Special screenings
The Big Heat
Glenn Ford, Gloria Grahame, Lee Marvin. Directed by Fritz Lang. 89 minutes. Not rated.
Tough cop Dave Bannion takes on a politically powerful crime syndicate. Clark County Library, 1401 E. Flamingo Road, 507-3400. 3/25, 1 pm, free.
IMAX Theatre
Deep Sea 3D, Mystery of the Nile, Dinosaurs 3D: Giants of Patagonia, Lions 3D: Roar of the Kalahari, Sea Monsters: A Prehistoric Adventure
Call for showtimes. $11.99 each show.
Luxor, 3900 Las Vegas Blvd. S., 262-4629.
The Nasty Girl
Lena Stolze, Hans-Reinhard Müller, Monika Baumgartner. Directed by Michael Verhoeven. 92 minutes. Rated PG-13. In German with English subtitles.
When a young woman investigates her town’s Nazi past, the community turns against her. Clark County Library, 1401 E. Flamingo Road, 507-3400. 3/25, 7 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.
Tristan und Isolde
335 minutes. Not rated.
Broadcast of the Metropolitan Opera Company’s performance of Wagner’s classic opera about star-crossed lovers. Live: Regal Cinemas Colonnade, Santa Fe Station, Village Square, Century Orleans, Sam’s Town. 3/22, 9:30 am, $15-$22. Encore: Regal Santa Fe Station, Century Orleans, Sam’s Town. 3/23, noon, $15-$22. Info: www.fathomevents.com.
New this week
Drillbit Taylor **
Owen Wilson, Nate Hartley, Troy Gentile, Leslie Mann. Directed by Steven Brill. 102 minutes. Rated PG-13.
See review Page 32.
The Hammer **
Adam Carolla, Oswaldo Castillo, Heather Juergensen. Directed by Charles Herman-Wurmfeld. 90 minutes. Rated R.
Look **
Hayes McArthur, Giuseppe Andrews, Miles Dougal, Spencer Redford. Directed by Adam Rifkin. 98 minutes. Rated R.
Shutter (Not reviewed)
Joshua Jackson, Rachael Taylor, David Denman. Directed by Masayuki Ochiai. 85 minutes. Rated PG-13.
A newly married couple discovers disturbing, ghostly images in photographs they develop after a tragic accident.
Sleepwalking **
Nick Stahl, AnnaSophia Robb, Charlize Theron, Dennis Hopper. Directed by William Maher. 100 minutes. Rated R.
Tyler Perry’s Meet the Browns (Not reviewed)
Angela Bassett, Jenifer Lewis, David Mann. Directed by Tyler Perry. 100 minutes. Rated PG-13.
A single mom takes her family to Georgia for the funeral of her father. There, her clan is introduced to the crass, fun-loving Brown family.
Under the Same Moon ****
Adrian Alonso, Kate del Castillo, Eugenio Derbez. Directed by Patricia Riggen. 109 minutes. Rated PG-13. In Spanish with English subtitles.
Now playing
10,000 BC **
Steven Strait, Camilla Belle, Cliff Curtis. Directed by Roland Emmerich. 109 minutes. Rated PG-13.
In a small mountain village, the dreadlocked inhabitants speak modern American English with an all-purpose “foreign” accent, give great credence to the prophecies of the local crazy old lady and hunt big CGI woolly mammoths. Here vapid protagonist D’Leh (Strait) grows up in love with Evolet (Belle), a refugee from a nearby village ravaged by violent outsiders. When those same villains show up on horseback, kidnapping many members of D’Leh’s tribe (including Evolet), he sets out to rescue them, no matter what the cost. Although there is one exciting action sequence, most of the movie is given over to tedious wandering through mountains, jungles and deserts, or the soporific romance between D’Leh and Evolet. –JB
27 Dresses ***
Katherine Heigl, James Marsden, Edward Burns. Directed by Anne Fletcher. 107 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Romantic comedies don’t come much more by-the-numbers than 27 Dresses. It begins and ends with a wedding, the inevitable lovers initially hate each other in order to have sexual tension, and, by the end, all conflicts and rivalries are resolved without a single sore feeling. But this story of the eternal bridesmaid finally getting her day begins to grow on you, courtesy of Heigl’s effortless charm. Her chemistry with Marsden is intoxicating enough that we don’t see some of the requisite reversals and temporary heartaches coming. –MSH
Alvin and the Chipmunks (Not reviewed)
Jason Lee, voices of Justin Long, Matthew Gray Gubler, Jesse McCartney. Directed by Tim Hill. 91 minutes. Rated PG.
Three chipmunk brothers are adopted by a man named Dave (Lee) and turned into singing sensations.
Atonement ***
Keira Knightley, James McAvoy, Saoirse Ronan, Romola Garai. Directed by Joe Wright. 122 minutes. Rated R.
Atonement is best in its first third or so, which focuses on a tense day at the English country estate of the Tallis family on the eve of the Second World War. Precocious and self-important 13-year-old budding writer Briony (Ronan) witnesses a series of incidents between her older sister Cecilia (Knightley) and Robbie Turner (McAvoy), the son of the family’s housekeeper. Misinterpreting the pair’s budding love as something more sinister, Briony, through a series of tragic coincidences, ends up condemning Robbie to prison for a crime he didn’t commit. When the film switches perspectives and time frames to focus on Robbie, now a soldier in the war a few years later, it’s less effective. Filmmaking skill aside, Wright never quite connects the emotion of the story to his awe-inspiring presentation of it, and that leaves the film beautiful but always just out of reach. –JB
The Band’s Visit *** 1/2
Sasson Gabai, Ronit Elkabetz, Saleh Bakri. Directed by Eran Kolirin. 84 minutes. Rated PG-13. In Arabic and Hebrew with English subtitles.
An Egyptian police band comes to Israel to play at the opening of an Arab cultural center, but a mix-up sends them to the wrong town. Stuck in the middle of nowhere, the musicians have no choice but to befriend and rely on the locals until they’re able to take the next bus to where they need to be. Writer-director Kolirin gives a decidedly low-key account of the evening that the band members spend in the town of Bet Hatikva. While no one talks about the strained relations between their two cultures, the effort to bridge the gap is always lurking in the background. Given how well the characters manage, it’s easy to imagine that the entire situation could be resolved if only the Alexandria Police Orchestra could visit every little town in Israel. –JB
The Bank Job *** 1/2
Jason Statham, Saffron Burrows, Daniel Mays. Directed by Roger Donaldson. 110 minutes. Rated R.
All that’s really known for sure about the 1971 London caper that inspired the film is that a group of amateur thieves tunneled their way into the basement vault of Lloyds Bank in Marylebone and made off with the contents of dozens of safe-deposit boxes. Though arrests were eventually made, little of the booty was ever recovered, and the incident quickly and rather mysteriously vanished from news reports. This prompted speculation that items involving national security had been pilfered, and the filmmakers have merrily woven the juiciest theories into a preposterously entertaining tapestry of scandal and intrigue, involving everything from evidence of police corruption to snapshots of Princess Margaret getting boned on some Caribbean island. –MD
Bee Movie ** 1/2
Voices of Jerry Seinfeld, Renee Zellweger, Matthew Broderick. Directed by Steve Hickner and Simon J. Smith. 90 minutes. Rated PG.
Disaffected honeybee Barry B. Benson (Seinfeld) is unwilling to commit himself to a regimented life of honey production and eager to experience life beyond the hive. So Barry ventures into the human world, where he breaks the bee law against communicating with people and strikes up a friendship with florist Vanessa (Zellweger). There are a few funny lines here and there, and the bee society is sometimes creative and clever. But the film is mostly a collection of tired celebrity voice cameos and stale Seinfeld riffs repackaged to relate to the bee world. –JB
Be Kind Rewind ***
Jack Black, Mos Def, Danny Glover. Directed by Michel Gondry. 101 minutes. Rated PG-13.
There’s a corner video store—Be Kind Rewind—that has never made the transition from VHS to DVD. Jerry (Black), bosom pal of Be Kind employee Mike (Mos Def), absorbs a massive electrical charge one night, and merely upon entering the store the following day, manages to demagnetize the entire inventory. Fearful of losing a slightly batty but valued customer who’s keen to catch up with Ghostbusters, Jerry and Mike proceed to grab a cheap video camera, scrape up some chintzy costumes and produce a 15-minute version starring themselves. Before you can say “yeah right okay sure,” their renditions of everything from 2001: A Space Odyssey to Rush Hour 2 have the neighborhood lined up around the block. Be Kind Rewind just sorta ambles along, goofy as hell, hoping you’ll be charmed by its absence of flash; only the homemade-movie excerpts are genuinely funny. –MD
Bonneville (Not reviewed)
Jessica Lange, Kathy Bates, Joan Allen. Directed by Christopher N. Rowley. 93 minutes. Rated PG.
A woman takes a road trip to Santa Barbara with her two friends in order to deliver the ashes of her dead husband to his resentful daughter.
The Bucket List ** 1/2
Jack Nicholson, Morgan Freeman, Sean Hayes. Directed by Rob Reiner. 97 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Early in The Bucket List, each of the film’s protagonists (auto mechanic Carter Chambers and hospital magnate Edward Cole) discovers that he has only a few months left to live—a year at most. Chambers (Freeman) draws up a list of things he’d like to do before his final kick, Cole (Nicholson) adds several items, and the next thing you know they’re flitting around the globe in Cole’s private jet, carpe-ing the holy hell out of every precious diem they have left. Any buddy movie rises or falls on the chemistry between its stars, and Freeman’s avuncular warmth offsets Nicholson’s irascible cynicism in a predictable but nonetheless satisfying way. And even at its most formulaic, the film manages the occasional surprise. –MD
Charlie Bartlett ***
Anton Yelchin, Robert Downey Jr., Hope Davis, Kat Dennings. Directed by Jon Poll. 97 minutes. Rated R.
After getting expelled from yet another ritzy private school, Charlie (Yelchin) enrolls at the local public school. Once there, he starts a prescription-drug ring in the boys’ bathroom and adopts the toilet seat as the new psychiatrist’s couch. As an added bonus, the pest of the principal’s office falls in love with none other than the principal’s daughter. The movie tends to ramble, frequently including scenes that fail to progress the story. Director Poll would have benefited from a dose of some Charlie-prescribed Ritalin to maintain his focus. But Yelchin’s performance as the ever-endearing Charlie makes up for Poll’s concentration problems. His onscreen presence makes it easy to sit back and be entertained. –TC
Charlie Wilson’s War *** 1/2
Tom Hanks, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, Julia Roberts. Directed by Mike Nichols. 97 minutes. Rated R.
Hanks puts his enormous charm to use as the seemingly oblivious politician who latched onto the conflict between the Russians and the Afghans in the 1980s and made it into his personal crusade, increasing funding for covert operations and, as the movie would have it, becoming almost single-handedly responsible for repelling the Russians from Afghanistan. This, apparently, is what has been missing from all of this year’s movies about the ongoing conflict in the Middle East: humor. It seems like a simple thing, but the reason that Charlie Wilson’s War is just about the only one of these films worth seeing is that it actually cares about entertaining its audience, about giving them something to laugh at and have fun with before hitting them over the head with how bad things are. –JB
College Road Trip (Not reviewed)
Martin Lawrence, Raven-Symoné, Brenda Song. Directed by Roger Kumble. 83 minutes. Rated G.
A college-bound girl (Raven-Symone) has her hopes of independence shattered when her overbearing police-chief father (Lawrence) insists on escorting her on a road trip to prospective universities.
Definitely, Maybe **
Ryan Reynolds, Isla Fisher, Elizabeth Banks, Rachel Weisz, Abigail Breslin. Directed by Adam Brooks. 105 minutes. Rated PG-13.
The film’s strained gimmick is that Will (Reynolds), about to get a divorce from his unseen wife, recounts the story of their romance to his curious daughter, Maya (Breslin), who has somehow gone all of her 10 years of life without ever learning how her parents met or where they lived or what they did before she was born. Will variously seems ready to commit to college sweetheart Emily (Banks); free-spirited writer Summer (Weisz); and cynical co-worker April (Fisher). Since none of them can be knocked out of the running right away, the movie equivocates on each, never tipping the sympathy too far toward one particular object of affection, and the result is three movies’ worth of rom-com clichés stuffed into one. –JB
Doomsday (Not reviewed)
Rhona Mitra, Sean Pertwee, Bob Hoskins. Directed by Neil Marshall. 105 minutes. Rated R.
A team of people venture into a walled-off city to find a cure for a disease threatening the future of the human race.
Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who! ***
Voices of Jim Carrey, Steve Carell, Carol Burnett. Directed by Jimmy Hayward and Steve Martino. 88 minutes. Rated G.
Carrey carries the weight of a hyperactive pachyderm with a propensity for folding his large, malleable ears into headgear. Upon discovering that an endangered microcosm of life exists upon a speck of dust, he undertakes a treacherous journey to secure a safe haven atop Mount Nool for the diminutive Whos, vocally mimicking ninjas, airline pilots and even JFK along the way. The film is visually impressive, from subtly waving strands of hair to Seuss’ signature towers of household items and giant machinery, and more faithful to the author’s vision than were the live-action How the Grinch Stole Christmas and Cat in the Hat. Unfortunately, with jokes like, “How many times have I told you, the jungle is no place to act like an animal,” Horton is nowhere near as witty as, say, Shrek. –JS
Enchanted *** 1/2
Amy Adams, Patrick Dempsey, James Marsden. Directed by Kevin Lima. 107 minutes. Rated PG.
Adams plays Giselle, an animated Disney girl hoping to marry a prince. The cartoon Prince Edward (Marsden) rescues Giselle, and they fall in love. But Edward’s stepmother, a bitter, evil queen, throws Giselle down a well that leads to live-action, modern New York City. Divorce lawyer and single dad Robert (Dempsey) finds her and reluctantly lets her stay on his couch. Although Enchanted doesn’t fully take advantage of its unique idea, it’s still a hugely entertaining, clever comic fairy tale. –JMA
The Eye (Not reviewed)
Jessica Alba, Alessandro Nivola, Parker Posey. Directed by David Moreau and Xavier Palud. 97 minutes. Rated PG-13.
A woman (Alba) receives a corneal transplant that allows her to see into the supernatural world.
Fool’s Gold * 1/2
Matthew McConaughey, Kate Hudson, Donald Sutherland. Directed by Andy Tennant. 110 minutes. Rated PG-13.
A murderous rap star/loan shark using his incompetent cronies to recoup his investment. An overly generous multimillionaire trying to connect with his tabloid-fodder daughter. A newly divorced pair of treasure hunters who give new meaning to the words “sexual history.” What do they have in common? Not as much as Fool’s Gold would like you to believe. The movie expects audiences to simply accept that this motley crew of characters might actually come together in pursuit of an 18th-century sunken treasure. But Fool’s Gold’s players are more caricatures than characters; only Hudson manages to infuse the otherwise absurd film with a hint of believability and comedy. Fool’s Gold delivers too many fools and too little comedy gold. –TC
Funny Games ****
Naomi Watts, Tim Roth, Michael Pitt, Brady Corbet. Directed by Michael Haneke. 107 minutes. Rated R.
Arriving one sunny afternoon at their summer home in the Hamptons, an affluent and from all appearances perfectly normal family—Watts and Roth as Mom and Dad, Devon Gearhart as their towheaded pre-teen son—notices a pair of young men in tennis whites chatting with their neighbors. Before long, this obsequious duo (Pitt and Corbet) show up at the house, ostensibly to borrow some eggs. Turns out they’re much more interested in the family’s golf clubs and kitchen knives. Why are they torturing these poor people? Why, for our own delectation, of course, as Pitt’s smiling killer makes clear in a series of knowing winks and quick asides delivered directly to the camera lens. It’s a uniquely nerve-shredding and thought-provoking treatise on screen violence, one explicitly designed to make you feel uncomfortable about your own voyeuristic bloodlust. But to say that this movie isn’t for everybody is a gross understatement. –MD
I Am Legend **
Will Smith, Alice Braga, Charlie Tahan. Directed by Francis Lawrence. 100 minutes. Rated PG-13.
A few years after an “elegant” man-made virus has wiped out most of the world’s human population, Robert Neville (Smith), a military microbiologist stationed in Manhattan and the city’s last healthy biped inhabitant, scavenges the island for supplies in the company of his German shepherd. Battling loneliness, he also conducts experiments to reverse the effects of the disease on “dark-seekers”—physically ravaged, vampire-like victims of the disease who huddle in cavernous hovels during the day and feed by night. The introduction of a pair of healthy, itinerant survivors (Braga and Tahan) midway through is the final straw, and from there the movie lumbers toward a hasty, predictable conclusion that even manages to mangle the meaning of Matheson’s lovely title. –MH
In Bruges ****
Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, Ralph Fiennes. Directed by Martin McDonagh. 107 minutes. Rated R.
The surreptitious plot revolves around two less-than-superb hitmen. In fact, they hardly seem suited for contract killing at all. The younger of the two, Ray (Farrell), has only performed two murders, and both at the same time. Only one of them was intentional. The elder assassin, Ken (Gleeson), is gentle and relaxed, seeming less interested in taking lives than in taking in the sights of Bruges, the well-preserved medieval town the two men are sent to following Ray’s debacle of an inaugural hit. The screenplay’s like a superb hitman—by the time you realize what it’s actually been doing, it’s already done. The difference is, after experiencing In Bruges, you’re still around to appreciate its brilliance. –MSH
Jumper 1/2
Hayden Christensen, Jamie Bell, Samuel L. Jackson, Rachel Bilson. Directed by Doug Liman. 88 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Teleporting Jumpers like David Rice (Christensen), who have existed in secrecy for millennia, are constantly hunted by a group of xenophobic zealots known as Paladins, whose mission in life is to exterminate David’s kind. Why? Beats me. The chief Paladin, Roland (Jackson), repeatedly intones that “only God should have such power,” and suggests that Jumpers are invariably corrupted by their absolute freedom of movement. Liman and his effects team do their damnedest to dazzle us, warping the frame at the point of rupture and accompanying each jump with a vaguely metallic “whoosh!” noise, but the novelty, which is negligible to begin with, wears off in a big hurry. Jumper’s most serious problem is its leading man, whose overpowering aura of whiny entitlement could make any film insufferable. –MD
Juno *** 1/2
Ellen Page, Michael Cera, Jason Bateman, Jennifer Garner. Directed by Jason Reitman. 92 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Pregnant high-school student Juno (Page) is a sullen indie-rock chick who sleeps with her best friend/bandmate Bleeker (Cera) because she’s “bored,” listens exclusively to punk rock made before she was born and peppers her speech with self-consciously artificial language that proves how much smarter she is than just about everyone she interacts with. Reitman continues to show his aptitude for sharp comedy in the face of situations that most people would find appalling, and he brings the at-times overly mannered screenplay to life in a visually inventive way, downplaying the preciousness that could make it come off like a riot-grrrl version of a Wes Anderson movie. –JB
The Living End ** 1/2
Mike Dytri, Craig Gilmore, Darcy Marta. Directed by Gregg Araki. 85 minutes. Not rated.
Hustler-with-a-death-wish Luke (Dytri) casually destroys property and murders gay-bashers, all with the same shrug and unlit cigarette dangling from his lips. When Luke barges into the car of shy writer Jon (Gilmore), the two begin an alternately sweet and violent romance that’s doomed from the start. Araki’s 1992 film spends maybe a third of its time grappling with serious, weighty concerns about AIDS and its implications for gay culture, and has a handful of truly touching moments. But those are outweighed by the slapdash plotting and go-nowhere set pieces, which seem designed mainly for cheap shock value. –JB
Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day ****
Frances McDormand, Amy Adams, Ciaran Hinds. Directed by Bharat Nalluri. 92 minutes. Rated PG-13.
McDormand plays Guinevere Pettigrew, an unemployable governess in the late 1930s. On the search for a new job, she finds herself quite suddenly and unexpectedly employed as a “social secretary” for rising singer and actress Delysia Lafosse (Adams). It goes without saying that the film hinges on Adams and her perky, wide-eyed, rapid-fire patter. She embodies a kind of cutie-pie, clueless innocence to balance her debauchery; it’s a Carole Lombard-like role that few living actresses could pull off. The soulful, earthy McDormand perfectly complements her, filling in as the better half of a kind of Jeeves and Wooster team for modern-day multiplexes. Depending on your leaning, Miss Pettigrew will go perfectly with either tea and cucumber sandwiches, or a chilled martini. –JMA
National Treasure: Book of Secrets (Not reviewed)
Nicolas Cage, Justin Bartha, Diane Kruger. Directed by Jon Turteltaub. 124 minutes. Rated PG.
Treasure hunter Benjamin Franklin Gates (Cage) looks to discover the truth behind the assassination of Abraham Lincoln by uncovering the mystery within the 18 pages missing from assassin John Wilkes Booth’s diary.
Never Back Down * 1/2
Sean Faris, Amber Heard, Djimon Hounsou, Cam Gigandet. Directed by Jeff Wadlow. 110 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Lower-class kid Jake (Faris) and his single mother and younger brother move to yuppie country. By the end of his first day at school, Jake has stumbled into a surreal fantasy world, where everyone looks like a supermodel (except for the one goofy kid who will inevitably become Jake’s sidekick), and the most popular kids beat each other senseless in mixed martial arts brawls, where victory guarantees you a high spot on the social ladder and a kick-ass fight clip on YouTube. Jake resists fighting for all of 30 seconds before remembering the movie’s title. Never Back Down is certainly as bad as its Steven Seagal-style title suggests, but I didn’t quite hate it. In fact, there are some unintentionally hilarious moments that almost make the film worth seeing. –MSH
The Other Boleyn Girl ** 1/2
Natalie Portman, Scarlett Johansson, Eric Bana. Directed by Justin Chadwick. 115 minutes. Rated PG-13.
The film’s account of the rivalry between Anne Boleyn (Portman), second wife of King Henry VIII of England, and her sister Mary (Johansson), who was the king’s mistress before he married Anne, is often rather bland and flat, and when the movie does occasionally unleash its seedier side, it does so awkwardly and unconvincingly. It’s not accurate enough to be a valuable history lesson, and its departures do little to justify themselves dramatically. It’s just another pointlessly dressed-up take on a story that’s already plenty overdressed. –JB
Penelope ***
Christina Ricci, James McAvoy, Catherine O’Hara, Peter Dinklage. Directed by Mark Palansky. 102 minutes. Rated PG.
Her blue-blood family having been struck with an unfortunate curse, the titular heroine (Ricci) was born sporting a prominent snout, one that keeps the well-heeled boys at bay and her mother (O’Hara) in a perpetual state of maternal hysteria. Only once she is loved by “one of her own kind” can Penelope break the curse, regain her proper human schnoz and presumably live happily ever after. Sure, parts are weighed down by earnest cutesiness, but what Penelope is lacking in indie cred it makes up for with its vibrant sets, costumes and special effects. –JS
Rambo **
Sylvester Stallone, Julie Benz, Matthew Marsden. Directed by Sylvester Stallone. 93 minutes. Rated R.
Rambo (Stallone) has been living in Thailand for some time, world-weary and cynical, catching snakes and piloting a longboat up the Salween River for a living. American missionaries approach him for a ride into Burma, a deadly war zone, so that they can hand out Bibles and encouraging words. Not surprisingly, their chosen village is attacked, and they are captured. So a band of scurvy, tattooed mercenaries join Rambo on a rescue mission that lasts the entire second half of the film and results in mighty amounts of carnage. Stallone plays Rambo with very little dialogue, which is good, because whenever anyone speaks, it’s cringe-worthy. Rambo really doesn’t bother to ask where this relic of a character fits today. –JMA
Semi-Pro ** 1/2
Will Ferrell, Woody Harrelson, Andre Benjamin. Directed by Kent Alterman. 90 minutes. Rated R.
Ferrell is disco one-hit wonder Jackie Moon, who used his music royalties to buy up an ABA basketball team in Flint, Michigan, and install himself as both the coach and the star player. With attendance barely in the double digits and a team full of lovable losers who aren’t exactly great basketball players, the Flint Tropics have only one chance to make it into the NBA as it absorbs the struggling ABA. It’s your classic sports-underdog formula, and the script never deviates from it. What laughs there are come from the absurdity of certain extended set pieces, no doubt largely improvised by Ferrell and the requisite who’s-who of current screen and TV comedy. –JB
The Spiderwick Chronicles ****
Freddie Highmore, Sarah Bolger, Mary-Louise Parker. Directed by Mark Waters. 97 minutes. Rated PG.
Show me a world with cell phones, single moms and SUVs and then reveal that every dandelion seed has a hidden mystical creature in it, and I’m as amazed as the film’s hero. The Spiderwick Chronicles never feels slow, but it is very deliberate in its pacing, and only gradually shows us the hidden magic in the mundane world we all know. Truth be told, the special effects aren’t even that convincing. The trolls and goblins look cool, but they also look very digital. But by the time the epic battle between the movie’s child heroes and the evil Mulgarath finally takes place, the spectacular images involved seem truly spectacular. This is also the first fantasy movie I’ve seen in a long time that didn’t set itself up for a sequel (or trilogy), and it’s the first one in a long time that I kind of wish had. –MSH
Step Up 2 the Streets (Not reviewed)
Briana Evigan, Robert Hoffman, Telisha Shaw. Directed by Jon M. Chu. 98 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Romantic sparks occur between two dance students from different backgrounds at the Maryland School of the Arts.
There Will Be Blood ****
Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Dano, Dillon Freasier. Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. 158 minutes. Rated R.
The film, which spans the period from 1898-1927, follows the meteoric rise to fortune of a rapacious prospector, Daniel Plainview. Unforgettably embodied by Day-Lewis, Plainview is first seen mining silver in an astonishing wordless prologue that lasts nearly 15 minutes. A few years later, he’s established himself as an oil man, traveling with his adopted son H.W. (Freasier) from one impoverished burg to another. All goes smoothly until Plainview runs up against his equal in greed and hypocrisy, a boy preacher by the name of Eli Sunday (Dano), who uses his influence to blackmail Plainview into supporting his Church of the Third Revelation. The ensuing battle of wills between the forces of capitalism and organized religion could scarcely be uglier. Anderson’s mastery of the medium has never been in doubt, but There Will Be Blood is even more impressive for the comparative restraint he shows here. –MD
Untraceable * 1/2
Diane Lane, Billy Burke, Colin Hanks. Directed by Gregory Hoblit. 100 minutes. Rated R.
Following pretty much every cliché known to the serial-killer genre, Untraceable has its particular psychopath broadcasting his grisly killings online, with the speed at which his victims die determined by how many sickos (just like the people who watch this movie!) log on to his website. Although Hoblit has made his share of passable-to-more-than-passable thrillers, here he and his three screenwriters generate essentially no suspense, showing us the killer early on and then having Lane’s FBI agent solve the whole case in one rushed, exposition-heavy scene. Instead of genuine tension, we get cheap gross-outs ripped off from movies like Hostel, making Untraceable into torture porn for housewives. –JB
Vantage Point ** 1/2
Dennis Quaid, William Hurt, Matthew Fox. Directed by Pete Travis. 90 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Quaid plays a Secret Service agent just returning to duty after taking a bullet for the president (Hurt) during an assassination attempt. He ends up caught in the middle of another assassination attempt, an elaborate and often nonsensical terror plot carried out during a peace summit in Spain. After shots are fired and two bombs go off, the movie is essentially one long chase sequence, but the filmmakers drag it out by employing a useless gimmick that keeps restarting the story from a different character’s perspective. It’s merely a cheap way to create false suspense, and also robs the movie of any chance for meaningful character development, so that we might care whether these people get blown up, or catch the undermotivated bad guys. –JB
Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins *
Martin Lawrence, James Earl Jones, Joy Bryant. Directed by Malcolm D. Lee. 114 minutes. Rated PG-13.
Lawrence stars as the successful host of a sleazy talk show, engaged to a Survivor winner (Bryant). They visit his Southern family, the source for a lot of unsolved childhood anguish. Funny people abound, such as Cedric the Entertainer, Mo’Nique and Mike Epps, but their antics can’t save this lazy, bloated, stupid affair. Writer-director Lee sets up all the typical jokes with no skill or timing, and his attempts at heartfelt drama flop; in fact, his camera seems to have trouble even following any kind of physical movement. This is the type of thing his cousin Spike has railed against for years. –JMA
JMA Jeffrey M. Anderson; JB Josh Bell; TC Tasha Chemplavil; MD Mike D’Angelo; MH Mark Holcomb; MSH Matthew Scott Hunter; JS Julie Seabaugh
Listen to film critic Josh Bell’s rundown of the week’s new releases in theaters and on DVD every Friday at 6 p.m. on Xtreme Radio 107.5-FM.