Two films highlight botanical garden, Oct 20, 2006
El Charco del Ingenio
Tuesday, October 24, 5pm, Teatro Santa Ana
Insurgentes 25, 50 pesos

The first film in the Teatro Santa Ana’s double-feature about San Miguel’s botanical garden is a documentary in English about the preservation project undertaken at El Charco. It is a beautiful and interesting presentation of this natural jewel, showing the botanical diversity, endangered species and what has been done and what remains to be done to preserve the garden’s habitat. The film was produced by David Gillis in 2004 and has a running time of 20 minutes. 
The second film is a collection of images produced by José Manuel Pintadoin in 2003, with a running time of 15 minutes. Its subject is the Santa Cruz (Holy Cross) of El Charco del Ingenio, a festivity that reunites the community of the surrounding area in an ancient celebration that hearkens back to colonial times and mixes Christian and pagan symbols and rites. The show will be introduced by César Arias, director of the botanical garden and a tireless conservationist. A question-and-answer period follows the films. Sales of tickets benefit El Charco del Ingenio and the Biblioteca Pública. 

Making a killing in Iraq
By Jon Sievert
Center for Global Justice Film
Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers
Thursday, October 26, 3pm, Teatro Santa Ana
Insurgentes 25, 50 pesos

Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers is the story of what happens to everyday Americans when corporations go to war. Acclaimed director Robert Greenwald (Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price, Outfoxed and Uncovered) takes you inside the lives of soldiers, truck drivers, widows and children who have been changed forever as a result of profiteering in the reconstruction of Iraq. Iraq for Sale uncovers the connections between private corporations making a killing in Iraq and the decision makers who allow them to do so.
Greenwald’s film exposes the long-time personal connections between the Bush administration and the profiteers as it investigates Blackwater Security Consulting, a Halliburton subsidiary, KBR, and CACI International, finding such travesties as truck drivers—told they would be kept out of harm’s way—forced to drive into battle zones unprotected; the use of mercenaries for combat operations and interrogations; and soldiers training civilians to, ultimately, outsource their own jobs at much higher salaries so that friends of the administration can rake in obscene profits.
Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers has a running time of 75 minutes, with a discussion to follow.
Cinemateca, October 23 thru October 27

José Luis’s Pick and Tips:

The pick: 

Day of the Dead, Halloween, death documentaries 
This week we are celebrating el Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) and Halloween, so we have an interesting collection of horror movies. Some are classic and some are funny, but overall they represent the way we Mexicans approach death—in an irreverent way. This way of looking at death goes back to the pre-Hispanic cultures in which death was more a beginning than an end. There are also two documentaries that explore history and death. A good choice this week would be the two documentaries on the Charco del Ingenio, San Miguel's botanical garden (see p. 33). To close the week with a treat, I highly recommend the play "Transylvania Mon Amour" presented by the renowned comedy company "Comedia del Universo" on Saturday at 8pm and Sunday, at 5pm (see p. 37).

The tips:
In order to be able to provide the best viewing experience, the show times for some movies may be adjusted to accommodate their length. Be sure to check the schedule carefully. Also, please remember the new ticket price of 50 pesos. Discount cards are 400 pesos for 10 shows. 

On Monday after 4pm buy your tickets for any selection of the week. Don't take the risk of being locked out! 
Nos vemos en el Cine

Mr. Death: 
The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr. (1999)
Monday, October 23, 6:30pm
English, 91 minutes 
Director: Errol Morris
Cast: David Irving, Fred A. Leuchter, Jr., Shelly Shapiro, James Roth.
Oscar-winning director Errol Morris's riveting documentary explores the life of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr., the execution specialist who worked with prisons to make capital punishment more humane. Hired by a revisionist historian to disprove the Holocaust, Leuchter traveled to Auschwitz—while on his honeymoon—to research the matter and concluded that the gas chambers didn't exist. The ensuing international flap destroyed his marriage and career.

Nosferatu: Original Version 
(Nosferatu, Eine Symphonie des Grauens, 1929)
Tuesday, October 24, 3pm
English, 81 minutes
Director: F.W. Murnau
Cast: Max Schreck, Alexander Granach, Greta Schroder, Gustav von Wangenheim. 
A sailor on a ghost ship opens a coffin, and a bald, claw-fingered vampire rises to standing position as if on a hinge. Nosferatu provides bone-chilling scares; many horror freaks call this silent German classic the scariest Dracula adaptation ever. Renamed "Count Orlok," by director F.W. Murnau, the creepy caped one is played by Max Schreck, with grotesque makeup that transforms him into a symbol of pestilence and decay.

Art Special
Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision (1995)
Wednesday, October 25, noon
English, 83 minutes
Director: Freida Lee Mock
Cast: Maya Lin
In this Academy Award-winning documentary, filmmaker Freida Lee Mock captures the genius of Maya Lin, a visionary architect vaulted to fame at age 20 after her pared-down, modern and controversial design was chosen to memorialize the Vietnam War in Washington, D.C. The film also describes other memorials Maya Lin has created, such as the Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery, Alabama.

The Phantom of the Opera (2004)
Wednesday, October 25, 3pm
English, 141 minutes
Director: Joel Schumacher
Cast: Gerard Butler, Emmy Rossum, Patrick Wilson, Miranda Richardson
Andrew Lloyd Webber's stunning musical comes alive onscreen in this Joel Schumacher rendition. A talented recluse (Gerard Butler) disfigured in a tragic accident roams beneath the Paris Opera. Fueled with resentment, he terrorizes other musicians until he falls for the lovely Christine (Emmy Rossum), a formidable singer whom he takes under his wing, molding her so she can become the sensational soprano he envisions her to be.

Cinema for Mexican Youth
Del Olvido Al No Me Acuerdo 
(Juan, I Forgot, I Don't Remember, 1999) 
Wednesday, October 25, 5pm
Spanish with English subtitles, 75 minutes
Director: Juan Carlos Rulfo
Expanded from an acclaimed short subject, Del Olvidio Al No Me Acuerdo (Juan, I Forgot, I Don't Remember) looks at the life of a great author and the ravages time can wreak upon both the body and mind. Director Juan Carlos Rulfo is the son of noted Mexican writer Juan Rulfo, and here the son speaks with many of his father's friends and contemporaries who also lived in southern Jalisco. However, the years have not been good to many of them, and few are able to clearly remember significant events in Rulfo's life—or their own—as the camera carefully records the wrinkles, grey hair, lost teeth, and other signs that time has left its mark upon their faces. What starts as a tribute to a great artist becomes a meditation on aging and how it is affecting the history of a generation of great Mexican literature. The film was shown as part of the 1999 Guadalajara Film Festival.

Little Shop of Horrors (1986)
Thursday, October 26, 5:30pm
English, 94 minutes
Director: Frank Oz
Cast: Rick Moranis, Steve Martin, John Candy, Bill Murray, James Belushi.
Plant yourself in front of the screen and veg out with this remake of schlockmeister Roger Corman's horticultural horror flick turned musical. Gawky Seymour Krelborn (Rick Moranis), looking for a way to save his job in a ramshackle, skid-row flower shop, purchases a curious, exotic plant hoping it will make business bloom. And it does. There's just one problem: The little creeper possesses a rapacious appetite for fresh human plasma … and it's mushrooming out of control!

White Zombie (1932)
Friday, October 27, 3pm
English, 73 minutes
Cast: Bela Lugosi
Made in just 11 days back in 1932, with a $50,000 budget and sets left standing from Universal's Dracula and Frankenstein, this film remains a horror classic. Keeping dialogue to a minimum, cameraman Arthur Martinelli cuts loose on this odd fairy tale about a newlywed couple menaced by zombies. Avoiding the stagy static feel that pervades many other early talkies, White Zombie shows its story, rather than tells it.