OKLAHOMA CITY – Hey, movie fan. Are you feeling lost? Are you starved for great cinema since awards season’s end? Are you wandering aimlessly from theater to theater in search of the kind of prestige power, foreign fare, or rousing, classic crowd-pleaser for which you live?
Yeah, I guess we all are at this time of the year.
Spring is often the absolute dregs of the filmgoing calendar, that nebulous time of the year when the distributers have burned all their prestige films on the late-winter awards push and studios are hoarding all the big-budget blockbuster bait for the summertime, leaving naught but some Hollywood holdovers and also-ran burn-offs.
But there are some great films springing up in the city’s best indie theaters and art houses in April, each exploring themes of lost souls and found families, and each employing music in its own unique way.
‘Into the Wild’ – Rodeo Cinema – Friday, April 3rd
Nearly two decades before Sean Penn won yet another Oscar this month for “One Battle After Another” (that he didn’t bother to even show up for,) he directed this pensive, evocative rumination on youth’s longing for freedom and the rejection of society in favor of something maybe transcendent or maybe naïve.
Based on author Jon Krakauer’s now legendary biography of amateur adventurer and unrepentant idealist Christopher McCandless, a well-educated and generally affluent young guy that, after graduating college, decided to leave civilized society behind and walk out into the Alaskan wilderness with only his wonder and awe to guide him.
History and hindsight have presented a lot of different ways to view McCandless, from folk hero for the unsatisfied to cautionary tale of hubris and privilege, but Penn’s film sloughs off all the outside interpretations and instead tries to get inside his head.
It’s a genuinely heartfelt, powerful film, full of naïve idealism and poor choices, yes, but full, also, of the infinite universe of youth and the staggering beauty of the world through the eyes of someone determined to see it, all filtered through what should’ve been a superstar-making turn for Emile Hirsch.
But in addition to the lasting emotional weight and lingering opinions of the story, one of the most enduring elements of “Into the Wild” is the almost entirely acoustic, delicate soundtrack from Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder, whose original songs carry the whole affair with the wandering, introspective pace of a classic folk song.
If you haven’t seen it, now’s a great time. I mean, who doesn’t want to just abandon society completely these days?
For more, visit rodeocinema.org.
‘Jesus Christ Superstar’ – Oklahoma Film Exchange – Sunday, April 5th
Hey, kids. Do you know who else felt lost and forgotten around this time of the year? Jesus.
That’s right, this Easter Sunday, you can relive the crucifixion the way God intended it, with showtunes!
It’s “Jesus Christ Superstar,” the 1973 film version of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s smash hit stage musical recounting the Passion with a sequiened flair that can only be achieved by someone with the questionably melodramatic powers of the man that made “Evita” and “Cats.”
Plot-wise, it all actually follows the Gospels closely enough, from the moneylenders to the Last Supper to the Romans, Pilate, and the cross.
But theatrical-wise, it’s a full-on fever dream of 70s rock opera indulgence, with Jesus effectively framed as the ideal, far-out hippie, all goodtime rock n roll energy and slick sex appeal, and Judas himself as the narrator and the vessel through which the Christian savior is seen as a pop culture celebrity.
Still, there’s no more popular or enduring tale of a misunderstood, wandering outcast and the found family that rallies around him. It’s just that this time, there’s guitar solos.
For more, visit oklahomafilmexchange.com.
‘Miroirs No. 3’ – Oklahoma City Museum of Art – April 17th through April 23rd
From acclaimed German auteur Christian Petzold (the man behind 2023’s “Afire”) comes this skewed, potentially unsettling look at just how lost you can be when you think that you’ve found (or been found by) the family you’ve been missing.
When a young pianist survives an awful car accident in rural Germany that leaves her boyfriend dead, but her mostly unscathed, she’s rescued and taken in by a lone woman long grieving the death of her daughter, to whom the young woman bears a striking resemblance.
In a darkly familial play on Hitchcock’s “Vertigo” (Petzold’s effusive favorite,) the lines between the departed daughter and this mysterious young interloper blur as her rescuer slowly tries to transform her into the child that she lost, digging up all manner of secrets, resentments, and family drama along the way.
“Miroirs No. 3” isn’t the third part of a film franchise or anything. It’s actually named after a piano piece by the great Chopin, one that rears its head through the film as music, and the piano in particular, weave throughout the mysteries and emotions of these grieving figures.
If you’re a diehard of modern world cinema, then you surely already know Petzold. But if you’re one of the lost denizens of film still searching aimlessly for something heady and deep on the springtime schedule, then this is a great place to begin.
For times, tickets, and more, visit okcmoa.com.
Catch Brett Fieldcamp’s film column weekly for information and insights into the world of film in the Oklahoma City metro and Oklahoma. | Brought to you by the Oklahoma City Museum of Art.
Brett Fieldcamp is the owner and Editor in Chief of Oklahoma City Free Press. He has been covering arts, entertainment, news, housing, and culture in Oklahoma for nearly two decades and served as Arts & Entertainment Editor before purchasing the company from founder Brett Dickerson in 2026.
He is also a musician and songwriter and holds a certification as Specialist of Spirits from The Society of Wine Educators.
