“In the Shadow of Women,” directed by Philippe Garrel, Film Society of Lincoln Center, opens January 15Any chance to see a film by Philippe Garrel is a cause for celebration. The French director’s latest, “In the Shadow of Women,” premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2015 before making its way stateside at the New York Film Festival in October. Now, three months later, it’s getting a proper theatrical release. Like Garrel’s previous film, “Jealousy” (read my review here), this one examines a fraught relationship in painful detail: Pierre (Stanislas Merhar) and Manon (Clotilde Courau) are a married couple who are working together on a documentary about a resistance fighter. But when Pierre meets a young woman who works at the film lab (Lena Paugam) and begins a relationship with her, Manon discovers his infidelity and decides to do the same. Pierre is fine with cheating on his wife, but doesn’t accept his wife cheating on him. Garrel is a master at investigating the intertwining of romance and resentment, and has managed, through a prolonged look at both over the course of 31 films, to find new emotional territory to explore. This one is not to be missed.“Chimes at Midnight” (1965), directed by Orson Welles, Film Forum, through January 19The work of Orson Welles keeps on coming to New York. Following the remarkable selection of unfinished work at the Museum of Modern Art, which screened during its equally remarkable “To Save and Project” series in November, now we have “Chimes of Midnight,” which for many years was difficult to see for the usual reasons that so much of what Welles made over his lifetime is difficult to see: disputes over rights, missing materials, etc. The new restoration, from Janus Films, looks great and offers the best version of “Midnight” available. Essentially a collection of various pieces from Shakespeare’s historical plays — “Richard II,” the first and second parts of “Henry IV,” and “Henry V,” to name a few — with Welles himself taking the role of Falstaff. Welles originally did a version of the film on the stage in 1938 with his Mercury Theater group, called “Five Kings,” and part of the reason it’s so highly regarded is that Welles, in his free-adaptation, makes Shakespeare fully cinematic through interesting clashes of material. Visually, it has some of Welles’s best work, most notably in the editing of the scene documenting the battle of Shrewsbury, which captures each moment of the action like a series of blows in a boxing ring.“Anomalisa,” directed by Duke Johnson, Charlie Kaufman, Landmark Sunshine Cinema, ongoingI spent the weeks between Christmas and New Years catching up on all the end-of-the-year movies I missed. Most of them were not great, even the ones that are currently winning awards, but the one that stuck out to me was “Anomalisa.” A stop-motion animated film from the mind of Charlie Kaufman, working in an even darker mode than usual here, and Duke Johnson (who has worked on the Adult Swim animated shows “Moral Oral” and “Mary Shelley’s Frankenhole”), it concerns the depression of Michael Stone (voiced by David Thewlis), a married man with his eye on getting out. He’s staying at a hotel the night before he is to present a lecture on customer service — his book, “How May I Help You Help Them?,” is revered in the customer service community. After hearing a mysterious voice, he meets the woman behind it, named Lisa (voiced by Jennifer Jason Leigh). She is an insecure fan of his work and may be the solution to all his problems. Everyone else in the film — man, woman, and child — are voiced by the actor Tom Noonan, who should be winning some kind of major award for his work here. But alas, because this is an animated film, and not something where an actor is mauled by a bear or where the director insists on using racial epithets as a badge of honor, it will get pushed to the margins.“The Limits of Control” (2009), directed by Jim Jarmusch, Museum of the Moving Image, January 16One of Jarmusch’s most oblique and fascinating films, “The Limits of Control” stars Isaach de Bankolé as a man traveling through Spain on a mission that he and we are unsure of. It’s a spy film drained of most of the plot but filled with tension and mystery, and also one of Jarmusch’s most beautiful films to look out, via the cinematography of Christopher Doyle (most famous for his work with Wong Kar-wai). Bill Murray, Tilda Swinton, Gael Garcia Bernal, and others make appearances.“Behind Jim Jarmusch” (2009) and “Traveling at Night with Jim Jarmusch” (2014), directed by Léa Rinaldi, Museum of the Moving Image, January 16Since you’re already going to see “The Limits of Control,” why don’t you head over to the beautiful streets of Astoria, Queens a few hours early and see these two essential behind-the-scenes documents of Jim Jarmusch’s working process? Both films were made by Léa Rinaldi and are screening, along with “The Limits of Control,” as part of the “First Look” series. “Behind Jim Jarmuch” shows the director while he’s making “Limits” in Spain,” while “Traveling at Night” follows Jarmuch as he is making his last feature film, the amazing “Only Lovers Left Alive” (2014).
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