Independent cinemas screen Kurosawa, rotoscoped sci-fi, and a time-travel fishing drama through July
The ByTowne and Mayfair are showing Rashomon, A Scanner Darkly, and Rose of Nevada—films worth escaping the heat for.
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Ottawa's independent cinemas are offering air-conditioned refuge and serious cinema through the second half of July.
The ByTowne is screening Akira Kurosawa's 1950 Rashomon as part of its Restoration series. Often credited with introducing Japanese cinema to the world, the film won the Golden Lion at the 1951 Venice Film Festival and the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. In it, a bandit assaults a woman and murders her samurai husband in a forest. A woodcutter witnesses the incident. All of them—with the dead husband speaking through a medium—recount the incident in court after the bandit is captured. But for the one crime, there are four radically different versions of the truth. The Guardian called it "cinematic storytelling at its most daring," and the cinematography ranks among the most gorgeous ever filmed. It holds a rare Metacritic rating of 98.
Also at the ByTowne in the Drawn In series is Richard Linklater's A Scanner Darkly, a rotoscoped animation feature based on Philip K. Dick's semi-autobiographical novel. Linklater shot it as live-action, then had rotoscope artists trace over individual frames, creating a distinctive "semi-real" quality suited to the story. Keanu Reeves plays an undercover cop living in Orange County in a household of drug users, trying to shield his true identity while becoming addicted to the same substance he's pursuing. The film's visual distinctiveness matches its profound sense of tragedy.
At the ByTowne as well, Rose of Nevada is a haunting British time-travel drama from Mark Jenkin. An unmanned fishing boat drifts into the harbour of an economically distressed Cornish village—but this boat, Rose of Nevada, disappeared 30 years ago. Its former skipper wants to take it out to fish, and two young men in dire economic straits agree to crew. After they've been at sea a while, they return to their village, but it's 30 years earlier, and they're mistaken for the original crew. The Daily Beast called it "like nothing else in modern movies. Feels unearthed from the deep, dark recesses of the subconscious." It has a Metacritic score of 84.
The details
What three films are playing at Ottawa's independent cinemas through July?
'Rashomon' (1950), a Japanese crime drama by Akira Kurosawa screening at the ByTowne as part of its Restoration series; 'A Scanner Darkly', a rotoscoped animation feature by Richard Linklater at the ByTowne in the Drawn In series; and 'Rose of Nevada', a British time-travel drama by Mark Jenkin also at the ByTowne.
What is Rashomon about?
'Rashomon' follows a bandit who assaults a woman and murders her samurai husband in a forest. A woodcutter witnesses the crime, and all four parties—including the dead husband speaking through a medium—recount the incident differently in court, each version radically contradicting the others.
Who stars in A Scanner Darkly?
Keanu Reeves plays the lead role in 'A Scanner Darkly', a rotoscoped film where he portrays an undercover cop living in Orange County who becomes addicted to the same drug he's investigating while living with other drug users.
