‘Method’ Casts a Spotlight on Acting

Among the films screening in this year’s “Method Fest” starting Friday at the Playhouse 7 in Pasadena are two pictures that impressively exemplify the festival’s emphasis on acting. Carl Bessai’s “Lola” (Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Monday at 2 p.m.) is an intriguing take on the assumed identity plot. Sabrina Grdevich’s Lola is a scattered young Vancouver wife whose lack of self-confidence is chronically worsened by her exacting, impatient husband (Colm Feore) whom she seems never able to please. When she saves Sandra (Joanna Going), a young woman in a blond wig, from being hit by a car, she encounters a woman who is her complete opposite, indeed an apparent prostitute used to living on the edge. They strike up an acquaintance, and a drastic development propels Lola into an adventure in self-discovery.

“After Freedom” (Monday at 7 p.m. and Wednesday at 2 p.m.) is a “Mean Streets” set in the prosperous boulevards of Glendale, which has become home to a large Armenian community. Michael Abcarian (Mic Tomasi) is the conflicted central figure in this taut, well-wrought drama set in a tradition-minded ethnic community in which loyalties can be as negative as they are positive. At 30ish, he feels increasingly obligated to care for his widowed father, Leon (Greg Satamian), who years ago gave up a good job with British Airways in Soviet Armenia so that his children could grow up in a free country.

Unfortunately, Leon has managed only to go from one menial job to another, and Michael is getting nowhere as an assistant supermarket manager because one of his pals, Mato (Ioannis Bogris) keeps pilfering. Worse, Michael and Mato are in the thrall of Avo (Shant Bejanian), a cynically manipulative older guy whose criminal impulses are escalating.

“After Freedom” engrossingly charts the increasing pressures upon Michael that could either liberate or destroy him.

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Screening Friday at 7:30 p.m. in LACMA’s “Out of India: The Films of Satyajit Ray” is “The Music Room” (1958), one of Ray’s finest films, a superb study of the decline of an impoverished nobleman whose abiding passion is to hold costly, lengthy recitals of classical Indian music in his decaying mansion. Ray views his obsolete mandarin (Chabi Biswas, the patriarch in “Kanchenjungha”) as a tragic figure, a victim of his overweening pride and the inevitable crumbling of his princely way of life in a time of change. Biswas makes this arrogant, selfish aristocrat’s obsession seem a grand folly and not mere frivolity, thus inspiring compassion rather than contempt. “The Music Room” and the second feature, “Company Limited” (1971), will be screened with prints restored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Archive. (323) 857-6010.

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Screening Saturday at 9:45 p.m. at the Music Hall in the 18th annual Israel Film Festival is Benny Torati’s “Desperado Square,” which takes its title from a derelict plaza in a rundown Tel Aviv neighborhood similar to the Hatkiva district where the first-time feature director was raised. When a former theater exhibitor dies, his younger son Nissim (Nir Levy) has a dream that he takes as a signal to reopen the long-closed theater and decides it should screen its most popular film, “Sangam,” a florid 1964 Hindi film starring the beloved Raj Kapoor.

Avraham (Mohammad Bakri), the uncle of Nissim, and his older brother George (Sharon Rejeano), who left when the theater closed, return for the funeral. His arrival and the idea of screening “Sangam” dismays his sister-in-law Seniora (Yona Elian) for reasons her sons do not understand.

What becomes clear is that not only does the plot of “Sangam” parallel events surrounding Avraham’s departure but also that “Desperado Square” has been made in affectionate emulation of popular Indian cinema in which emotion-charged melodrama has been intercut with broad, corny comic relief and substantial musical interludes--handily, a lot of the action takes place in a local nightclub. “Desperado Square” attests to the worldwide potency of often primitive genre movies--spaghetti westerns and Italian sword-and-sandal muscleman epics as well as long-winded Hollywood potboilers. Those who can go along with Torati’s homage, which tends to be as awkward as the Indian originals it salutes, might be surprised to find “Desperado Square” does a bit of effective heart-tugging. “Desperado Square” will be repeated at the Music Hall and at the Town Center 5 in Encino. (877) 966-5566.

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The Laemmle Theaters’ “Documentary Days 2002” continues Saturday and Sunday at 10 a.m. at the Sunset 5 with Gayle Ferraro’s revealing and encouraging “Sixteen Decisions.” Its title refers to a social charter for a Utopian community with precepts regarding respect for the environment, the importance of sanitation and hygiene and harmonious and mutually supportive community life. Instead it is a manifesto established by the progressive Grameen Bank of Bangladesh, founded by Dr. Muhammad Yunus, a socially conscious visionary who believed that poor people could be good credit risks and that receiving additional income of less than a dollar a day could transform someone’s life.

Ferraro focuses on young Selina, a mother of two boys, ages 4 and 5, who has just joined a group of women in her rural village who have formed a collective to receive small loans from Grameen to buy livestock, open a tiny store or make improvements to their homes. Regular payments on the loans as agreed upon are mandatory if a woman is to stay a member of the collective. Selina has joined to obtain a loan so her husband can buy a rickshaw rather than rent one at high cost. Selina’s parents were so impoverished that they sold her at the age of 7 into virtual slavery in a wealthy family; she was married at 12. In telling Selina’s story sensitively, Ferraro discovers how the oppressive condition of Bangladeshi women is changing through the Grameen bank’s program. “Sixteen Decisions” screens Saturdays and Sundays at 11 a.m. April 20-21 at the Monica 4-Plex, (310) 394-9741; April 27-28 at the Playhouse 7, (626) 844-6500; and May 11-13 at the Lido, (949) 673-8351.

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This year’s “City of Lights, City of Angels” festival concludes Sunday at 8 p.m. with “Chaos,” followed by a Q&A; session with its director, Coline Serreau, best known for the blithe comedy “Three Men and a Cradle,” successfully remade in Hollywood as “Three Men and a Baby.” There’s lots of humor in this picture, but it is far more serious and lots bolder than a tale about three swinging bachelors who have an infant thrust upon them. A beautiful Algerian-born prostitute (Rachida Brakni) in Paris’ gamy Pigalle district, begs a well-dressed couple (Catherine Frot, Vincent Lindon) to open the door of their expensive car, but the husband refuses. Later, the wife sees the light and seeks out the prostitute, an act that completely upends her life and allows Serreau to skewer the low status of women in Arab culture, the sense of entitlement of privileged men and the self-absorption rampant in modern life. With the great Line Renaud as Lindon’s neglected but uncomplaining mother, this is an ambitious and entertaining film that sustains its 109-minute running time, normally long for a comedy. (323) 651-4119.

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Opening a regular run Friday at the Fairfax Cinemas, Geoff Cunningham’s “Rocky Road” is a well-meaning but overly preachy and heavy-handed account of the hostility confronting a young interracial couple, Talia and John, played by the attractive and capable Nicole Smith and Will Wallace, real-life spouses. Opposition is intense from John’s father, a brutal, racist cop, and from Talia’s brother and sister, intent on breaking up the romance because John is white. (323) 655-4010.