Special screenings
Cool Hand Luke
Paul Newman, George Kennedy, J.D. Cannon.
Directed by Stuart Rosenberg. 126 minutes. Not rated.
A man refuses to conform to life in a rural prison.
Whitney Library, 5175 E. Tropicana Ave., 507-4010. 5/27, noon, free.
E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial
Henry Thomas, Drew Barrymore, Dee Wallace.
Directed by Steven Spielberg. 115 minutes. Rated PG.
A group of Earth children help a stranded alien botanist return home. The District, 2240 Village Walk Drive, Henderson, 564-8595. 5/25, 7:30 pm, free.
The Great Match
Ahmed Alansar, Shag Humar Khan, Mohamed Telit.
Directed by Gerardo Olivares. 88 minutes. Not rated.
Three interspersed stories of people in remote parts of Mongolia, Niger and Brazil struggling to get TV reception of the 2002 World Cup final between Germany and Brazil. Clark County Library, 1401 E. Flamingo Road, 507-3400. 5/29, 7 pm, free.
IMAX Theatre
Deep Sea 3D, Fighter Pilot, Mystery of the Nile, Lions 3D: Roar of the Kalahari
Call for showtimes. $11.99 each show.
Luxor, 3900 Las Vegas Blvd. S., 262-4629.
Jurassic Park
Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum.
Directed by Steven Spielberg. 127 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Scientists clone dinosaurs to populate a theme park, which then suffers a major security breakdown that sets the dinosaurs free. The District, 2240 Village Walk Drive, Henderson, 564-8595. 5/26, 7:30 pm, free.
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Harrison Ford, Karen Allen, John Rhys-Davies.
Directed by Steven Spielberg. 115 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Archaeologist and adventurer Indiana Jones is hired by the U.S. government to find the Ark of the Covenant, before the Nazis do. The District, 2240 Village Walk Drive, Henderson, 564-8595. 5/27, 7:30 pm, free.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
Susan Sarandon, Barry Bostwick, Tim Curry.
Directed by Jim Sharman. 100 minutes. Rated R.
The perennial 1975 cult classic is a mix of horror, comedy and musical, featuring sex, transvestites and the Time Warp. Augmented by a live cast and audience participation. Onyx Theater inside The Rack in Commercial Center, 953 E. Sahara Ave., #101. First & third Sat of month, 11:30 pm, $7. Info: 953-0682 or www.divinedecadence.org.
Trouble in Paradise
Herbert Marshall, Miriam Hopkins, Kay Francis.
Directed by Ernst Lubitsch. 83 minutes. Not rated.
When thief Gaston Monescu (Marshall) meets his true love in pickpocket Lily (Hopkins), they embark on a scam to rob lovely perfume company executive Mariette Colet (Francis). Clark County Library, 1401 E. Flamingo Road, 507-3400. 5/29, 1 pm, free.
New this week
Bug ****
Ashley Judd, Michael Shannon, Harry Connick Jr.
Directed by William Friedkin. 102 minutes. Rated R.
See review Page 40.
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End *
Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Keira Knightley, Geoffrey Rush.
168 minutes. Rated PG-13.
See review Page 40.
Waitress ***1/2
Keri Russell, Nathan Fillion, Jeremy Sisto.
Directed by Adrienne Shelly. 107 minutes. Rated PG-13.
See review Page 41.
The Wind That Shakes the Barley ***1/2
Cillian Murphy, Padraic Delaney, Orla Fitzgerald.
Directed by Ken Loach. 127 minutes. Not rated.
See review Page 41.
Now playing
28 Weeks Later ***1/2
Robert Carlyle, Rose Byrne, Jeremy Renner.
Directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo. 99 minutes. Rated R.
Opening during the outbreak depicted in the original film, Weeks wastes no time in first creating and then compromising our loyalty. No sooner have we been introduced to married survivors Don (Carlyle) and Alice than we’re watching our ostensible hero callously abandon his wife to the infected hordes. Seven months pass. The epidemic, successfully contained, is now over. (Ha.) Civilians slowly return to what remains of London, now under military jurisdiction; among the first wave of resettlers is our cowardly buddy Don, who’s been reunited with his two young children. Credit Fresnadillo for continually finding new and innovative ways of creeping us out, from a lengthy sequence shot through a night-vision rifle scope to the unexpected lyricism of one character’s post-transformation onslaught. –MD
300**
Gerard Butler, David Wenham, Lena Headey, Vincent Regan.
Directed by Zack Snyder. 117 minutes. Rated R.
The film is about the battle of Thermopylae in 480 B.C. Thanks to the whiny indecision of corrupt religious leaders and spineless bureaucrats, Spartan King Leonidas (Butler) is unable to take his full army to meet the massive Persian forces, and must make do with only 300 of his best soldiers, acting as his personal retinue. It’s brutal, it’s painful, it’s mind-numbing and, most disturbingly, it’s a rallying cry for the testosterone-heavy that posits “no mercy” as the most noble sentiment in the world. –JB
Are We Done Yet? *
Ice Cube, Nia Long, John C. McGinley.
Directed by Steve Carr. 92 minutes. Rated PG.
Nick (Cube) has softened since Are We There Yet?; he’s married and living with Suzanne (Long) and the kids in his cramped apartment. Nick moves the entire brood, plus a set of twins on the way, to a house in the country. A slick real estate agent, Chuck (McGinley), sells Nick the money pit, then turns up again as the town’s contractor, electrician and inspector. If the movie had simply placed the streetwise Cube in the country and told a fish-out-of-water story, it might have had something, but instead it follows a tired, family-film formula, grinding along on worn-out gears. –JMA
Avenue Montaigne***
Cecile de France, Valérie Lemercier, Albert Dupontel.
Directed by Daniele Thompson. 100 minutes. Rated PG-13.
On the hoity-toity side of Paris sits Avenue Montaigne, which is host to an upscale theater, an auction house, a grand concert hall ... and a quaint little café, where a young woman named Jessica (De France) talks her way into a waitressing job. The movie is pure fluff: The likeable, quirky characters, breathtaking Parisian vistas and dashes of wry wit amount to little more than the superficial luxuries that Jessica admires throughout the film. –MSH
Away From Her ***
Julie Christie, Gordon Pinsent, Michael Murphy, Olympia Dukakis. Directed by Sarah Polley. 110 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Grant and Fiona have been married for more than 40 years when the film begins. We get the sense that for the last several years they’ve had a happy life. That is, until Fiona begins forgetting things, and the onset of Alzheimer’s threatens their close bond. There’s much to like in this assured and insightful debut. As in most films directed by actors, the performances are strong all around. Polley makes effective use of a fractured narrative and some luminous visuals. –BS
Black Book ***1/2
Carice van Houten, Sebastian Koch, Thom Hoffman.
Directed by Paul Verhoeven. 145 minutes. Rated R.
The film starts with the bombing of the farmhouse in which Dutch Jew Rachel Stein (van Houten) has been hiding from the Nazis, and that sets her on an odyssey through the underground resistance, where she dyes her hair blond and takes on the name Ellis de Vries. Not content simply to lay low until the war ends, Rachel/Ellis teams up with anti-Nazi fighters to take on the German occupants of Holland. The staid World War II epic has become Hollywood’s most boring awards-baiting genre, and Black Book sidesteps all that by being unabashedly lurid and melodramatic, with tons of suspense and plenty of silly plot twists. In Dutch and German with English subtitles. –JB
Blades of Glory**
Will Ferrell, Jon Heder, Will Arnett, Amy Poehler.
Directed by Josh Gordon and Will Speck. 93 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Ferrell’s macho, womanizing and buffoonish blowhard, perfected in Anchorman and Talladega Nights, shows up again as Chazz Michael Michaels, a renegade figure skater with a sex addiction and a fondness for leather. He’s acting opposite Heder, a one-note actor if ever there was one, as Jimmy MacElroy, Chazz’s fey rival-turned-partner thanks to a skating-bylaws loophole that allows them to compete as a pair even after they’ve been banned from singles competition after a nasty fistfight. So it’s Ricky Bobby and Napoleon Dynamite on skates, with exactly one joke for the whole movie: Figure skating sure is gay, isn’t it? –JB
The Condemned *
Steve Austin, Vinnie Jones, Robert Mammone.
Directed by Scott Wiper. 113 minutes. Rated R.
Ten death-row convicts from various Third World prisons are stranded on an island and told to kill each other, with the last one standing awarded freedom. It’s all being filmed by a sadistic billionaire (Mammone) for broadcast on the Internet. It’s hard to say what’s worse about The Condemned: the monotonous, uninteresting fight sequences staged like pro-wrestling matches and shot with shaky, headache-inducing handheld cameras; or the awkward, heavy-handed dialogue scenes, with huge, undiluted chunks of exposition and nauseatingly hypocritical speeches about the irresponsible depiction of violence in the media. –JB
Delta Farce (Not reviewed)
Larry the Cable Guy, Bill Engvall, DJ Qualls.
Directed by C.B. Harding. 90 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Three bumbling Army reservists bound for Iraq are accidentally dropped at a Mexican village besieged by hostile forces.
Disturbia***
Shia LaBoeuf, Sarah Roemer, Carrie-Anne Moss.
Directed by D.J. Caruso. 104 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Kale Brecht (LaBeouf) is confined to his house. His only visitors are his friend Ronnie and love interest Ashley (Roemer). His life is quickly reduced to a vicarious existence as he spends his time looking out the window at his neighbors. Paranoia sets in and he begins to suspect one of them could be a killer. Our protagonist is on house arrest, complete with alarm on his ankle. This is both a strength and a weakness. As remakes of Hitchcock masterpieces (Rear Window) go, this one is actually pretty good, at least until the climax devolves into a slasher flick. –BS
The Ex(Not reviewed)
Zach Braff, Amanda Peet, Jason Bateman.
Directed by Jesse Peretz. 93 minutes. Rated PG-13.
A slacker (Braff) is forced to work for his father-in-law after his pregnant wife (Peet) steps away from her high-paying job.
Fracture **1/2
Anthony Hopkins, Ryan Gosling, Rosamund Pike.
Directed by Gregory Hoblit. 112 minutes. Rated R.
Ted Crawford (Hopkins), villain extraordinaire of the psychological thriller Fracture, methodically manipulates both the legal system and arrogant young prosecutor Willy Beachum (Gosling) after being arrested for the attempted murder of his wife. The film hums along at a steady clip, navigating narrative twists and turns that may be complex but seem wholly predetermined and inorganic. –JB
Georgia Rule*1/2
Lindsay Lohan, Jane Fonda, Felicity Huffman.
Directed by Garry Marshall. 113 minutes. Rated R.
This rather feeble fish-out-of-water comedy stars Lohan as a rebellious teen named Rachel, who’s been sent to live with her sassy grandma (Fonda) in a movie-stereotype small town in Idaho to learn some old-fashioned values. Then this happens, at about half an hour into the movie: Rachel casually divulges the fact that her stepfather started sexually abusing her when she was 12 years old. This unexpected revelation changes the whole tenor of the film—or at least it should. But Marshall blithely soldiers on with the city-girl-in-a-small-town hijinks, and Rachel’s past as a serial liar throws the whole sexual-abuse scenario into doubt in an uncomfortable and dramatically unsatisfying manner. –JB
Ghost Rider**1/2
Nicolas Cage, Eva Mendes, Wes Bentley, Peter Fonda.
Directed by Mark Steven Johnson. 114 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Motorcycle stuntman Johnny Blaze (Cage) sells his soul to the devil and turns into a fiery spirit of vengeance. Cage cannot help but bring his twitchy Nicolas Cage-ness, which is probably entirely inappropriate for the character but nevertheless adds a weird layer of existential dread. But the plot really fails in the villain department. Bentley looks like a cast-off from Good Charlotte, and is more whiny than menacing, and defeated way too easily. The effects when Cage changes into Ghost Rider look silly, and it doesn’t help that he then speaks in a voice that sounds like Dr. Claw from Inspector Gadget. –JB
Hot Fuzz ****
Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Jim Broadbent.
Directed by Edgar Wright. 121 minutes. Rated R.
The hyper-perfect London cop Nicholas Angel (Pegg) is transferred to the tiny village of Sandford because his extraordinary arrest record makes other cops look bad. There he becomes concerned with a rash of “accidental” deaths, though everyone else shrugs him off. He befriends local cop Danny Butterman (Frost), the son of the chief inspector (Broadbent), and together they uncover a sinister conspiracy. Every facet of this film finds its proper place. Rather than buckling under all those old cop movies, Hot Fuzz is more like the result of them. –JMA
In the Land of Women (Not reviewed)
Adam Brody, Kristen Stewart, Meg Ryan.
Directed by Jon Kasdan. 97 minutes. Rated PG-13.
His world in complete disorder after a break-up with a famous actress, a young TV writer goes to suburban Detroit to care for his sickly grandmother and heal his broken heart. Along the way he forms a special bond with the family that lives across from his grandma.
The Invisible (Not reviewed)
Justin Chatwin, Margarita Levieva, Marcia Gay Harden.
Directed by David S. Goyer. 97 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Nick (Chatwin) is brutally attacked and left for dead. He finds himself suspended between the worlds of the living and the dead, and his only chance to live again is to find out what happened to him and why, before his time runs out.
Kickin’ It Old Skool (Not reviewed)
Jamie Kennedy, Miguel A. Nuñez, Maria Menounos.
Directed by Harvey Glazer. 107 minutes. Rated PG-13.
At a talent show in 1986, young Justin Schumacher suffers a head injury and slips into a coma. Twenty years later, Justin (Kennedy) awakes with the mindset and experience of a 12-year-old. He decides to reunite the members of his former dance team and revive their short-lived careers.
Lucky You *
Eric Bana, Drew Barrymore, Robert Duvall.
Directed by Curtis Hanson. 135 minutes. Rated PG-13.
In Lucky You, poker player Huck (Bana) speaks almost exclusively in poker metaphors, forcing other characters to inevitably throw them back in the most predictable ways. For example, when speaking to his love interest, Billie (Barrymore), Huck might describe something as “a good fold.” So when Billie breaks up with him, guess what she’ll say to describe the break-up? That’s not clever. That’s the screenwriting equivalent of “stacking the deck.” I just used a poker metaphor. See how they suck? Normally, the combination of Hanson, Bana, Barrymore and co-writer Eric Roth would be a pretty strong hand, and that makes Lucky You a really bad beat. –MSH
Meet the Robinsons ***1/2
Voices of Angela Bassett, Jordan Fry, Wesley Singerman.
Directed by Stephen Anderson. 93 minutes. Rated G.
This animated time-travel adventure tells the story of a young inventor and orphan named Lewis. Lewis’ entry in the science fair is sabotaged by a mysterious villain in a bowler hat. As it turns out, Bowler Hat Guy has come from the future to steal Lewis’ invention and pass it off as his own. But an ally has traveled back in time to help—young Wilbur Robinson. Together, Lewis and Wilbur travel back to the future. There are enough funny gags and visual delights to keep adults interested, and kids are sure to enjoy the fast-paced madness of it all. –MSH
The Namesake ***
Kal Penn, Irfan Khan, Tabu.
Directed by Mira Nair. 122 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Nair follows the Ganguli family from Calcutta to Queens in the late 1970s with surprising thoroughness and attention to detail. Ashoke (Khan), a quiet, young engineering student who survives a horrific accident, and beautiful aspiring singer Ashima (Tabu) embark on an arranged marriage and subsequent move to New York City. The middle third of The Namesake shifts focus to the Gangulis’ oldest child (Penn). Wholly Yankified and borderline surly, adolescent Gogol grapples with his own demons. Generally well-observed and more contemplative than Nair’s previous works, The Namesake nevertheless has its deficits. –MH
Next**
Nicolas Cage, Jessica Biel, Julianne Moore.
Directed by Lee Tamahori. 91 minutes. Rated PG-13.
This is a curiously pointless movie, with a plot that puts all of its emphasis on what would seem like the least important goal. That is, the FBI expends nearly all of its efforts to track down Cage’s magician who can see two minutes into the future, rather than, say, stopping the terrorists who are about to detonate a nuclear bomb in Los Angeles. And after all of Cage’s running from them, the whole terrorist thing is a big anticlimax, followed by the stupidest twist ending ever. The movie practically taunts you about how it’s wasting your time. Plus, Cage and Biel have to be the ickiest and least believable screen couple of all time. –JB
Perfect Stranger *1/2
Halle Berry, Bruce Willis, Giovanni Ribisi.
Directed by James Foley. 109 minutes. Rated R.
Berry is journalist Rowena Price. An old friend of hers turns up dead, and Rowena suspects a slick ad executive (Willis), so she goes undercover as a temp to seduce him and gather evidence—rather than, say, alerting the police. This is exactly the kind of movie that Ashley Judd would have starred in five years ago, only Judd usually managed to retain some shred of dignity in her woman-in-peril thrillers. Not so Berry, who flails and wails and ultimately fails as Rowena. The requisite twist ending is completely nonsensical, but by the time you get there, things have gotten so absurd that the only proper response is to laugh it off. –JB
Shrek the Third **
Voices of Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, Cameron Diaz, Antonio Banderas. Directed by Chris Miller. 92 minutes. Rated PG.
The loveable titular ogre (voiced by Myers), already saddled with talking-animal sidekicks Donkey (Murphy) and Puss In Boots (Banderas) and married to princess-turned-ogre Fiona (Diaz), acquires a horde of new friends and foes in this latest installment. Chief among them is the supremely uninteresting Artie, cousin to Fiona, and Shrek’s choice to succeed Fiona’s late father as the king of Far, Far Away, because the ogre himself would rather not rule. What started out as a genial stab at Disneyfied fairy tales has morphed into a catch-all parody with no focus and even less bite. It’s hard to buy into the movie making fun of anything when it’s become such an easy target for mockery itself. –JB
Spider-Man 3 ***
Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, Thomas Haden Church. Directed by Sam Raimi. 140 minutes. Rated PG-13.
You want villains? Our boy Spidey must contend not just with the Sandman (Church), an ex-con brawler capable of departiculating his entire body at will; not just with Harry Osborn (Franco), who’s discovered his late father’s secret laboratory and refashioned himself as a junior version of the Green Goblin; but also with a malevolent hunk of symbiotic black goo from outer space, which first attaches itself to one of Spider-Man’s costumes and later transforms snotty rival Daily Bugle photographer Eddie Brock (Topher Grace) into a fanged mutant Spider-Clone known as Venom. You want romance? Mary Jane (Dunst) is still around, but she’s now simmering with jealousy at the vapid blond advances made by Peter’s science lab partner. The overall game plan involves tossing so much sheer stuff at us that we’ll be too dizzy and distracted to notice that no single element is actually working. –MD
Vacancy (Not reviewed)
Luke Wilson, Kate Beckinsale, Frank Whaley.
Directed by Nimrod Antal. 80 minutes. Rated R.
A young married couple becomes stranded at an isolated motel and finds hidden video cameras in their room. They realize that unless they escape, they’ll be the next victims of a snuff film.
Wild Hogs***
John Travolta, Martin Lawrence, Tim Allen, William H. Macy.
Directed by Walt Becker. 99 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Wild Hogs is about four guys who set off on a motorcycle trip across America. The road trip is inspired by the midlife crises of the four friends. The plot works methodically to solve these problems as soon as they’re introduced, without the slightest touch of subtlety. So the film’s intro, with its predictable dialogue drowning in the overly sentimental score, doesn’t bode well. But something wondrous happens. As soon as their hogs hit the highway, the movie becomes consistently funny. –MSH
Year of the Dog ****
Molly Shannon, Peter Sarsgaard, John C. Reilly.
Directed by Mike White. 97 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Shannon plays Peggy, a shy Southern California office flunky whose sole satisfying relationship is with her beloved beagle, Pencil. When the pooch dies suddenly after raiding the garage of a hunting-obsessed neighbor (Reilly), Peggy is forced to stare into the void around which she’s carefully but unfulfillingly shaped her life. White finds sly, understated humor in the extremes to which his characters will go in order to wrestle value from their existence, but never resorts to the cruel laughs or judgmental snideness that hobble so many movie satires these days. –MH
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JMA Jeffrey M. Anderson; JB Josh Bell; MD Mike D’Angelo; MH Mark Holcomb; MSH Matthew Scott Hunter; BS Benjamin Spacek