The Best Old Movies on a Big Screen This Week: NYC Repertory Cinema Picks, August 10-16
The ‘Burbs (1989)
Directed by Joe Dante
Three suburbanites—Tom Hanks (before the regular Joe hardened into the pillar of decency), Bruce Dern in all his wiry nasal glory, and schlub specialist Rick Ducommun—grow convinced the new family on the block has done away with another of their neighbors, and go to increasingly outlandish lengths to uncover the truth. Dante’s screw-loose take on Rear Window finds the director, as ever, emulating the spring-coiled anarchy of a Road Runner cartoon while he affectionately skewers American conformity. Few other directors are as resourceful in putting familiar tropes to unexpected uses, or as committed to the art of the throwaway gag. Eli Goldfarb (August 12, 4:30pm, 8:30pm; August 15, 4:30pm, 9:15pm at BAM’s Dante series; August 12 screenings part of a double feature with W.C Fields comedy It’s a Gift)