The delightfully titled dance drama Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty! screens Nov. 4 at the International Film Series. Courtesy: Sundance Institute
The 1933 stop-motion classic King Kong hits the big screen as part of the Giant Monster Movies series at IFS on Oct. 14. Courtesy: Encyclopedia Brittanica
If you’ve never been to the International Film Series — then, by golly, here’s your chance. The venue, located in the University of Colorado’s Muenzinger Auditorium, just received a substantial upgrade in preparation for the Sundance Film Festival in January.
But you don’t have to wait until 2027 to check out the new digs. There are more than 50 screenings currently announced for this season’s calendar — check internationalfilmseries.com, for secret screenings and special showings as they pop up — and they’re all going to be beautiful. Since we’re aware not everyone can always see every movie, here are a few choice options you won’t want to miss.
Former CU Boulder film studies professor and punk filmmaker extraordinaire Alex Cox is ready to hang up his spurs. Well, sort of. The 71-year-old filmmaker is billing his latest, Dead Souls, as his last. Though maybe his last feature film, as he is currently at work on a short about the filming locations of the 1970 Western, Barquero — more on that one in a minute.
Back to Dead Souls. The film is a Coxian blend of Nikolai Gogol’s 19th-century novel of the same name, Italian Westerns — he co-wrote the script with Gianni Garko of Sartana fame — and anachronisms to remind the audience that the story they’re watching, set in 1890, is not far removed from today. Cox stars as Strindler, a government man with mysterious motives going around Arizona border towns, collecting names of dead Mexicans. That sounds Cox enough, but toss in a musical number and stop-motion animation, and you get a final feature from a man going out in style.
Cox will be at IFS to present Dead Souls on Sept. 9 before he heads south to work on his latest appreciation feature for the upcoming Barquero home video release from Kino Lorber. The American-made imitation Italian Western was filmed in Cañon City and at the Brush Hollow Reservoir in Southern Colorado (Barquero checks in at number 55 on the Colorado 150 Film Festival) and stars two classic faces of the genre: Lee Van Cleef and Warren Oates.
Barquero will kick off this semester’s Western Movie Club on Sept. 13. The other two titles are The Shootist (Oct. 4), featuring John Wayne as an aging gunfighter with a terminal illness, and Winchester ’73 (Nov. 29), this writer’s pick for the quintessential film of the genre.
All three films will screen on Sundays at 2 p.m., and will feature a post-screening discussion about the films, the genre, the source material and how these movies relate to modern day, hosted by yours truly. If you’ve been to the Western Movie Club in the past, then you know that there is more than meets the eye in these stories from centuries past. If you’ve never been before, rest assured that it’s a delightful and illuminating way to spend a Sunday afternoon.
If you haven’t seen Nouvelle Vague, Richard Linklater’s 2025 love letter to the French New Wave, then here’s your chance to see it on the big screen. The best part? All six movies playing the Albertine Cinémathèque French Film Festival are free of charge.
The series kicks off Sept. 26 with Nouvelle Vague — a fictionalized account of the making of Breathless — followed by the 1960 film on Sept. 27, introduced by CU Cinema Studies & Moving Image Arts professor Hanna Rose Shell. It doesn’t matter if this is your first or fifth time seeing Jean-Luc Godard’s cinematic deconstruction; Breathless still zaps like a bolt of lightning.
The series continues Sept. 28 with The Ties That Bind Us, Carine Tardieu’s take on the modern family; Young Mothers (Sept. 29), the latest from Belgian brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne; the Oscar-nominated Little Amélie or the Character of Rain (Sept. 30), a beautiful animated fantasy; and Souleymane’s Story (Oct. 1), a day-in-the-life drama about a Guinean refugee preparing for the legal interview that will either grant or deny him residency in France.
Ninety years on, the 1933 King Kong, directed by Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack with stop-motion special effects by Willis H. O’Brien, reigns supreme. It’s a landmark film that persists because of its ability to inspire wonder. Imagine watching this movie in 1933, at the height of the Great Depression. It must have been like peering into an alternate universe.
While there have been many remakes and Kong sequels, IFS will screen the three biggies: the 1933 version (Oct. 14), the 1976 edition starring Jeff Bridges and Jessica Lange (Nov. 7), and the 2005 Peter Jackson remake (Dec. 3). And if the giant ape roaring thrice isn’t enough, IFS adds in ants, Them! (Dec. 2) and rabbits, Night of the Lepus (Dec. 4) to get your creature feature fix.
We’ve been focusing a lot on repertory picks. Worry not, IFS will screen its share of new titles as well, including the Indian grief drama, Cactus Pears (Sept. 23), the Australian coming-of-age and out-of-the-closet horror film, Leviticus (Oct. 27), a Vietnam doc telling a story you probably haven’t heard before, Soul Patrol (Nov. 14), and the delightfully titled dance drama, Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty! (Nov. 4).
If those titles all seem to have something in common, you’d be correct: They all debuted at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. And they’re not alone — IFS will be bringing a bevy of classics from Sundances past, from Whiplash (Aug. 31) to Hereditary (Oct. 29), some with special guests, to give you a taste of things to come.
The newest movie on this year’s slate is also among the oldest. And it might be the best: 1932’s Letty Lynton.
This storied drama, starring Joan Crawford and Robert Montgomery as lovers who meet-cute and then have to figure out what to do about Crawford’s less-than-lovable husband, got tied up in a copyright battle and shoved into the vaults for 90 years. All that existed publicly was a few stills of Crawford wearing costume designer Adrian’s gowns — stills that became iconic in the fashion world.
Why was Letty shelved four years into its run? The movie too closely resembled a 1930 play entitled Dishonored Lady — not a bad title considering the alibi Letty concocts to get herself out of hot water. But in 2025, the copyright of Dishonored Lady lapsed, and Letty Lynton was cleaned up and restored for theatrical and home video release. It re-premiered at the TCM Classic Film Festival this past May.
Letty is a hoot. The film was made in what is now known as the pre-Code era, referring to the handful of years in the 1930s before the enforcement of the Production (i.e., morality) Code. Such a code would have made Letty inadmissible for theatrical release thanks to its depiction of sex outside of marriage and murder.
The movie is a breath of fresh air: no special effects, no convoluted plots with multiple characters, just crackling wit, sparkling black and white photography, the beautiful faces of Crawford and Montgomery, and a police inquest that’s as good as anything you’ve seen in a detective show.
You don’t want to miss any of the movies on this list. But if you really, truly only have time to see one, make it Letty Lynton.
Crested Butte Film Festival
Sept. 24-27, The Majestic Theatre and Center for the Arts, 507 Red Lady Ave. and 606 6th St., Crested Butte. Ticket packs start at $68; Passes start at $200
Founded in 2010 and presented at 9,000 feet above sea level, the Crested Butte Film Festival is what you do in a mountain ski town when you’re not watching the aspens turn. At most festivals, moviegoers sprint from one theater to the next, one screening after another. At CBFF, you’ll be tempted to take a midday stroll down Elk Avenue before you duck into another darkened theater.
The program for the 16th anniversary has not yet been released, but mark the dates on your calendar anyway. The festival screens 60-plus features and shorts, narratives and docs, some directly from the Telluride Film Festival, others playing the festival circuit since Sundance.
49th Denver Film Festival
Oct. 22–Nov. 1, venues yet to be announced. Ticket packages start at $65; Passes start at $100
Earlier this year, the Boulder International Film Festival shifted its dates from March to April to accommodate the Sundance Film Festival coming in 2027. Could that be why the Denver Film Festival, which typically spans the first two weekends of November, moved its dates as well? Or maybe it’s because the weather is slightly more predictable in late October than early November. (But who the hell knows: Have you seen what’s going on outside these days?)
Though the lineup won’t be released for a few weeks, go ahead and block off the time from work. Denver Film Festival brings tons of festival darlings and award circuit hopefuls with plenty of guests and events scattered across the Mile High City.
Most of the screenings will be at the Sie FilmCenter on Colfax — which has a fantastic lounge for libations and discussions before and after screenings — but if you can, try to see something at the Denver Botanic Garden’s theater on York Street. There’s not much in the immediate area for food and drink, but the theater is gorgeous and raked beautifully so there isn’t a bad seat in the house.
Boulder Jewish Film Festival
Oct. 25–Nov. 1, Dairy Arts Center, 2590 Walnut St., Boulder. $TBA: Tickets on sale Oct. 8.
Curated by founder Kathryn Bernheimer, Boulder Jewish Film Festival strives to capture the best in current Jewish cinema. And for the 14th annual BJFF, Bernheimer will once again be bringing her picks to the Dairy Arts Center for screenings and talkbacks. The schedule has not been announced, but programs at BJFF tend to run toward the contemporary.
