Things to Do

The Month of July in Film

What's showing at the National Gallery, Landmark, and other movie theaters around town this month.

Clockwise: Eyes Wide Shut, The Edukators and Chris & Don: A Love Story.

Freer Gallery of Art

The film My Name Is Fame tells of a washed-up actor who grudgingly takes an ingenue under his wing only to see her career take off while his goes nowhere. It’s part of this year’s Made in Hong Kong Film Festival, July 11 through August 17. Two other movies—including Exodus, a satire of the thriller genre—will also be shown this month. Films are screened in the Meyer Auditorium, 1050 Independence Ave., SW; 202-633-4880; asia.si.edu/events/films.asp.

Goethe-Institut

“Best of Film Neu: Summer Sizzlers” revisits some of the most popular selections from Goethe-Institut’s annual series of German-language films. July’s movies include The Edukators, about a trio of youths reacting against capitalism, and Summer in Berlin, a dramedy chronicling the ups and downs of two friends during a summer in the German capital. Tickets are $4 to $6. 812 Seventh St., NW; 202-289-1200; goethe.de/washington.

Landmark E Street Cinema

A selection at last year’s Cannes Film Festival, Alexander Sokurov’s Alexandra features Russian opera legend Galina Vishnevskaya in the title role of a woman visiting her grandson at a military outpost on the Chechen front. Opens July 4.

Chris & Don: A Love Story chronicles the relationship of artist Don Bachardy and writer Christopher Isherwood—who, despite a 30-year age difference, stayed together until Isherwood’s death in 1986. The documentary, which opens July 25, features interviews with colleagues including director John Boorman and Liza Minnelli as well as footage shot by Isherwood and Bachardy.

Tickets to all films are $7 to $9.75. 11th and E sts., NW; 202-452-7672; landmarktheatres.com.

National Gallery of Art

Michelangelo Antonioni made films that defied convention, and watching a movie by Antonioni—whose attention to landscapes and visual space often halts plot development—can be a trying experience. “Michelangelo Antonioni: The Italian Treasures”—July 19 through August 24—looks at eight of the director’s most important Italian films, including 1960’s L’Avventura, which at the time of its release was denounced by some critics for its inconclusive story.

Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb and Eyes Wide Shut will be screened July 26 as part of a discussion led by film scholars Robert Kolker and James Naremore in commemoration of the late director’s 80th birthday.

“Envisioning Russia: Mosfilm Studio,” commemorating the legacy of Russia’s most important studio, concludes this month. Starting July 5, six Mosfilm features from the 1960s, ’70s, and ’80s will be shown, including Andrei Konchalovsky’s lush adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya.

In conjunction with the exhibit “Afghanistan: Hidden Treasures From the National Museum, Kabul,” movies and shorts about Afghanistan, both fictional and documentary, will be featured through September. The Giant Buddhas, about the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddha statues by the Taliban, kicks off the series July 4.

Films are shown in the auditorium in the East Building concourse, Fourth St. and Constitution Ave., NW; 202-737-4215; nga.gov/programs/film.

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