Lost And Found And Confused

By Scott Smith in Arts & Entertainment on Jan 3, 2006 8:36PM

Chicagoist knows there are some adventurous types who expect they’ll get their $10 worth of entertainment by just showing up at the local multiplex, placing their faith in the Hollywood studio system and picking a movie at random. Not us. We like to research our picks ahead of time, often by looking at plot synopses online. Yet it’s still a case of caveat emptor with similarly titled films.

Consider the case of the film Lost and Found, currently playing at the Gene Siskel Film Center. The Gene is known for running foreign films or revivals of films that have cultural, historical or cinematic value. So you can imagine our surprise when we looked at this Zap2It listing online and saw that they were showing the David Spade vehicle from 1999, which co-stars Sophie Marceau as a woman whose pants Spade schemes to get into by stealing her dog.

The Gene’s sudden lack of standards made us cry until we realized Zap2It erred and this Lost and Found is actually a Vietnamese film from 2003 about a mathematician who tries to prevent his student’s dismissal by claiming he is the father of her unborn child (you’d think putting her on the Dean’s List would be a better idea but whatever). Also known as Cua Roi, it’s the final screening of the Gene’s Cinema Vietnam series and starts at 6:00 p.m. tonight.

As for whom to blame for the Zap2It snafu, we’re chalking it up as yet another example of the vast Protestant conspiracy in this country.