On the Big, Big Screen: Five movies you’ve gotta go see in local theaters this month

The Host (2006)

Directed by Bong Joon-ho

Everybody liked Parasite, right? Bong’s Best Picture follow-up, Mickey 17, opens on March 6. Based on the unceremonious release date, and the funny voice Robert Pattinson is doing in the trailer, the studio seems weirded out in a way that should bode well for audiences. If you want to see another one of Bong’s biggest hits, The Host is monster-mashing its way through the Davenport riverfront this month. The film made Quentin Tarantino’s top 20 movies released since 1992, and of equal note, Little Big Screen’s stack of dirty water movies.

Raw (2016)

Directed by Julia Ducournau

The raunchy and very R-rated teen comedies from the late 90s/early 00s have their share of gross-outs and pieces of meat — but they’ve got nothing on Raw. This coming-of-age movie from the writer-director of Titane follows a 16-year-old girl’s journey of self-discovery as she enrolls in veterinarian school and starts to incorporate flesh into her vegetarian diet. There’s one scene, with a bikini wax, that you’ll want to watch through your fingers. But, uh, be careful.

Demons (1985)

Directed by Lamberto Bava

Demons might be the most “metal” movie ever made. Things get started when a horror movie possesses its packed theater and turns the audience members into vomitous demons. Since these demons only kill and get killed in the gnarliest and ooey-gooiest of fashions, the movie is basically a series of images that could’ve been screen printed on single-stitch band tees, and yes, the images are set to songs from Mötley Crüe, Billy Idol, Scorpion, etc. One big “Hell yeah, brother!” to The Fright Zone podcast for picking such a primo slice of late-night Italian horror.

Nightshift (1981)

Directed by Robina Rose

Shot over five days at The Portobello Hotel in West London, this 16mm snapshot of the city’s early 80s underground stars Jordan — the Queen of Punk — as a dusk-till-dawn desk clerk who, along with the audience, gazes at the constellation of too-cool customers moving through the lobby. Basically unseeable for, what, 50 years, and now restored in 4K, FilmScene is one of only a handful of theaters in the country showing Nightshift. Be there or be square.

Part of the  Women At Work series.

Legends of the Fall (1994)

Directed by Edward Zwick

It’s easy to see why Legends of the Fall won the Academy Award for Best Cinematography. The vistas are vista-ing, and yet, even with their saturated colors and endless skies, they can’t help but become background to Brad Pitt. His long blonde locks and half-buttoned shirts are almost too hot for a historical melodrama, turning this lit class-style epic into a fan-yourself fantasy. (Also, I guess Inglourious Basterds wasn’t the first time Pitt scalped Germans on camera?) 

Presented by Chase Stine for the Films That Inspire Me series.