REEL TALK: MOVIES RATED BY WAYS I WOULD PLURALIZE “OCTOPUS”

NOSTALGIA FOR THE LIGHT | OCTOPUSES

Chile’s Atacama Desert is the location of the world’s most powerful telescopes. We build them there because it’s one of the driest places in the world, and coincidentally that makes it an effective place to dispose of dead bodies. While scientists peer deep into the cosmos, director Patricio Guzman juxtaposes them with a group of nearby women sifting through the sandy Earth, looking for body parts of loved ones—who happen to be people deemed political enemies of former Chilean president Augusto Pinochet. [NR | Brattle Theatre, Fri 6.10.11]

ART SAFARI | OCTOPI

Probably inspired in part by reality TV—the kind where a host travels around the world looking for the grossest thing to eat, or the most dangerous place to stick his finger—art critic Ben Lewis goes on the hunt for contemporary artists. In three sections, Ben discusses Maurizio Cattelan’s cartoonish sculptures, Matthew Barney’s befuddling Cremaster Cycle and (even though he gets lost on the way) Takashi Murakami’s super-sized cartoonish toys. [NR | Museum of Fine Arts, Wed 6.8.11]

THE FIRST BEAUTIFUL THING | NINETOPUS

Anna (Micaela Ramazzotti, Stefania Sandrelli) is that rare type of mother who used to be hot. To her son, Bruno (Valerio Mastandrea), she’s a woman his sister forces him to visit in the hospital when he’d rather be left alone to be stoned out of his mind. Bruno’s story never becomes the standard family melodrama. Through judicious use of flashbacks of his mother’s life, there’s plenty sleeping around, drugs and even the occasional tragic beauty contest. [NR | Kendall Square Cinema, Fri 6.10.11]

ESSENTIAL KILLING | OCTOPUSSSS

Vincent Gallo doesn’t play ordinary roles. In Essential Killing, he plays a laconic terrorist, Mohammed, a Taliban soldier captured by American forces after killing three soldiers with a bazooka. The film never tries to redeem him with maudlin sob story or flashback to a terrible childhood to try to get the audience to empathize with him, but the grisly trauma he endures (and sometimes inflicts) to escape American forces sometimes seem to be too much to wish—even on someone you don’t like. [NR | Harvard Film Archive, Sat 6.11.11]

SUPER 8 | OCTOPU’S

An instructional video about the dangers of transporting extraterrestrial, mutant or biologically engineered super creatures by train—always use planes or boats. Director J.J. Abrams really spells out what can go wrong by plopping a group of teenagers filming on an old-timey 8 mm camera machine right next to the inevitable train derailment. Shortly after, people begin to disappear and it’s up to the local deputy and this group of junior cinematographers to solve the mystery of the derailed train. [PG-13 | Wide release, Fri 6.10.11]