Following a couple weeks’ pause to make room for the GlobeDocs festival and prerequisite Halloween programming, IFFBoston’s Fall Focus series returns to The Brattle Theatre this week for its second round of programming. This leg is even more expansive than the first, cramming 15 features into seven days, spanning the Earth and ranging from cockeyed comedies to gripping dramas. As always, and particularly in a year as stacked as this one, the variety of choices can be daunting. With that in mind, here are our picks for some of the most exciting titles of the series (though, of course, all are well worth a look!).
‘The Secret Agent’
(Kleber Mendonça Filho, director) Kleber Mendonça Filho has already co-directed one of the most politically incendiary films of the decade in “Bacurau,” which fortuitously captured the rage and unease at the dawn of the Covid pandemic. Filho’s up-to-date looks to continue this trend for no less uncertain times. Wagner Moura (“Civil War”) plays a researcher on the run from an oppressive regime in 1970s Brazil; he arrives in Recife (Filho’s hometown) seeking asylum, only to be drawn into a web of intrigue. Set against the colorful backdrop of Carnival, “The Secret Agent” promises to capture the intensity of the paranoid thrillers of the 1970s in content and style: Filho shot his film entirely on vintage Panavision equipment to authentically replicate the look of the period. (7 p.m. Thursday)
‘Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery’
(Rian Johnson, director) Few characters have grown as beloved among cinephiles in recent years as Benoit Blanc, Daniel Craig’s southern-fried sleuth who first appeared in Rian Johnson’s 2019 whodunnit “Knives Out.” The third entry in the series, “Wake Up Dead Man” once again tasks Blanc with solving a seemingly impossible murder, this time in the spooky setting of a small town church. To say more of the plot would be to spoil the fun, but the typically star-studded cast includes Josh O’Connor, Glenn Close, Josh Brolin, Kerry Washington and Jeremy Renner. (8:30 p.m. Friday)
‘No Other Choice’
(Park Chan-wook, director) South Korean director Park Chan-wook is one of the most reliably unpredictable voices in world cinema, from the brutal 2003 revenge thriller “Oldboy” to 2022’s Hitchcockian “Decision to Leave.” Park’s newest film, South Korea’s official submission to this year’s Academy Awards, is a jet-black comedy adapted from a 1997 book by cult crime novelist Donald E. Westlake. Lee Byung-hun plays Man-soo, a family man laid abruptly off from his company. Thrust into the job market for the first time in 25 years and desperate for stability, Man-soo hatches a novel scheme: He finds the names of all other applicants for his desired position and systematically murders them one by one. “No Other Choice” promises to be vintage Park Chan-wook; that his withering worldview is so in tune with our times is a sickly reminder of the state of the world. (8:30 p.m. Monday)
‘Is This Thing on?’
(Bradley Cooper, director) Through 2018’s remake of “A Star Is Born” and 2023’s Leonard Bernstein biopic “Maestro,” Bradley Cooper has developed a body of work as a director exploring the struggles and breakthroughs of tortured performers. This looks to continue in “Is This Thing On?,” albeit on a somewhat more intimate scale. When a divorce threatens to upend his life, Alex Novak (Will Arnett) channels his frustration and heartbreak into a new career: that of a brutally honest stand-up comedian. Always a great actor’s director, Cooper has assembled a formidable supporting cast, including Ciarán Hinds, Andra Day, Peyton Manning (yes, the football player!) and, in a role tipped for Oscar buzz, Laura Dern as Arnett’s soon-to-be-ex. (8 p.m. Tuesday)
‘The Testament of Ann Lee’
(Mona Fastvold, director) A late addition to the Fall Focus lineup, “The Testament of Ann Lee” is one of the most intriguing films of the season. Directed by Mona Fastvold, who co-wrote last year’s “The Brutalist” with husband Brady Corbet (who, in turn, serves as co-writer here), “Ann Lee” stars Amanda Seyfried in the title role, the 18th century founder of the short-lived religious sect the Shakers. No mere biopic, “Ann Lee” attempts to capture the religious ecstasy that gave the Shakers their name, at times taking the form of something close to a musical (experimental composer Daniel Blumberg, who won an Oscar for “The Brutalist,” is once again on hand). “The Testament of Ann Lee” promises to be something you’ve never seen before, and a perfect capper on this year’s Fall Focus. (7 p.m. Wednesday)
Oscar Goff is a writer and film critic based in Somerville. He is film editor and senior critic for the Boston Hassle and his work has appeared in the monthly Boston Compass newspaper and publications such as WBUR’s The ARTery and iHeartNoise. He is a member of the Boston Society of Film Critics, the Boston Online Film Critics Association, and the Online Film Critics Society.
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