Movie Roundup

By Rob Christopher in Arts & Entertainment on Dec 9, 2008 6:00PM

Winter is a damn good time to just sit around and drink coffee and watch movies. Stuff to watch:

-- Vampires. All over the place. But Nadja is probably the only vampire movie to (a) be partially filmed in Pixelvision, and (b) feature a cameo by David Lynch as a morgue attendant. Filmmaker Michael Almereyda has since made a modern-dress version of Hamlet and a documentary about one of our favorite photographers, William Eggleston in the Real World. On Thursday he'll present a work-in-progress screening of his new film Paradise. It's a diary-like compilation of short episodes. "Friends and strangers, kids and adults, are featured in roughly equal proportions, in settings split between familiar American cities – New York, Los Angeles, New Orleans – and unlikely, far-flung places: Tehran, Krakow, Seoul," says the pess kit. Fleeting moments, captured by Almereyda's camera, become bits of preserved paradise. The screening is at the Nightingale, 1084 N. Milwaukee Ave.at 8pm on Thursday; admission is $7-$10 (sliding scale).

-- The French. Running at Facets through Sunday, the 12th Annual Festival of French Cinema throws the spotlight on some of the quirkier, pulpier French movies to come out recently. These kinds of movies usually don't get the kind of American distribution enjoyed by a major art-house hit like Tell No One. The festival encompasses every kind of genre you could want. Check out the full schedule.

-- Deserts. Burning sand, scorching heat, camels. All sounds really great right about now, doesn't it? Lawrence of Arabia screens Saturday and next Tuesday at the Siskel Film Center in a newly-struck print.

-- Awards. It's never too early to start Oscar speculation. Right? Watch for our own "best of 2008" list later this month. The Dark Knight could be a contender ...