The Philadelphia Inquirer from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania • Page 120

In Philadelphia Festival of World Cinema's 2d weekend AVETIK Cifts Mitt tM tfirtctf Ulff tiC(l kt tilt Wife til MII (MM HARD ROILED Pruducn1 bf liada Kuk a4 Ttrenr Chang, dirnd by Juha Woo, rma by tWry Wong Ffeaturitti Chow un-Fat, Toey Lwint Tm Ma Mmn Ko, la lfiUx nh Subtitle, Running timet: hour. 12 mint. Parent's ruiaV No MPAA rating (ulira AiiletKl Showing at 8 tonight, AMC OtJ City, and 7 pm, neit Friday, I'mtod Artikta l'U, tnb7 tttliitf snh4 Wrirttklr A Hit ti fUDK Aifltft Ksr fe 11 Ita'tu dtftul t4 tori life it at juasJioJ tf rs Till itxtp)hi mwi fun tht art 4 KaU'fe'. a (Vuuk t)D httitt-f rteWraieicid hunt btt MKlfii kg IrtBUUWT) SiKiuld Ktmtktw MBitlaW bef titniy (Mikt motixt. Aim.

tcwr Ckij ly tuAtlue MunriHy lite inrnt iiaig oritu sunuf4f dr the Me) the fixtttHmUa fuu(d(t bef AttM Kut). JtwcfhiM IteltT hw uiiin and trt eontr lkiru Ok turn aimnoiirtocl IUin Mrs ruW as vll at thai the ksuts Alma and Puby, it froqumtty us funu and mommtua. Hut the mtHie to tuturtluitctlly aii5 and hcauufully ihui suae of Its tobkux are like Kuuscau paint cumc to hie that its fadings are ertf fiary. Ulnl Aimes Ruinhow lacks in thairlinox of script. It makes up fur in the common trase and uncommon hu mor of lis principals.

lis Sunday screening marks the films world premiere ALMA'S RAINBOW Produced by Ayoka Chetuira, Howard Brickner and Charles Lane, written and directed by Ayoka Chenzira. featuring Victoria Gabriella Piatt, Kim Wes- ton-Moran and Mizan Nunes. Running time: 1 hour, 25 mins. Parent's guide: No MPAA rating (discreet nudity, sexual candor, sex) Showing at: 8 p.m. Sunday, Ritz rive.

Director Ayoka Chenzira will attend. 'Avetlk'lsan inspired look at the Armenian genocide Ity Ikhmond Ryan INyl'IKKHMOVIKCKITIC In the Inspired and deeply tragic vision of Don Askarian, the agoniz ing fate of the Armenian people in this century can be presented as a paradox: Things of beauty become images of something that will be a sorrow forever. In Avetik and Komitas, to be screened at the festival on Saturday, the Armenian director views the sys tematic genocide that claimed two million lives between 1915 and 1920 from slightly different perspectives but with the same general method. Disdaining linear narrative and even obvious connections between individual scenes, Askarian con structs contrasts of the ordinary and the grotesque, the natural and the abominable. Experiencing his highly original conceptions is more like watching a painter and a poet at work than a director.

In Avetik, the sensuous, often lyric imagery is interrupted by ruminations on a catastrophe that still resonates after six decades and the guilt of the survivors. ctuUrvo. asd led tit aoae tilths ferwf tut lis ta UWt 2mm, (tear fteto acluldt to ittiould ar Itui tihrre jui about nvniiifig ftarwl It it the ronirkt of this -y of otMiowit ke, cut ihe uU iiwif, that Mds the krrr la Cmma, 5ieba, dirwlur of lfuu and Colonel JL dfmtu the littral and surial coavalaoes htou4ht on by new rtliuc. toma and Huhe are teachers of KuKtian. a Ur.ju now useless and oVsptcd.

and they mutf find a new tiill in hurry. As they Urn 10 bvrome teachers of fjigttth. the young women eke out a penny pinching exuicnc in shared mum in a government bmcl. and Kmma tries to make something of her liaiMin with the principal of ber school Subo proves a knowing and war nod guide to what the collapse of communism has meant to hu native land and an eloquent advocate for those whose lives have been shat tered SWEET EMMA, DEAR BOBE Produced by Lajos Ovari and Gabriella Grosz, directed and written by Istvan Szabo. Star ring Johanna ter Steege, Eniko lirz-Kif tlr PafAt AnlikfAi an1 Puai a ovi a wa iiuuui tat siu aviB Kerekes.

In Hungarian with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour, 30 mins. Parent's guide: No MPAA rating (sex, nudity) Showing at: 9:30 p.m. Saturday, AMC Olde City 2, and 4 p.m. Wednesday and 7:15 D.m.

Thursday, AMC Midtown. In John Woo's world, cops, crooks are all 'Hard-Boiled' By Steven Rea INyriKKHMOYlKCHITIC Hong Kong action king John Woo's latest balletic bloodbath reworks the director's central themes: male bond ing, conflicting loyalties and the pre ternatural resilience of its bullet-rid dled heroes. Set in the corporate gangster mi lieu of contemporary Hong Hong, Hard-Boiled teems with cops and crooks, all of them sporting dark shades and menacing countenances. The plot's a pastiche of gangster pics from way back, and it's all a bit long mere are Dig chunks or corny character development between the hyperkinetic shoot-'em-ups. But shoot-'em-up they do.

and the opening and closing set-pieces in a tea house and a hospital, respectively are impossibly wonderful feats of cinematic choreography. Woo's camera shots ricochet with as much velocity as the gunfire, and his star, Chow Vun-Fat (gnawing on that trademark toothpick), is as relent lessly cool as ever.1 1 1 1 I Prudocix! tv Xlarfitiia Was Ikm Aklartan, la Amman a Ranninj time 1 bttur, 24 mint. Parrni't fuil: Na MPAA rating (adult thrmc! Showing at: 7 tonight, AMC MidtuMo, I)un Akrun tit attrnd Director sole debut features Bridget roada and CrkStotU It) Slnra tit ItiucSe Catrv llnJd Fonda. Tim Roth and Knc Siultz comprii the quartet of under hievm 10 SoJm, Rea a ifotuNi. a cout, intelligent and surprtvingly atfociini tale of twenty- umething ennui, In his first solo lob.

Michael Steinberg, who co4i- rtctd Tm aitidantt. uodcrtcores the routlesuicss of hu characters by placing them In the strtp-malled Southwest a drab Everytowo su rounded by majestic desert The setting and situation echo the fiction of rrcderick Itartbelmc: dead pan patter in anonymous ex urban chain restaurants, lethargic souls sulking about their lives but not do ing much to Improve them. As In Itarthelme's books, too. Bodies, Rest a Motion details a relationship In which one 01 the men In this case, Roth's deadbeat Nick lives with a woman whose friend is his ex.Tbe whole thing's Incestuous and slightly awkward. Some have been bugged by the arbitrariness of what passes for moti vation here, but that's the point' These people are in a state of spiri tual lethargy, and that's where the the title a reference to Newton law that a body at rest or in motion will remain In that state unless af fected by an outside force comes into play.

OK, it's a little pretentious but that not the case with the film itself, which is keenly acted, funny and poignant, and knows exactly where it going. BODIES, REST MOTION Produced by Allan Mindel, Den-ise Shaw and Eric Stoltz; di rected by Michael Steinberg; written by Koger Hedden. star ring Phoebe Cates, Bridget Fonda, Tim Roth and Eric Stoltz. Running time: 1 hour, 34 mins. Parent's guide: (language, sexual situations) Showing at: 7 p.m.

Saturday, United Artists Theatre Sam's Place. Screenwriter Roeer Hed den will attend. A tale of love and changes after communism's collapse By Desmond Ryan 1 JNqi'lRKKMOVUi CRITIC: When the married man tells his mhr wan KMX WW tm WW WMHMa MM Mia Ik fcA es'ijj CwlHWj fcsISJsK( K4 tiwm ft tHlK iiiiin wwM HI lll tuw Win iw tm fcuMM IM MtWM 0m (UK MM WM MHMk4WII (fcJ (ink aNk i Cmm UK km Aw Mr AA aM Tfct twN 1K acnm 99 fcttmo nan fMtvMfi bun MM MUM jmmk mw it tin tWAA mt turn muc eWwwuw Art documentary tkctches portrait of a Chine master III Slrr Kr t' 11 1 II kill) An bitfory it usutlty to Wcsicrn in Hi orunuiiun thai many who too Abode of Wunon, Carmt lltnion and Kicbard Corduot insightful docu mrntary on the Chinese painter Chang l)aibicn (imivgj), nay never have heard of the man. or be familiar with bis masterly, cbame- leonlike work. Tracing bis life and art through Interviews with Asian and Western artists and scholars, the filmmakers paint a fascinating portrait of Chang.

Here was a brilliant young Iconoclast who revered tradition; an exile who carried the beauty of bis homeland In his soul; a man whose stylistic skills were so complete that he glee fully produced forgeries that continue to defy experts. While a few of Abode's talking heads are overly academic, one Sotheby's Arnold Chang offers a pointed illustration of bow this work is perceived (or not perceived) in the West. The Chinese American ex ecutive recounts bow, as a boy, be was given a roster of artists from which to do a school assignment a list composed entirely of European and American names. Instead, Chang researched a report on the Chinese painter, thereby tapping Into his own rich, centuries-old cultural heritage. ABODE OF ILLUSION Produced and directed by Carma Hinton and Richard Gordon.

In English and Mandarin with subtitles. Running time: 1 hour. Parent's guide: No MPAA rating (nothing offensive) Showing at: 2 p.m. Saturday, Philadelphia Museum of Art, and 1 p.m. May 15, Free Library of Philadelphia.

Hinton and Gordon will attend the first screening. A documentary a a enaa trite set the record straight a gajrt IW i i Often calkd the Rota Paris of the gay nbts movement." Pr, IVlyn lluukrr. a behavioral pycboloctiit who is. by the way, a heteroarnual and a humanist. Is more property its Klranor Know-veil Hefore her landmark study in the l9S0s.

no scientist bad ever investigated hanumrituls outside a medical or jail selling. Directed by the late Kicbard Sihmiechcn. tbe Oscar nominaieO documentary ChangtRg Our ttindi Is an affectionate portrait of this pioneering scientist today a clear thinking octogenarian whose humor is radiant as the sun. At a time when homosexuals were routinely given loboiomies and eloc troshock to "cure" what was constd crod a Hooker con ducted a study comparing the psychological profiles of JO male homo sexuals with a heterosexual control group. Her 1957 findings, stringently analyzed by three psychiatrists, proved gays were as well-adjusted as straights These findings helped destigmatizc bo mosexuality and changed the lives ol many Americans, none more so than Hooker herself.

Changing Our Minds: The Stor of Dr. Evelyn Hooker Produced by David Haugland, directed by Richard Schmie-chen, written by Richard Schmiechen and James Harri son. With Dr. Evelyn Hooker. Running time: 1 hour, 26 mins.

Parent's guide: No MPAA rating (sexual candor). Showing at: 7 and 9:15 p.m. Saturday, both at Temple Cinematheque, and 4:30 p.m. Sunday, International House. 'Junk Movie': Messy allegory of post-Communist Hungary By Steven Rea INQl'IKKK M0VIKCKITIC As Junk Movie begins, a motley troop of thirsty Hungarians crashes through a wall and storms a sleepy Budapest taproom.

It doesn't take long to figure out that the wall they've knocked down is allegorical: it's director Gyorgy Szomjas' symbolic Berlin Wall, the dismantling of which foreshadowed the demise of the Eastern Bloc nation's rigid social structure. Subtitled We Won, So What), Szomjas' movie is a messy, energetic hut Continued on next page.