NYC cinemas weekend

The IFC Center still programs like someone actually watches movies. Friday night brings a 35mm print of Chungking Express that hasn't been this sharp since 1994. The projectionist here knows the difference between 1.85 and 1.66, and it shows. Two blocks south, Film Forum is running their Tarkovsky retrospective through Sunday. The Andrei Rublev screening Saturday at 7pm will change how you think about time, or at least how directors use it.

The Metrograph on Ludlow Street feels like what the Cinematheque probably felt like in 1962. Their weekend double feature pairs Céline and Julie Go Boating with Out 1, which means you're committing to nearly sixteen hours of Rivette if you're serious about it. The candy counter stocks French cigarettes they don't sell, just display. Someone here understands the assignment.

Cinema Village on 12th Street runs whatever didn't make it to Lincoln Center but probably should have. This weekend it's a Korean restoration of Burning that plays once at midnight Sunday. The sound system rattles during the wheat field scenes exactly the way Lee Chang-dong intended. Three stops north on the 6, the Paris Theater programs like Netflix owns it because Netflix does own it, but somehow the Roma 70mm print still feels like discovery.

The Anthology Film Archives exists in a permanent state of barely surviving and completely essential. Their Essential Cinema series runs Wavelength Friday at 9pm. Forty-five minutes of Michael Snow zooming across a room. It's exactly as riveting as it sounds, which is completely. The seats haven't been reupholstered since 1979. This is not an oversight."