With dozens of world, national and Florida premieres screening at theaters from Boca to West Palm Beach for the next seven days, the Palm Beach Film Festival offers an overwhelming embarrassment of riches in a myriad of categories, from documentaries to student films, underground horror flicks to uplifting romances. To help you navigate the multitude of titles, we perused the lineup and, hopefully, extracted this handful of gems. For the complete schedule, visit pbifilmfest.org.
10. The Closer
So you enjoyed last year’s “The Big Short” and “99 Homes,” and you mostly understood them, right? But if you can’t get enough dramas about the rise and fall of avaricious banksters involved in the subprime mortgage crisis, “The Closer” should satiate your schadenfreude with a tale of three best friends who make a fortune on the backs of the poor, only to face their inevitable comeuppance.
Screens at 1:30 p.m. April 9 at Cinemark Palace in Boca and 2 p.m. April 12 at Palm Beaches Theatre in Manalapan
9. Poor Behavior
The jury is very much out on this world-premiere comedy-drama, but it makes our list because of the pedigree of its writer-director: Theresa Rebeck, the prolific playwright and TV scriptwriter whose credits include the plays “Mauritius” and “Seminar” and the series “Smash” and “L.A. Law.” Based on her 2011 play of the same name, “Poor Behavior” is one of those slow-burn, single-room, marriage-collapsing sort of films, in which two couples’ vows are put to the test over a fraught weekend in the country.
Screens at 1:40 p.m. April 10 and 1:10 p.m. April 11 at Muvico Parisian in West Palm Beach
8. Pin Up! The Movie
Miss Rockwell De Vil, Ginger Rose and Bang Bang Von Loola aren’t the names of strippers or rejected Disney villains. To the contrary: They are modern incarnations of the pin-up girl, a form of chaste but suggestive modeling that peaked with Bettie Page and Bunny Yeager. Kathleen Ryan’s new documentary, shot over two years of interviews and performances with modern masters of the cheesecake photo, traces the movement’s cultural history, its surprising feminist conception and its rebirth.
Screens at 8 p.m. April 9 and 4:25 p.m. April 13 at Cinemark Palace
7. Prisoner X
“Paranoia—it’s the greatest weapon there is.” So says a prominent character in this sleek, dystopian and propulsive Canadian thriller set in a secret government prison in which genetic experimentation and mind control are par for the course. Still, CIA agent Carmen Reese hasn’t seen anything quite like her latest case: the time-traveling terrorist on whom the world (naturally) hands in balance.
Screens at 9:30 p.m. April 8 at G Star Studios in West Palm Beach and 8:15 p.m. April 11 at Muvico Parisian
6. Silver Skies
“Silver Skies” is an endangered species: an ensemble dramedy offering complex roles for actors of a certain age. It’s set in a 55-and-older community whose development is sold from under them, with plans for it to be rebuilt into condos, to the chagrin of its eccentric and opinionated residents. Palm Beach’s own golden movie god, George Hamilton, leads a cast that includes Valerie Perrine, Alex Rocco and Barbara Bain, in PBIFF’s Closing Night Film.
Screens at 7 p.m. April 14 at Cinemark Palace
5. Ovation
“Ovation” is the landmark 20th feature by Henry Jaglom, a director of dogged distinction whose improvisatory, cinema verite style hasn’t changed much since his 1971 debut. Loose, micro-budgeted and insider-y, “Ovation” is his latest vehicle for his recurring lead Tanna Frederick, reprising her role as actress Maggie Chase. Maggie is transitioning from film to stage acting at the expense of her bank account—and it doesn’t help that a murder may have been committed on the set of her struggling play. But as usual with Jaglom, plot is secondary to character, and action is subservient to language.
Screens at 6:10 p.m. April 13 at Muvico Parisian
4. Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You
No matter where you stand politically, television wouldn’t be the same without the contributions of showrunner Norman Lear, whose series “All in the Family” and “The Jeffersons,” among others, were arguably the first sitcoms to present the American home as it existed in the real world, in all its strifes and contradictions. This illuminating documentary about Lear’s life and career includes contributions from Rob Reiner, Jay Leno, George Clooney and more.
Screens at 6 p.m. April 8 at the Palm Beaches Theatre
3. The Adderall Diaries
In PBIFF’s Centerpiece Film, James Franco, taking a sojourn from his bailiwick of self-referential comedies, plays real-life author Stephen Elliott, a formerly successful novelist broken by writer’s block and an Adderall addiction whose discovery of a high-profile, true-crime case becomes more than just a writerly obsession. It forces him to reassess his relationship with his vindictive father, played by Ed Harris. Christian Slater and Amber Heard round out the stellar cast.
Screens at 7 p.m. April 9 at Muvico Parisian
2. Ctrl Alt Delete
A luminous tech-savvy thriller in the vein of Michael Crichton and “Mr. Robot,” James B. Cox’s crowd-funded indie demystifies the romance of 21st century hacking. A group of hacktivists breaks into an office building’s server and holds its system administrators hostage, only to find out that they need these “sysadmins” to help them escape when they uncover an artificial superintelligence bent on taking over the Internet.
Screens at 3:25 p.m. April 11 at Cinemark Palace
1. Phoenix Incident
The real-life phenomenon of the Phoenix Lights—one of the most notorious UFO sightings in modern history, seen by thousands of witnesses (including the state’s governor) over Arizona and Mexico in 1997—inspired this crafty science-fiction docudrama. Stock footage of relevant people and material is intercut with writer-director Keith Arem’s mockumentary story, blurring the line between fact and fiction and between government conspiracy and alien visitation. Whether you’re familiar or not with the sighting in question, “Phoenix Incident” promises thrills and subversive style.
Screens at noon April 12 at Muvico Parisian
