New Releases for the Week of June 30, 2017

DESPICABLE ME 3

(Universal/Illumination) Starring the voices of Steve Carell, Kristen Wiig, Trey Parker, Miranda Cosgrove, Steve Coogan, Julie Andrews, Jenny Slate. Directed by Kyle Balda, Pierre Coffin and Eric Guillon

Supervillain Gru is on the straight and narrow now that he has a family to take care of. He’s even working on the other side – law enforcement – but when tasked with taking down up and coming supervillain Balthazar Bratt he fails and loses his job. Adrift, he is reunited with the twin brother he never knew he had and who has been continuing the family legacy of villainy. It doesn’t take much cajoling to get Gru on board for a twin brother villain team but how will his girlfriend Lucy react to his return to criminal behavior?

See the trailer, clips, interviews, a featurette and B-roll video here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard, 3D, IMAX 3D
Genre: Animated Feature
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG (for action and rude humor)

Baby Driver

(Tri-Star) Ansel Elgort, Lily James, Kevin Spacey, Jamie Foxx. Fan favorite director Edgar Wright has come up with another winner in this much-anticipated crime epic. Baby is a gifted getaway driver with a few quirks, not the least of which is putting on his own personal playlist to drown out the white noise when he’s working. After he falls hard for a waitress, he realizes he wants a different life but getting out of the life he’s in is not easy at all.

See the trailer, clips and featurettes here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Action
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for violence and language throughout)

The Beguiled

(Focus) Colin Farrell, Nicole Kidman, Kirsten Dunst, Elle Fanning. Who would have ever thought that “Sofia Coppola remakes Clint Eastwood” would ever become a sentence? In the waning days of the Civil War a wounded Union soldier is taken in by the headmistress of a girl’s school in the rural South. As he is nursed back to health, some of the girls in the school begin to fall for his charm. The headmistress realizes that he is far more dangerous to the school than she first thought and takes steps to protect her charges.

See the trailer, clips and featurettes here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Thriller
Now Playing: AMC Altamonte Mall, AMC Disney Springs, Cinemark Artegon Marketplace, Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: R (for some sexuality)

The Hero

(The Orchard) Sam Elliott, Laura Prepon, Nick Offerman, Krysten Ritter. An aging actor who was once a respected Western actor spends most of his time smoking dope and hanging out with a fellow actor. When he meets a much younger woman who falls head over heels for him, he begins to turn things around, even reaching out to bridge the rift between himself and his estranged daughter. Can he resurrect his career and heal old wounds? The Hero was not only a big hit at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, it was also the opening night film at the Florida Film Festival as well.

See the trailer, clips and interviews here.
For more on the movie this is the website
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Dramedy
Now Playing: AMC New Smyrna, Enzian Theater, Regal Pavilion Port Orange, Rialto Spanish Springs Town Square
Rating: R (for drug use, language and some sexual content)

The House

(New Line) Will Ferrell, Amy Poehler, Jason Mantzoukas, Nick Kroll. When a doting pair of parents loses their daughter’s college fund, they start scrambling to find a way to make sure she can afford the high-end college she has not only gotten into but has always dreamed of attending. They come up with the somewhat desperate plan of turning their home into a Las Vegas-style casino. As you might expect, things go crazily out of control quickly.

See the trailer, clips, interviews and B-roll video here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Comedy
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for language throughout, sexual references, drug use, some violence and brief nudity)

Past Life

(Goldwyn) Nelly Tagar, Joy Rieger, Dovon Tavory, Evgenia Dodina. While touring West Germany in the late 70s, a soloist is accosted by an elderly German woman who claims she’s the daughter of a murderer. Understandably shaken, she and her sister – a caustic woman who has a chilly relationship with her father – begin to investigate what he did during the war and discover some family secrets are best left buried.

See the trailer and a clip here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Thriller
Now Playing: Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: NR

OPENING IN ORLANDO/DAYTONA

None

ALSO OPENING IN MIAMI:

David Lynch: The Art Life
Inconceivable
Manifesto
Queen of Thursdays
Sex Doll
The Student
The Wedding Plan

ALSO OPENING IN TAMPA:

A Stork’s Journey

ALSO OPENING IN JACKSONVILLE:

The Wedding Plan

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Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You

Little Norman at the lectern.

(2015) Documentary (Music Box) Norman Lear, Rob Reiner, Amy Poehler, John Amos, Russell Simmons, George Clooney, Louise Lasser, Mel Brooks, Bob Saget, Carl Reiner, Bill Moyers, Jon Stewart, Lyn Lear, Kate Lear, Keaton Nigel Cooke, Jay Leno, Martin Mull, Jimmie Walker, Bud Yorkin, Sally Struthers, Mary Kay Place, Valerie Bertinelli, Adrienne Barbeau. Directed by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady

One of the giants of the television landscape is Norman Lear. While there are those who criticize his politics (he’s an unabashed liberal who brought progressive thought to the airwaves back when it was dominated by conservative sorts) nobody can deny the success that he enjoyed (the only man to have six shows in the top ten simultaneously) nor the legacy he left behind.

This documentary is mainly aimed at the glory days of Lear’s career in the 70s, as we follow the creation and execution of shows like All in the Family, Maude, Good Times and The Jeffersons among others. There are some interesting things worth noting, like Carroll O’Conner had a very hard time reconciling his own liberal beliefs with the racist dialogue his character had to say. He often fought Lear on certain elements of dialogue because he felt so uncomfortable about saying it, even as a character not himself. Generally, Lear prevailed and as such we got Archie Bunker, America’s favorite bigot as TV Guide once termed him.

While there are plenty of talking head interviews, the most interesting are with Lear himself who even as a nonagenarian is clear-eyed and a charismatic raconteur. While some of the interviews come a bit close to fawning, certainly if anyone warranted such treatment its Lear. As we hear from such modern comedy icons as Amy Poehler and Jon Stewart (as well as Everybody Loves Raymond creator Phil Rosenthal) one gets a real sense of just how influential the man continues to be. Certainly the modern television landscape would be a very different place without him.

Best of all, we get to see a goodly amount of clips of some of the various shows’ best moments. For those like myself who grew up in that era, the sense of nostalgia is palpable, and very welcome. While I didn’t religiously watch these shows (I grew up in a conservative household with a dad who thought Lear was too political and certainly too much of a leftie for his tastes), I did watch them often and enjoyed them.

There is a bit of a misstep; there are some linking devices here with a young boy, wearing a hat similar to the one that Lear has become known for wearing (for more than 50 years, no less) apparently playing Lear as a young man re-enacting some of the events of Lear’s life on a bare stage. While I give the filmmakers props for at least trying to get out of the typical talking head/archival footage mode that characterizes most profile documentaries, it just doesn’t work.

What does work is Lear himself. He had a difficult relationship with his own father, who was jailed when Lear was just nine years old. One of the more powerful moments is when Lear unexpectedly breaks down when discussing his relationship with his dad. It’s one of the times we get to see inside the inner Lear.

And there’s the rub. I don’t think we get a very complete view of who Lear the man is, but you’re not really going to do that in an hour and a half in any case. Thinking that any documentarian can do so is simply unrealistic. We do get a good sense of Lear’s accomplishments and what he means to modern television in general. We also come to the understanding that as influential as Lear is, and as much as his work echoes into the modern day small screen ethos, nobody makes ‘em like the master anymore and there is a hint of the bittersweet in that fact that is inescapable. There will never be another quite like him.

REASONS TO GO: Some very powerful emotional moments. A trip down memory lane. Really gives you an idea of how influential Lear is.
REASONS TO STAY: Not sure we needed Little Norman.
FAMILY VALUES: A little bit of profanity.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Lear was 93 years old when interviewed for this film.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 4/17/16: Rotten Tomatoes: 80% positive reviews. Metacritic: No score found.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: The Kid Stays in the Picture
FINAL RATING: 8/10
NEXT: Wrestling Alligators

Sisters

Sisters partying like it’s 1989.

(2015) Comedy (Universal) Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Maya Rudolph, Ike Bairnholz, James Brolin, Dianne Wiest, John Cena, John Leguizamo, Bobby Moynihan, Greta Lee, Madison Davenport, Rachel Dratch, Santino Fontana, Britt Lower, Samantha Bee, Matt Oberg, Kate McKinnon, Jon Glaser, Chris Parnell, Paula Pell, Emily Tarver. Directed by Jason Moore

I’m a big fan of Tina Fey and Amy Poehler. For one thing, they’re really, really funny and when paired up, even funnier. As a matter of fact, they might just be the best all-female comedy team of all time. Think about it; how many all-female comedy teams are you aware of? There definitely should be more of them.

So this is their second movie together after the successful Baby Mama and it has kind of a John Hughes-like scenario. Two sisters – Kate Ellis (Fey), a 40ish foul-up who is brash and sexy, and Maura (Poehler), a divorced nurse with a charitable compulsion that sometimes leads to awkwardness – are summoned home to Orlando (although only one scene was filmed here) to their ancestral family home which their parents (Brolin, Wiest) are putting on the market so that they can move into a retirement community and divest themselves of most of their possessions. The girls are meant to clean out their rooms so that the sale can be finalized the following Monday.

Much nostalgia ensues as the girls decide to throw one last blow-out party like the ones they threw in high school…when Maura would be the responsible one and Kate would party hard. With the realization that Maura never got laid in her own bedroom and the window of opportunity closing, Kate decides to snare James (Bairnholz), a hunky neighbor, to seal the deal.

Kate offers to be the designated party Mom and stay sober, which is a new role for her. She does have a teenage daughter (Davenport) but their relationship is rocky. In fact, the daughter has left the nest, exasperated by her mom’s irresponsibility and party party party attitude and she refuses to tell Kate where she is. Determined to prove herself responsible, Kate throws herself full tilt into her new role.

And that’s really it for plot. If you’ve seen one high school blowout party movie, you’ve seen them all and this is essentially a middle aged riff on that. It has that 80s John Hughes movie kind of vibe which isn’t a bad thing at all, but lacks the really laugh-out-loud consistency that Hughes was able to create for his movies. There’s more of a Farrelly Brothers consistency in which everything is thrown at the comedy wall and whatever sticks does, the more outrageous the better. There are more bra jokes in this movie than I think have been in any movie in cinematic history, and some drug humor (although nothing like a Seth Rogen film) for people who don’t do drugs. There is most definitely a been-there done-that feel to things, and while that can make for cinematic comfort food, it really isn’t what you want out of talents the likes of Poehler and Fey.

The good thing is that Fey and Poehler are one of the greatest comic teams in history – not just female, but any. Their chemistry is undeniable and the two play off of each other better than anyone working in the movies today. It’s at the center of the movie (as well it should be) and makes their roles as sisters thoroughly believable. Da Queen, who has a sister, agreed that it was a realistic portrayal of the dynamic between sisters.

There is a cornucopia of supporting roles, from SNL veterans (Fey, Poehler, Dratch, Moynihan, Rudolph) to WWE wrestlers (Cena) to Daily Show stars (Bee) and sitcom regulars (Bairnholz, Brolin). Most of the roles are essentially one-dimensional who are there to add a specific element (angry rival, studly drug dealer, drugged-out class clown, Asian pedicurist) to the proceedings, but like the leads are given very little to do that is really genuinely funny. Bairnholz shows some promise as a comic leading man though, and Rudolph manages to express every annoyed expression that it is possible for a human face to make.

Don’t get me wrong; this is entertaining enough that I can recommend it, largely due to Fey and Poehler, but this isn’t as good as it could and should have been. A pedestrian plot and lack of actual laughs turn this from what should have been a showcase for two of the most talented comedians working today into a just average comedy with too many characters and not enough character.

REASONS TO GO: The chemistry between Fey and Poehler continues. Some fine supporting performances.
REASONS TO STAY: Not enough laugh-out-loud jokes. The plot is too been-there done-that.
FAMILY VALUES: Plenty of crude sexual content, a fair amount of profanity and drug use.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Brolin and Wiest also play parents in last year’s indie film Life in Pieces.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 1/5/16: Rotten Tomatoes: 59% positive reviews. Metacritic: 58/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Step Brothers
FINAL RATING: 6/10
NEXT: Won’t Back Down

New Releases for the Week of December 18, 2015

STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS

(Disney) Daisy Ridley, Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford, Oscar Isaac, Adam Driver, Max von Sydow, John Boyega, Simon Pegg, Lupita Nyong’o. Directed by J.J. Abrams

The wait is finally over as the most eagerly anticipated movie in maybe a decade finally debuts in theaters and everyone is going gaga over it. I’d give a plot summary here but does it really matter? The reviews have been strong, word of mouth is as usual critical from the fanboys and aging fans are reliving their youth all over the globe, and that can’t be a bad thing. Merry Christmas, Disney accountants!

See the trailer, promos, interviews and featurettes here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard, 3D, IMAX 3D
Genre: Science Fiction
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG-13 (for sci-fi action violence)

Alvin and the Chipmunks: Road Chip

(20^th Century Fox) Jason Lee, Justin Long (voice), Kimberly Williams-Paisley, Matthew Gray Gubler (voice). The chipmunks and Dave take their act on the road. Just as long as it takes them away from wherever I am.

See the trailer, clips and interviews here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Family Comedy
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG-13 (for some thematic elements and brief suggestive material)

The Assassin

(Well Go USA) Qi Shu, Chen Chang, Satoshi Tsumabuki, Dahong Ni. A young woman, abducted as a child from her home by a general of the army, trained into adulthood to be an assassin, is ordered to kill the man she is betrothed to. She must discover why she was chosen for this job and in doing so confront her past before she makes the choice to leave the only life she’s ever known or murder the only man she’s ever loved.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Martial Arts
Now Playing: Enzian Theater
Rating: NR

Bajirao Mastani

(Eros International) Priyanka Chopra, Deepika Padukone, Ranveer Singh, Mahesh Manjrekar. In ancient India, a cunning general and his second wife are fated to be caught in events that are sweeping through the sub-continent. This true story has the production values of an epic and may be one of the most sumptuously filmed movies to ever come out of that country.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Romance Adventure
Now Playing: AMC Loew’s Universal Citiplex, Touchstar Southchase
Rating: NR

Dilwale

(Red Chillies) Shah Rukh Khan, Kajol, Kriri Sanon, Varun Dhawan. A little bit like Romeo and Juliet, two families that compete in business, in politics and in just about everything else are separated when one family moves away. Fifteen years afterwards, the children meet again and sparks fly – as well as romantic ones.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Romance
Now Playing: Touchstar Southchase
Rating: NR

Hitchcock/Truffaut

(Cohen) Alfred Hitchcock, Francois Truffaut, Matthieu Amalric (voice), Martin Scorsese. One of the most influential books in the history of filmmaking is the interview between French New Wave director Truffaut and the Master of Suspense Hitchcock. Two of the all-time best in the business (many say Hitchcock was the best) talk about directing with a candidness that they might never have given during a mainstream interview. The book made from the interview has influenced many of the greatest directors of this generation; excerpts from the original interviews and commentary on what the book meant to their careers are included.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Documentary
Now Playing: Enzian Theater
Rating: PG-13 (for suggestive material and violent images)

Sisters

(Universal) Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, John Cena, Maya Rudolph. Two very different sisters – one a divorced mouse, the other a single party animal, come home to discover their parents are putting their childhood home up for sale. Distraught, they decide to relive their glory years one last time with a blow-out party that will perhaps provide the catharsis they need and the laughs that we need.

See the trailer, clips, a promo, a featurette and B-roll video here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Comedy
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for crude sexual content and language throughout, and for drug use)

A Very Murray Christmas

More fun to make than it is to watch?

(2015) Musical (Netflix) Bill Murray, Paul Shaffer, George Clooney, Miley Cyrus, Chris Rock, Michael Cera, Rashida Jones, Jason Schwartzman, Maya Rudolph, Jenny Lewis, Amy Poehler, David Johansen, Dmitri Dimitrov, Julie White, Phoenix. Directed by Sofia Coppola

Back in the day, celebs like Dean Martin and Judy Garland used to put on Christmas specials and variety shows that would have the thinnest of plot lines but were mainly an excuse for them to sing a few Christmas tunes, have a few friends show up and generally just be themselves.

Director Sofia Coppola is trying to resurrect that vibe and has picked the perfect guy to do it; Murray plays a version of himself, contracted to do a live Christmas special at the Hotel Carlyle in New York City with its retro-cool Bemelmans’s Bar and Cafe Carlyle. An impressive guest list and audience however has evaporated as the city is paralyzed by a blizzard. Sensing catastrophe, Murray sinks into a booze-fueled depression as Hollywood handler-types (Poehler, White) and wanna-be agents (Cera) beset his Christmas mellow.

Guests happen by (Rock) or turn up as hotel employees (Lewis as a waitress, who has one of the better songs when she covers the Pogues’ “Fairytale of New York”, the band Phoenix whose frontman is married to Coppola, as a group of singing chefs) and musical numbers ensue. Murray captures the barfly/hipster mode nicely and sings adequately, but this is the type of Christmas show you’ll want to watch with a shaker full of martinis, a bowlful of peanuts and a pack of cigarettes.

Murray is a genial host but not in the tradition of a Dean Martin, a Mel Tormé or a Steve and Edie. Yes, he’s got that same rumpled charm that Dino had, but there is a weather-beaten feel to him, like someone who’s been too far and seen too much. The show opens with a bluesy downbeat Christmas song that sets the tone; world-weary Murray feeling the depression that often accompanies the Holidays. Essentially confined to the hotel by the weather and prowling the hallways like a claustrophobic cat, he hangs out in the bar and drinks away his sorrow, interacting with a bride (Jones) and groom (Schwartzman) whose wedding fell apart and whose relationship may be as well and listening to a lounge singer (Rudolph) belt out a few Christmas tunes.

Much of the action takes place in the hotel, other than a fantasy sequence featuring Clooney and Cyrus that takes place after Murray passes out. This is the kind of Christmas special for the crowd that identifies strongly with Mickey Rourke in Barfly or Nicolas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas. And yet, there is a hipness to it, like Murray has us in on the coolest night in that crazy New York town ever, a place where Chris Rock might just stumble in from out of the cold and warble a duet of “Do You Hear What I Hear?” with Murray.

So this isn’t for everybody, needless to say. Some will find it too irreverent and even take insult – those who think there’s a war on Christmas might see this as yet another salvo (it’s not). I think it’s far more subversive, taking a pot shot at our attitudes towards the holiday and snickering at it, reminding us at once that there are those who are lonely and depressed at this time of year, but also reminding us that the holidays can take a bunch of strangers and make them family, even if just for one night. In that sense, A Very Murray Christmas is suffused with holiday magic. I don’t know that this would bear repeated viewings but I suspect that those who revel in this sort of thing will make it an annual tradition. As for me, I’ll take A Charlie Brown Christmas every time.

REASONS TO GO: Hippest Christmas special ever. Murray is always a hoot.
REASONS TO STAY: Might be overly irreverent for some. A bit heavy on the quirk.
FAMILY VALUES: Some profanity, adult themes, drinking and general attitude.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Bill Murray doesn’t have Netflix and refuses to get it, which means he won’t be able to watch his own movie – not that he does that anyway.
BEYOND THE THEATER: Netflix
CRITICAL MASS: As of 12/11/15: Rotten Tomatoes: 79% positive reviews. Metacritic: 69/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Scrooged
FINAL RATING: 6.5/10
NEXT: Children of Men

Inside Out (2015)

Antonin Scalia reacts to recent Supreme Court decisions.

(2015) Animated Feature (Disney*Pixar) Starring the voices of Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith, Richard Kind, Bill Hader, Lewis Black, Mindy Kaling, Kaitlyn Dias, Diane Lane, Kyle MacLachlan, Paula Poundstone, Bobby Moynihan, Paula Pell, Dave Goelz, Frank Oz, John Ratzenberger, Josh Cooley, Flea, Carlos Alazraqui, Laraine Newman, Rashida Jones. Directed by Pete Docter and Ronaldo del Carmen

Growing up can be a dangerous thing. There are no manuals on how to deal with our emotions; we just have to do the best we can, which is generally not good enough. All we can do is learn from our mistakes and realize that it is okay not to be happy and cheerful every minute of every day.

11-year-old Riley (Dias) and her Mom (Lane) and Dad (MacLachlan) have moved to San Francisco from Minnesota and the usually cheerful Riley is not happy about it. She misses her friends, she misses playing hockey – a sport she loves and excels at – and she misses the shall we say less urban environment of her old home.

Up in her head, Riley’s emotions are working double time. In charge (more or less) is Joy (Poehler), a sprite-like being who wants all of Riley’s memories to be happy. Working alongside her are Sadness (Smith), Anger (Black), Disgust (Kaling) and Fear (Hader). Sadness is a squishy blue teardrop, Anger a red brick who sometimes blows flames out of his head, while Disgust is broccoli-green and Fear is a twitchy pipe cleaner with a bow tie.

The emotions work in Headquarters, the part of her brain where the emotions exert control and memories are made and separated into storage – long term, short term and core. “Islands” are formed by her core memories, helping to establish Riley’s personality – love of hockey, honesty, love of family, imagination and so on. A variety of workers keep the memories stored and occasionally, dump them to disappear (Phone numbers? Doesn’t need them. She keeps them in her phone) and make room for new ones. The memories manifest as little globes like pearls, colored by whatever emotion is associated with that memory although Sadness has discovered that when she touches a memory, the emotional hue can change.

Not long after that, a series of accidents strands Joy and Sadness together in the long term memory area of Riley’s head. Worse yet, the core memories have accidentally been sent there, which will slowly lead to her personality islands crumbling away. Joy and Sadness will have to work together to get those core memories back to Headquarters. They’ll be aided by Bing Bong (Kind), Riley’s imaginary playmate whom she hasn’t thought of in years. But they’ll have to hurry; Anger, Disgust and Fear have been left in charge and their decision-making process is, to say the least, untrustworthy.

This is one of the most imaginative animated features in years. Say what you want about the execution of the movie (which is, by the way, pretty dang nifty) but the concepts here are much different than any animated movie – or movie of any other kind – you’re likely to encounter.

The vocal performances are solid, albeit unspectacular although the casting of Black as Anger was inspired if you ask me. He steals the show whenever his rage button is pushed, which is frequently. Poehler gets the bulk of the dialogue as Joy but Kaling, Smith and Hader also get their moments and all of them encapsulate their emotional counterparts nicely.

True to its subject matter, the movie moves from whimsical (as when Bing Bong, Joy and Sadness move through the subconscious and change forms to two-dimensional and into Depression era animated figures) to downright moving (Bing Bong’s plaintive expression of his desire to make Riley happy, despite the fact that she’s forgotten him). While the emotional resonance of Wall-E and Toy Story 3 aren’t quite there, it still packs quite a powerful emotional punch in places. Softies, beware and bring plenty of tissue.

The only real quibble I have with the movie is that from time to time the story is not as straightforward as it is with other Pixar films and it might be a tad difficult to follow for younger kids, who will nonetheless be quite happy with the colors and shapes of the new characters that are likely to dominate the toy merchandise this summer (at least, until the new Minions movie comes out). It also has a tendency to set us up with what appear to be rules to follow only to do something a bit different. I’m not a stickler for such things – this is an animated feature, not a documentary – but some people who are anal about it might have issues.

The lesson to be learned here for kids is that it’s okay to be sad, or angry, disgusted or even afraid. It isn’t a requirement to be happy all the time – nobody is. We all must, sooner or later, deal with all of our emotions, even the not so nice ones. All of them are there for a reason.

Despite the minor flaw and given all of the movie’s strengths I found this movie to be beautifully rendered with a wonderfully imaginative setting and characters I could get behind. The storyline isn’t earth-shattering – essentially it’s about a disgruntled 11-year-old girl who wants to go back to the home she’s used to and acts out because of it – but all of us can relate to dealing with emotions, either because we know an eleven year old or at least been an eleven year old. Pixar has been on a bit of a cold streak as of late but this movie reminds us of how great this studio is and how much they have contributed to the animated feature genre. This is a gem, destined to be another in a long line of Pixar classics.

REASONS TO GO: Imaginative and different. Moving in places. Teaches kids that it’s okay to have negative emotions as well.
REASONS TO STAY: Can be confusing.
FAMILY VALUES: Some of the thematic elements may be a bit much for the very small; there is also some animated action and a few images that might be frightening for the less mature child.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Mindy Kaling was reportedly so moved by the script that she burst into tears during the initial meetings with director Pete Docter.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 7/5/15: Rotten Tomatoes: 98% positive reviews. Metacritic: 93/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Up
FINAL RATING: 8,5/10
NEXT: Ted 2

New Releases for the Week of June 19, 2015

INSIDE OUT

(Disney*Pixar) Starring the Voices Of Amy Poehler, Bill Hader, Louis Black, Mindy Kaling, Richard Kind, Diane Lane, Kyle MacLachlan, Paula Poundstone. Directed by Pete Docter and Ronaldo del Carmen

When a family moves to San Francisco, 11-year-old Riley is bummed to the max. Her parents don’t understand her, mainly because the emotions that live inside her head – Joy, Anger, Fear, Disgust and Sadness – have accidentally gone amuck inside her head. The emotions are conflicting over how to handle all the things going on in her life – a new city, a new school, new friends, a new life, and the loss of everything familiar. Battle stations – things are about to get a little heated in Headquarters…

See the trailer, interviews, a promo, a clip and B-roll video here.
For more on the movie this is the website .
Release Formats: Standard, 3D (opens Thursday)
Genre: Animated Feature
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG (for mild thematic elements and some action)

5 Flights Up

(Focus World) Morgan Freeman, Diane Keaton, Carrie Preston, Josh Pais. An elderly couple in Brooklyn have lived in the same apartment since they were young, never dreaming that their Williamsburg neighborhood would become gentrified and one of the most sought-after addresses in the city. Now having trouble mounting the five flights of stairs to get to their apartment, they reluctantly decide to put their apartment on the market. An unlikely sequence of events, combined with overeager realtors and snotty bargain hunters combine to make them wonder if they wouldn’t be better off just walking away.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Comedy
Now Playing: AMC Downtown Disney
Rating: PG-13 (for language and some nude images)

ABCD 2

(UTV) Varun Dhawan, Shradda Kapoor, Prabhu Deva, Dharmesh Yelande. An Indian dance troupe with three outstanding choreographers head to Vegas for an international hip-hop dance championship. However, internal pressures threaten to tear the team apart.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard, 3D
Genre: Bollywood Musical
Now Playing: AMC West Oaks, Touchstar Southchase
Rating: NR

Anarchy Parlor

(Gravitas) Robert LaSardo, Sara Fabel, Jordan James Smith, Tiffany DeMarco. A group of college friends traveling in Lithuania go to a tattoo parlor to commemorate their travels in ink. Instead, they are captured and tortured by the Artist who has more sinister ideas as to what to do with them.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Horror
Now Playing: AMC Altamonte Mall
Rating: NR

Dope

(Open Road) Shameik Moore, Zoe Kravitz, Forest Whitaker, Kimberly Elise. Malcolm is treading a fine line in navigating life in a brutally tough neighborhood in Los Angeles, looking to escape by going to college. However, a chance encounter at a party leads him along a different path. Set in the 1990s with a classic hip-hop score, this was a critical hit at Sundance.

See the trailer and clips here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard (opens Thursday)
Genre: Urban Crime Drama
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for language, drug content, sexuality/nudity and some violence, all involving teens)

Felix and Meira

(Oscilloscope Laboratories) Martin Dubreuil, Hadas Yaron, Luzer Twersky, Anne-Elisabeth Bosse. A Hassidic Jewish wife and mother in Montreal is lost in a highly structured life. She meets a Secular young man, mourning the death of his estranged father, in a bakery. The two begin an innocent friendship which in turn becomes something more which forces her to make a choice between the life she’s always known, or being with the man she loves.

See the trailer and a clip here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Romantic Drama
Now Playing: Regal Winter Park Village

Rating: R (for a scene of sexuality/nudity)

Gemma Bovery

(Music Box) Gemma Arterton, Fabrice Luchini, Jason Flemyng, Isabelle Candelier.  A rural French village and in particular its baker find their lives transformed by the arrival of a British couple whose name reflects the heroine of a classic Flaubert novel that was written in that very village. When her life begins to mirror that of the heroine of that novel, the baker tries to prevent her from meeting the same tragic end as Madame Bovary. This was a big hit at the recent Florida Film Festival and you can read my review of the movie here.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Romance
Now Playing: Enzian Theater
Rating: R (for sexuality/nudity and language)

New Releases for the Week of August 22, 2014

FRANK MILLER’S SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR

(Dimension) Mickey Rourke, Josh Brolin, Eva Green, Jessica Alba, Bruce Willis, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Powers Boothe, Rosario Dawson. Directed by Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller

In Sin City, the corrupt rule and it takes a hard-bitten sort just to make it from day to day. At the center of the spider’s web is the gleefully wicked Senator Roark as a group of disparate citizens, all wronged in one way or another by the Senator, plot their vengeance in this collection of tales from the graphic novel series filmed in a highly stylized manner. Miller has written two vignettes especially for the film.

See the trailer, clips, interviews, a featurette, and B-roll video here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard (opens Thursday)

Genre: Action Noir

Rating: R (for strong brutalized violence throughout, sexual content, nudity and brief drug use)

Are You Here

(Millennium) Owen Wilson, Zach Galifianakis, Amy Poehler, Edward Herrmann. A womanizing weatherman determines to help his off-the-grid and somewhat not-altogether-there buddy inherit a fortune from his estranged father, a decision that is being challenged by his overbearing sister. This is the feature film debut from the creator of the hit TV series Mad Men.

See the trailer and clips here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Romantic Comedy

Rating: R (for language, drug use and some sexual content/nudity)

Calvary

(Fox Searchlight) Brendan Gleeson, Chris O’Dowd, Kelly Reilly, Aidan Gillen. A Catholic priest in Ireland does his best to minister to his flock and take care of his daughter (from before he was a priest). However during confession with a mysterious man, he is informed that the man is going to murder him to make a statement about the Catholic church, knowing that killing a good priest will be far more effective than killing a bad one. However, the father isn’t going to take this lying down. From the director of one of Gleeson’s better performances in The Guard.

See the trailer, a clip and a featurette here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Dramedy

Rating: R (for sexual references, language, brief strong violence and some drug use)

If I Stay

(Warner Brothers/MGM) Chloe Grace Moretz, Jamie Blackley, Joshua Leonard, Mireille Enos. A young woman looks to have a bright future; a potential scholarship to Julliard, a loving family and a boy she’s crazy about and who’s crazy about her right back. In a single instant, everything changes and her world is torn apart. Hovering between life and death, the girl must make the nearly unbearable choice whether to fight and live with the boy she loves, or pass on and join her loved ones.

See the trailer, clips, interviews and B-roll video here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard (opens Thursday)

Genre: Drama

Rating: PG-13 (for thematic elements and some sexual material)

Island of Lemurs: Madagascar

(Warner Brothers) Morgan Freeman, Patricia Wright, Hantanirina Rasamimanana. Journey to the real island of Madagascar, one of the largest in the world and home to an amazing array of creatures, some found nowhere else. Follow a dedicated scientist working to save the ancient lemurs of Madagascar from extinction.

See the trailer, an interview, a clip and a featurette here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: IMAX 3D

Genre: Nature Documentary

Rating: G

Mardaani

(Yash Raj) Rani Mukerji, Tahir Raj Bhasin, Sanjay Taneja, Jisshu Sengupta. A female police officer is faced with a crisis when her teenage niece is kidnapped by a crime lord and human trafficker. The young kingpin and the cop play a game of deadly cat and mouse with the teen’s life hanging in the balance.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Crime

Rating: NR

When the Game Stands Tall

(TriStar) Jim Caviezel, Laura Dern, Michael Chiklis, Alexander Ludwig. The inspiring story of Coach Bob Ladouceur and the De La Salle High School Spartans who at one time were riding the longest winning streak in the history of sports. In a matter of weeks the streak ended, the beloved coach suffered a massive heart attack and one of their most popular players was shot to death. The team and the community will face adversity of the sort they’ve never seen before – a true test of champions.

See the trailer, clips, interviews, featurettes and B-roll video here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard (opens Thursday)

Genre: True Sports Drama

Rating: PG (for thematic material, a scene of violence and brief smoking)

Baby Mama

Tina Fey is just miffed that Amy Poehler won’t share the Pringles.

(2008) Comedy (Universal) Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Greg Kinnear, Steve Martin, Dax Shepard, Sigourney Weaver, Maura Tierney, Holland Taylor, James Rebhorn, Will Forte, Fred Armisen, Romany Malco, Denis O’Hare, Stephen Mailer, Siobhan Fallon Hogan, Kevin Collins, John Hodgman, Thomas McCarthy, Jason Mantzoukas, Dave Finkel, Felicity Stiverson.  Directed by Michael McCullers

Starting up a family is always something of an overwhelming proposition, never more so for a single parent who intends to stay a single parent. It is darn near impossible for an infertile single parent.

Kate Holbrook (Fey) is a capable, ambitious woman and that has played out into an executive position for a health food store chain, a beautiful apartment in Manhattan that is absolutely empty when she comes home. Not that she’s complaining, mind you – she owns her choices, after all. However, she is feeling her biological clock ticking down. She wants a baby in the worst way, and in her own organized fashion is doing what it takes. She’s tried adoption, and has been turned down. She’s tried artificial insemination, but her doctor (O’Hare) informs her that her uterus is not really suitable for impregnation and that an actual pregnancy would be a one in a million shot.

Desperate, she decides surrogacy might be the answer. She goes to the Chaffee Bicknell agency, whose titular head (Weaver) is despicably fertile, but promises to get a surrogate mother for Kate’s baby that passes the most rigid scrutiny. Chaffee sends Kate to Angie Ostrowski (Poehler), who couldn’t be any more different from the prim, cultured Kate. While Kate frets over every detail, Angie tends to be less detail-oriented than, say, a ten-year-old. While Kate keeps her apartment neat and clean, Angie prefers a more let-it-all-hang-out attitude. Kate dresses in smart business suits; Angie’s style can only be described as rural whore. In fact, if there were trailer parks in New York, Angie and her conniving boyfriend Carl (Shepard) would probably be living in one. If Kate is Masterpiece Theater, Angie and Carl are The Dukes of Hazzard.

Despite this, the two women find themselves bonding against all odds and decide to go through with the pregnancy. Not long after, Angie and Carl have a big fight and Angie shows up on Kate’s door, having nowhere else to go. Now, instead of preparing for a new baby in the home, Kate is having to live with a woman whose maturity level isn’t far above the baby she’s carrying.

The stresses begin to pile up. Kate is given a huge project at work by her new age boss (Martin) that may make unwelcome changes to a neighborhood, whose residents are not happy about the prospect, led by the handsome smoothie store owner Rob (Kinnear) who Kate is beginning to develop feelings for. On top of that, Angie is driving Kate crazy, and doesn’t appear to be all that concerned with the health and well-being of the baby – and Angie’s sins are rapidly catching up with her. Kate’s dream of being a mom is beginning to look like a longshot at best.

Fey has proven herself one of the funniest women working today, and those who loved her on 30 Rock are going to love her here. Poehler, so good in Blades of Glory and on SNL, does some of the best work of her career here. Martin, who has been mostly sticking to family comedies, returns to the silliness that characterized him in the ‘70s. Kinnear has carved out a niche as the nice, solid guy and makes a fine foil for Fey – hey, alliteration! ER’s Tierney plays Fey’s married mom of a sister and performs capably. Worth mentioning is Holland Taylor as Kate’s overbearing mom – she’s one of those dependable character actresses who almost always improves every movie she’s in. Shepard does the sleazy manipulator as well as anyone – if you saw him in Let’s Go to Prison, you pretty much know what to expect here.

Fey and Poehler work exceedingly well together, so much so that it leaves you hoping that they will continue to make movies together although as of yet they haven’t. The laughs come crisply but not at the expense of the characters and story.

This is definitely aimed at a female audience, and I found Da Queen laughing much more at things that only puzzled my poor, underdeveloped male brain. Not relating with the messy details of pregnancy and birthing, I found myself having a hard time relating to characters going through it and wanting to go through it.  .

Think of this as a chick comedy. If you’ve had a baby, or are pregnant, you are going to find this much more funny than the rest of us. That doesn’t mean that it’s completely without redemption, however. Fey and Poehler are a very good team, and their scenes together are the highlights of the movie. Bottom line, this is pretty well-written and plotted, although it isn’t difficult to discern where this is heading.

WHY RENT THIS: Great comedic chemistry between Fey and Poehler. Women tend to find this funnier than men do so if you’re of the fairer sex, this works nicely. Great support cast.

WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: Women tend to find this funnier than men do so if you’re of the male sex, this might be too much for you. Predictable in places.

FAMILY MATTERS: Plenty of jokes about female plumbing. There’s also some foul language and a drug reference.

TRIVIAL PURSUITS: The Boo Boo Busters company that professionally childproofs Kate’s home is based on a real company by the same name in California. They supplied many of the child safety devices seen in the film, including the infamous toilet seat lock that “doesn’t work.”  Poehler eventually used that company to childproof her own home when she had children.

NOTABLE HOME VIDEO FEATURES: There is a featurette on Saturday Night Live and its influence on the movies.

BOX OFFICE PERFORMANCE: $64.2M on a $30M production budget.

COMPARISON SHOPPING: Knocked Up

FINAL RATING: 6.5/10

NEXT: The Housemaid

New Releases for the Week of November 1, 2013

ENDER’S GAME

(Summit) Asa Butterfield, Ben Kingsley, Harrison Ford, Viola Davis, Hailee Steinfeld, Abigail Breslin, Nonso Anozie, Brandon Soo Hoo, Moises Arias. Directed by Gavin Hood

After barely surviving a vicious alien invasion, humanity’s future rests on the shoulders of a little boy named Ender. Alone out of all the candidates for Battle School, he shows the most potential to lead humanity to victory against the Formic. However, the aliens are returning and time is running out. Ready or not, Ender must lead the forces of humanity against a formidable foe and impossible odds. Is he up to the challenge?

See the trailer, promos, a clip and a featurette here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard, IMAX (opens Thursday night)

Genre: Science Fiction

Rating: PG-13 (for some violence, sci-fi action and thematic material)

12 Years a Slave

(Fox Searchlight) Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Benedict Cumberbatch, Brad Pitt. This is the true story of an African-American born a free man in New York City. In 1841, Solomon Northup was a respected violinist who traveled around North America performing recitals, but one night he is betrayed, drugged and transported to New Orleans where he is sold as a slave. His struggle to escape and return home to his wife and children became the stuff of legend.

See the trailer, clips, featurettes and a promo here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Historical True Life Drama

Rating: R (for violence/cruelty, some nudity and brief sexuality)

About Time

(Universal) Domhnall Gleeson, Rachel McAdams, Bill Nighy, Lindsay Duncan. At first skeptical, a young man discovers that he has indeed inherited the family gift to be able to travel back to any moment in his life and relive it. He uses his gift to woo a comely young woman and to make his life better but eventually learns that time travel cannot cure everything and that there is a price to pay for every gift. This is opening at the Regal Winter Park Village only at present in the Orlando area but will expand to most theaters on November 8.

See the trailer and clips here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Romantic Fantasy

Rating: R (for language and some sexual content)

Free Birds

(Relativity) Starring the voices of Owen Wilson, Woody Harrelson, Amy Poehler, George Takei. A somewhat delusional militant turkey recruits the very unwilling Thanksgiving turkey presidential pardon for a mission back in time. Their destination: the very first Thanksgiving. Their mission: to substitute some other meat for turkey. Good luck with that.

See the trailer, clips and a promo here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard, 3D

Genre: Animated Feature

Rating: PG (for some action/peril and rude humor)

Krrish 3

(Filmkraft) Hrithik Roshan, Priyanka Chopra, Vivek Oberoi, Kangna Ranaut. An Indian superhero must battle an evil scientist and the mutant creatures he has created to save the world from a hostile takeover.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Bollywood

Rating: NR

Last Vegas

(CBS) Michael Douglas, Robert De Niro, Morgan Freeman, Kevin Kline. Four childhood friends, now edging somewhat reluctantly from middle age to old age, decide to head to Sin City to celebrate the impending wedding of the last hold-out to bachelorhood among them. While they’ve changed, so has Vegas baby and once these four hit the Strip, neither will be the same.

See the trailer and a clip here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Comedy

Rating: PG-13 (for sexual content and language)

Man of Tai Chi

(Radius) Keanu Reeves, Tiger Hu Chen, Karen Mok, Iko Uwais. A young martial artist studies Tai Chi to improve his spiritual self but an unscrupulous promoter on the underground fight circuit in Hong Kong ropes him into that lucrative field. As the matches grow more intense, the young fighter turns his back on the precepts he once held dear and his will to live must carry him through this crisis.

See the trailer and a link to stream the full movie here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Martial Arts

Rating: R (for violence) 

Skinwalker Ranch

(Deep Studios) Jon Gries, Kyle Davis, Erin Cahill, Devin McGinn. Strange goings-on at an isolated ranch and the literal disappearance of the ranchers 8-year-old son garner media attention. A year afterwards, a security firm sends an investigative team to look into what really happened. What they discover is much more than anyone could have imagined.

See the trailer and a clip here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Sci-Fi Horror

Rating: R (for language and some violence)

Underdogs

(Media Services) D.B. Sweeney, William Mapother, Melora Walters, Natalie Imbruglia. A perennially underachieving Ohio high school football team gets a new coach, a new attitude and a new lease on life. However, they still have to play their crosstown rival, a traditional powerhouse, in order to make that move to the next level.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: True Sports Drama

Rating: PG (for some language)