3:10 to Yuma (R, 117 minutes) Russell Crowe and Christian Bale replace Glenn Ford and Van Heflin in this remake of the highly regarded 1957 western. Crowe is the outlaw leader on his way to court via the titular conveyance. Bale is the small-time rancher charged with escorting him there alive—no small task when droves of gun-toting bad guys show up. The film’s tense, ticking clock narrative plays out quite a bit like High Noon, with Bale and especially Crowe turning in compelling performances. James Mangold (Walk the Line) directs. Playing at Carmike Cinema 6
28 Weeks Later (R, 91 minutes) 2002’s apocalyptic zombie flick, 28 Days Later, was a shot in the arm to a stagnant horror film industry. Unfortunately, director Danny Boyle isn’t back for this follow-up. Substitute Juan Carlos Fresnadillo (Intacto) can’t quite replicate Boyle’s kinetic camerawork; but he does O.K., adding a few honest jump scares to a fairly standard script. It’s six months after the initial outbreak of the Rage Virus, and the U.S. Army has arrived in England, helping to secure a small section of London for repopulation. Naturally, everything goes wrong and those American boys start getting a tad trigger-happy. Playing at Carmike Cinema 6
30 Days of Night (R) The hit graphic novel about a savage (but clever) band of vampires who emigrate to Alaska to bask in the extended darkness of the Arctic Circle’s sunless winter hits the big screen. Josh Hartnett (40 Days and 40 Nights) headlines as the small-town sheriff who tries to fend off the bloodthirsty gang until the sun returns. An energetic, scary and tense addition to the well-worn vampire mythos. Opening Friday; check local listings
The Comebacks (PG-13, 104 minutes) Inspirational sports movies get the Scary Movie Treatment (formerly known as the Airplane Treatment). An out-of-luck coach (comedian David Koechner) leads a rag-tag band of misfits to the football championships in this spoof of everything from Rocky to Remember the Titans to Blue Crush to Field of Dreams. Opening Friday; check local listings
Death at a Funeral (R, 90 minutes) Former Muppet man Frank Oz directs this very British farce about a funeral gone very wrong. A large, dysfunctional family (all mostly unknown actors on this side of the pond) gathers at a lovely house in the English countryside to mourn the passing of its patriarch. Over the course of the chaotic funeral, various wacky situations (homosexual dwarves, hallucinogenic drugs, diarrhea) rear their ugly head. Farce should appear effortless, and Death at a Funeral strains so hard to be funny that it nearly busts a blood vessel. Unfortunately, it aims for the drawing room wit of Oscar Wilde and lands somewhere near the sitcom zaniness of Benny Hill. Playing at Regal Downtown Mall 6
Eastern Promises (R, 100 minutes) Director David Cronenberg (A History of Violence, Naked Lunch) contributes another sober rumination on violence. This one stars Viggo Mortensen (Lord of the Rings) as a mysterious tattooed driver tied to a family of Russian mobsters from London. Our taciturn criminal’s world view goes through some serious changes when he crosses paths with an innocent midwife (Naomi Watts, King Kong) caught up in the death of a pregnant teen. Playing at Regal Downtown Mall 6
Elizabeth: The Golden Age (PG-13, 114 minutes) Director Shekhar Kapur and star Cate Blanchett try to repeat history with this sequel to 1998’s award-winning Elizabeth. Here, the British monarch is distracted from running her empire by an affair with adventurer Sir Walter Raleigh (Clive Owen). The cast is packed (Geoffrey Rush, Samantha Morton and Rhys Ifans are also in there) and the computer-generated maritime battles are impressive, but the history lesson feels simplified and melodramatic this time around. Playing at Regal Downtown Mall 6
Feel the Noise (PG-13, 86 minutes) Jennifer Lopez produced this song-and-dance-filled musical about an aspiring Harlem rapper (Omarion Grandberry, You Got Served) who flees to Puerto Rico to reunite with the father he never knew after a run-in with some local thugs. On the colorful island nation, he hooks up with a hottie dancer and finds “salvation” in the spicy music style of Reggaeton. For major fans of Reggaeton, I guess. Playing at Regal Downtown Mall 6
The Game Plan (PG, 110 minutes) Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson stars as a cocky professional quarterback who, out of the blue, finds the 8-year-old daughter he never knew dumped on his doorstep. This lazy family comedy recycles the most clichéd elements available from the sports movie genre and the “selfish adult learns a lesson from the impossibly cute little kid” genre. Suitable only for those mourning the loss of very special episodes of “Full House.” Playing at Carmike Cinema 6
Gone Baby Gone (R, 115 minutes) Ben Affleck turns director to helm this gripping adaptation of a mystery novel by Dennis Lehane (the guy who also provided Sean Penn with Mystic River). Casey Affleck delivers an understated star turn as a youthful, but charismatic Boston P.I. who—along with his attractive g.f., Michelle Monaghan (The Heartbreak Kid)—is hired to help out in a child-abduction case. A little snooping through Beantown’s seedier neighborhoods roots out a mother with some very ugly underworld connections and a growing conspiracy. Some of the plot mechanics might not be entirely realistic, but Affleck has created a gritty and quite realistic portrait of low-rent Boston. Opening Friday; check local listings
The Heartbreak Kid (R, 116 minutes) What would happen if you combined Neil Simon and The Farrelly Brothers? The makers of There’s Something About Mary try remaking a 1972 Neil Simon comedy with decidedly mixed results. Ben Stiller plays a loveless 40-year-old who marries an attractive gal (Malin Ackerman, Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle) on a whim. While on their honeymoon in Mexico, our boy discovers his wife is nuts and manages to fall in love with an even more attractive gal (Michelle Monaghan, Mission: Impossible III). There are a few stabs at the Farrelly’s tradmark rude humor, but most of it is awfully uncomfortable and unsympathetic. Playing at Carmike Ci
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In the Shadow of the Moon (PG, 100 minutes) This meticulous documentary allows the surviving crew members of NASA’s history-making Apollo missions to tell their stories in their own words. The excitement and majesty of these pioneering days is fully captured thanks a treasure trove of archival footage (who doesn’t love rocket ships?) and some colorful commentary by the astronauts themselves (Buzz Aldrin, Mike Collins, Alan Bean, Jim Lovell and Harrison Schmitt among them). Playing at Regal Downtown Mall 6
Into the Wild (R, 140 minutes) Sean Penn directs this poetic, true-life biopic about Chris McCandless, a middle-class college grad who abandoned his possessions, renamed himself "Alexander Supertramp" and hitchhiked to Alaska to live a Thoreau-like existence in the wilderness. He starved to death after a few months. Emile Hirsch (The Girl Next Door) gives a strong performance and Penn avoids romanticizing the misguided rebel too awfully much. Opening Friday at Vinegar Hill Theatre
The Jane Austen Book Club (PG-13, 105 minutes) Once again, the name Jane Austen is employed as a carefully calculated beacon to attract loyal chick flick viewers. In this ensemble romance (based on Karen Joy Fowler’s book), six Californians start the titular organization, only to find that their tangled relationships start to resemble the plots of Ms. Austen’s novels. The cast (Maria Bello, Emily Blunt, Kathy Baker, Amy Brenneman, Jimmy Smits, Hugh Dancy) is up to the task, but the script is laid out purely by the numbers. From the director of such other femme-friendly literary adaptations as Little Women, Practical Magic and Memoirs of a Geisha. Playing through Thursday at Vinegar Hill Theatre
The Kingdom (R, 110 minutes) The Iraq War dramas continue with this thriller about an FBI counter-terrorism team sent to Saudi Arabia to investigate the bombing of an American facility. Of course, both the Saudi government and the American military stymie the investigation at every turn. Jamie Foxx, Jennifer Garner, Jason Bateman and Chris Cooper fill out the cast. Playing at Carmike Cinema 6
Michael Clayton (R, 120 minutes) George Clooney toplines this hard-hitting legal drama about an in-house "fixer" at a top New York Law firm. When one of the firm’s defense attorneys goes bonkers working on a questionable class action lawsuit, our titular character is called in to clean house. Naturally, our protagonist starts to uncover all sorts of dirty truths that could potentially sabotage the case. Will he do his job or do the right thing? Tom Wilkinson, Tilda Swinton and Sydney Pollack round out a topflight cast for screenwriterwriter-turned-director Tony Gilroy (The Bourne Identity, The Bourne Supremacy, The Bourne Ultimatum). Playing at Carmike Cinema 6
Preview for Michael Clayton. |
Rendition (R, 120 minutes) Reese Witherspoon and Jake Gyllenhaal are the sexy young stars of this drama about government kidnapping and torture. Witherspoon is the Chicago soccer mom whose hunky Egyptian hubby gets nabbed by the CIA and electrocuted (among other things) to find out his (possibly nonexistant) ties to a terrorist bombing in North Africa. Gyllenhaal is the sypathetic CIA analyst who tries to help Witherspoon get her husband back. The cast (including Meryl Streep, Alan Arkin and Peter Sarsgaard) try their best, but the direction is dull and the script badly melodramatic. Opening Friday; check local listings
Meryl Streep takes a back seat to some young stars in the kidnapping flick, Rendition. But she’s still the coolest.
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Resident Evil: Extinction (R, 95 minutes) The Resident Evil franchise ups the ante (so to speak) with this postapocalyptic outing. Apparently things have gone very wrong since the last couple of movies, as Alice (Milla Jovovich) is now leading a small band of survivors across the Nevada desert. While passing through the ruins of Las Vegas, the group must battle hordes of undead monsters created by the Umbrella Corporation’s now rampant T-Virus. Speaking of coming back from the dead, Russell Mulcahy (Highlander) directs. Playing at Regal Downtown Mall 6
Sarah Landon and the Paranormal Hour (PG, 81 minutes) This family affair written by unknown John Comrie, directed by unknown Lisa Comrie and starring unknowns Brian Comrie, Dan Comrie and Rick Comrie plays like an extended episode of "Goosebumps." Newcomer Rissa Walters headlines as a spunky teen investigating supernatural happenings in her small hometown of Pine Valley. Posters promise this is "the first in a series of Sarah Landon mysteries." I wouldn’t hold my breath if I were you. Opening Friday; check local listings
The Seeker: The Dark is Rising (PG, 94 minutes) As expected, Susan Cooper’s Harry Potter-ish book series (written before Harry Potter, it should be noted) goes Hollywood. In it, an ordinary boy learns that he is the last of a group of warriors bestowed with secret magical powers in order to defeat the forces of darkness. If you loved Eragon… Playing at Regal Seminole Square Cinema 4
Superbad (R, 114 minutes) From the makers of Knocked Up comes another outrageous comedy. This one stars Jonah Hill (Accepted) and Michael Cera (“Arrested Development”) as a couple of dorky, codependent high schoolers who figure they’ll get lucky if only they can score some booze for an upcoming graduation party. This is unrepentant R-rated stuff and all the better for it. Underneath all the shocking talk about male and female anatomy, however, is a rather sweet story about friendship and growing up. Playing at Regal Downtown Mall 6
Tyler Perry’s Why Did I Get Married? (PG-13) Tyler Perry directs another big screen adaptation of one of his shot-to-video stageplays (this one barely a year old). For better or worse (much better as far as I’m concerned), Perry’s drag character Madea does not appear in this comedy/drama about a sexy young temptress who shows up at a marriage retreat for couples only. Perfectly acceptable if you like your comedy, your drama and your Christian dogma extremely light. Playing at Regal Seminole Square Cinema 4
We Own the Night (R, 117 minutes) Joaquin Phoenix, Mark Wahlberg and Robert Duvall star in this muscular but conventional crime drama about a coke-dealing Brooklyn nightclub manager who tries to save his straight-arrow brother and father (both cops) from evil Russian hitmen. Writer/director James Gray (maker of the nearly identical flicks Little Odessa and The Yards) would helm a fine episode of “The Shield,” but he’s no Martin Scorsese. Playing at Regal Seminole Square Cinema 4
