The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers

“First, I didn’t like their decision, unbelievable, wasn’t it? You know those clowns we got on there. I tell you, I hope I outlive the bastards.” – President Richard M. Nixon (in conversation with J. Edgar Hoover, on the Supreme Court’s decision to allow the ongoing publication of the Pentagon Papers, July 1, 1971) “I just say that we’ve got to keep our eye on the main ball. The main ball is Ellsberg. We’ve got to get this son-of-a-bitch.” – Nixon (in conversation with Attorney General John Mitchell, June 29, 1971) In 1971, Daniel Ellsberg, a high-level Pentagon official and Vietnam War strategist, concludes that the war is based on decades of lies and leaks 7,000 pages of top secret documents to The New York Times, making headlines around the world. A riveting story of how one man’s profound change of heart creates a landmark struggle involving America’s newspapers, its president and Supreme Court. A political thriller whose events lead directly to Watergate, Nixon’s resignation and the end of the Vietnam War.  

Don't miss your chance to engage in a discussion with the film's director, Rick Goldsmith at the Grand following the film's 4:45p and 6:50p showings on Saturday, March 13th! Check out the interview with the director in Filmmaker Magazine.

So many people risked their livelihoods to put the 7,000-page Pentagon Papers out there -- although its most tangible result was the creation of Nixon’s plumbers unit. We have not celebrated Daniel Ellsberg enough. Let’s begin. -- David Edelstein, New York Magazine

The movie is an act of hero worship, but it inadvertently suggests that, without a necessary touch of grandiosity, Ellsberg might never have acted as bravely as he did. -- David Denby, New Yorker 

It's a professional job, standing above the crowd of politico documentaries that proliferate like kudzu over arthouse screens. -- Nick Pinkerton, Village Voice

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The White Ribbon

Controversy-courting director Michael Haneke (CACHé) earned the Palm d’Or at Cannes in 2009 for this arresting drama set just before World War I. In a small German village, a number of unexplained accidents beset the schoolchildren and their parents. Though they at first appear coincidental, it begins to seem that they are not, in fact, accidents at all.

Winner of the Golden Globe for Best Foreign Film! Nominated for two Academy Awards: Best Foreign Film, and Best Cinematography!

In German, Polish, Italian and Latin with English Subtitles.

Immaculately crafted in beautiful black-and-white and entirely absorbing... -- Todd McCarthy, Variety

The ends remain loose in The White Ribbon. But that lack of closure is thrilling. -- Wesley Morris, Boston Globe

I don’t question Haneke’s craft: it’s his ideas that get under my skin. -- A.O. Scott, At the Movies

This is among the most luminous and painterly of black-and-white films, but what's portrayed will shock or numb you. -- TIME Magazine

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Bestsellers

The Grand Cinema is proud to present Tacoma indie filmmaking at its best! Join us for a special screening and Q&A with local filmmaker Rick Gratzer.

Bernard (Jeremy Adams) is a writer desperate to get published and move away from his hometown of Tacoma, WA. When a famous James Patterson-esque author rolls into town on a nationwide book signing tour, Bernard takes it upon himself to get his manuscript into the right hands by any means necessary. Along the way, a cartoonist by the name of Odessa Pearl (Courtney Kessler) introduces him to the beauty of the city, his ex-hippie best friend Kyle (Mathew Suhr) attempts to woo his punk rock crush Wendy (Sasha Stuber), and two bumbling goofballs named Simon and Ira (played hilariously by Juan Rivera and Riley Gratzer) strive to get the money together to film their opus, "Lethal Heaven".

The Runaways

Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning star in this music-fueled story of the ground-breaking, all girl, teenage rock band of the 1970s: The Runaways. The film follows two friends, Joan Jett and Cherie Currie, as they rise from rebellious Southern California kids to rock stars of the now legendary group that paved the way for future generations of girl bands. Joan and Cherie fall under the Svengali-like influence of rock impresario Kim Fowley, played by Michael Shannon, who turns the group into an outrageous success and a family of misfits. With its tough-chick image and raw talent, the band quickly earns a name for itself—and so do its two leads: Joan is the band’s pure rock’ n’ roll heart, while Cherie, with her Bowie-Bardot looks, is the sex kitten. Written and directed by Floria Sigismondi, the film chronicles Joan and Cherie’s tumultuous relationship on and off stage, as the band starts to break out.

A quick-silver, impressionistic account of the swift rise and long, steep fall of rock's first all-girl band. -- Kirk Honeycutt, Hollywood Reporter

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The Ghost Writer

From director Roman Polanski, a successful British ghostwriter, THE GHOST, agrees to complete the memoirs of former British Prime Minister Adam Lang. His agent assures him it’s the opportunity of a lifetime. But the project seems doomed from the start—not least because his predecessor on the project, Lang’s long-term aide, died in an unfortunate accident. The Ghost flies out to work on the project, in the middle of winter, to an oceanfront house on an island off the U.S. Eastern seaboard. But the day after he arrives, a former British cabinet minister accuses Lang of authorizing the illegal seizure of suspected terrorists and handing them over for torture by the CIA—a war crime. The controversy brings reporters and protesters swarming to the island mansion where Lang is staying with his wife, Ruth, and his personal assistant (and mistress), Amelia. As The Ghost works, he begins to uncover clues suggesting his predecessor may have stumbled on a dark secret linking Lang to the CIA—and that somehow this information is hidden in the manuscript he left behind. Was Lang in the service of the American intelligence agency while he was prime minister? And was The Ghost’s predecessor murdered because of the appalling truth he uncovered?

Mr. Polanski’s work with his performers is consistently subtle even when the performances seem anything but, which is true of this very fine film from welcome start to finish. -- Manohla Dargis, New York Times

Shows Polanski in brilliant command of a political thriller that ties you up in knots of tension while zinging politics and showbiz like two sides of the same toxic coin. -- Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

A dark pearl of a movie whose great flair and precision make it Polanski's best work in quite a while. -- Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times

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A Prophet

At age 18, Malik El Djebena (Tahar Rahim) is just beginning a six-year prison sentence in this drama from director Jacques Audiard. Though he cannot read or write, Malik soon figures out the politics of the prison system, giving him a prime spot in the power struggle between two battling groups of prisoners. A PROPHET reunites Audiard with two of his stars from THE BEAT THAT MY HEART SKIPPED, Niels Arestrup and Gilles Cohen, as well as that film’s director of photography, Stéphane Fontaine, and its composer, Alexandre Desplat. Read the interview with Director Audiard and lead actor Tahar Rahim in Filmmaker Magazine.

Nominated for the Academy Award AND the Golden Globe for Best Foreign Film!

In French, Arabic and Corsican with English subtitles.

Director Jacques Audiard scores a triumph of the highest order with the defiant poetry of his vision.  -- Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

A Prophet is one of those rare films in which the moral stakes are as insistent and thought through as the aesthetic choices. -- Manohla Dargis, New York Times

Sweetgrass

A paean to the Old West: SWEETGRASS captures modern cowboys’ overland journey, wrangling thousands of sheep, as they move across Montana’s Absaroka-Beartooth Mountains, amid sweepingly dramatic vistas and endless skies. Ronnie Scheib in Variety describes the film as “a mad cross between Howard Hawks’s RED RIVER” and an anthropological account of vanishing nomadic traditions, with “a dash of Tex Avery’s DRAG-ALONG DROOPY.” Twenty-first century cowboys call their mothers on cell phones and complain about rainy weather, ornery sheep and exhausted horses. A strikingly beautiful film, SWEETGRASS is at once funny, awe-inspiring and endearing. At first the passive, fuzzy sheep seem utterly adorable; over time we come to understand the exasperated cowboy who screams profanities at this sea of stubborn, bleating beasts over which he struggles to reign. Learn more from Filmmaker Magazine's interview with the director.

The first essential movie of this young year. - Manohla Dargis, New York Times

The filmmakers' motivation couldn't be clearer: They needed to capture a way of life that may soon exist only on film and in memory. -- Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News

Castaing-Taylor's lensing -- from sheep staring into a camera to panoramic views of the gorgeous landscape -- is pleasing to the eye. -- V.A. Musetto, New York Post

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Fish Tank

FISH TANK is the story of Mia (Katie Jarvis, in a break-out role), a volatile 15-year-old, who is always in trouble and who has become excluded from school and ostracized by her friends. One hot summer's day her mother (Kierston Wareing) brings home a mysterious stranger called Connor (Michael Fassbender) who promises to change everything and bring love into all their lives. Winner of the British Academy Film Award for Best British Film! Read the interview with director Andrea Arnold in Filmmaker Magazine.

The contradictions of adolescence have rarely been conveyed with such authenticity and force. -- A.O. Scott, New York Times

Katie Jarvis, 18, hits you like a shot in the heart with her sensational breakout performance. And cheers to director Andrea Arnold, who flies on her own unerring instincts. -- Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

The brilliant power of the film comes from the gritty reality Arnold creates. -- Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times

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The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Forty years ago, Harriet Vanger disappeared from a family gathering on the island owned and inhabited by the powerful Vanger clan. Her body was never found, yet her beloved uncle is convinced it was murder and that the killer is a member of his own tightly knit but dysfunctional family. He employs disgraced financial journalist Mikael Blomkvist (Michael Nyqvist) and the tattooed and troubled but resourceful computer hacker Lisbeth Salander (Noomi Rapace) to investigate. When the pair link Harriet's disappearance to a number of grotesque murders from almost forty years ago, they begin to unravel a dark and appalling family history. But the Vanger's are a secretive clan, and Blomkvist and Salander are about to find out just how far they are prepared to go to protect themselves.

Author Stieg Larsson, who died suddenly in 2004, left behind three unpublished novels, known as the "Millennium" trilogy, which have become a global sensation, elevating Larsson to the world's second best-selling author last year (behind "The Kite Runner"'s Khaled Hosseini). "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" is one of the decade's major literary success stories, selling over 8,000,000 copies worldwide and the film adaptation is the highest grossing Swedish film in history.

...a movie as lush, dense, character- and story-driven as the lauded novel. -- Staci Layne Wilson, Horror.com

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To Kill a Mockingbird

Part of the Grand's April Film Series: "Hospitality: Welcoming the Stranger". Join us for a special evening screening of this classic film!

Robert Mulligan's classic adaptation of Harper Lee's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, set in the racially charged atmosphere of Macon County, Alabama in the 1930s, TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD is a poignant coming-of-age story. Winner of four Academy Awards including Best Screenplay (written by Horton Foote), and Best Actor (Gregory Peck), TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD is a timeless film packed with beautiful scenes and meaningful life lessons. The story is told from the vantage point of a young girl nicknamed Scout (Mary Badham) whose widowed white father Atticus Finch (Peck), an attorney, decides on principle to defend a black man (Brock Peters) charged with raping a poor white woman. But the bigoted townspeople would rather lynch the accused than try him, and they make life hellish for the lawyer, his daughter, and his son Jem (Philip Alford). While their father is in the throes of the trial, his bright, inquisitive children learn a hard and unforgettable lesson in justice, morality, and prejudice, part of which requires overcoming an unfounded fear of their mysterious neighbor Boo Radley (Robert Duvall).

Harper Lee's highly regarded first novel has been artfully and delicately translated to the screen. -- Variety

Universally recognized as a classic, and the label is well deserved. -- James Berardinelli, ReelViews

The Visitor

Part of the Grand's April Film Series: "Hospitality: Welcoming the Stranger". Join us for a special evening screening of one of the most popular Grand movies of 2008!

In a world of six billion people, it only takes one to change your life. In actor and filmmaker Tom McCarthy’s follow-up to his award winning directorial debut The Station Agent, Richard Jenkins (Six Feet Under) stars as a disillusioned Connecticut economics professor whose life is transformed by a chance encounter in New York City.

Sixty-two-year-old Walter Vale (Jenkins) is sleepwalking through his life. Having lost his passion for teaching and writing, he fills the void by unsuccessfully trying to learn to play classical piano. When his college sends him to Manhattan to attend a conference, Walter is surprised to find a young couple has taken up residence in his apartment. Victims of a real estate scam, Tarek (Haaz Sleiman), a Syrian man, and Zainab (Danai Gurira), his Senegalese girlfriend, have nowhere else to go. In the first of a series of tests of the heart, Walter reluctantly allows the couple to stay with him.

Touched by his kindness, Tarek, a talented musician, insists on teaching the aging academic to play the African drum. The instrument’s exuberant rhythms revitalize Walter’s faltering spirit and open his eyes to a vibrant world of local jazz clubs and Central Park drum circles. As the friendship between the two men deepens, the differences in culture, age and temperament fall away.

After being stopped by police in the subway, Tarek is arrested as an undocumented citizen and held for deportation. As his situation turns desperate, Walter finds himself compelled to help his new friend with a passion he thought he had long ago lost. When Tarek’s beautiful mother Mouna (Hiam Abbass) arrives unexpectedly in search of her son, the professor’s personal commitment develops into an unlikely romance.

And it’s through these new found connections with these virtual strangers that Walter is awakened to a new world and a new life.

Both director and cast exhibit the dedication of those who truly believe in the message at hand. -- Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News

The Visitor, featuring an award-caliber performance by Richard Jenkins as the prof, is a heartfelt human drama that sneaks up and floors you. -- Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

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In America

Part of the Grand's April Film Series: "Hospitality: Welcoming the Stranger". Join us for a special evening screening of this acclaimed film!

From master storyteller Jim Sheridan ("My Left Foot," "In The Name of the Father") comes a deeply personal and emotionally raw tale of a family finding its soul IN AMERICA. Through the wide-open eyes of two young heroines, Sheridan transforms a devastating human tragedy into a riveting, humor-tinged story about memory, secrets, love, loss, coming together and starting over. To begin all over again is a classic American dream. But it's remarkably hard to do, as Irish émigrés Johnny and Sarah (Paddy Considine and Samantha Morton) discover when they hit the streets of modern-day Manhattan, their two spunky young daughters in tow, and emerge into a realm as comical and adventure-filled as it is strange and terrifying. The family faces a dizzying new future –- but first they must face down a past that haunts every single one of them. With no cash to spare, Johnny and Sarah settle into a chaotic New York tenement populated by a colorful assortment of characters – and attempt to turn a Gothic horror-movie setting into a true home. From dragging an iffy-looking air conditioner across Manhattan to finding make-do jobs, nothing comes without a fight for the couple. And yet, while they see America as rife with challenges, dangers and weirdness, their daughters see it as a magical place where anything can happen, a place that might release them all from the anguish of what has come before. Then, on Halloween, Christy and Ariel (sisters Sarah and Emma Bolger) dare to knock on the door of "the screaming man," a mysterious neighbor named Mateo (Djimon Hounsou), and everything changes. As the family heads for a crisis, Mateo becomes their unlikely ally in the territory where hope, faith and even magic hold sway.

Insightful, joyous and positively heart-stopping. -- Rex Reed, New York Observer

It's a wistful yet penetrating film, shot through with magic realism and life-affirming humor, that gets you deep down where you live. -- Megan Lehmann, New York Post

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The Maltese Falcon

Join the Grand Cinema and the Tacoma Public Library in celebrating the 2010 edition of the Tacoma Reads initiative with the special screening of one of the original Film Noir masterpieces, "The Maltese Falcon"!

Hard-drinking private eye Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) sleuths the backyard of San Francisco in search of an elusive black bird statuette while evading the setups of three disparate miscreants: the duplicitous Brigid, the perfumed Mr. Cairo, and the scheming Fat Man. John Huston's brilliant directorial debut is aided by first-rate performances, excellent camera work, as well as the director's acute attention to detail while shooting the film. Based on the crime novel by Dashiell Hammett. Academy Award Nominations: 3, including Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (Sydney Greenstreet), and Best Screenplay.

Among the movies we not only love but treasure, The Maltese Falcon stands as a great divide. -- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

This is one of the best examples of actionful and suspenseful melodramatic story telling in cinematic form. -- Variety

The Secret of Kells

Do not miss the highly anticipated new animated masterpiece from the producers of Kirikou, The Sorceress and Triplets of Belleville! Magic, fantasy and Celtic mythology come together in a riot of color and detail that dazzle the eyes in this sweeping story about the power of imagination and faith to carry humanity through dark times. Young Brendan lives in a remote medieval outpost under siege from barbarian raids. But a new life of adventure beckons when a celebrated master illuminator arrives from foreign lands carrying an ancient but unfinished book, brimming with secret wisdom and powers. To help complete the magical book, Brendan has to overcome his deepest fears on a dangerous quest that takes him into the enchanted forest where mythical creatures hide. It is here that he meets the fairy Aisling, a mysterious young wolf-girl, who helps him along the way. But with the barbarians closing in, will Brendan's determination and artistic vision illuminate the darkness and show that enlightenment is the best fortification against evil?

Nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Film!

With its jewel-bright colors and intricate use of lines, the result is absolutely luscious to behold. -- Leslie Felperin, Variety

Flowery meadows, wafting dandelion clocks, packs of baying wolves -- all are grist for the film's palette of beauty. -- Ella Taylor, Village Voice

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