HUDSON VALLEY CRUCIAL VIEWING: January 23- February 5

Your Guide to Repertory Movies in the Hudson Valley

Author

Bel Simek
January 22, 2026

Happy newsletter week cinephiles! I hope everyone has been finding ways to enjoy this sub-zero, snowy winter so far. Watching lots of movies, perhaps? In case you haven’t noticed, we have finally, officially entered Awards Season. That means all your local independent theaters have the creme de la creme of indie cinema and awards bait right now, but it also (sadly) means there isn’t a lot of room in the calendars for our favorite repertory fare. But, fear not! Though the next two weeks are slim, we’re still bringing you some excellent features, including the start of KFF’s “Comedy on the Clock” series at Upstate Midtown in February. More on that one soon. Until then, see you at the movies!

THE LIST

Sunday, January 25

Kingston Film Foundation presents: You know it, you love it, you’ve definitely seen it, and if you haven’t… well, I don’t know what to tell you. Now’s your chance! One of the most beloved documentaries in queer cinema, Paris is Burning is soulful, joyous, and tragic, sometimes in such quick succession it gives you whiplash. If you have any interest in the history of the queer liberation front in NYC this doc feels like a keystone text. It’s also a great explainer on the culture of voguing, in addition to being some of the best representations of trans people ever put to screen (c’mon y’all, step it up). This is the finale of our “Documents of Joy” series at Upstate Midtown, and I couldn’t imagine a better film to define the thesis of that series. I know we’ve all seen it before, but it’s one of those movies I can watch a hundred times and find that it never gets old. Treat yourself, it might just help warm you up during these next few cold, cold months.

Monday, January 26

Thursday, January 28

Saturday, January 31

Sunday, February 1

Bel’s Pick: Look, I’m not gonna go crazy about this movie. Longtime subscribers may remember my lightly unhinged recommendation for this film when we showed it at Midtown Linear Park last October, and based on the turnout it would appear that a lot of you feel exactly the same way that I do. Something I will add is that I love that this movie is having such a cultural moment right now. Maybe it’s cognitive bias because I only saw it for the first time in 2020 (thank you Covid for giving us all so much time to watch movies) but I really feel like it’s been seriously getting its due in the last 5 years. Maybe that’s silly to say about a film that won three Oscars the year it came out, but like many great films, it does feel like it languished into obscurity for a while. Correct me if I’m wrong! Either way, I’m glad to see it pop up on indie programming calendars with more regularity, and I for one am looking forward to driving up to Catskill to watch it again.

Kingston Film Foundation presents: This is the first film of our “Comedy on the Clock” series and it is a classic. I’m proud of this series for a lot of reasons but especially because it spans so many years of cinema’s history to explore a classic genre. This is a fantastic turn for Billy Wilder with a stellar cast (Jack Lemmon and Shirley MacLaine? Wah wah wee wah). Really, the original 1960 poster says it all: “Movie-wise, there has never been anything like “The Apartment” love-wise, laugh-wise, or otherwise-wise.” Isn’t that just the thing?

Tuesday, February 3

Wednesday, February 4

Bel’s Pick: I just had to go back through the Crucial Viewing archives to make sure I hadn’t written about this film before. Somehow, I haven’t, and that just seems unlikely. Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain has gone through the ringer when it comes to reception. It was praised upon release, the subsequently revisited by teenage queers and critics alike in the 2010s for its raw, tragic depiction of gay male life. To me its always felt like a film that is either loved or abhorred, and I’ll tell you what, I’m resolutely in the love camp. The closest I ever got to getting into a fight in high school was over this movie, hand to god, true story. Lee’s adaptation of the Annie Proulx story (which, if you haven’t read it, you can read it for free, go, now) is masterfully executed, elegantly expanding on Proulx’s world. Alongside cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto (a frequent collaborator of Scorsese), Lee captures Proulx sparse, beautiful prose and conjures a landscape that is so reflective of its characters, their internal worlds, and the tragedy of their affair. I also think it remains a career defining piece for its four leads, all of whom were barely into their twenties and have since become household names. It’s also often forgotten in discussions of the New Queer Cinema movement of the 90s despite its deep connections to it. I might even argue that it serves as the capstone to the movement. We can talk about that some other time. Either way, I think this movie is always well worth revisiting, especially in an era were queer narratives have become more mainstream. Think about the movies that got us here. Brokeback Mountain is certainly one of them.

(Also shout-out Gustavo Santaolalla’s soundtrack work. You play that guitar line out of context? I’ll cry. I know you know what I’m talking about, you can hear it in your head right now.)

Thursday, February 5