New Releases for the Week of July 31, 2015

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – ROGUE NATION

(Paramount) Tom Cruise, Rebecca Ferguson, Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg, Alec Baldwin, Ving Rhames, Simon McBurney, America Olivo. Directed by Christopher McQuarrie

The IMF is on the verge of being shuttered by a government that doesn’t truly understand how unique they are and what they do to protect not just the United States but the world. In this tumultuous time they come up against their greatest foe – the Syndicate. Long a rumor in the intelligence community, IMF Agent Ethan Hunt has discovered that they are real and out to destroy the IMF by any means necessary. How does one fight a mirror image of oneself, a group trained to do what the IMF does, only more ruthless and amoral – a rogue nation in the intelligence community? The remaining agents of the IMF must find a way.

See the trailer, interviews, featurettes and a clip here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard, IMAX (opens Thursday)
Genre: Action
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG-13 (for sequences of action and violence, and brief partial nudity)

Drishyam

(White Hill/Viacom18) Ajay Devgn, Tabu, Shriya Saran, Rajat Kapoor. When the teenage son of a powerful and corrupt police officer disappears, suspicion falls on the family of a local cable TV outlet in the remote village of Goa. The father, a thrifty man who dropped out of the 4th grade as an orphan and made what little he has off of hard work and determination, will do anything to protect his family. Absolutely anything – and he’ll have to pull out all the stops as his powerless family feels the full weight of the law coming down upon them.

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

The Farewell Party

(Goldwyn) Ze’ev Revach, Levana Finkleshtein, Aliza Rosen, Ilan Dar. A handyman and mechanical prodigy is now living out his golden years tinkering with gadgets and hanging out with a group of friends who are also retired. When a close friend begs him to help her husband end his suffering, he devises a euthanasia machine which the sufferer can operate and end the life at the moment of his or her choosing. It was meant to be used once, but word gets out and soon he has become a serial killer according to his wife who is not at all happy with what he is doing. But when she is diagnosed with a terminal illness, suddenly the usefulness of his machine takes a whole new turn. This Florida Film Festival favorite from last spring is now making a run at the Enzian; you can read my Festival review of it here.

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

The Human Centipede III: Final Sequence

(IFC Midnight) Dieter Laser, Eric Roberts, Lawrence Harvey, Bree Olsen. A sadistic prison warden and his accountant are in the crosshairs of the governor who finds their methods extreme. After watching the first two movies in The Human Centipede series, the accountant hits upon the idea of suturing the prison population face to anus in a gigantic 500-person human centipede. The warden is at first dismissive but at last comes around, leading to general ickiness. Critics have lambasted the film but it is likely to appeal to the sick and twisted, and those who love them. One showing only, at 11:59pm Friday.

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

Jimmy’s Hall

(Sony Classics) Barry Ward, Francis Magee, Aileen Henry, Simone Kirby. Jimmy runs a dance hall that is also a center for discourse and social life for the Irish rural town in the 1920s. The fun the powers that be might tolerate but not the nascent anti-church socialist talks and the hall is shut down and Jimmy chased out of the country. A decade later, he returns at the height of the Depression, with the objective to live a quiet life and take care of his ailing ma. However, he sees that the grip of the church and the powerful is tighter than ever. He will have to fight the same losing battle all over again, but this time he is determined to win.

See the trailer and a clips here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Drama
Now Playing: Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: PG-13 (for language and a scene of violence)

Twinsters

(Small Package) Samantha Futerman, Anais Bordier. Two young girls who were adopted from South Korea believe they are twins who were separated by birth. Although they were adopted by families on two different continents, they look nearly identical and are determined to discover the truth about their birth but the dive into this particular pool is not an easy one and there are all kinds of rocks and dangers to contend with.

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

Vacation

(New Line) Ed Helms, Christina Applegate, Chris Hemsworth, Chevy Chase. Rusty Griswold decides to take a page out of his father’s book and take his family on a road trip. When you’re a Griswold, you can never say die after all and Wally World is a shining El Dorado in the distance. However, when you’re a Griswold, vacations are never easy.

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

The Farewell Party (Mita Tova)

You’re never too old to multitask!

(2014) Dramedy (Goldwyn) Ze’ev Revach, Levana Finkleshtein, Aliza Rosen, Ilan Dar, Raffi Tabor, Josef Carmon, Hilla Surjon, Assaf Ben Shimon, Illanit Dado Lansky, Ruth Farhi, Ruth Geller, May Katan, Orly Katan, Jameel Khoury, Itzik Konfino, Michael Koresh, Kobi Maymon, Aviva Paz, Hanna Rieber, Hezi Saddik, Sigal Shimoni, Idit Teperson, Samuel Wolf, Annabella Yaacov. Directed by Tal Granit and Sharon Maymon

Euthanasia remains a controversial subject around the world. Those who face terminal illnesses, excruciating pain and the loss of their own identity through diseases like Alzheimer’s are not legally given the opportunity to end their lives with dignity, something that we afford to animals but not humans. There are few societies enlightened enough to allow it; most take the religious view that suicide is a crime against God.

Yehekzel (Revach) is a tinkerer, and a good one. He also has a bit of a puckish sense of humor; he calls a friend and using an electronic voice distortion device pretends that he is God, telling her to hang in there. His wife Levana (Finkleshtein) puts up with his nonsense affectionately.

But one of his friends at the retirement home in which he lives wants to die. He is in the throes of a painful and terminal illness. The patient’s wife Yana (Rosen) desperately wants her husband to be put out of his misery, but of course such things are illegal. Yehekzel comes up with a plan; he can build a machine that will administer drugs; the first a sedative, the second something to stop his heart. Yana and Yehekzel enlist the help of Dr. Daniel (Dar) to help come up with the right drugs and the right dosages. Yehekzel even makes it easy for the patient to actually control when he or she wants the injection. Dr. Kevorkian would be proud.

But word spreads about the machine. Levana is horrified; she sees it as murder, plain and simple, even though the patients themselves want to die. Soon Yehekzel and his little crew are getting plenty of requests for the use of the machine. Yehekzel feels like he’s providing a much-needed service and despite his wife’s objections is pretty proud of what he’s doing.

Then Levana begins to show signs of Alzheimer’s and is truly terrified that in a short time she will be in the grip of that horrible disease. Now that her viewpoint has changed, she wants Yehekzel to use the machine on her. This is a horse of a different color for Yehekzel; can he use the machine on someone he loves?

Euthanasia doesn’t get much play in movies and with good reason; it’s a hideously depressing subject. Here, however, it is handled with a good deal of sensitivity and humor; not that the filmmakers and actors don’t take the subject seriously but they don’t make it a grim death march either.

The cast is made up of some of Israel’s most respected actors, in a large sense an all-star gathering although most are largely not well-known in America. They all do crackerjack jobs; there’s not a false note in the bunch. Each character fits into the puzzle nicely and you get the sense that these are all old friends. The cast meshes together well.

The only quibble I have here is a musical number that doesn’t quite fit in. It comes off as something that they grabbed from a production of Fiddler on the Roof and even though the singing is fine, I found the scene a bit jarring considering the rest of the movie. It’s somber and while I get it is there to tell us what’s going on internally with the characters, it was unsuccessful at least in my case.

This is a gem of a movie that is likely going to appeal more to older audiences than to younger other than those who are in to good movies and different viewpoints. It likely won’t convert those who are against euthanasia to the cause, but it certainly offers a point of view that is at least respectful. Definitely one to keep an eye out for when Goldwyn releases this in a limited run throughout the U.S. in late May.

REASONS TO GO: Tackles old age, death and euthanasia sensitively. Moving in places, beautiful in places, sweet in places.
REASONS TO STAY: Musical number hits the wrong notes.
FAMILY VALUES: Adult themes and content.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Was nominated for Best Picture at the Ophir Awards, Israel’s equivalent of the Oscars but lost to Gett: The Trial of Viviane Amsalem.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 5/2/15: Rotten Tomatoes: no score yet. Metacritic: no score yet.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Cocoon
FINAL RATING: 8/10
NEXT: Offshoring continues!