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This week's picks By Steven Rea

Listen to Me Marlon Ritz Bourse, playing now. "I arrived in New York with holes in my socks and holes in my mind," Marlon Brando says at the start of this brilliant bio-doc, narrated by the actor himself - culled from more than 200 hours' worth

Documentary features clips of Marlon Brando’s best work, including “A Streetcar Named Desire.” (SHOWTIME)
Documentary features clips of Marlon Brando’s best work, including “A Streetcar Named Desire.” (SHOWTIME)Read more
    by Steven Rea | Columnist, Inquirer
    Published 

Listen to Me Marlon Ritz Bourse, playing now. "I arrived in New York with holes in my socks and holes in my mind," Marlon Brando says at the start of this brilliant bio-doc, narrated by the actor himself - culled from more than 200 hours' worth of personal audiotapes in which the iconic star reflects on his life and work. Lacerating, self-lacerating, insightful, regretful, Brando's commentary - and the amazing footage that goes with it - brings a career back into focus. With clips from A Streetcar Named Desire, On the Waterfront, The Godfather, and more. A must-see.

Reel East Film Festival Friday through next Sunday, Ritz Theatre, Oaklyn. The three-day, one-venue cinema fest, presented by the Camden County Board of Freeholders and Rutgers-Camden Film Studies, is back for its second year, with horror, Samuel Fuller, and a Jason Schwartzman slacker-com straight from SXSW included in the mix. The opening-night premiere, Carver, comes by way of writer/director Emily DiPrimio, who was 13 when she launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund her "1980s-style slasher film." Two years later, the South Jersey splatter auteur will introduce the finished product.

A Fuller Life, a bio of hardboiled Hollywood maverick Samuel Fuller, screens Saturday. Directed by daughter Samantha Fuller, the film features William Friedkin, Jennifer Beals, Joe Dante, Wim Wenders, James Franco, Buck Henry, Mark Hamill, and Tim Roth paying homage and reading from Fuller's memoir. Rare footage shot by Fuller during World War II, too.

And if you're a sucker for Jason Schwartzman's shtick, 7 Chinese Brothers, from writer-director Bob Byington, screens Saturday, too. The Wes Anderson regular stars as a just-fired-from-his-job goofball, sharing his deepest thoughts with his French bulldog, who happens to be Schwartzman's real-life French bulldog. Favorite bit from the trailer:

Olympia Dukakis, as Schwartzman's grandma: "Who's going to dial 911 when you're gasping for air?"

Schwartzman: "I'm teaching the dog how to do it."

For a complete schedule and ticket info: http://reeleastfilm.org/, 856-858-5230.