Could We Have Just One Screen For Viewing Alternative Cinema?

Since the latest closing of the Magic Lantern, since Regal Cinema’s recent decision to reinstate the Lincoln Heights as a first-run theater and since the former owners of the Magic Lantern are busily trying to finance a theater in Cheney, the Spokane movie-going scene has become achingly predictable.

Last week, “You’ve Got Mail” played at five theaters, “Patch Adams” played at four theaters (on five screens), “Stepmom” played at four theaters, “A Bug’s Life” played at four theaters, “A Civil Action” “Star Trek: Insurrection” and “Virus” all played at four theaters.

Meanwhile, “Shakespeare in Love” played on one screen at one theater. “Waking Ned Devine” played on one screen at one theater.

And while, yes, “The Thin Red Line” did play on single screens at four different theaters, it’s likely that this Terrence Malick meditation on war is getting a wider release more because it figures to pick up on the “Saving Private Ryan” crowd than because of any intent on local theater owners’ part to bring us anything remotely resembling alternative cinema.

For if non-mainstream fare indeed were a priority, then why has it taken so long for “A Simple Plan” to get here, and where are “Life is Beautiful,” “Hurlyburly,” “Affliction,” “Celebration,” “The General,” “Hilary and Jackie,” “Gods and Monsters,” “Down in the Delta,” “Little Voice” and “Dancing at Lughnasa,” as well as numerous others?

There are a couple of obvious reasons. One is that Spokane-area audiences never have supported alternative cinema, even the late, great Magic Lantern, in numbers enough to earn any individual theater-owner much to live on.

Another is that prints of such films are hard to come by.

But prints to such films are not impossible to get (ask any movie-buyer in the business). And Spokane’s overall tastes can’t change the obvious fact that a small, but dedicated, group of alternative-minded movie-lovers would certainly be able to generate enough business to warrant booking at least one screen - at, say, the four-screen Lincoln Heights - exclusively for alternative films.

You’d think so, at least.

Instead, another week goes by in which any resident of Spokane-Post Falls-Coeur d’Alene wanting to see a truly challenging movie is forced to head for the video store.

Or for Seattle.

The week’s major openings on video:

Buffalo ‘66

***

In his first directorial effort, underground actor Vincent Gallo (“Palookaville,” “The Funeral”) takes on a challenge: He attempts to make an unattractive character someone with whom the viewer can empathize. Nothing new there, except that the character - one Billy Brown - kidnaps a young woman (Christina Ricci) in the film’s first half-hour. But he’s not interested in doing anything sexual. Instead, he’s interested only in using the woman, Layla, to - get this - help him impress his parents. Part fantasy, part dark comedy, part study of unmet needs and supreme family dysfunction, “Buffalo ‘66” is, against all odds, thoroughly entertaining. Especially good are Anjelica Huston and Ben Gazzara as the most self-absorbed parents this side of Joan Crawford. Not rated.

Return to Paradise

***

When a young American (Joaquin Phoenix) is threatened by the Malaysian authorities for alleged drug-running, his friends (Vince Vaughn, David Conrad) must return to the country or he will be executed. An attorney (Anne Heche) makes it her personal crusade to convince the friends to go back and face charges, too, which is no easy feat. Having gotten used to the soft life, neither is anxious to face prison sentences to soothe their guilty consciences. The film, which often plays like a made-for-TV melodrama, works mostly because of the chemistry that exists between Vaughn and Heche. But that results in some pretty substantial heat. Rated R

The Slums of Beverly Hills

**-1/2

Hoping to make the most of a Beverly Hills address, a working-class family of neurotics shambles from one apartment to another in this exclusive Los Angeles neighborhood. Why? Dad (car salesman Alan Arkin) says that the schools are better, which improves each kid’s chance of getting into a better college. The film, which is a sort-of-coming-of-age look at the life of Arkin’s daughter (Natasha Lyonne), offers several funny situations. But it never becomes much more than a situation comedy. In the end, neither the characters - nor, for that matter, we - have learned much of a lesson about life or anything else. Rated R