Kerouac’s Road: The Beat of a Nation at Real Art Ways

“…for superfans, “Kerouac’s Road: The Beat of a Nation” will play like a party, and probably drive the repeat reader right back to the book. What’s true about “On the Road” — like most books with broad appeal to those still in the throes of youthful idealism — is that when you return to the text, you encounter not just the book but also yourself, who you were when you first read it and all the selves you’ve been in the meantime. Even if you haven’t hopped in a car or a train and struck out for another coast, that’s a journey worth taking.” – NYT

“It tackles the American dream through the perspective of an immigrant who, in his attempt to understand a country that once felt foreign to him, has etched his name forever into its mythos.” – In Session Film

KEROUAC’S ROAD: THE BEAT OF A NATION explores Jack Kerouac’s legacy through stories of modern “on-the-roaders” and those who knew or were inspired by him. Featuring Josh Brolin, W. Kamau Bell, Matt Dillon and more, it reveals a rarely seen side of Kerouac and offers a fresh take on On the Road and its lasting impact on America.

“For all of his genre-bending on display, Kurosawa is interested in something more real and more dark about humanity’s capacity for greed and bitterness, and the quiet ways that the internet can further mutate those diseases in us.” – New York Times

“Unfolding at a hauntingly subdued register before unleashing its pent-up tension during its final act, director Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Cloud skewers the anonymity that characterizes our presence in online spaces.” – Chicago Reader

92% on Rotten Tomatoes

A stylish, subversive thriller from suspense-maverick Kiyoshi Kurosawa (Cure, Pulse), concerning Yoshii, an ambitious, yet directionless, young factory worker from Tokyo who side hustles in the murky realm of black market reselling, cheating buyers and sellers alike. After swindling his way into loads of cash, he becomes slowly disconnected to humanity, moving out of the city, shunning his girlfriend, and hiring a devoted assistant. After a series of mysterious, sinister incidents occur, he begins to suspect his former victims could be plotting the ultimate revenge.

A master of carefully simmering tension to a bloody crescendo, Kurosawa delivers a searing portrait of digital greed and vengeance.

“What writer/director Kate Beecroft achieves exists in its own unique realm. A Stunning feature debut that captures the beauty and pain of the modern American West in intimate detail. Tabatha Zimiga May be playing herself, but she’s also giving an incredibly delicate, nuanced performance that harkens to the work of the 1970s American cinema icons like Gena Rowlands, Ellen Burstyn, and Karen Black” – Harrison Richlin, IndieWire

“A hard-changing, unbreakable drama powered by immeasurable tenacity. Kate Beecroft’s directorial debut is a lyrical semi-biographical drama whose quiet grandeur uplifts an unyielding, fractal story.” – Robert Daniels, RogerEbert.com

“Three generations of South Dakota women put a new face on the western. From the first shot to last, Kate Beecroft’s ‘East of Wall’ expands our perception of those iconic horse wranglers to consider the women so often overlooked. Those shots of Porshia Zimiga bolting across the horizon faster than her mom’s pickup truck can keep up… Well, there’s just no faking that” – Peter Debruge, Variety

Sundance 2025 NEXT Audience Award Winner

EAST OF WALL is an authentic portrait of female resilience in the “New West” inspired and played by the women and girls who live it. Set in the Badlands of South Dakota, Tabatha, a young rebellious rancher, who rescues and resells horses, must make hard decisions to deal with her fractured family, the financial uncertainty of losing her ranch, and unresolved grief, all while providing refuge and the skills of the horse trade to a group of wayward neighborhood teens.

“A raw, beautiful and demanding essay on the fate of our collective home.” – Washington Post

“Architecton is quite the transcendent experience and makes you view the world in a more aware, alert light.” – San Jose Mercury News

“As Kossakovsky’s contemplative images envelop the vision and spark the mind, his film mines profundity from beneath our feet.”  – AV Club

95% on Rotten Tomatoes

From filmmaker Victor Kossakovsky (Gunda, Aquarela) comes an epic, intimate and poetic meditation on architecture and how the design and construction of buildings from the ancient past reveal our destruction — and offer hope for survival and a way forward.

Centering on a landscape project by the Italian architect Michele de Lucci, Kossakovsky uses the circle to reflect on the rise and fall of civilizations, capturing breathtaking imagery from the temple ruins of Baalbek in Lebanon, dating back to AD 60, to the recent destruction of cities in Turkey following a 7.8 magnitude earthquake in early 2023.

Rocks and stone connect the disparate societies, from ghostly monoliths stuck in the earth to tragic heaps of concrete rubble waiting to be hauled off and repurposed anew. Through Kossakovsky’s inquisitive lens, the grandeur and folly of humanity and its precarious relationship with nature posits the urgent question: How do we build, and how can we build better, before it’s too late?

“This is the kind of film that sneaks up on you, funny when least expected and affecting without being cloying. And it officially announces the arrival of Victor as a performer and filmmaker to keep on your radar.” NPR

“Tough, tender and observational, “Sorry, Baby” suggests that Victor’s promising career has been suitably launched. The best, with luck, is yet to come.” – Washington Post

“This is a diamond of a screenplay. Based on just those merits alone, “Sorry, Baby” is a tremendous artistic triumph on the healing power of friendship and queer relationships.” – San Jose Mercury News

97% on Rotten Tomatoes

Something bad happened to Agnes. But life goes on… for everyone around her, at least. When a beloved friend on the brink of a major milestone visits, Agnes starts to realize just how stuck she’s been, and begins to work through how to move forward.

American political economist, professor, author, and social media sensation Robert Reich worked under presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. He served as Secretary of Labor in President Bill Clinton’s cabinet, and as a member of President Barack Obama’s economic transition advisory board. Reich is known for his work on economic inequality and as a champion of public education and American democracy. He is one of America’s most prominent public intellectuals.

The Last Class is a nuanced and deeply personal portrait of Reich as he reflects on a period of immense transformation, personally and globally. It is also a love letter to education. The former Secretary of Labor might be famous for his public service, best-selling books, and viral social media posts, but he always considered teaching his true calling.

Now, after over 40 years and an extraordinary 40,000 students, Reich is preparing for his last class.

Throughout the film, Reich confronts the impending finality, and his aging with increasing candor, introspection, and, ultimately, emotion. He displays a rawness of feeling he has never shared publicly before. Drawing on his lifetime in politics, he uses his class, “Wealth and Poverty,” to offer a deeper look at why inequalities of income and wealth have widened significantly since the late 1970s, and why this poses dangerous risks to our society.

One thousand students fill the biggest lecture hall on the UC Berkeley campus, the last class to receive Reich’s wisdom and exhortations not to accept that the world has to stay the way it is. His belief in the next generation’s ability to take on the fight is inspiring.

“Every genre Peele invokes is a flytrap for social meanings, and you can’t watch this cowboys-and-aliens monster movie without entertaining some deep thoughts about race, ecology, labor, and the toxic, enchanting power of modern popular culture.” – New York Times

“A wild but self-aware mashup of sci-fi and westerns…” – The New Yorker

“It’s extremely sophisticated, this film. And it’s very mysterious in its structure.” – Monocle

83% on Rotten Tomatoes

A man and his sister discover something sinister in the skies above their California horse ranch, while the owner of a nearby theme park tries to profit from the mysterious, otherworldly phenomenon.

“Fearsomely entertaining, consistently thought-provoking and occasionally bloody scary.” – Observer (UK)

“A sharp, often funny meditation on the terrifying power of human connection.” – The Atlantic

Even as the central characters are enveloped by doom, Peele provides a haunting image of a black family that is both unsuspecting and frighteningly unfuckwithable.” – Harper’s Bazaar

93% on Rotten Tomatoes

Accompanied by her husband, son, and daughter, Adelaide Wilson returns to the beachfront home where she grew up as a child. Haunted by a traumatic experience from the past, Adelaide grows increasingly concerned that something bad is going to happen. Her worst fears soon become a reality when four masked strangers descend upon the house, forcing the Wilsons into a fight for survival. When the masks come off, the family is horrified to learn that each attacker takes the appearance of one of them.

“Peele seduces, subverts and manipulates audience expectations – as the masters Alfred Hitchcock, John Carpenter, and Stanley Kubrick did before him.” – IndieWire

“It’s a game-changer.” – Sydney Morning Herald

“By focusing the storyline on a particular form of racism — the kind that’s often disguised as peculiar envy — Get Out reveals something more insidious.” – Salon.com

“Beneath the beatific smile of 21st-century liberalism, Get Out finds the still grinning ghoulish skull of age-old servitude and exploitation unveiled during a rollercoaster ride into a very American nightmare.” – Observer (UK)

“Peele succeeds where sometimes even more experienced filmmakers fail: He’s made an agile entertainment whose social and cultural observations are woven so tightly into the fabric that you’re laughing even as you’re thinking, and vice-versa.” – TIME Magazine

98% on Rotten Tomatoes

Now that Chris and his girlfriend, Rose, have reached the meet-the-parents milestone of dating, she invites him for a weekend getaway with Missy and Dean. At first, Chris reads the family’s overly accommodating behavior as nervous attempts to deal with their daughter’s interracial relationship, but as the weekend progresses, a series of increasingly disturbing discoveries leads him to a truth that he never could have imagined.

“This film is a perfect place to kick off our Filmmaker Spotlight: Ang Lee series because it highlights a central theme in all of Lee’s work: Finding meaning through human relationships. While the framework of Eat, Drink, Man, Woman is art (in this case, cooking) it is the familial relationships that are both fulfilling and confounding.” – Ian Ally-Seals, Film Programming Coordinator & Curator for this series

“This is a startlingly superior piece of craftsmanship, with the flavour of life and richness of the script conveyed via uniformly wonderful performances.” – Empire Magazine

“Eat Drink Man Woman may not just amuse and entertain you. It’s likely to make you very hungry, too-perhaps for more than food.” – Chicago Tribune

“Wonderfully seductive, and nicely knowing about all of its characters’ appetites.” – New York Times

“A spicy, well-written comedy about family, food and independence.” – San Francisco Chronicle

88% on Rotten Tomatoes

Master Chef Chu (Sihung Lung) is semi-retired and lives at home with his three unmarried daughters, Jia-Jen (Kuei-Mei Yang), a religious chemistry teacher; Jia-Chien (Chien-Lien Wu), an airline executive; and Jia-Ning (Yu-wen Wang), an employee at a fast-food joint. Life at the family’s house revolves heavily around preparing and eating an elaborate dinner every Sunday. The stability of these meals gives them all strength as they deal with new romantic relationships and disappointments.

A family gathers around a dinner table for an elaborate meal.

“When discussing his approach to making Hulk, Ang Lee stated that he was, “attempting to make filet mignon from American hamburger.” You can see this approach in every frame of the film. Ang Lee dives deep into the comic book form, bringing everything from complex panel structure to epic themes onto the big screen. It is a quirky, playful experiment in adaptation. The film also has bombastic and thrilling fight scenes. It is the Hulk, after all.” – Ian Ally-Seals, Film Programming Coordinator & Curator for this film series

“An interesting effort to give one of the staples of mass entertainment something extra in the way of insight and feeling.” – Observer

“Where The Hulk excels is in Schamus and Lee’s almost academic attempt to reinvent the superhero movie according to the rules of its source material.” – Premiere Magazine

“A comic-book movie for adults, that, while it finally flies wide of its intended ‘classic’ mark, is shockingly ambitious in nearly everything it attempts…”- Austin Chronicle

Eric Bana (“Black Hawk Down”) stars as scientist Bruce Banner, whose inner demons transform him in the aftermath of a catastrophic experiment; Jennifer Connelly portrays Betty Ross, whose scientific genius unwittingly helps unleash the Hulk; Nick Nolte plays Banner’s brilliant father, who passes on a tragic legacy to his son; and Sam Elliott portrays the commander of a top-secret military research center.

Large green man-monster climbing uphill on the street in San Francisco

“We conclude the Filmmaker Spotlight: Ang Lee series with one of his most influential films to date. Brokeback Mountain‘s compassionate and unblinking look at its same-sex love story cleared a path for queer focused cinema. Lee subverts expectations by casting Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal, pulling nuanced performances from this movie star duo. Focusing on the raw emotional truth of the characters, Brokeback  Mountain tells a story that is moving and resonant. It is, in other words, an Ang Lee film.” – Ian Ally-Seals, Film Programming Coordinator & Curator of this film series

“[A] powerful and moving film, a smart study of relationships that could but can’t and never will be.” – Empire Magazine

“The whole movie is a rich, spacious, passionate way of showing, not telling, feelings that dare not speak their name — and doing so with superb intelligence and magnificent candour.” – Guardian

“Lee has taken a story of gay love and placed it where it should be — in the mainstream. He’s delivered a beautifully crafted film to boot.” – Time Out

“A film about love and the cost of lying that’s exquisite in its beauty, painful in its truths.” – Houston Chronicle

88% on Rotten Tomatoes

In 1963, rodeo cowboy Jack Twist and ranch hand Ennis Del Mar are hired by rancher Joe Aguirre as sheep herders in Wyoming. One night on Brokeback Mountain, Jack makes a drunken pass at Ennis that is eventually reciprocated. Though Ennis marries his longtime sweetheart, Alma, and Jack marries a fellow rodeo rider, the two men keep up their tortured and sporadic affair over 20 years.

Two cowboys embrace

“…a bold reshaping of the romcom.” – Arizona Republic

Celine Song’s sophomore feature stars Dakota Johnson, Pedro Pascal, and Chris Evans in an attractive love triangle.

Johnson plays a young New York City matchmaker whose lucrative business gets complicated as she finds herself torn between the perfect match (Pascal) and her imperfect ex (Evans).

“This film feels like the coziest of blankets enveloping you in the theater. However, you should expect a few jolts of static electricity as you snuggle into that blanket. After all, this touching, beautiful film is based on a novella by Stephen King.” – Boston Globe

From childhood to adulthood, Charles “Chuck” Krantz experiences the wonder of love, the heartbreak of loss, and the multitudes contained in all of us.