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FILM It's been more than 15 years since Jodie Foster sat in the director's chair, but for a project like The Beaver, she was up to the challenge. As with her past directorial projects, Little Man Tate (1991) and Home for the Holidays (1994), Foster felt a connection to the material that inspired her to take on a larger role.Read more »

WEDS/27

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SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL Science fiction's open secret is that it has never really been about the future. As William Gibson explained to an interviewer in 2007, echoing earlier genre criticism by writers such as Samuel R. Delany and Joanna Russ, science fiction is, at its heart, "speculative fiction, but you don't really have the future to work with, so you are always working with history and with the present."Read more »

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SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL Remember that episode of The Brady Bunch where Carol and Mike decide to sell the house and the kids fake-haunt it to scare off potential buyers? It's the pop culture moment I always think of when I hear about an apartment with suspiciously cheap rent. First reaction: "Wow! Is it haunted?"Read more »

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SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL "Is this what you wanted/ To live in a house that is haunted/ By the ghost of you and me?"

Likewise, try as its makers might, the specter of Leonard Cohen looms over the short films by Alex Da Corte, Christian Holstad, and the other artists who try their hand at making 11 new pieces inspired by the 11 tracks comprising New Skin for the Old Ceremony, the 1974 long-player that some consider the songwriter's most sublime.Read more »

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FILM For many devoted fans of horror films who grew up in the 1980s — especially those who were monster kids in spirit or became one in the ensuing years — the 1987 movie The Monster Squad has a special, firmly staked place in their hearts.

Paying tribute to the icons of the classic Universal monster pantheon while weaving a modern storyline into the mix, writer and director Fred Dekker created a now-cult favorite, a film that is scary and funny, entertaining and touching all at the same time.Read more »

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FILM With great girl power comes great responsibility — words that only a few of the Powerpuff Girls of 2011 have lived by. Behold the new generation, too young to settle down, prepped to suit up in skintight Lycra or schoolgirl gear, and eager to mete out punishment to the baddies. Girls mature faster than boys, sure, but that diary-keeping wimpy kid reigning the other half of the cineplex would have plenty to jot down in his diary if he met up with one of these slay-belles.Read more »