The Highwaymen

Gault (left) and Hamer discuss their next move.

(2019) Crime Biography (Netflix) Kevin Costner, Woody Harrelson, Kathy Bates, John Carroll Lynch, Thomas Mann, Dean Denton, Kim Dickens, William Sadler, W. Earl Brown, David Furr, Jason Davis, Joshua Caras, David Born, Brian F. Durkin, Kaley Wheless, Alex Elder, Emily Brobst, Edward Bossert, Jake Ethan Dashnaw, Jane McNeill, Karson Kern, Savanna Renee. Directed by John Lee Hancock

]The mythology around Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, notorious Depression-era bank robbers, was without question aided by the 1967 Arthur Penn masterpiece Bonnie and Clyde. Portraying the outlaws as Robin Hood-types who led the bumbling cops on a merry chase through the Midwest, ending in a hail of bullets that turned the folk heroes into martyrs.

This Netflix production aimed to right the scales somewhat. The lawmen who chased Bonnie and Clyde and eventually caught them, Frank Hamer (Costner) and Maney Gault (Harrelson), were called out of retirement by Texas governor “Ma” Ferguson (Bates) to combat the thieves who had become popular and eluded the police time and time again. It didn’t seem to matter that Barrow often killed people in cold blood, the good folks of Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas and the Midwest were uncooperative with the investigation and occasionally shielded the gang when they needed a place to hide.

The movie was described by Reel Films critic James Bernardinelli as “a companion piece” to the Penn film, and in many ways it is that, but it is also it’s opposite. Hagiographic to the lawmen where the Penn version was to the title characters, through much of the movie Costner as Hamer growls at those who express admiration for the lawless bank robbers, occasionally resulting in beatdowns by the ex-Texas Rangers. It bears noticing that there are parallels to the modern complaints about police brutality towards African-Americans to the way the cops behave in this film.

The overall mood of the film is dour, and the overall impression is watching cantankerous grandparents trying to show the young ‘uns the error of their ways. I wish Hancock, a very able filmmaker in his own right, would have cut down on the lecturing somewhat as the movie runs a bit long for what it is. But Costner and Harrison  both have excellent chemistry together, and watching a couple of old pros doing some of their best work is worth the time spent. Not to mention that the score, by Thomas Newman, is simply lovely.

REASONS TO SEE: Costner and Harrelson give strong, believable performances. The music score is absolutely gorgeous.
REASONS TO AVOID: A little bit on the long side.
FAMILY VALUES: There is occasionally graphic violence, brief profanity, and some grisly images.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Hamer and Gault are buried in the same section of the same cemetery.
BEYOND THE THEATERS: Netflix
CRITICAL MASS: As of 2/18/22: Rotten Tomatoes: 58% positive reviews; Metacritic: 58/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Bonnie and Clyde
FINAL RATING: 7/10
NEXT: Ted K

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Them That Follow

(2019) Documentary (1091) Alice Englert, Walton Goggins, Olivia Colman, Thomas Mann, Lewis Pullman, Jim Gaffigan, Kaitlyn Dever, Dominic Cancelliere, Annie Tedesco, Bradley Gallo, Katherine DeBoer, Brooks Roseberry, Erik Andrews, Connor Daniel Lysholm, Catherine L. Albers, Kami Amore, Chris Breen, Logan Fry, Christine M. Pratt, Ramona Schwalbach. Directed by Britt Poulton and Dan Madison Savage

It is said that faith can move mountains, but in the mountains of Appalachia faith is much more than that. Faith is everything; one’s devotion to God must be absolute. There are no other alternatives. In some rural churches, faith is a life or death equation.

Mara (Englert) is the pretty young daughter of Pentecostal preacher Lemuel Childs (Goggins). Lemuel is part of the snake handler sect which requires his flock to prove their devotion to God by allowing a venomous rattlesnake to be draped around their neck. If the snake leaves them alone, fine; that’s God telling you that your faith is sufficient. However, if the snake elects to sink its fangs into you, you’ll undergo an agonizing slow death unless you can fight off the venom. With the help of friends or family praying away, anyone who succumbs to the snake bite does so due to a lack of faith, not to a lack of medical care which the congregation eschews.

It’s a highly patriarchal society in which women are made to wear ankle length skirts, perform roles of cooking, cleaning and child-rearing and to be absolutely submissive to their husbands. They are not even supposed to drive, making this a kind of Saudi America. If the Muslims hadn’t claimed the burkas first, I wouldn’t be surprised if the women of the congregation were made to wear them.

Mara is at an age where she is ready to be married. Daddy has picked out intense Garret (Pullman), a member of the parish and a true believer. However, Mara is kind of sweet on Augie (Mann), the son of local gas station/market owner Hope (Colman) who is known more commonly as Sister Slaughter. She was a bit of a hellraiser in her youth but her husband Zeke (Gaffigan) has essentially calmed her down. As for Augie, he is anything but a true believer; in fact he’s an atheist. His mother tolerates it pretty much as you tolerate the drunk uncle in the family.

Mara and her good friend Dilly (Devers) are inseparable, especially since Dilly’s mom abandoned her in fleeing the church and community which isn’t especially tolerant of free thinkers, particularly among the women. However, Mara is carrying a secret of her own and when it gets out it could rock the entire community to its core.

The feel here is authentic Appalachia; although the movie was filmed in Ohio it feels more like West Virginia. The gorgeous cinematography from Brett Jurkiewicz helps set that particular mood, as does the set design – Lemuel’s church is in a converted barn with only a neon cross to differentiate it from other barns. The life of the mountain folk here are pretty simple and uncomplicated; there are no television sets and things move at a fairly slow place, like the land the Internet forgot.

In fact, one of the drawbacks to the film is that the pacing is maddeningly slow particularly through the first two thirds of the movie. It does pick up speed towards the end, though so if you can sit through the first hour, you should be golden the rest of the way.

However, there’s still the performances of Goggins and Englert to enjoy; the two of them have a real chemistry and they both embrace their roles with gusto. Colman, who is a recent Oscar-winner, sounds a bit uncomfortable with the Southern accent, but she is solid as well as are Pullman and Mann as Maras two suitors. Gaffigan, a gifted comedy actor, shows off his dramatic chops nicely here.

The movie is largely about how far you are willing to take your faith before it becomes unhealthy. It’s hard not to see comparisons between these cultish Pentecostals and modern Evangelicals who seem to be grabbing the headlines lately. The directors respect the faith of the characters here which is nice to see; too often Hollywood tends to be either dismissive of characters with faith, or in the case of Christian cinema, too proselytizing. Some of the snake scenes are pretty horrible to watch and the sensitive sorts might want to take a pass on it, or at least watch it those scenes with eyes tightly shut and a trusted friend to tell you when to open them up again.

I’m not sure why anyone would think that God requires you to prove your faith by taking a rattlesnake to your breast, but some believe that it is so. The movie isn’t going to give you any answers in that direction but it is going to show you characters with strong faith and strong convictions – not to make them look evil, or backward but if anything to remind us that some good people sometimes believe in things that the rest of us might not understand – or accept.

REASONS TO SEE: The cinematography is gorgeous. Englert and Goggins deliver incendiary performances.
REASONS TO AVOID: Moves at a fairly slow and languid pace.
FAMILY VALUES: There is some mild profanity, an attempted rape and some disturbing violence.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Lewis Pullman is the son of actor Bill Pullman who memorably played the President in Independence Day and its sequel.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 8/12/19: Rotten Tomatoes: 63% positive reviews: Metacritic: 56/100
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Apostle
FINAL RATING: 7/10
NEXT: ZZ Top: That Lil’ Ole Band from Texas

Our House

Something dark awaits at the bottom of the stairs.

(2018) Horror (IFC Midnight) Thomas Mann, Xavier de Guzman, Nicola Peltz, Percy Hynes White, Allison Hossack, Carlyn Burchell, Christine Horne, John Ralston, Lucius Hoyos, Robert B. Kennedy, Marcia Bennett, Aaron Hale, Kate Moyer, Stefanie Nakamura, Neil Whitely, Evan Marsh, Ryan Wilson, Jennifer Nichols. Directed by Anthony Scott Burns

 

The world is full of doors. Some are open, others are closed to us. Some of them should stay that way and others are downright dangerous to open even the tiniest of cracks.

Ethan (Mann) is a brilliant engineer/physicist who shares the dream of Nicola Tesla to make electricity wireless, available cheaply for anyone. He knows an invention like this could be his ticket to the good life; although he and his parents (Ralston, Hossack) are pretty well-off. Ethan’s studies make him essentially an empty chair in the house; his mom and dad (and brother Matt (White) and sister Becca (Moyer), a brooding teen and adorable moppet) wish he was home more often.

But Ethan is obsessed with his work and during a rare family gathering he cuts out early with his girlfriend Hannah (Peltz) to work on his creation in the deserted AI lab – except he’s not really supposed to be there. Things don’t go well at the lab – he doesn’t have enough power to make the device work – and ends up overloading the system and causing a campus-wide outage.

Things go from bad to worse when a call from home reveals that his parents have died in a car crash, leaving him to raise his two siblings alone. Three months later he has quit school and a promising future to work in a local electronics store. That doesn’t mean he’s given up on his project which he continues to work on in his spare time.

But his project has some unexpected side effects; it turns out that what he’s doing is amplifying the paranormal energy in the house, making it possible for the dead to communicate with the living and even materialize. The more power that Ethan draws with the help of a friendly neighbor (Kennedy) who works at the local power company (and whose wife recently committed suicide) the closer the spirits of his parents come to fully materializing. That would be good for Matt and Becca but extraordinarily bad as the range is beginning to widen and there are spirits who aren’t nearly as benevolent residing in the house.

There are some classic Spielberg-like qualities to the film; the close-knit suburban neighborhood, the family without parents, the bittersweet tone and the young genius. However, this isn’t yo Daddy’s Spielberg; this is something else. As with films like The Conjuring series, Although this doesn’t have the budget or the publicity push of those films, it actually does a pretty solid job of building up the tension slowly before going into overdrive at the end.

The juvenile leads have to carry the movie and they do a pretty good job overall. Poor Katie Moyer is given a pretty cliché sensitive little girl role who is the first to start sensing the return of her parents, who sleeps in her big brother’s room and is seemingly the most torn up over the loss of her parents. In fact, all of the young juveniles handle the difficult emotion of grief surprisingly well.

The special effects are pretty slim pickings but that’s okay; the filmmakers get a lot out of a little. There does appear to have been some post-production controversy; the director of photography pulled his name from the credits and the electropop duo Electric Youth withdrew their score after changes were made during Post and released the music on the soundtrack to a lost movie.

However to be honest I was surprised to find out about those issues well after I saw the movie. When I was watching it I didn’t get a sense that the movie was jumbled the way you normally do when producers or a distributor get involved in the creative process. The movie held its cohesion pretty well and the build up to an explosive climax was right on the money. I found it to be a truly effective horror film that while not quite as good as Hereditary was right up there in the same tax bracket.

REASONS TO GO: The suspense builds slowly but the ending is intense. Haunted house films are particularly well-done these days; this one is among the best. The scares are unrelenting. There is some good real-world content as well.
REASONS TO STAY: Becca is a little bit too cliché the sensitive little girl.
FAMILY VALUES: There is some profanity, a little bit of suggestive content, some terror and child peril and some disturbing horrific images.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: The film was significantly altered during post-production; even the titled was changed from Breathing.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 7/30/18: Rotten Tomatoes: 62% positive reviews: Metacritic: 46/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: The Babadook
FINAL RATING: 9/10
NEXT: Larger Than Life: The Kevyn Aucoin Story

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl

Bet you can guess which one is the dying girl.

(2015) Drama (Fox Searchlight) Thomas Mann, RJ Cyler, Olivia Cooke, Nick Offerman, Molly Shannon, Connie Britton, Jon Bernthal, Katherine C. Hughes, Matt Bennett, Massam Holden, Bobb’e J. Thompson, Gavin Dietz, Edward DeBruce III, Natalie Marchelletta, Chelsea Zhang, Marco Zappala, Kaza Marie Ayersman, Hugh Jackman, Etta Cox, Nicole Tubbs. Directed by Alfonso Gomez-Rejon

Hollywood tends to churn out movies aimed at the teen market and why not; teens make a sizable chunk of their audience and even though they don’t necessarily go to movie theaters as often as they once did – many view movies via the internet or other sources – they still are an important economic factor to the studios. Indie films tend to be less teen-centric although that doesn’t mean that we don’t see coming of age films emerge from the ranks of the indies.

Greg (Mann) is just trying to navigate the treacherous waters of high school without hitting a reef. He determines that the best way to avoid being picked on by a clique is to be part of all of them, at least to an extent. So he is friendly with everyone in a nondescript way; he’s carefully built up anonymity at his school. Everyone likes him, but nobody knows him and he wants to keep it that way.

He doesn’t have any friends per se except for Earl (Cyler) and even Earl he refers to as a co-worker. The two spend most of their time making short parodies of famous films with oddball titles and premises; The Godfather becomes The Sockfather; The 400 Blows becomes The 400 Bros and so forth. The two of them spend their lunch periods in the office of Mr. McCarthy (Bernthal), a history teacher who lets them watch movies in his office and is the only teacher they respect.

His parents aren’t the most ordinary on the block. His mom (Britton) mostly is, although she snoops around his stuff which irritates the hell out of him. His dad (Offerman), a college professor, mostly stays at home in a bathrobe, making unusual snacks of foreign delicacies that only Earl seems to appreciate. Neither one of them seem to be into telling him what to do, although his mom worries about his lack of friends. Nonetheless one day his mom badgers him to go spend some time with Rachel (Cooke) who was recently diagnosed with leukemia.

Greg doesn’t really know Rachel at all but his mom insists so he reluctantly hangs out and to his surprise the two of them have a lot more in common than you might think and what was supposed to be a one-time chore for an hour or two becomes a regular thing. Some mistake the budding friendship for romance but as Greg says repeatedly in voice-over narration, this isn’t that kind of story. He allows her to watch his crappy movies and keeps her company while she suffers through her chemotherapy and depression. Greg though doesn’t really know how to handle the really emotional stuff and eventually alienates both Earl and Rachel as well as Madison (Hughes), a very pretty girl who is Rachel’s friend and seems intent on what Greg believes to be manipulating him but could just be a teenage girl with a crush on a guy that doesn’t normally attract girls like her. High school can be a real drag that way.

This movie probably generated the most buzz at Sundance earlier this year and it is for good reason; Me and Earl and the Dying Girl is for coming of age films as (500) Days of Summer is to romantic comedies and that’s high praise indeed. While this film isn’t quite as innovative as the other, it has that same spirit and gives the conventions of a genre a slight twist to give the audience a fresh perspective of that type of film.

You could say that the situation is not unknown in coming of age movies and you’d be right. You could say that this film is full of indie cliches and rote characters and you’d be right on target. And yet still the movie manages to hold my attention and stick in my mind after the film had thoroughly unspooled, and that’s surprising; on paper it would seem like the kind of film I’d forget after enduring it. You don’t find many movies that defy characterization like that.

The young leads – Mann, Cyler and Cooke – all turn in strong performances and all of them show the ability to become big stars in the not-too-distant future. While in Mann’s case the character is given a ton of indie quirks, he manages to overcome the tendency to make him a cliche and instead imbues the character with authenticity. He reacts as a real teen would which is not always the way you would want him to. Greg makes mistakes as all people do but in particular teens who lack the life experience and perspective to make the right decision all the time. This is also true of Rachel and Earl as well.

Cooke as the dying girl refuses to be maudlin; she is terrified of what is to come but she’s also weary of the effects of her treatment. She isn’t a vain person by nature but when her hair falls out it affects her unexpectedly.

The supporting performances are also strong. Offerman is fatherly in a quirky sort of way; his character understands his son much better than Greg’s overly critical mom does even though when push comes to shove his mom has his back more than he realizes. Offerman is offbeat here but never overwhelmingly so and thus fits into the story like a glove. Bernthal, best known for his role as Shane in The Walking Dead, doesn’t play your typical high school teacher, tattooed and a fan of Pho but able to connect with his students in a meaningful way. Once again, Bernthal makes a character that could easily become cliche and makes him believable.

Best of all is former SNL standout Molly Shannon as Rachel’s mom, who is coping with her baby having a deadly disease, and she self-medicates in order to do it. Her relationship with Greg is borderline inappropriate and she always seems to have a glass of wine in her hand, but the role – while funny – never descends into parody and we wind up having enormous empathy for a woman who knows that if her only daughter dies, she’ll be all alone in the world. How unbearable must that be.

This is a movie that rather than being manipulative as these types of films tend to be comes by its emotional payoffs honestly. We become involved in the story and in Greg, and care about the characters in the movie as if they were in our own neighborhood. In a summer full of blockbusters and big studio releases, this might get lost in the shuffle in a lot of ways but is worth keeping an eye out for. It is expanding into a wide release this weekend and is one of those rare teen movies that I can not only recommend to teens but to adults as well. This might just be the best movie you see this summer.

REASONS TO GO: Excellent performances all around. Feels authentic. Gripping when it needs to be, funny when it needs to be.
REASONS TO STAY: Occasionally suffers from indie preciousness. Sometimes feels like it’s borrowing from too many other sources.
FAMILY VALUES: The thematic elements are fairly adult; there is some sexuality, some drug use and a bit of foul language.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Fox Searchlight purchased this film for $12 million at this year’s Sundance Film Festival; it is as of this date the most ever paid for a film at Sundance.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 7/1/15: Rotten Tomatoes: 82% positive reviews.. Metacritic: 74/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: The Fault in Our Stars
FINAL RATING: 8.5/10
NEXT: The American Experience 2015 begins!

New Releases for the Week of June 26, 2015

TED 2

(Universal) Mark Wahlberg, Seth MacFarlane (voice), Amanda Seyfried, Jessica Barth, Giovanni Ribisi, Morgan Freeman, Sam J. Jones, Patrick Warburton, Michael Dorn. Directed by Seth MacFarlane

The magically animated teddy bear Ted is living the good life now. Although his thunder buddy has broken up with his girlfriend, Ted’s relationship has blossomed and he is going to get married, and the two are even thinking about having a kid. The trouble is, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts needs Ted to prove that he is human. That’s going to require some legal-type stuff and there’s a hottie named Samantha L. Jackson who might just be the ticket to Ted’s happiness – and his pal John’s as well.

See the trailer and clips here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard (opens Thursday)
Genre: Comedy
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for crude and sexual content, pervasive language and some drug use)

Max

(Warner Brothers/MGM) Thomas Haden Church, Josh Wiggins, Lauren Graham, Robbie Amell. Max is a specially trained dog that sniffs out bombs and mines for the army in Afghanistan. When his handler is killed in action, Max is severely traumatized and is taken out of service. He is shipped back stateside to the family of his beloved handler and makes a bond with their teenage son. However, when a dangerous situation threatens the family, the hero in Max will need to re-emerge if he and his new friend are to save the day.

See the trailer, a clip, an interview and a music video here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Family Drama
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG (for action violence, peril, brief language and thematic elements)

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl

(Fox Searchlight) Thomas Mann, R.J. Cryler, Olivia Cooke, Nick Offerman. A high school senior tries to remain as invisible as possible to avoid any sort of relationship which might cause him discomfort. He spends most of his free time making film parodies of classic movies with his only friend, who he describes as a co-worker rather than a best friend. However, when his mom insists that he spend time with a girl in school who has just been diagnosed with cancer, he finds something that is worth all the trouble he had tried to avoid. This was perhaps the most acclaimed film to come out of Sundance this year.

See the trailer, clips, interviews and a featurette here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard (opens Thursday)
Genre: Dramedy
Now Playing: Enzian Theater, AMC Downtown Disney
Rating: PG-13 (for sexual content, drug material, language and some thematic elements)

Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters

This isn’t your grandparents’ Hansel and Gretel.

(2013) Fantasy Action (MGM/Paramount) Jeremy Renner, Gemma Arterton, Famke Janssen, Peter Stormare, Thomas Mann, Pihla Viltala, Derek Mears, Robin Atkin Downes (voice), Ingrid Bolso Berdal, Joanna Kulig, Rainer Bock, Bjorn Sundquist, Zoe Bell, Kathrin Kuhnel. Directed by Tommy Wirkola

Even after I outgrew them, I always loved fairy tales. You know, the sort in which brave heroes outwit fiendish foes, beautiful princesses await rescuing and fantastic creatures exist in a kind of idealized Renaissance Faire-like environment which is free of disease, the commoners were well-treated by their land-owning nobles and nobody starves, living a simple life in which everyone is basically good. You know, Fantasyland.

Certainly it never existed in real life. Still, we all know the story of Hansel and Gretel, a brother and sister who wandered into the woods to find a cottage made of candy – what child wouldn’t investigate that. But then they meet the owner of the cottage – a witch who uses the candy to attract children whom she imprisons, fattens up and then cooks. Sort of like Gordon Ramsay on estrogen. Of course the kids trick the witch and shove her into her own oven. And there the tale ends.

But in a marvelous idea of what-if, a 15-years older and wiser Hansel and Gretel are posited. They have evolved into professional witch hunters, travelling from village to village to rid them of the witch menace while collecting the bounties offered. Hansel (Renner) ate too much candy at the witch’s cottage and now must inject himself periodically or die. Think of it as fairy tale diabetes. Gretel (Arterton) is a kick-ass ninja who while beautiful and desirable doesn’t seem to have any takers. Hansel, on the other hand has attracted the comely Mina (Viltala) whom he rescued from being burned by the overzealous Sheriff (Stormare) who resents the bounty hunters incursion into his territory. It seems that children have been disappearing in great numbers in the village as of late.

Notwithstanding, the Mayor (Bock) insists so the pair go after the kids and find the witch responsible. Which happens to be Muriel (Janssen), who has it in her head to perform a ritual in a few days during the blood moon that will let her create a potion that will permanently make witches immune to fire. Muriel also has a connection to their late mother (Kuhnel) and Gretel herself has in turn a connection to this ritual.

So they need to stop this thing from happening but they will have to get past an angry sheriff (whose had his nose broken by the no-nonsense Gretel), a monstrous troll (Mears, voiced by Downes) and a coven of very nasty witches who have a broomstick up their butts about the whole thing.

Wirkola, best known for Dead Snow, the zombie Nazi ski resort horror film of a few years back, has a great concept to work with. Unfortunately, his writers (of which he is one) do nothing creative with it. This is a generic fantasy action film with nothing unusual to recommend it.

Oh, Renner is good. Renner is, in fact great. He has a kind of sardonic grin throughout as if he is saying to the audience “Yeah, I know it’s crap but it’s a paycheck and I’m gonna have a great time making it.” He’s a terrific action hero as he showed last summer with The Avengers and The Bourne Legacy. He’s a star and time will tell how big he’ll be. This movie unfortunately won’t help.

It might help Arterton though. She’s had some pretty good performances in films that ranged from good (Tamara Drewe) to not-so-good (Prince of Persia) and here she continues that streak. She’s due a movie that is worthy of her talents and one in which she’ll get enough fans where she can be a star herself. She’s not quite there yet though.

As you might guess, there are a lot of effects here much of which have to do with witches getting eviscerated by Hansel and Gretel (a sentence which sounds kind of crazy on its own merits). There is the troll who is well realized with some very evocative facial expressions; there are also tons of fire effects some of which looks none too realistic. It’s pretty much hit and miss. The 3D incidentally is pretty miserable; there really isn’t much reason to have made this movie in 3D other than as a cash grab; that they pushed back the movie nearly a full year in order to retro-convert it is even worse.

This is a major disappointment. They had a great idea but could think of nothing good to do with it. There are some humorous bits – drawings of the missing children on the milk bottles for example but not enough of them. The anachronisms – the swearing, the machine guns, the magic bullets – simply don’t work. They remind you that you’re watching a movie instead of being part of a mysterious. The reason that a movie like this works is that you feel a part of the experience. The reason that it doesn’t is that you’re constantly reminded that you aren’t.

REASONS TO GO: Renner and Arterton are pretty damn good. Janssen makes an effective baddie. Edward the Troll is nicely realized.

REASONS TO STAY: A great concept poorly executed. Too many anachronisms.

FAMILY VALUES:  There is a good deal of violence albeit mostly of the fairy tale variety although there is a goodly amount of gore i.e. heads exploding, heads being hacked off, heads being stepped on etc. – this isn’t a good movie to be a head. There is also some brief nudity, a bit of sexuality and a lot of bad language – who knew there were so many f bombs in medieval Germany!

TRIVIAL PURSUIT: The movie was already in pre-production and was to be about the unsuccessful hunt for Osama Bin Laden when the news broke that Bin Laden was dead. Immediately the screenplay was re-written to turn the movie into the story of the successful hunt for Bin Laden.

CRITICAL MASS: As of 1/30/13: Rotten Tomatoes: 17% positive reviews. Metacritic: 22/100; the reviews are miserable.

COMPARISON SHOPPING: Van Helsing

FINAL RATING: 4/10

NEXT: Pearl Harbor

New Releases for the Week of January 25, 2013

HANSEL AND GRETEL: WITCH HUNTERS

(Paramount/MGM) Jeremy Renner, Gemma Arterton, Famke Janssen, Peter Stormare, Derek Mears, Thomas Mann, Rainer Bock, Thomas Scharff, Zoe Bell. Directed by Tommy Wirkola

Fifteen years after nearly being cooked alive at the hands of a naughty witch, brother and sister Hansel and Gretel have taken up the mantle of witch hunters, using ingenious weapons to battle the evil creatures. However, their success has made them a target and their past is about to catch up with them in a malevolent way. This is most certainly not your mom and dad’s fairy tale.

See the trailer and promos here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard, 3D, IMAX 3D

Genre: Fantasy Horror

Rating: R (for strong fantasy violence and gore, brief sexuality/nudity and language)

Holy Motors

(Indomina) Denis Lavant, Edith Scob, Eva Green, Kylie Minogue. A man steps into a limousine and heads out into Paris for a series of appointments. The man changes with each appointment from a captain of industry to a gypsy crone, to an assassin to the melancholy father of a teenage daughter. The movie changes to from drama to action film to science fiction to melodrama. Experimental French cinema at its finest.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Drama

Rating: NR

Movie 43

(Universal) Halle Berry, Gerard Butler, Richard Gere, Emma Stone. An ambitious ensemble piece from some of the most deliciously twisted minds in comedy, including the Farrelly Brothers, Steven Brill and…Brett Ratner. Okay, the last was sarcastic but there really are some talented guys here. Just ask them. But don’t ask them what happened to Movies 1 through 42, okay?

See the trailer and a promo here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Comedy

Rating: R (for strong pervasive crude and sexual content including dialogue, graphic nudity, language, some violence and drug use)

Parker

(FilmDistrict) Jason Statham, Jennifer Lopez, Michael Chiklis, Nick Nolte. Parker is one of the best thieves in the world. He can afford to live by a code of ethics that he sticks to no matter what. He’s not the sort of fellow you want to cross. So when a group of fellow thieves do just that, Parker aims to get his own sort of justice. Even if he has to use Jennifer Lopez to help him get it.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Crime Action

Rating: R (for strong violence throughout)

Quartet

(Weinstein) Maggie Smith, Billy Connolly, Michael Gambon, Tom Courtenay. At a retirement home for opera singers, an annual concert commemorating Verdi’s birthday has been a major source for fundraising, which this year is particularly crucial because the home is in hot financial water. When a diva joins the home and refuses to sing in the concert even though her presence might mean the difference between the home surviving and all its residents being thrown out into the street, an uproar ensues. This is Dustin Hoffman’s directorial debut, by the way.

See the trailer and a featurette here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Comedy

Rating: PG-13 (for brief strong language and suggestive humor)

Race 2

(UTV) Saif Ali Khan, Anil Kapoor, John Abraham, Deepika Padukone. After his partner and lover dies in a car bomb explosion, Ranveer vows to bring her killer to justice. To do that he’ll have to navigate through the criminal underworld of India and through the corrupt corridors of power where betrayal is always an option.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Bollywood

Rating: NR

New Releases for the Week of October 26, 2012

CLOUD ATLAS

(Warner Brothers) Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Jim Broadbent, Hugo Weaving, Jim Sturgess, Doona Bae, Ben Whishaw, Xun Zhou, James D’Arcy, Keith David, Susan Sarandon, Hugh Grant. Directed by Tom Tykwer, Andy Wachowski and Lana Wachowski

Based on the bestselling novel by David Mitchell, six stories through various eras from the 19th century to the distant future. Events in all eras ripple through time in ways both directly and subtly to effect characters who have much more to do with one another than a startling resemblance to one another.

See the trailer, featurettes and a promo here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard, IMAX

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy/Drama

Rating: R (for violence, language, sexuality/nudity and some drug use)

Ajab Gazabb Love

(Puja) Arjun Rampal, Jakky Bhagnani, Nidhi Subbiah, Arshad Warsi. The heir to a worldwide automobile empire falls in love with a girl who’s only interested in social justice and could never have anything to do with a rich guy. The young man convinces his family to play “poor” so that the girl of his dreams will accept him. This is a remake of the Telugu film Seema Tapakai.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Bollywood

Rating: NR

Chakravyuh

(Eros International) Arjun Rampal, Abhay Deol, Manoj Bajpai, Om Puri. The very real Naxalite rebellion in India is examined as young activists battle extreme poverty and social injustice. Pushed into a corner, it seems that a violent uprising may be the only way to achieve justice for the poor and defenseless.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Bollywood

Rating: NR

Chasing Mavericks

(20th Century Fox) Gerard Butler, Elisabeth Shue, Abigail Spencer, Jonny Weston. A young man yearns to surf the most dangerous waves in the world.  A local legend takes him under his wing and that young man would become Jay Moriarty, one of the most beloved of the big wave surfers.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Sports Biography

Rating: PG (for thematic elements and some perilous action)

Dhenikaina Ready

(24 Frames) Vishnu Manchu, Hansika Motwani, Brahmanandam, Kota Srinivasa Rao. When a couple from Hindi and Muslim families elope, the two families enter open hostilities. When a court case ends the dispute, the couple tries to mend fences between the two families.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Bollywood

Rating: NR

Fun Size

(Paramount) Victoria Justice, Thomas Mann, Chelsea Handler, Jane Levy. A pretty high school senior with attitude to spare gets invited to the biggest, most important Halloween party…like, ever in the history of the universe. But there’s just one thing – her skanky mom is going to her own dress-like-a-slut Halloween party leaving the senior to babysit his little brother. And when her little brother gets lost she’ll have to rely on, like, geeks to save her night and set her on the path to awesomeness.

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Comedy

Rating: PG-13 (for crude and suggestive material, partying and language)

Silent Hill: Revelation

(Open Road) Adelaide Clemens, Sean Bean, Radha Mitchell, Carrie-Anne Moss.  A father and his daughter are on the run from powerful supernatural forces. As she approaches her 18th birthday, disturbing nightmares plague her and when her father disappears she will have to go to Silent Hill to rescue him and come face to face with the truth of who she really is.

See the trailer and clips here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Supernatural Horror

Rating: R (for violence and disturbing images, some language and brief nudity)

Sleepwalk With Me

(IFC) Mike Birbiglia, Lauren Ambrose, James Rebhorn, Carol Kane. A stand-up comedian deals with a stalled career, disapproving parents, a deteriorating relationship and a sleepwalking habit increasing in length and severity. Did we mention this is a comedy?

See the trailer here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Comedy

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

V/H/S

(Magnet) Joe Swanberg, Adam Wingard, Sophia Takal, Calvin Reeder. A group of thieves hired to find a specific VHS tape in an abandoned house finds a whole stack of them, each one more morbid and horrifying than the last. As they continue to watch it soon becomes terrifyingly apparent that these tapes are much more than they seem to be.

See the trailer or stream the full movie from Amazon here.

For more on the movie this is the website.

Release formats: Standard

Genre: Horror Anthology

Rating: R (for blood violence, strong sexuality, graphic nudity, pervasive language and some drug use)