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10:30 PM IFC
Street Mobster (1972 JAP): If you enjoyed last year's IFC airings of Kinji Fukasaku's five-film Yakuza Papers series, here's another of the director's nikkatsu (gangster) offerings. Street Mobster features good old Bunta Sagawara as Isamu, a particularly loathsome hoodlum who has a penchant for rape when he isn't knocking heads with the local competition. Isamu is a loose cannon, but he's also got big time aspirations, and is determined to set up his own powerhouse gang with compatriot Kizaki. Unsurprisingly, the incumbent Yato gang doesn't take kindly to this sort of thing, setting in motion the incredibly bloody proceedings that follow. Unlike some of Fukasaku's oeuvre, there's no attempt here to graft social commentary onto the story, which is either a good or a bad thing, depending on your perspective.

Friday 11/30/07

3:15 AM Sundance
The Fearless Freaks (2005 USA): Either they changed or I did. I remember seeing The Flaming Lips open for Nick Cave back in the ‘80s, and I was not impressed. They looked and sounded like a metal band, and I especially didn't like that song about how she didn't like the jelly. Twenty years on, I consider them amongst the finest contemporary exponents of psychedelic music. Go figure. This rockumentary does a pretty good job of explaining The Lips' evolution from hairy rock gods to purveyors of perfect, though slightly perverse, pop. There's lots of concert footage, home movies, and interviews, and this is absolutely essential viewing for anyone interested in Oklahoma's finest export since Will Rogers.

Sunday 12/02/07

3:00 AM Fox Movie Channel
Champagne Charlie (1936 USA): Genuinely rare movie alert! This hour-long Fox murder mystery has been unseen for decades, and according to IMDb, survives only on a single nitrate print at UCLA. Whether that's the print being utilized for this airing, or if Fox discovered another print in their archives, remains a mystery, as the folks at FMC don't do a very good job of tooting their own horn when it comes to preservation work. Their Web site doesn't even feature a single sentence synopsis for Champagne Charlie, and I've never seen it, so you're on our own with this one - but it probably won't air again real soon, so don't miss the opportunity.

Monday 12/03/07

12:45 PM Sundance
Deadline (2004 USA): Ready for some cognitive dissonance? This documentary examines the recently imprisoned former governor of Illinois, George Ryan, who suspended his state death penalty for all the right reasons in the year 2000 and followed it up with a blanket amnesty three years later. Ryan comes across as one of the most thoughtful, moral politicians you could imagine - but is currently serving a 6½ year sentence in a Wisconsin prison camp on federal corruption charges.

10:00 PM Sundance
Last Jews of Libya (2007 USA): Once upon a time, over 30,000 Sephardic Jews lived in the North African desert kingdom of Libya. Today, not a single one remains. Tracing the history of the Roumani family, who lived in the city of Benghazi for hundreds of years, The Last Jews of Libya takes a fascinating look at a diaspora most of us have never heard about. Narrated by Isabella Rossellini and directed by Vivienne Roumani-Denn (yes, she's related, and moved from Benghazi to Boston when she was 12), this is an absolutely fascinating look at this historical footnote, which saw the Jews of Libya survive the World War II depredations of their fascist Italian colonial master only to run adrift on the rocks of Arab nationalism and the perverse decision-making of Colonel Muammar Kaddafy, once an American bogeyman but now a staunch War on Terror ally.

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