The Nice Guys

An outtake from The Shining?

(2016) Action Comedy (Warner Brothers) Russell Crowe, Ryan Gosling, Angourie Rice, Matt Bomer, Kim Basinger, Margaret Qualley, Yaya DaCosta, Keith David, Beau Knapp, Lois Smith, Murielle Telio, Gil Gerard, Daisy Tahan, Jack Kilmer, Lance Valentine Butler, Ty Simpkins, Cayla Brady, Tammi Arender, Rebecca Dalton Rusk, Terence Rosemore, John L. Morris, Michelle Rivera, Nathaniel “Nate” Scott. Directed by Shane Black

 

1977 in Los Angeles was an interesting place. It was the golden age of porn; bell bottoms and flower shirts were the fashion, and guys with too-long locks and elaborate facial hair were on the prowl for chicks with teased hair. Smog choked everything and in the post-Watergate atmosphere, it felt a lot like innocence had been irrevocably lost. This is where and when I grew up.

Shane Black gets it note-perfect, and while I admit I had very little to do with the porn industry as a teenager (other than as a prospective consumer) this feels like the L.A. I grew up in. This is the kind of town where a sports car might crash from a hilltop road into your background, disgorging a beautiful naked porn star (Telio) whose final words are “How do you like my car?”

This is also the kind of place inhabited by Jackson Healy (Crowe), a Bronx-bred tough guy who is the kind of guy you call when you want someone hurt, but not killed. He’s also a bit of a knight in not-so-shining and dented all to hell armor, hired by a young woman named Amanda (Qualley) to discourage a guy who’s been stalking her.

That guy happens to be Holland March (Gosling) whom Healy appropriately sends to the hospital with a spiral fracture of his arm. But as it turns out, he’s been hired to find Amanda – he’s a private detective, albeit one who drinks far too much and isn’t nearly as bright as he thinks he is. After their encounter, Healy is visited by a pair of mobsters (Knapp, David) who are trying to intimidate him about the whereabouts of Amanda. March gets away from the two of them, leaving one of them with permanent blue dye all over his face.

Realizing that he’s stepped into something that doesn’t smell so good, he enlists the guy he sent to the hospital – March – to find out what’s going on and locate Amanda, who’s disappeared off the face of the Earth. At first none too pleased to be teamed up with him, March begins to grudgingly respect his new partner. The two are helped by March’s precocious daughter Holly (Rice) who is a better detective than either of them.

It turns out the case is related to the porn industry, the California Department of Justice whose head honcho (Basinger) turns out to be Amanda’s mother. On the trail is the chief bad guy John Boy (Bomer) who is thus named because he has a similar mole as Richard Thomas of The Waltons. And with avant garde pornographers, vicious hit men, and Vegas mobsters to contend with, these two ne’er-do-wells will have their work cut out for them if they plan to live to see 1978.

Black has always been a terrific writer, going back to his Lethal Weapon days and to an extent, he’s mocking the genre he helped create (the buddy cop movie) with this film, which would come out ten years after this film was set. As I mentioned earlier, he gets the period stuff right on with the fashions, the smog, the soundtrack and even the vibe. This is most definitely the City of Angels I remember.

He also casts his film nicely. Both Gosling and Crowe take to their parts like they were born to them, and the chemistry between the two is what carries the movie and holds it together. Crowe, who carries himself as a big guy, does the tough-with-a-heart-of-gold as well as anybody and while Gosling is often the comic relief, he never stoops to making his character a laughing stock, although March easily could be considering all the poor choices he makes.

Rice should also be given some credit. The movies are filled with precocious kids who are smarter than the adults in the movie, and often these types of characters are annoying as the fluctuating price of gas. However, Rice makes the character credible enough and vulnerable enough to avoid that pitfall, although again I do wish the adults here didn’t have to be quite so dumb.

The action sequences are decently staged as are the comedy bits, although I think most of the best comedy moments can be found in the trailer which is a bummer. At times, it feels like it is one irritable police captain away from a TV cop show from that era – Starsky and Hutch much?  There is also a little bit of a reach in the plot department in terms of the conspiracy going on in high places, although the movie is well-written overall in terms of plot construction. However, it feels a little bit like a noir film with a funk soundtrack, if you get my drift. Some of it just doesn’t work.

Overall though this is far more entertaining than a lot of stuff out there. It’s smart, it has some decent performances and it captures a place and time better than most. Some might find the immersion in the porn culture a bit distasteful but Black doesn’t stick it in your face overly much. Well, maybe not to me. While I have friends who dug this a lot more than I did, I can say they’re not wrong in giving this film the kind of love they’ve given it and as far as I’m concerned, Shane Black is the kind of director who always seems to make movies that are worthwhile viewing. Boom shaka laka laka, baby.

REASONS TO GO: Smart dialogue and plot construction. Crowe and Gosling have genuine chemistry.
REASONS TO STAY: Originally started life as a television pilot and has that kind of TV quality to it. A little far-fetched in places.
FAMILY VALUES: Violence abounds as well as sexuality and nudity with plenty of foul language and a smattering of drug use – all 70s-centric things.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: In the elevator scene, the same background Muzak plays as in the similarly-set scene in The Blues Brothers.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 6/20/16: Rotten Tomatoes: 91% positive reviews. Metacritic: 70/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Inherent Vice
FINAL RATING: 6.5/10
NEXT: Warcraft

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New Releases for the Week of July 11, 2014

DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES

(20th Century Fox) Andy Serkis, Jason Clarke, Gary Oldman, Keri Russell, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Kirk Acevedo, Toby Kebbell, Judy Greer. Directed by Matt Reeves

Years after a horrible plague decimated the human race – one brought on by the same drug that made apes smarter – a lone ragtag band of humans living in a fortified enclave in San Francisco venture into the woods to rig a dam to provide desperately needed power for their colony. However, a peaceful  village of apes – led by Caesar, the young chimp born of an ape who had been injected with the original formula – don’t trust the humans and don’t want them around. There are some who don’t simply want them at the dam, they want them not to exist anymore. There are some humans who are fine with the apes being remanded to the endangered species list. Something’s got to give.

See the trailer, clips, interviews, a promo, featurettes, premiere footage and B-roll video here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard, 3D (opened Thursday)

Genre: Science Fiction

Rating: PG-13 (for intense sequences of sci-fi violence and action, and brief strong language)

Bangalore Days

(Star) Dulquer Salmaan, Nazriya Nazim, Nivin Pauly, Parvathy. Three cousins, for various reasons, make their way to Bangalore from Kerala to pursue their dreams or in one case, to help their husband pursue his. They will find heartbreak, love, redemption and bike racing in one of India’s most beautiful cities.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Bollywood

Rating: NR

Drushyam

(Suresh) Venkatesh, Meena, Nadhiya, Baby Esther. When the wife and daughter of a movie buff/cable TV installer accidentally kill the son of a police inspector who was trying to blackmail them with indiscreet photos he had taken of the daughter in a public bathroom, the father uses his knowledge of movies to help his family “get away with it.” This movie is a Telugu remake of the highest grossing Malayalam film of all time.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Bollywood

Rating: NR

Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania

(Dharma) Varun Dhawan, Alia Bhatt, Siddharth Shukla, Ashutosh Rana. A Hindi woman, bound for Delhi and an arranged marriage, decides to live life to the fullest while she still can. She meets a free-spirited unconventional college student and the pair gradually fall deeply in love. However, they will have to overcome a good deal of obstacles if they are to wind up together.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Bollywood

Rating: NR

Rage

(RLJ/Image) Nicolas Cage, Danny Glover, Rachel Nichols, Peter Stormare.  An All-American businessman seems to be leading an ideal life; success, a family, a nice home. But when his teenage daughter is abducted from their home, his violent past has emerged to catch up with him. He will have to put together his old crew in order to beat his past and rescue his daughter.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Thriller

Rating: R (for violence, language and drug content)

Third Person

(Sony Classics) Liam Neeson, Mila Kunis, Adrien Brody, Kim Basinger. Three couples in New York, Rome and Paris try to balance love and need in an atmosphere of secrets – some devastating – as their interrelated stories begin to entwine. From writer/director Paul Haggis, the originator of the genre with Traffic.

See the trailer, clips and an interview here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Drama

Rating: R (for language and some sexuality/nudity)

The Burning Plain

This is what it’s like to be stalked by a dark, handsome stranger.

(2008) Drama (Magnolia) Charlize Theron, Kim Basinger, Jennifer Lawrence, JD Pardo, Tessa Ia, John Corbett, Robin Tunney, Joaquim de Almeida, Rachel Ticotin, Jose Maria Yazpik, Danny Pino, Anthony Escobar, Stacy Marie Warden, Debrianna Mansini, Kacie Thomas. Directed by Guillermo Arriaga

In a relationship we take it on faith that our partner will be faithful to us. Of course, that doesn’t always happen. The consequences of infidelity can be far-reaching and are not always paid just by the one doing the cheating.

Gina (Basinger) is a housewife who has embarked on an affair with another man, who is also married but not to her – ruggedly handsome Nick (Almeida). They meet in a ramshackle mobile home stuck out in the middle of the New Mexico desert not far from where Gina lives but far enough off the beaten track that there’s no auto traffic. Gina and Nick’s little love shack however proves to be not as safe a place as they thought – and there they meet a tragic end.

Gina’s daughter Mariana (Lawrence) is trying to cope with her mother’s death. Both her family and Nick’s family are at odds with one another, each blaming the other family’s relative for being the catalyst for the affair leading both of them to their doom. Nick’s son Santiago (Pardo) is desperate to find answers and he initiates a conversation with Mariana which blooms into something more.

Sylvie (Theron) is the manager of a high-end restaurant in Portland, Oregon. She is affected by an air of melancholy which is exacerbated with routine bouts of loveless sex, temperamental behavior and frequent absences from work. She smokes incessantly, staring at the sea and the waves crashing on the rugged coastline. She is being followed by Carlos (Yazpik), a mysterious man who speaks no English.

Santiago (Pino) is a crop duster who knows his business backwards and forwards. When his plane crashes in a terrible accident, his daughter Maria (Ia) is heartbroken. Santiago makes his good friend go looking for her mother up North, a woman who suddenly and inexplicably abandoned her family after Maria was born.

If you thought this was a movie from Mexican filmmaker Alexander Gonzalez Inarritu, you’d be half-right – this is from his regular writer Guillermo Arriaga. Entwined storylines that gradually coalesce into a single cohesive story is something of a trademark with Inarritu; Arriaga is unfortunately less successful with it here.

It’s not because he didn’t have the right actors. The three female leads give incendiary performances albeit all tinged with melancholy and heartache. Lawrence, who has since gone on to win an Oscar and become one of the most acclaimed young actresses in Hollywood, is a teenager whose own emotions are a seething cauldron of confusion to her; she feels rage at her mother’s betrayal but also grief for her passing. It’s not an easy part to play and she does a good job playing it.

Basinger has the thankless role of playing a woman in a marriage that seems happy on the outside betraying her family. It’s not the kind of thing that makes a character lovable or one you want to identify with; in fact these kinds of actions tend to make audiences feel uncomfortable with that character and yet Basinger gives the character warmth and relatability. Gina is a good mom and a good wife (other than the infidelity thing) but Nick let’s her access a part of her that her marriage and family life no longer allow – her sense of being an individual, a sexual being and someone who is desirable and desired. That’s a powerful feeling and one that we all need to feel, regardless of our marital status.

Theron is icy cool at the movie’s beginning, closed off and emotionally guarded. Sylvie lives in a sterile environment that betrays nothing about her and love for her has become a series of meaningless sexual trysts. As the movie progresses and we begin to learn more about her, we see the terrible burden she bears. Theron wisely let’s Sylvie’s guard down in fits and starts and as her walls crumble, so too does the movie excel.

The movie’s downfall comes from its storytelling style. All of the stories are interweaved and as the movie progresses we realize that they aren’t concurrent – they take place in different timelines. This can be confusing to the audience as they struggle to figure out who’s who and as more of the plot gets revealed the story should be coming together but in some ways it isn’t too hard to guess what’s going on but in others it really is because Arriaga is so deliberately vague. It’s quite maddening at times.

Still the power of the performances and the storyline make this worthwhile at the end of the day. Just be warned that a good deal of patience is required and a little bit of observation. It’s easy to lose yourself in the acting, particularly the women. It might however distract you from following the storylines you need to be aware of in order to make sense of this.

WHY RENT THIS: Terrific performances by Basinger, Theron and Lawrence.

WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: The jumps between stories and timelines makes the film choppy and unfocused.

FAMILY VALUES: There is some brief nudity and plenty of sexuality as well as a bit of foul language. Mostly it’s adult in a thematic sense.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Arriaga spent 11 years as a screenwriter (most notably for Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu) before choosing this novel, one of the most acclaimed in recent years written in Mexico, as the basis for his directing debut.

NOTABLE HOME VIDEO EXTRAS: There’s an interesting featurette on the musical scoring of the film, a segment that rarely gets attention on home video extras.

BOX OFFICE PERFORMANCE: $5.5M on a $20M production budget; unfortunately the movie hasn’t recouped its production costs.

COMPARISON SHOPPING: Unfaithful

FINAL RATING: 6.5/10

NEXT: G.I. Joe: Retaliation

Bless the Child

I'd look worried too if I had the lead in this movie.

(2000) Horror (Paramount) Kim Basinger, Jimmy Smits, Holliston Coleman, Rufus Sewell, Angela Bettis, Christina Ricci, Michael Gaston, Lumi Cavazos, Ian Holm, Eugene Lipinski, Leeza Gibbons, Dimitra Arlys, Anne Betancourt, Helen Stenborg. Directed by Chuck Russell

When you’re a Roman Catholic, you can go to an occult-oriented movie with a certain degree of smugness. After all, nobody knows the Devil like us Catholics. We’ve got the exorcisms to prove it.

Hollywood knows this. Therefore, a whole lot of their devil flicks are liberally steeped in what I call the Catholic experience. Lots of statues, paintings of Christ’s agony, aging priests (often with deformities or disabilities) and a whole lot of gobbledygook about how the world will end. I, being Catholic born and Catholic bred, love every minute of it, although I can’t possibly imagine my old high school guidance counselor Father Campanella taking on Satan mano a mano. It’s just too much of a stretch.

In this one, Maggie O’Connor (Basinger) is minding her own business one night when her junkie sister (Bettis) shows up on her doorstep, newborn baby in hand. And before you can say “Whaaaasssssuppppppp?” she’s gone, leaving Maggie with the baby. Of course, everyone who’s ever seen an occult flick before knows that this is Not An Ordinary Child.

Years later, the NAOC (Coleman) is displaying signs of autism (although for an autistic child she’s awfully expressive). But she’s also showing her NAOC-ness by causing objects to move about of their own accord, and bringing the occasional critter back to life. This brings her to the attention of Eric Stark (Sewell), a self-help guru and a rather nasty cult leader in his spare time.

Turns out that he’s been searching for a specific child who, in the future, will lead people to God. Turns out he’s been murdering innocent children in a ritualistic fashion to find the specific NAOC he is looking for. Turns out he’s married the junkie sister just to get to the NAOC. Turns out that the nasty cult leader is a bit cozier to Beelzebub than he is to the Almighty. Turns out the FBI Investigator (Smits) who was called in to investigate the child murders is in way over his head, as is O’Connor (remember her?). That’s a whole lot of coinkydinks, don’t you think?

I think. Part of what makes this movie an epic fail is that it relies too much on serendipity. There’s no organic flow to the plot; characters exist just to explain something that is going to be meaningful three scenes later, or three scenes previously. The script lacks clarity and subtlety.

You’d never guess that Basinger won an Oscar just three short years earlier. She sleepwalks her way through the part, although to be fair it ain’t much of a part. Maggie is a strong-willed, independent woman which the filmmakers took to mean “ignorant, stubborn hothead” and she often quite incomprehensibly gets herself into situations no sane person would even consider without calling in the National Guard first. Frankly, if my kid were kidnapped by a whacked-out Satanist, I’d be calling the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, cops, Guardian Angels and Johnny Cochran before I’d go into the lion’s den by myself. What would horror movies do without stupid people acting stupidly?

Of course, the ludicrous scale doesn’t really factor in to horror movies — common sense is supposed to take a back seat to a good scare. And that’s what this movie really lacks. I’ll admit, Da Queen jumped once, but I think she was more frightened by the teen-age girls sitting two rows behind us more than anything. In fact, if you REALLY want a good scare, try reading the political coverage in the local papers. Despite valiant efforts by Smits and Sewell, and a couple of good supporting role turns by Christina Ricci and Ian Holm, Bless the Child is more of a snooze than a scare.

WHY RENT THIS: There are  few decent performances here.

WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: A horror movie that isn’t particularly scary. Basinger sleepwalks through a role that is plainly beneath her. Too many coincidences.

FAMILY MATTERS: There’s quite a bit of violence, some drug use and a few foul words here and there. There is also some scenes of children in jeopardy and a few disturbing images.

TRIVIAL PURSUITS: The line “the devil’s greatest trick was convincing mankind he doesn’t exist” is a reference to a similar line penned by the French poet Charles Baudelaire “La plus belle des ruses du Diable est de vous persuader qu’il n’existe pas!”

NOTABLE DVD FEATURES: None listed.

BOX OFFICE PERFORMANCE: $40M on  $65M production budget; the movie was a flop.

FINAL RATING: 3/10

TOMORROW: Hancock 

Charlie St. Cloud

Zac Efron responds when asked if there are any High School Musical alumni out there.

(Universal) Zac Efron, Amanda Crew, Charlie Tahan, Donal Logue, Ray Liotta, Kim Basinger, Dave Franco, Jesse Wheeler, Matt Ward, Augustus Prew, Miles Chalmers, Desiree Zurowski, Adrian Hough, Jill Teed, Valerie Tian, Grace Sherman, Brenna O’Brien. Directed by Burr Steers

One of the most difficult events we can go through in life is to watch a loved one die before their time. This can only be made worse by having that loved one be a child and feeling responsible for that child’s demise.

Charlie St. Cloud (Efron) is a golden boy. He’s wicked good-looking and a fantastic sailor, so much so that Stanford has given him a scholarship to be on their sailing team. His mom (Basinger) pulls double shifts at the hospital so that he can achieve his dreams, although I have not a clue how a working class kid can afford a racing sloop; it’s probably best if you try not to think about such things.

Charlie has a very close relationship with his little brother Sam (Tahan) who is devastated that Charlie is going to leave, in a sense just like their dad did. “I’m not dad,” Charlie says a bit crossly when Sam voices that fear. I can imagine that the comparison occurred to Charlie too.

Sam is a huge Red Sox fan and wants to play baseball; Charlie is only too happy to coach him every day. He’s just graduated (and the principal expects Great Things from this young man; to be sure, Charlie answers somewhat immodestly “So do I, sir”) from high school and has the entire summer in their coastal Washington town to teach Sam how to throw a slider.

Of course, being that it’s graduation time, Charlie wants to spend some time with his friends, particularly Sully (Franco) and Green (Wheeler) who have joined the military and are shipping out to the Middle East in a week. However, mom has landed another shift at the hospital, putting Charlie on Sam duty, which interferes with his plans. Thinking that Sam has fallen asleep, he tries to sneak out but Sam catches him and demands to be taken somewhere where he can watch the Red Sox game – apparently quite a few of them are broadcast in Washington.

Sam gives in and perhaps he shouldn’t have. On the way to wherever it is they are going, Sam is rear-ended by a drunk driver who pushes Charlie into oncoming traffic where they are T-boned by a rather big truck. A paramedic (Liotta) brings Charlie back from the dead, but Sam isn’t as lucky.

Charlie is devastated. At Sam’s funeral, he can’t bring himself to leave Sam’s mitt and ball in the casket, so instead, having glimpsed what he thought was Sam leaning against a tombstone, he runs into the woods, only to come up to Sam’s apparition, petulantly whining that Charlie and he had a deal. They do indeed; and at sunset when the town’s yacht club conveniently fires off a cannon to signal that they are fully capable of warding off pirates, they will meet in the woods and play catch.

Fast forward five years. Charlie has put his life on hold and works as a caretaker where his brother lies buried. He has but one friend, an obnoxious Englishman named Alistair (Prew) and yes, he has fulfilled his promise to his brother each and every day, rain or shine, come hell or high water. Mom has moved on to Portland, but Charlie remains in a stasis of his own grief.

That’s when Tess (Crew), an old high school classmate of Charlie’s returns to town, apparently having become a pretty fair sailor herself. She has entered herself in an around the world yacht race, and her coach Tink Weatherbee (Logue) thinks she’s got a good shot. She’s back in town, apparently to just take her boat on a trial run, but really she’s there to run into Charlie and fall in love with him. She does both admirably.

Charlie’s deepening relationship with Tess is putting a serious crimp in his meetings with his brother Sam. Sam is terrified of being deserted by his brother and that he will fade into nothingness if Charlie moves on; However, Charlie doesn’t want to exist in this half-life anymore. Will Charlie choose Tess over Charlie, or will he remain tied to his dead brother, doomed to remain a slave to his own grief?

This is based on a best-selling novel by Ben Sherwood and was originally set in Massachusetts. Quite frankly, the novel screams New England what with prep schools, Red Sox, yachting, old cemeteries and ghosts. Unfortunately, the production (in order to save money) chose to film in British Columbia instead and perhaps realizing that the Pacific Northwest doesn’t look anything like New England, set the action in a small town in Washington state. Unfortunately, many of the New England trappings remain and their presence makes the movie look a little bit ridiculous. For example, rather than having Sam be a Red Sox fan, couldn’t he be a Mariners fan instead?

Quite frankly, even though they were filming in BC I think the movie still should have been set in New England. I might have found the movie a bit more believable (as believable as a movie about a guy who sees his dead brother can be anyway) and more palatable.

The movie took was flayed by critics when it was released; quite frankly, I think most critics dislike any movie that makes you cry. After all, in order to weep you must have a heart that can be broken and most movie critics have cast iron hearts. I will admit that the movie is quite manipulative in that regard, but quite frankly it can be awfully cathartic to have a good cry at the movies.

Efron is pretty solid in the lead; he has to be because he’s in nearly every scene. He has improved by leaps and bounds since his High School Musical days and is quite likable; he might have a long career ahead of him if he doesn’t make bad choices. Tahan is actually quite likable in his role; there are few really good male juvenile actors out there (Josh Hutcherson comes to mind) compared to the female ones, so it’s nice to find one that doesn’t ACT like he’s in child actor 101. His relationship with Charlie seems very natural and close in the way that brothers are, and forms the heart of the movie.

This is a good looking movie with plenty of sunsets, sun-dappled forests, and quaint town shots, as well as beautiful boats knifing through the sea. It doesn’t particularly add much insight to life – I think it’s fair to say that most of us are aware that there comes a time that we all must set aside our grief, no matter how intense and overwhelming it may be, to pick ourselves up and move on which is what the movie’s central theme seems to be. There’s a nice little twist I won’t spoil that elevates the movie past the realm of the mediocre. Had they not made the critical tactical error of setting this in the Northwest, I think I might have been even more charmed by the movie than I was. As it is I can give the movie a recommendation – a surprised one to be sure but a recommendation nonetheless.

REASONS TO GO: Efron is making satisfying progress as an actor and Tahan handles his role without reverting to typical kid-actor clichés. There’s some beautiful cinematography here.

REASONS TO STAY: There are quite a few logical lapses that had a lot to do with transplanting the story from New England to the Northwest. It’s also a little too over-the-top manipulative in places.

FAMILY VALUES: There are some mild language concerns and a fairly intense auto accident depicted; certainly should be okay for most teenagers and mature pre-teens.

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: While the book was set in Marblehead, Massachusetts, unfortunately it was too cost-prohibitive to film it there so the action was relocated to the Pacific Northwest and filming took place in British Columbia.

HOME OR THEATER: In all honesty I thought this might be best served by seeing it at the multiplex.

FINAL RATING: 6/10

TOMORROW: Pride and Glory

New Releases for the Week of July 30, 2010

Steve Carell is no dummy.

DINNER FOR SCHMUCKS

(Columbia) Steve Carell, Paul Rudd, Zack Galifianakis, Jermaine Clement, Stephanie Szostak, Lucy Punch, Bruce Greenwood, Jeff Dunham, Rick Overton. Directed by Jay Roach

An ambitious young executive finally seems to be getting to where he wants to be. He’s got a great girlfriend and he’s on the verge of getting that promotion he’s worked so hard for. All that he needs to do to get it is attend a dinner that his boss is giving. The catch is that he and all the other young execs who are attending must bring a guest, but not just any guest – the strangest, weirdest, most eccentric person they can find. The one whose guest is the most whacko wins. Of course, this being a Jay Roach (Austin Powers) comedy, nothing proceeds according to plan.

See the trailer and clips here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Rating: PG-13 (for sequences of crude and sexual content, some partial nudity and language)

Cats and Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore

(Warner Brothers) James Marsden, Nick Nolte, Christina Applegate, Bette Midler. The struggle between cats and dogs for control of their humans has been eternal and at times, vicious but now it’s going to be put on hold. A rogue ex-agent of MEOWS, the secret organization of cats that uses high-tech means to keep the dogs at bay, threatens to overthrow both agencies and take over the world. To protect themselves and their humans, cats and dogs are going to have to learn to work together, or the world will become one big litter box. Yes, it’s a kid’s movie.

See the trailer and featurettes here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard, 3D

Rating: PG (for animal action and humor)

Charlie St. Cloud

(Universal) Zac Efron, Amanda Crew, Kim Basinger, Ray Liotta. A young man with a bright future sees his world ripped apart when a tragic accident takes one of the most precious things of his life away from him. Existing in a curious half-life, he gives up all his dreams to try and make sense of things. When a high school classmate returns home, he falls in love and soon must choose between that love and the only thing connecting him to what he has lost.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Rating: PG-13 (for language including some sexual references, an intense accident scene and some sensuality)

Restrepo

(National Geographic) Tim Hetherington, Sebastian Junger. Two respected journalists are embedded with the Second Platoon, Battle Company of the 503^rd Infantry Regiment (Airborne) stationed at Restrepo in the Korengal Valley of Afghanistan, considered by many to be the most dangerous posting in the military. The two spent a year with the soldiers, sharing in their camaraderie, duties and danger. It is an intimate look at service in harm’s way that no other documentary has ever captured so fully. The movie won the Grand Jury Prize for a Documentary at the most recent Sundance Film Festival.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Rating: R (for language throughout including some descriptions of violence)

Winter’s Bone

(Roadside Attractions) Jennifer Lawrence, John Hawkes, Lauren Sweetser, Kevin Breznaha. This film came out of Sundance as one of the most talked-about indie films of the year. A young Ozark girl, who has already set her dreams aside to care for her family, must now find her absent father or risk losing her home. In order to do that she must take on the tight-lipped and often violent mountain folk who work in the illegal drug trade. I saw this movie at the Florida Film Festival and was blown away – it still remains the best movie I’ve seen this year.

See the trailer and clips here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Rating: R (for some drug material, language and violent content)