Moon posterStill, they are return­ing from the Fest­iv­al: Moon by Bowie’s boy Duncan Jones is a Para­mount exclus­ive which should do quite nicely for them as they pre­pare for new own­er­ship (dis­cuss rumours you might have heard in the com­ments). After three years alone min­ing the moon Sam Rock­well might be going slightly nuts and ima­gin­ing that he’s got com­pany. Or is he?

The Pent­house and the Light­house both share Steph­en Frears’ Chéri and the doc­u­ment­ary that launched the Fest­iv­al back in June, The Septem­ber Issue. Chéri is based on two nov­els by Colette and is a cher­ished pro­ject by acclaimed screen­writer Chris­toph­er Hamp­ton (Dan­ger­ous Liais­ons, The Diving Bell and the But­ter­fly).

[The rest of this week’s new releases after the jump]

The Septem­ber Issue is a fly on the wall thing about Anna Win­tour, edit­or-in-chief of Vogue and tor­ment­or of edit­or­i­al assist­ants. In a vaguely Wel­ling­ton-related link, Anna Win­tour’s step-daugh­ter-in-law is from New­lands.

Cre­at­or of The 40-Year-Old Vir­gin and Knocked Up, Judd Apatow gets a little bit ser­i­ous with his over­long new film Funny People. Adam Sand­ler plays a rich stand-up comic/movie star who dis­cov­ers he is dying and attempts to recon­nect with the world via a friend­ship with aspir­ing comedi­an Seth Rogen. Read­ings and Sky City Queens­gate.

Ali­ens in the Attic is that rare thing at the moment – a film that under 16s can go and see (that isn’t Up). A group of toothy kids (one of whom was second fiddle to the leads in High School Music­al) dis­cov­er an advanced party of angry look­ing but knee-high ali­ens intent on tak­ing over the plan­et – and only the kids can stop them. Read­ings, Empire, Sky City Queens­gate.

There’s a one-off screen­ing at 4.00pm on Sunday at the Para­mount of Rus­sell Camp­bell’s new doc­u­ment­ary, Sis­ters from Siber­ia about WCC coun­cil­lor Stephanie Cook’s adop­tion of two Rus­si­an daugh­ters (and by exten­sion a look at the Rus­si­an emigré com­munity in Wel­ling­ton).

The film I’m most look­ing for­ward to this week is at the Film Soci­ety on Monday night: Parad­jan­ov’s The Col­our of Pomegranates from 1968, a film described on IMDb as “one of the greatest mas­ter­pieces of the 20th cen­tury”. I’ve missed almost everything the Film Soci­ety has screened this year as Monday night is Cap­it­al Times “write the bloody review” night but there’s no way I’m miss­ing this.

And, at the Embassy on Sunday at 2.30pm they have Grease.

All the com­mer­cial releases will be reviewed (sub­ject to space) in the Cap­it­al Times on Wed­nes­day. Funer­als & Snakes is in a bit of dis­ar­ray at the moment after a botched host change but plans are afoot for a relaunch in early Octo­ber. Mean­while, tell us what you are watch­ing in the com­ments.