Magic Lantern openings: hockey, horror, gratitude

Above : The documentary feature “Hockeyland” is scheduled to open Friday at the Magic Lantern Theatre. (Photo/Greenwich Entertainment)

It’s not often that the Magic Lantern Theatre opens four new films at once. But that’s exactly what’s scheduled to occur on Friday.

The four films are:

“Pearl” : A prequel to the slasher film “X,” “Pearl” explores the origins of the serial killer played by Mia Goth (who also starred in “Pearl”).

Zaki Hasan of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote, “Taken together, ‘X’ and ‘Pearl’ make for a compelling double-feature showcasing blood-spattered homages to different eras of film.

“Hockeyland” : A pair of rival Minnesota town view for regional hockey supremacy.

Chris Hewitt of the Minneapolis Star Tribune wrote, “wo huge gifts a documentary filmmaker can receive are access and good timing. ‘Hockeyland’ director Tommy Haines had both.”

“Gratitude Revealed” : Documentary filmmaker Louis Schwartzberg uses the tests of the late Alan Watts to explore how gratitude affects the lives of people around the world.

Reviewer Douglas Davidson wrote, “Schwartzberg weaves together an exploration of gratitude that’s as much stream of consciousness as it is an organized collection of thoughts, notions, and aspects of consideration.”

“See How They Run” : Sam Rockwell and Saoirse Ronan play a pair of 1950s-era cops who investigate murder at a London theater.

Variety critic Amy Nicholson describes the film as “A snappy comedy that struts in with an eyebrow coyly arched.”

I’ll run down the mainstream openings tomorrow. Stay tuned.