Screening at the Miami Beach Cinematheque is the controversial "This Is Not A Film," which was made illegally by imprisoned Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, who has been banned from filmmaking for 20 years. His imprisoned life was documented on a friend's iPhone before it was smuggled into France via cake to screen at the Cannes Film Festival.
Other movies to check out this week include the comedy "The Perfect Family" at Cinema Paradiso, about a devout Catholic woman trying to hide her family's imperfects to win a coveted award from her church. At the Cosford Cinema at the University of Miami, Rachael Harris stars as a woman traveling from Texas to Florida to bring back her dying husband's illegitimate son.
Footnote (Hearat Shulayim)
May 15 and 16 at 6:50 p.m.
Tickets: $8 to $10
In this Academy Award nominated film, a father, Eliezer, and son, Uriel, are competitive professors in Talmudic studies with completely different views on Judaism. When the father is called with the news he is the winner of the acclaimed Israel Prize, he finally has a chance to shine. However, Uriel learns it was actually meant for him, and must decide whether to break the news to his father or let him take the award. Hebrew with English subtitles.
Detachment
May 15 and 16 at 8:45 p.m.
Tickets: $8 to $10
In this film,= by “American History X” director Tony Kaye, Adrien Brody plays a substitute teacher (alongside a power-packed cast) who makes all efforts to never bond with his students or fellow teachers. However, at a new school, he encounters frustrated teachers and angry students, and finds himself connecting with those around him.
The Turin Horse
May 17 at 8 p.m.
Tickets: $8 to $10
Grand Prize winner at the Berlin Film Festival, this film set in 1889 follows a man who is traumatized by the beating of a horse. He becomes mute from the experience, while the man who owns the horse struggles with food and water growing scarce. In the distance, the apocalypse is near. Hungarian with English subtitles.
This is Not a Film (In film nist)
May 18 at 7 p.m., May 19 and 20 at 5:30 and 7 p.m.
Tickets: $8 to $10
Iranian director, Jafar Panahi was handed a six-year prison sentence and a 20-year ban from filmmaking and conducting interviews with foreign press after openly supporting the 2009 opposition party. Even so, the rogue filmmaker has his close friend, Mojtaba Mirthasmasb, film his life on an iPhone. The movie it smuggled into France on a flash drive and then delivered to the Cannes Film Festival inside a cake for a last-minute screening. Persian with English subtitles.
Bonsai
May 18, 19 and 20 at 8:40 p.m.
Tickets: $8 to $10
Julio, a struggling young writer, doesn’t get a job with a writer to transcribe his work. Rather than tell his girlfriend about the let down, he says he’s transcribing it when he’s really writing his own story about the girl who got away eight years ago. Spanish with English subtitles.
Natural Selection
May 18 at 9 p.m., May 19 at 2, 6 and 10 p.m., May 20 at 5 and 9 p.m.
Tickets: Free to $9
Rachael Harris plays Linda White, a Christian housewife living a sheltered life in Texas. Her whole life changes when she discovers that her dying husband has a 23-year-old son living in Florida. She vows to bring him back to Texas before her husband dies, and learns about herself and the world along the way.
The Bright Stream
May 14 at 7 p.m.
Tickets: Free to $9
Audiences are taken to the Russian steppes where a Moscow dance troupe, the Bolshoi Ballet, performs for workers. However, when the dancers mix in with the community, hilarity bubbles to the surface.
The Fairy (La fée)
May 18 at 7 p.m., May 19 at 4 and 8 p.m., May 20 at 3 and 7 p.m.
Tickets: Free to $9
A hotel night shift worker, Dom, meets a woman who claims to be a fairy and will grant him three wishes. After she grants the first two, she disappears and Dom must find the woman he has fallen in love with. French with English subtitles.
First Position
May 14, 15, 16 and 17 at 4:30, 6:45 and 9:00 p.m.
Tickets: $11
Six young ballet hopefuls from around the world with dreams of finally making it big converge in New York City for the Youth America Grand Prix. In addition to moving their dance careers forward, they tell their stories of being a male dancer, escaping from war in Africa, and saying goodbye to family in South America to follow dreams.
One Man, Two Guvnors
May 19 and 20 at 1 p.m.
Tickets: $10 to $16
Francis Henshall, always hungry and easily confused, ends up working for a gangster and a criminal but can’t let the two of them meet. Watch the comical performance by the National Theatre of London, recorded live.
The Perfect Family
May 15 at 8 p.m., May 16 and 17 at 6 p.m.
Tickets: $6 to $10
Kathleen Turner plays Eileen Cleary, who has been nominated for the Catholic Woman of the Year. Determined to receive the plaque, she must hide her very un-Catholic life from the church: her gay daughter soon to marry her partner, an adulterous and unhappily married son, and her recovering alcoholic husband.
Check out these other films playing at the cinema:
In the Family
May 14 at 6 p.m. and May 19 at Noon
Tickets: $6 to $10
A Bag of Hammers
May 15 at 6 p.m. and May 16 at 8 p.m.
Tickets: $6 to $10
Follow Me: The Yoni Netanyahu Story
May 18 at 6 p.m., May 19 at 4 p.m. and May 20 at 7 p.m.
Tickets: $6 to $10
Chinese Take-Away (Un cuento chino)
May 18 at 8 p.m., May 19 at 6 p.m. and May 29 at 5 p.m.
Tickets: $6 to $10