Dr. Strangelove. I've always suspected Stanley Kubrick of basically despising human beings. His sets tend to resemble the Mather House courtyard, done in that intimidating style intended to give people the feeling that they are insignificant. In Strangelove, though, his contempt for people isn't particularly noxious, because he's portraying a particularly contemptible group--the American military-political elite. George C. Scott satirizes the character of military men brilliantly--at heart, they are adolescents who never grew up, infatuated with the noise and destructive power of weaponry, and strangely naive.
Dog Day Afternoon. Al Pacino is brilliant as the bank robber-cum-rock star. The efforts of the New York Police Department and the FBI to foil him pale in comparison to the recent Israeli raid on Uganda, but the denouement of this thriller is gripping nonetheless.
Love and Anarchy. The least offensive of Lina Wertmuller's movies--her world-view at this point had not yet resolved itself into the cold cynicism which would later pervade Seven Beauties and Swept Away. A sensitive, moving film, marred only by a somewhat confusing and incongrous postscript about the pointlessness of political violence. One thing that does appear fixed already is her hatred of women--fittingly, the entire movie is set in a whorehouse. And in case you can't get enough of Shirley Stolle, the 700 lb. obesity in Seven Beauties, you can catch her in an earlier movie, The Seduction of Mimi. Shirley creates a whole new meaning for the word "fat."
Buffalo Bill and the Indians. After seeing his bomb, it's not difficult to see why Dino de Laurentis pulled Altman off the Ragtime project. Altman is best at presenting little stories, but he has this awful tendency to cast himself as the grand philosophe. In Buffalo Bill, the oracle has come down from the mountain to tell us that we have lied to ourselves about our history and that we mistreated the Indians. How interesting. At the Cheri III, in Boston, 1:30, 3:45, 6:15, 8, 10.
SCIENCE CENTER B
American in Paris, Tuesday, 7:30 p.m., $1.50.
Chapayev, Thursday, 7 and 9:30 p.m., 1.50.
SCIENCE CENTER D
Stones of Eden, Oasis in the Sahara, Berber Villages, Thursday, 7:30 p.m., free.
GUTMAN LIBRARY CONFERENCE CENTER
The Man in the Cocked Hat, 8 p.m., Thursday, $1.
BRATTLE THEATER
Hiroshima Mon Amour, 6:15, 9:40, and The Assassination of Trotsky, 7:50, ends today.
Nights of Cabiria, 5, 9:50, and La Dolce Vita, 7, starts tomorrow.
CENTRAL I
American Graffiti, 7:15, 9:15, ends today.
Seven Beauties, 7:30, 9:30, starts tomorrow.
CENTRAL II
Taxi Driver, 7:30, 9:30, ends today And Now For Something Completely Different, 6:45, 8:20, 9:50, starts tomorrow.
THE GALERIA
The Man Who Skied Down Everest, 2, 3:50, 5:40, 7:30, 9:20.
HARVARD SQUARE THEATER
Dog Day Afternoon, 3:35, 7:55, and Mean Streets, 1:30, 5:50, 10:05, ends today.
The Seduction of Mimi, 12:30, 4:10, 7:45, and Love and Anarchy, 2:10, 5:45, 9:20, starts tomorrow.
ORSON WELLES I
Knife in the Water, 4, 7:40, 11, and M, 5:45, 9:20, ends today.
Citizen Kane, 4, 7:45, and The Magnificent Ambersons, 6:10, 10:10, begins tomorrow.
OW II
Freaks, 4:30, 7:30, 10:30, and Forbidden Planet, 5:45, 8:45, ends today.
Dr. Strangelove, 6:10, 10:05, and Lost Horizon, 4, 7:55, starts tomorrow.
OW III
Psycho, 5:40, 9:20 and Pretty Poison, 4, 7:40, ends today.
Le Magnifique, 4:15, 6, 7:45, 9:30, 11:10, starts tomorrow.
