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Up To Date

Up To Date's Indie, Foreign & Doc Critics' 'Three To See,' December 29-31

Cohen Media Group
The travels of Agnes Varga (foreground) and JR are followed in the new documentary 'Face Places.'

It's the last weekend of the holiday season and maybe you're looking to do that anti-New Year thing — you know, just kick back and relax. Well, Up To Date's indie, foreign and documentary Film Critics have some avenues of escape you can travel for a few hours. 

Steve Walker

Faces Places, PG 

  • Agnes Varda, 89, and one of the leading figures of the French New Wave, pairs up with JR, a 33-year-old French photographer and muralist, for a road trip where both make good on their vow to energize and personalize their distinct artistic visions. 

Lady Bird, R

  • This sublime, tart comedy, written and directed by Greta Gerwig, features flawless performances from Laurie Metcalf as a stressed-out mom and Saoirse Ronan as a bohemian high school senior circa 2002 wishing she was anywhere but Sacramento.

Big Sonia, Not Rated

  • A moving documentary about local Holocaust survivor Sonia Warshawski, who ran a tailor shop at the Metcalf South Shopping Center long after the mall had been largely abandoned. 

Cynthia Haines 

The Shape of Water, R

  • Guillermo del Toro's dark romance-fantasy follows the relationship night-shift janitor Elisa Esposito, played by Sally Hawkins, forges with a strange creature housed in the secret government lab where she works.

Lady Bird, R

  • Greta Gerwig's first solo effort as writer/director is a heartfelt dedication to her NorCal hometown, and a masterful, funny examination of the mercurial relationship between a mother and her high school-aged daughter.

Loving Vincent, PG-13

  • A creative interpretation of the life and allegedly mysterious death of Vincent Van Gogh, depicted in more than 65,000 oil-painted animations that mirror the artist's own style.
Since 1998, Steve Walker has contributed stories and interviews about theater, visual arts, and music as an arts reporter at KCUR. He's also one of Up to Date's regular trio of critics who discuss the latest in art, independent and documentary films playing on area screens.