By Don Morton

Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith

Stupendous, it is. George Lucas finally brings full circle the Shakespearian space opera he launched long, long ago in 1977 (and at the same time makes up for the disappointing Episodes I and II). It provides no answers, for the simple reason that we already know what’s going to happen. What it does, and brilliantly, is provide the details of how Anakin Skywalker loses his way and gains great power only by destroying everything he is trying to save. Granted, Hayden Christensen is not the strongest actor to take on this central role, but he does okay, and it could’ve been a lot worse. Fittingly, the SFX set a new standard for realism and sheer vividness (yes, even better than LOTR). No video-game races, no phony clone multitudes. It’s fast-paced and packs an unexpected emotional punch. Sure, it has some clunky dialogue, but (sorry, George) it wouldn’t be a Star Wars movie without clunky dialogue. Special honors to Ian McDiarmid as Chancellor Palpatine.

Cinemas 2 3 7 10 11 26 45 57 60 61 70 81 90 95 96 99 102 107 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120

Alfie

Moderately successful transplanting (London to Manhattan) and updating (’60s to today) of the Michael Caine classic takes a lighter approach; there’s no abortion scene, and the womanizing cad at least tries to be likable. But what was a swingin’ lifestyle during the sexual revolution seems downright dangerous today, and it leaves one vaguely uncomfortable. None of this is Jude Law’s fault, who turns in a solid performance as the smug, narcissistic and ultimately clueless title character whose karma eventually catches up with him, and taken on its own it’s entertaining enough, especially for Law fans.

Cinema 52

Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights

It’s hard to make a bland movie that features pulsating Latin music and is set in Havana, but this one gives it a pretty good try. Tepid script has rich American teenage girl in 1958 Havana hooking up with a salsa-swinging local kid of whom her parents would not approve, etc. Unless, maybe, they win the big dance contest (which they actually call “The Big Dance Contest”). The kids are all right, and the dancing’s okay, but just about everything else—cheesy and inexplicable cameo by Patrick Swayze-hips, lame dialogue, pseudo political babble, laughably sanitized Cuban revolution—falls short.

Cinema 52

Duplex

This forced, one-joke movie must have looked better when homicidally inclined director Danny DeVito (Throw Mama from the Train, Drowning Mona) pitched it. Yuppie couple (a dull Ben Stiller & a duller Drew Barrymore) buys a Brooklyn house, but cannot evict the sweet old lady (81-year-old Eileen Essell) in the rent-controlled apartment upstairs. Sweet soon turns to irritating, and before you know (or believe) it, the two are contemplating murder. I’d call it a black comedy except for that pesky comedy part. The only humor is of the crass, Home Alone, physical type. Don’t even rent this Duplex.

Cinemas 9 32

Modigliani

Overlong, overdramatic, overly artsy and vaguely silly biopic about the last years of the young artist’s life is heavy on bad-boy incident, light on examinations of the man’s creativity and passion. Amadeo Modigliani, or Modi to his friends, is portrayed in a bathetic performance by Andy Garcia as a drunken, drug-addicted party animal, while Picasso (engaged in a mostly made-up rivalry with the title character) is a clown in a bad rug, and other artists of the period, such as Rivera, Utrillo and Soutine, are madcap sidekicks. There’s a painting contest at the end! Totally inappropriate music.

Cinemas 52 102

Riding Giants

Stacy Peralta does here for surfing what his Dogtown and Z-Boys did for skateboarding, focusing, as the title suggests, on the moving mountains of water in Hawaii and other places that stand six to eight stories tall. Gnarly. Using outstanding archival footage, Peralta follows the sport’s continuing evolution from big boards to short boards to things that look more like water skis, on which you are flung by a jet ski onto these impossibly big waves, as jaw-droppingly demonstrated by superstar Laird Hamilton. Vicariously thrilling and, like, totally awesome. Cool music. Big screen, please.

Cinema 99

Vera Drake

Mike Leigh’s best film since Secrets and Lies is an astounding, morally complex character study of a cheerful, willfully oblivious abortionist in 1951 Britain who “helps out” poor women who cannot afford proper clinics. Imelda Staunton is phenomenal in the title role, as Leigh’s close-up camera registers every subtle nuance of expression. The film does not judge or preach. Indeed, it’s not really about abortion, but about family, and about a woman who sees herself useful, but whose entire world comes crashing down when she is reluctantly prosecuted. Strong supporting performances.

Cinema 42

War of the Worlds

It began life in 1898 as an H.G. Wells novel, had its first reincarnation as an Orson Welles radio broadcast in 1938 that caused panic in the streets (and decades of research on mass hysteria), followed by the 1953 Hollywood movie that pretty much set the standard for sci-fi thrillers of the day. It also spawned a late ’80s TV series, a Marvel Comics series and even a musical. So now it’s probably ready for the Big Time, meaning Steven Spielberg, Tom Cruise and Dakota Fanning, and it promises to be one of the loudest motion pictures ever made. Powerful tripod war machines (one of the few aspects retained from the 1953 effort) turn up on Earth (but they’re not from Mars this time—probably a diplomatic thing), and dockworker Cruise does battle to protect his family. I haven’t seen it yet, as there were no press previews, but I’ll have a more opinionated review for you in a few weeks.

Cinemas 2 3 10 11 26 45 56 60 61 70 81 90 95 96 99 102 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119

Open Water

You might not think that watching a couple of people float around in the ocean for 60 of a film’s 80 minutes would be very interesting, let alone scary, but you’d be wrong. The couple in question had gone diving in the Caribbean on a large party boat, but due to an ominous series of events leading to a nose-counting screw-up, the boat leaves the diving area thinking they are aboard. And when they surface, they find themselves quite alone in a very, very big ocean, filled with creatures that are not aware that humans are at the top of the food chain. As they await rescue, they have to deal with curious sharks, stinging jellyfish, dehydration, seasickness, hysteria, darkness and even marital bickering. This quiet thriller was filmed on the cheap (reportedly $130,000), with a kind of Blair Witch feel to it, but perhaps more effective for it. And it’s all the more horrifying, and at a gut level, because if could actually happen. And no one likes being forgotten. I was sweating at the end.

Cinemas 33 90 109 110 111 112 116 118 119

Dear Frankie

In order to protect deaf, nine-year-old Frankie (Jack McElhone) from his abusive dad, his mother (Emily Mortimer) has fabricated a detailed deception, telling the boy his father’s in the merchant marine and sending him letters she writes herself. But when dad’s supposed ship docks at their port town, she has to pay a stranger (Gerard Butler) to pose as the boy’s peripatetic papa. They bond. Then mom finds herself attracted to the guy as well. It’s not nearly as sappy as it sounds, and though some relationships seem a bit rushed, this infectious, subtle emotional tale avoids manipulation.

Cinemas 22 49

Melinda and Melinda

Woody Allen’s best and certainly most ambitious film in years tells two stories in parallel, using just one set of circumstances (a young woman common to both stories—Radha Mitchell—crashes a dinner party). One’s a comedy, starring Will Farrell and Amanda Peet, the other’s a tragedy, starring Chloe Sevigny, Johnny Lee Miller and Chiwetel Ejiofor. Forget all that juvenile whingeing about “Woody’s earlier films.” He’s making the films he wants to, ones that, especially like this one, require you to pay attention if you are to appreciate their complexity and wit, and in a way to participate.

Cinema 100

The Nomi Song

Landing in the middle of New York’s avant-garde musical/cultural crossroads of the late `70s was an elfin, otherworldly (the film is bookended with clips from It Came from Outer Space), retro-futurist humanoid singer named Klaus Nomi. A trained German opera singer (spookiest Tosca you’ve ever seen), his geometric outfits, kabuki makeup, powerful countertenor and intense artificiality took the scene’s hipsters by storm, until he became an early casualty of AIDS in 1983. This brilliant and amusingly assembled documentary is a stylish, affectionate portrait by Andrew Horn, who knew Nomi.

Cinema 36

Unleashed

A lethal chop-socky artist has been literally dog-collared (alternate title: Danny the Dog) since childhood by a Glasgow crime boss (Bob Hoskins in full lather), who removes the collar when he wants a leg or two broken. Yes, I know. But once you get past the this silly conceit, the annoying music and its complete illogicality, what you’ve got is a nicely constructed, better-than-average Jet Li film (not difficult), produced and written by action auteur Luc Besson, directed by Louis Leterrier (The Transporter), and choreographed by Yeun Wo-ping. Also Morgan Freeman as a kind, blind piano tuner.

Cinemas 5 30 48 63 96 102 109 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119

Batman Begins

You can forget all that campy stuff. This one is serious, dark and scary. The theme here is overcoming fear—in this case of bats—and of turning it back on the bad guys (represented this time by crime boss Tom Wilkinson, refreshingly not a super-villain). It chronicles, with logic and rationality (for a comic book character), the gradual metamorphosis of a terrified kid, traumatized by his parents’ murders, into the Caped Crusader. Apologies to Michael Keaton and Val Kilmer (but perhaps not to George Clooney), but Christian Bale is the best Batman yet. He gives depth to the tortured Bruce Wayne character in a capable, engrossing, angry performance. Also refreshing is the low-tech Batcave, which is dark and dank and actually has bats. The bottom line is that this reworking of the dark avenger by director Christopher Nolan is smart, gritty, thoroughly entertaining and finally gets it right. Also Michael Caine as manservant and mentor Alfred, Gary Oldman as a good guy (!), and Morgan Freeman as a “Q” figure.

Cinemas 4 5 23 47 60 70 81 90 95 96 99 102 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119

The Ring Two

The Ring scraped by on originality and some good scares, and you didn’t notice until later that it didn’t make a lick of sense. Well, that doesn’t work twice, even if the moneymen want it to. This horrible story admittedly has a few “Boo!” moments, but these are separated by long, plodding sequences of labored and/or comically ridiculous exposition. Naomi Watts is far better than this stale, absurd material deserves. Directed by Hideo Nakata, who made the Japanese Ringu and Ringu 2, though this is a “new” sequel to the American The Ring and not a remake. Maybe he should move on.

Cinemas 11 34 50 61 90 95 96 99 102 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119

50 First Dates

It’s Groundhog Day meets The Wedding Singer in this gooey, manipulative romantic comedy dealing with the lighter side of short-term memory loss (!). A “sweet”Adam Sandler (read: “not funny”) meets the girl of his dreams (one-note actress Drew Barrymore), and they hit it off. But she’s forgotten him by the next morning. (The audience is not so lucky.) Seems that, thanks to an automobile accident, her brain reboots every night. So he has to start over. They then, in essence, “meet cute” again times 50. This is not entertaining. Kind of like Memento, without all the laughs.

Cinemas 1 21 96 109 112 116

One Point O

Scruffy, art-house sci-fi mystery is nicely atmospheric and creepy, done in the Cronenberg/Lynch/Aronofsky style and on a tight budget. A reclusive, telecommuting computer programmer (Jeremy Sisto, for whom I am gaining respect) living a sort of futuristic/retro lifestyle (not unlike Brazil) keeps finding empty parcels delivered inside his locked apartment. And he’s developed an abnormal thirst for milk. The film gets a bit repetitive in the middle, but is curiously involving nonetheless. Nice minimalist use of sound. Also Deborah Kara Unger, Udo Kier and Lance Henriksen. Also called Paranoia 1.0.

Cinema 24

Sahara

Updated Indie Jones wannabe movie features a cloyingly studly, buffed-up Matthew McConaughey, in shockingly orange makeup for some reason and positively exuding preposterone, doing battle with a lot of really ugly bad guys. He’s in the title desert searching for a lost Civil War-era Confederate ironclad buried there (and it gets even sillier), while romancing Penelope Cruz, a doctor with the World Health Organization. Right. I’m not making this up. It was inspired by a novel by Clive Cussler, who’s suing, and directed by music-video maker Breck Eisner, son of Michael and kind of a Steven Spielberg without the talent. There are some pretty okay action sequences, and chases involving every imaginable vehicle (also camels), but it’s one of those movies where if you’ve seen the trailers, you’ve seen all the good parts; the rest is tiresome exposition, and it lacks any real tension. Steve Zahn is good as the obligatory sidekick, and clearly slumming are Delroy Lindo and William H. Macy.

Cinemas 1 27 40 60 71 82 109 111 112 116 117 118 119

The Assassination of Richard Nixon

Sam Bicke’s (Sean Penn) marriage (to Naomi Watts) is virtually finished (he thinks they’re “working it out”), he’s a failure at selling furniture, and the bank won’t give him a loan for his flaky new business. But everything’s someone else’s fault. And since it’s 1974, during the Watergate hearings, he decides it’s mostly President Nixon’s. Though the story, based loosely on a true incident, is not the most compelling and a bit slow-moving, completely lacking a point, this one is well worth seeing solely for Penn’s riveting portrait of this whiny, psychopathic screw-up.

Cinemas 8 24 42 96 109

Elvis Has Left the Building

Kim Basinger is a traveling cosmetics saleswoman that apparently has some cosmic attachment to Elvis Presley. Trouble is, when she’s around, Elvis impersonators start to die off in freak (and funny) accidents. And there’s a convention of such morons coming up in Vegas. This is a very silly movie, and went direct-to-video in the States. Maybe I was just in the right mood, but I found it consistently amusing. Of course, I’m weird. Also John Corbett and several of the world’s worst Elvis Impersonators. Directed by Joel Zwick, who did My Big Fat Greek Wedding and a lot of TV.

Cinema 32

Hostage

Though you may think from the posters that Bruce Willis is trying to recreate his John McClane Die Hard persona with this unpretentious B-movie, that’s not what’s happening. In fact, if anything he (thankfully) dials it down quite a bit in his role as a former Los Angeles hostage negotiator, now a small-town police chief suddenly involved in not just one, but two simultaneous hostage crises (one of which only he knows about). And though it hurts to say it about a Bruce Willis flick, I didn’t hate it. If you can get past the implausible secondary plot, several screaming inconsistencies, some gratuitous violence, the overdramatic music, and the overcooked, disappointing final showdown, this is an above-average, nicely filmed (by Frenchman Florent Siri), brainlessly efficient suspense thriller, and what it lacks in credibility it makes up for with pure momentum.

Cinemas 1 29 31 55 62 71 82 90 95 96 102 109 110 111 112 113 116 117 118 119

Hitch

There’s not one aspect of this romantic comedy that’s original, but it really doesn’t matter. This fast, fashionable and forgettable crowd-pleaser succeeds, quite nicely, purely on the charm of its characters. It’s just hard not to like. “Date doctor” (Will Smith) with the too-cute name of “Hitchins” helps geeks like (a very funny) Kevin James meet, impress and succeed with the women of their dreams, but Hitch himself strikes out when he falls for a smart, cynical and virtually unattainable gossip columnist (Eva Mendes). If I were a date doctor, I’d advise you to take her to see this movie.

Cinemas 7 57 90 96 102 107 108 109 111 112 113 116 117 118 119

Elektra

You perhaps first saw Elektra as a minor character in Daredevil, where she died. (Not a good start—either dying or sharing a bill with Ben Affleck.) Among the weakest of the Marvel Comics movies (it’s no Spiderman, but neither is it as bad as Catwoman), this noisy flick stars Jennifer Garner in a kind of dominatrix-themed samba-carnival outfit, a paid assassin with an apparently irrelevant case of OCD (SuperMonk?) doing battle with a silly script and several underdeveloped characters, herself included. Liked it more than I thought I would, but don’t take that as a recommendation.

Cinemas 2 61 99 102 109 111 116 117 118 119

The Forgotten

Even Julianne Moore makes the occasional misstep. This silly sci-fi flick starts out as a lost-child weepie, then looks like it might develop into an interesting memory-management political thriller, soon more resembles a feature-length X-Files, then finally a really bad feature-length X-Files. I admit to having jumped out of my seat a few times at defibrillator-level jolts, but this does not necessarily a scary movie make, and you’ll probably see these in the TV trailers anyway. I’m trying hard not to make a pun on the title, but you can. And then follow your own advice.

Cinemas 2 10 26 45 60 72 90 96 99 102 109 110 111 112 113 114 116 117 118 119

Million Dollar Baby

Firstly, this is no distaff Rocky. That would be Girlfight. But this is no Girlfight, either. It’s not even a sports movie. What makes this film about a female, would-be boxer (Hillary Swank) and her gruff trainer (Clint Eastwood) stand out is the third-act plot twist, which you will not hear about from me, that leads it to address with truthfulness and clarity several topical moral questions. The film is beautifully paced, with not a dull moment in its 2:15 running time. A host of side characters, notably her greedy family (mom: Margo Martindale), add texture and background. Fine voice-over narration by third main character Morgan Freeman, and excellent use of light by cinematographer Tom Stern. Oscars for Best Director for Clint Eastwood, who at 75 is at the top of his game, a deserved (2nd) Best Actress for Swank, Best Supporting Actor for Freeman and Best Picture. As close to perfect as a film can get, it packs an emotional punch that will leave you stunned, and does so without any of that annoying button-pushing.

Cinemas 4 5 23 47 60 70 81 90 95 96 99 102 107 109 110 111 112 113 115 116 117 118 119

Kingdom of Heaven

When he made the excellent Gladiator in 2000, Ridley Scott unfortunately and unknowingly spawned a bunch of imitators, vaguely silly sword-and-sandals epics like Troy and the even worse Alexander. So now he’s back to show ‘em how it’s done with this Crusades-era man-saga, dramatizing the siege of Jerusalem in the late 12th century. Orlando Bloom does a fine job as the humble blacksmith-turned-knight who in 1184 is pressed into service (and given a knighthood) by his dying father (Liam Neeson), and who goes on to become the defender of Jerusalem. An unseen Edward Norton stands out as the eerie voice of the leprosy-afflicted King Baldwin of Jerusalem; he wears a mask to cover his ravaged face. Best battle scenes since Lord of the Rings, neither overlong nor overdone (cool medieval war machines), and despite all the Christian/Muslim strife, a pacifist, tolerant message. At 2:20, it held my attention. Also a sultry Eva Green, a noble Jeremy Irons, a battle-hardened David Thewlis and a superb Ghassan Massoud as a ruthless-but-wise Saladin.

Cinemas 3 11 26 61 70 90 95 96 99 107 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 11

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