{"id":177149,"date":"2026-02-13T23:17:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-13T23:17:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/177149\/"},"modified":"2026-02-13T23:17:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-13T23:17:08","slug":"valentines-day-for-movie-lovers-plus-the-best-to-see-in-l-a","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/177149\/","title":{"rendered":"Valentine’s Day for movie lovers, plus the best to see in L.A."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Hello! I\u2019m Mark Olsen<\/a>. Welcome to another edition of your regular field guide to a world of Only Good Movies.<\/p>\n

The week\u2019s most anticipated new release, shrewdly hitting theaters just in time for Galentine\u2019s\/Valentine\u2019s Day, is Emerald Fennell\u2019s adaptation of \u201cWuthering Heights\u201d starring Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi.<\/p>\n

Fennell, of course, won a screenplay Oscar for her debut feature \u201cPromising Young Woman\u201d<\/a> and created another controversial sensation with \u201cSaltburn.\u201d<\/a> Robbie has produced all three of Fennell\u2019s features via her production company LuckyChap Entertainment.<\/p>\n

Robbie, Fennell and Elordi all spoke<\/a> to Emily Zemler about the new film. Regarding the bold choices they make in their adaptation, Robbie said, \u201cMy hope is always: There\u2019s got to be one person that watches this movie and thinks \u2018That\u2019s my favorite of all time.\u2019 I want to make a movie that is someone\u2019s favorite movie of all time and I\u2019ll know how much that means to them. That it might save them in whatever ways movies can save you.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Three <\/p>\n

Jacob Elordi, Margot Robbie and director Emerald Fennell, photographed in Los Angeles in January.<\/p>\n

(Shayan Asgharnia \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n

In her review, Amy Nicholson<\/a> admires the film\u2019s look and craft, but feels it falters in the performances. Nevertheless, she adds, \u201cThough \u2018Wuthering Heights\u2019 is a phony tease, I\u2019m grateful that Fennell wants to titillate audiences. If they show up, they\u2019ll help her convince the industry to move past chasing superheroes in codpieces and make more movies about messy, marvelous human sweat. The box office isn\u2019t my personal kink; movie reviews are where you and I meet to talk about what gets us hot and bothered. But I hope Fennell, and other hedonistic filmmakers like her, get to keep whipping blockbusters out of their doldrums.\u201d<\/p>\n

And Malia Mendez broke down seven ways<\/a> in which Fennell\u2019s movie veers away from Emily Bront\u00eb\u2019s original novel.<\/p>\n

Other new releases this week include Bart Layton\u2019s \u201cCrime 101,\u201d <\/a>Gore Verbinski\u2019s \u201cGood Luck, Have Fun, Don\u2019t Die\u201d<\/a> and Matt Johnson\u2019s \u201cNirvanna the Band the Show the Movie.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Two <\/p>\n

Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel in the movie \u201c(500) Days of Summer,\u201d chosen by our readers as an essential L.A. movie that we forgot to include in our 101 list.<\/p>\n

(Chuck Zlotnick \/ Fox Searchlight Pictures)<\/p>\n

Last month, we unleashed our ranked list of the 101 best Los Angeles movies<\/a> and you had thoughts. Lots of them. After receiving an avalanche of emails, we selected the 14 best L.A. movies that didn\u2019t make our list<\/a>, as chosen by you.<\/p>\n

Among the movies our readers were most passionate about, there are titles that, frankly, we should have made room for. (Send us to Richard Gere jail for not including \u201cAmerican Gigolo.\u201d) But we still think \u201cCrash\u201d stole \u201cBrokeback Mountain\u2019s\u201d Oscar and nothing will change that.<\/p>\n

Nitrate Film Festival \"A <\/p>\n

William Powell in the 1936 movie \u201cMy Man Godfrey.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Criterion Collection)<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s American Cinematheque\u2018s Nitrate Film Festival<\/a> at the Egyptian Theatre (one of only a small number of venues in the country that can still show the rare, combustible film stock) starts tonight with John Cromwell\u2019s 1947 noir thriller \u201cDead Reckoning,\u201d staring Humphrey Bogart and Lizabeth Scott, screening in a print from the Library of Congress. Writing about the film in 1947, The Times\u2019 Edwin Schallert wrote, \u201cSummed up, therefore, this picture carries a different impact from some of its predecessors, while in outcome it is somber by comparison.\u201d<\/p>\n

A highlight of this year\u2019s program will be the Valentine\u2019s Day showing of Gregory La Cava\u2019s 1936 class comedy \u201cMy Man Godfrey,\u201d<\/a> starring William Powell and Carole Lombard in a print from the Filmarchiv Austria. Writing about the film\u2019s premiere at Hollywood\u2019s Pantages Theatre, Schallert noted of its stars, \u201cIt is their first picture together since before they were married, and a divorce has, or course, intruded since then. For which reason the production assumes characteristics of a news event.\u201d<\/p>\n

Other films in the series include William Wyler\u2019s 1935 \u201cThe Good Fairy,\u201d starring Margaret Sullavan; William Wellman\u2019s 1937 \u201cNothing Sacred,\u201d starring Lombard and Fredric March; and Mikio Naruse\u2019s 1935 \u201cWife! Be Like a Rose,\u201d starring Sachiko Chiba.<\/p>\n

Points of interest<\/p>\n

Archive Trailer Show<\/p>\n

\"A <\/p>\n

An image from the \u201cRetro Romantics: An Academy Archive Trailer Show,\u201d presented at the Academy Museum.<\/p>\n

(Academy Museum)<\/p>\n

The Academy Film Museum possesses what is said to be the world\u2019s largest collection of movie trailers. And they are putting it to good use on Saturday with \u201cRetro Romantics: An Academy Film Archive Trailer Show in 35mm.\u201d<\/a> <\/p>\n

Programmed by preservationists Cassie Blake and Tessa Idlewine, the show promises to be full of surprises, per the program notes: \u201cThis vintage compendium of coming attractions explores the agony and the ecstasy of art-house amour, from red-blooded lust and lovelorn lotharios to feverish melodramas and tortured obsessions.\u201d <\/p>\n

It would make for a fun evening for film lovers whether it was Valentine\u2019s Day or not.<\/p>\n

Fassbinder\u2019s \u2018Querelle\u2019<\/p>\n

\"Two <\/p>\n

An image from Rainer Werner Fassbinder\u2019s 1982 \u201cQuerelle.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Criterion Collection)<\/p>\n

Anyone made curious by the recent \u201cPillion\u201d<\/a> would do well to catch a Valentine\u2019s Day show of Rainer Werner Fassbinder\u2019s \u201cQuerelle,\u201d<\/a> which would be the prolific German filmmaker\u2019s final work before his death at age 37 in 1982.<\/p>\n

An adaptation of the novel by Jean Genet, the film exists in a stylized fantasy world in which a young sailor (Brad Davis) visits a bar and brothel and soon finds himself confronting his own sexuality in new ways. The cast also includes Jeanne Moreau and Franco Nero, the latter who, just this week, received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.<\/p>\n

Reviewing the movie in 1983, Kevin Thomas called it \u201cone major gay artist\u2019s tribute to another\u201d and added, \u201cMore than anything else, \u2018Querelle,\u2019 despite Fassbinder\u2019s characteristic tough-minded compassion, suggests the vulnerability of sexual fantasy to unintended humor.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018The Hunt for Red October\u2019<\/p>\n

\"Three <\/p>\n

Sean Connery, left, Alec Baldwin and Scott Glenn in the movie \u201cThe Hunt for Red October.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Paramount Pictures)<\/p>\n

On Sunday in the Academy Museum<\/a>\u2019s David Geffen Theater, there will be a 4K showing of John McTiernan\u2019s 1990 espionage techno-thriller \u201cThe Hunt for Red October\u201d<\/a> starring Sean Connery as the captain of a Russian nuclear submarine and Alec Baldwin as a CIA analyst.<\/p>\n

A surprisingly lengthy set report<\/a> by Jay Sharbutt from July 1989 notes that Connery was cast as a Russian submarine captain only after actor Klaus Maria Brandauer dropped out. Connery, coming off projects such as \u201cThe Untouchables\u201d and \u201cIndiana Jones and the Last Crusade,\u201d was paid a reported $4 million for the film.<\/p>\n

In her review of the film, Sheila Benson wrote<\/a>, \u201cIts film makers know that a little technology goes a very long way, and if they hope to keep an audience\u2019s attention they\u2019ll have to do it with story, not hardware. \u2026 You may not be limp from accumulated tension when this hunt is over, but its cautiously upbeat global message leaves a satisfying glow and it operates with a crackerjack premise.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hello! I\u2019m Mark Olsen. Welcome to another edition of your regular field guide to a world of Only…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":177150,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[9628,9629,9631,2790,2242,9630,9632,5686,48,52,51,47,50,49,63,9626,4287,425,9627,1791,8074],"class_list":["post-177149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-angelina-jolie","tag-barry-jenkins","tag-david","tag-dead","tag-drama","tag-evil","tag-good-work","tag-killing","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-los-angeles-times","tag-lovers","tag-movie","tag-series","tag-short-film","tag-times","tag-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=177149"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177149\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/177150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=177149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=177149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=177149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}