What to Watch Right Now

The effects of home brew, fearful and wonderful, are humorously depicted in this two reel comedy. The still, an intricate apparatus, is harbored in a boarding house.

A European royal couple come to New York to sell some of the royal family's crown jewels. A gang of international jewel thieves plans to steal the gems, so a private detective is assigned to guard them. Unfortunately, the private eye turns out to be a bumbling, inept fool--or so everyone thinks.

Against the backdrop of Reno, talkback radio, casinos, money, religion, crime, and other perversions, "Melvin Smarty" is a comedic romp about young love and what it takes to achieve happiness--which, given the context of the above, is quite a lot.

One level a deeply felt story of a woman, and on another, that of a country's tragic past and its exploited people.

Phil, a shy, insecure teenager growing up in a affluent suburb, is trapped in the painful throes of adolescence. He's struggling to come to terms with his sexuality. At his elite private school, Phil is picked on by his former friend and love interest, Adam. Adam frequently lashes out with violence against Phil and enjoys humiliating him in the locker room. As the bullying intensifies, both at school and at home, the back story of Phil and Adam's ill-fated relationship is revealed, leading to a horrific final assault.

Rogue couple Betty Williams and Bob Fishman attempt to rob a jewelry store in Glasgow. The plan fails and a policeman is killed.

Charley Wyckham and Jack Chesney pressure fellow student Fancourt Babberly to pose as Charley's Brazilian Aunt Donna Lucia. Their purpose is to have a chaperone for their amorous visits with Amy and Kitty, niece and ward of crusty Stephen Spettigue. Complications begin when Fancourt, in drag, becomes the love object of old Spettigue and Sir Francis Chesney.

Retreat participants at a modern-day monastery embark on a healing journey.

Christmas in Tattertown is a failed 1988 TV pilot turned television special created and directed by Ralph Bakshi about a place where everything discarded in the world came alive. It aired on the cable television network Nickelodeon. When a young girl called Debbie, her pet dog and her toy doll Muffet end up in Tattertown, Muffet comes to life and, seeking freedom, refuses to go back to Debbie, who is unable to understand this. Debbie learns more about Tattertown and realizes that there is no Christmas there, so she tries explaining what Christmas is and helping the townspeople celebrate it for the first time. However, Christmas reminds Muffet of the day she was given to Debbie and decides to sabotage it with the help of her minion Spider. The story is narrated by the town's anthropomorphic saxophone. The short shares many similarities with Bakshi's more adult take on a similar idea in his follow up part animated part live action film Cool World.

Ident follows a clay-man and his day-to-day struggles fitting in the real world. As he keeps changing his face, and struggles to find a connection with anyone besides his dog, the man finds himself with a rare opportunity: to start a new life reflecting himself, rather than the world at large.

The first omnibus film made in Yugoslavia, tells the three stories set in Belgrade by night - a loving couple, a desperate boxing handler, and troubles of contemporary youth.

Tina Lehmann is an auto mechanic who dreams of becoming a pop star. One day after work she sneaks onto the set of the TV music program 'Formel Eins' with her demo tape, and lands a job as a go-fer. Her boyfriend Stevie Dromberger, who has been drafted into the army, doesn't like the attention she's receiving from the celebrity guests, and goes AWOL when he thinks she is dating the singer Limahl.

A female cat wants to board a French cruise ship. Prior to the ship's departure, she crawls under a freshly-painted, white metal gate and sneaks aboard. The paint from the gate has given her a white stripe on her back that causes everyone to think she's a skunk. An amorous skunk, Pepe Le Pew, spots her from shore and runs underwater to the ship, which has by now been abandoned by frightened crew and passengers, and climbs aboard. Pepe tries to woo the female cat, who runs away from him when she smells his odor. Pepe chases her around and around the ship.

After a one night stand with a struggling addict, a Cuban plainclothes officer from The Bronx falls into a rabbit hole of New York City's heroin trade, dragging his partner along with him. Discovering a family that is smuggling deadly strains of dope into the city, it becomes a fight to escape the grip of a deadly organization.

Two couples are at an isolated lakeside cabin and the tragic psycho-sexual interaction between these four people leads one of them, Piotr, to commit an unspeakable act.

The life and death of Giuseppe "Pippo" Fava, a Sicilian journalist and intellectual who tried to fight the Mafia through his newspaper "I Siciliani" during the 70's and the early 80's

The seamy side of Los Angeles is revealed through the lens of a stolen video camera as it passes through a succession of owners.

A true story of a naive Chinese girl who is forced to confront betrayal after she awakes in a remote forest covered in blood. Xiaofan, a young girl who works at a Karaoke Club, awakes one morning in a remote forest with her body covered in blood. As she struggles to find her way out, she tries to understand the dramatic circumstances which got her into the situation, events mainly related to her attractive and unpredictable boyfriend. She needs to make a decision that may change her life. Betrayal, hypocrisy, and social commentary are represented in this story, inspired by real events and shot in Sichuan, using the local dialect.