This Week in Rep Cinema features second run and classic film selections from cinemas such as the Bloor Hot Docs Cinema, The Fox, The Revue, The Royal, Toronto Underground Cinema, the Projection Booth, TIFF Bell Lightbox, and more.

With TIFF Kids coming to a close, that can only mean one thing, Hot Docs is just around the bend! The festival starts on Thursday and you can already see our picks in this preview. Next week's post will mostly focus on festival screenings, but this week, there's music, lust, aliens and nasty divorce settlements!

MONDAY APRIL 23 / SOUND IT OUT / BLOOR CINEMA / 9:15PM
In a world where physical music stores are selling as many t-shirts, headphones and peripherals as possible to keep out of the red, keeping a vinyl store up and running should be impossible. In Sound it Out we meet a record-store owner in Teesside, North East England whose shop is a musical oasis in a culturally deprived area, kept alive by neighbours and friends alike. It shows the real connectivity that music has in peoples' lives and the lengths people would go to keep it that way. Tickets are $11 and can be purchased at the cinema.

TUESDAY APRIL 24 / A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE / REVUE CINEMA / 6:45PM
Anybody who had to bumble through Tennessee Williams' classic play can attest, A Streetcar Named Desire is a hot mess. It's a soapy story about a neanderthal-like man, his gorgeous, push-over of a wife and the sister-in-law with a past that he resents and dislikes; and when push comes to shove, Stanley Kowalski is a disgusting pig and Blanche is a broken-down liar, but it does make a great film. Elia Kazan made the best casting in his life with the smouldering looks of Marlon Brando and the mournful face of Vivien Leigh in this adaptation which still stands the test of time. Tickets are $10 and can be purchased at the cinema.

WEDNESDAY APRIL 25 / THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL / TIFF BELL LIGHTBOX / 7PM
I think anybody who has read this post more than once knows I'm a bit of a science fiction fan, so this week's recommendation for TIFF's Science on Film series can come as no surprise. But literary nerds can also rejoice, for this weeks screening of The Day the Earth Stood Still will include a discussion by famed science-fiction author Robert J. Sawyer, and he'll be discussing artificial intelligence and nanotechnology. An interesting contrast for a film about a world much like our own that is thrust into chaos and the unknown after an encounter with a very advanced extraterrestrial visitor. Tickets are $35 and can be purchased at the cinema.

THURSDAY APRIL 26 / AI WEIWEI: NEVER SORRY / BLOOR HOT DOCS THEATRE / 6:30 & 9:30PM
The opening night of Hot Docs is an amazing thing, especially when the film is about contemporary Chinese artist Ai Weiwei. The film expands upon the struggles he's undergone as an artist who has been persecuted for his art and who actively attempts to battle the Chinese censor with his sculpture and installation work. In the past year alone he's been detained by police for two months, his studio was destroyed and his blog was muffled in an attempt to quiet him. But with documentaries like this turning a global eye on the situation, Ai Weiwei is given precisely the voice that the authorities would take away. Tickets prices vary, see website for details.

SATURDAY APRIL 28 / WAR OF THE ROSES / CARLTON CINEMA / 7PM
Screening as part of the one-day Kathleen Turner Mini Film Festival (really, there's one for everything now) one of her funner, darkest roles is showcased at the Carlton this Saturday. The War of the Roses basically plays very similar to, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? except as more of a satire than a drama, but with Turner playing to her strengths as a brassy spitfire while Michael Douglas schemes and scowls as her disenchanted husband. The film follows the couple through a bitter divorce, as they literally divide the house up and throw everything they have at each other until somebody abandons ship first. Tickets are a suggested $5 and all benefits go to YouthLink.

Additional Screenings

• We Need to Talk About Kevin - Fox Theatre - Mon April 23 - 9:15pm
  
• The Artist - Revue Cinema - Fri April 27 - 7pm
  
• Bruce Lee: Fists of Fury - Projection Booth - Sat April 28 - 9pm

For Toronto movie showtimes, view our Movie Listings section.