’t love pizza, which is hard to fathom, this one's a must-see. more ›

more ›

more ›

"Papa, are you a terrorist?" We spent several very fun, yet dark weeks in Hamburg, Germany (when you don’t get up before noon in December there, you don’t see much light) with a friend who grew up there years ago. Watching the dim, gray aerial views and port scenes of what we found to be an ultimately beautiful city in the Hitchcockian style, Seeds of Doubt brought us back to those days. However, what followed was an unmistakable reminder that things have changed in Hamburg, as they have many places, in a post-9/11 world. We didn’t really know what to expect going into the film, whose German title Folgeschaden, we’ve been told translates into "damaging after-effects." The film showcases a young couple, presumably in their thirties, who’ve seemingly already acknowledged and encountered the issues inherent in sharing their lives with someone of a different ethnicity and religion. When Tariq is suspected of being a "sleeper" in a Hamburg terrorism cell, it becomes apparent that the couple only touched the surface of the difficulties their relationship will face in the days to come. It is clear that Maya and Tariq have discussed issues relating to their young son and his religious upbringing, but not much more. SFist Wendy, contributing more ›

We woke up again today with a strange kink in our neck, which we immediately recognized as the curse of our height challenge. Ahhhh . . . . It must be those darned subtitles we were straining to read (so much for several years of French class, eh). So, we are going to share our epiphany for those festgoers who struggle with the same height challenge. Sit on an aisle on the right side of theatre. No, not the right side of the middle section -- the aisle seat in the right section. Voila. Or so we hope. Don't expect "Cops" or "The First 48" if you see “Le Petit Lieutenant.” That’s not because the film doesn't feel realistic. In fact, it feels very realistic. That must be in part because many of the cops in the film by Xavier Beauvois are real cops, in their everyday setting. We learned at the post-film Q&A with cinematographer, Caroline Champetier, who showed up in a long black leather jacket in the spirit of a "cop" film, that Beauvois actually lived among Paris cops for two years, who served as inspiration for the script. Several of them actually had roles in the film. The film differs from the law enforcement reality shows that we would never admit to watching because it focuses on the officers themselves – as people -- showcasing the developing relationship between veteran cops, and the rookie, aka “Le Petit Lieutenant.” However, don’t be fooled. There are plenty of crime scenes, including a trip to the morgue – and the film is not for the squeamish. Tonight's your last chance to see "Le Petit Lieutenant." It shows at the Kabuki at 9:15 p.m. P.S. We also learned that Beauvois plays one of the veteran cops in the film. One clue: Look for the lizard. more ›