The Book of Life (1998) / The Girl from Monday (2005) R

THE BOOK OF LIFE (1998) With an outrageous lightness of touch, lucidity and intelligence, Hal Hartley (Trust) re-imagines the apocalypse as foretold in the Christian tradition. He asks the simple question: would Jesus really put up with this madness? Told with great energy, style, and curiosity, The Book of Life is a humanistic deconstruction of western values and a vigorous exercise in what was in 1998 the new digital media. It's an unrelenting kaleidoscope of fast moving images and heart-pounding music perfectly capturing a techno-driven, computerized and postmodernist world. Thoughtful, respectful, funny and very bold in its assertions, the film was cited by the New York Times as "whimsical yet deeply serious" Written and directed by Hal Hartley and starring Martin Donovan as Jesus Christ, PJ Harvey as Magdalena and Thomas Jay Ryan as Satan with DJ Mendel, Miho Nikaido, Dave Simonds, Katreen Hardt and James Urbaniak.

THE GIRL FROM MONDAY (2005): A girl drops into the Ocean from outer space. A being from a distant constellation called Monday, she has assumed the human form of a beautiful young woman in order to look for her missing friend. An unapologetically stylized account of friendship, sacrifice, and free love in the information age, The Girl From Monday is fraught with the tensions of an unchecked consumer society and its impact on our sexualities, terrorist paranoia, and the difficulty in distinguishing elected officials from other corporate elites. Written and directed by Hal Hartley (The Unbelievable Truth) and starring Bill Sage, Sabrina Lloyd, Leo Fitzpatrick, DJ Mendel, Edie Falco, James Urbaniak and Tatiana Abracos as The Girl From Monday.