LIMITED RUN


An American Werewolf in London
See Stranger Suggests. Grand Illusion, Fri-Sat at 9 pm, 11 pm, Sun-Thurs at 9 pm, no screening Mon.

Dead Ringer
Continuing the creep-streak she began with What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, Bette Davis covers two roles as a pair of rival twins in a dark tale of murder and deceit. Consolidated Works, Fri-Sun at 8 pm, 10 pm.

* Depth of Focus
This monthly screening series of short films with free food and a pay-as-you-exit policy, curated by the Puget Sound Cinema Society. Featuring films by the likes of Wago Kreider, Jeremy Newman, Lars von Trier, and the National Film Board of Canada. For more info: www.scn.org/pscs. University Heights Center, Fri at 8 pm.

Dignity II
Returning to the scene of Dignity's intial inquiry, this hour-long documentary examines Seattle's mental health funding disaster that forced two local houses for the mentally ill, the Mercer Inn and the Summit Inn, to combine. Directed by Lorian Elbert. 911 Media Arts Center, Wed at 7:30 pm.

* GINGER SNAPS
Ginger and Brigitte are teen-age sisters living the deadened life of the underage suburbanite--so, naturally, they dream of bloodshed. Fantasy becomes reality when Ginger is attacked by a wild animal in the woods one night, and then recovers with unnatural speed, only to discover that she has become a sexually rapacious werewolf. Rowr. Grand Illusion, Fri-Thurs at 7 pm, no screening on Mon.

LESBIAN AND GAY FILM FESTIVAL
The seventh annual Seattle Lesbian and Gay Film Festival includes over 100 films and videos at four different venues for seven glamorous days. See Movie Times for full info, or visit www.seattlequeerfilm.com.

* Merci Pour Le Chocolat
Reviewed this issue. Varsity, Fri-Sun at 2:10 pm, 4:30 pm, 7 pm, 9:20 pm, Mon-Thurs at 7 pm, 9:20 pm.

New Voices 2002
Allowing documentary filmmakers the coveted opportunity of public television exposure, 911 Media Arts Center and KCTS television team for third straight year to screen New Voices, a series of locally produced documentaries ranging in subject matter from Kabuki dancing to moles. 911 Media Arts Center, Fri at 8 pm.

* OLYMPIA FILM FESTIVAL
See Stranger Suggests. Despite the number of film fests going on in town lately, this one is worth an hour's drive--not only for the movies they're showing, but for the sense of community that runs through Olywood like a plumb line. The locus is Olympia's fabulous Capitol Theater. (Sean Nelson) See www.olywa.net/ofs for details; online ticket purchase: www.buyolympia.com.

Psycho
"I'll lick the stamps." Egyptian, Fri-Sat at Midnight.

Tribute
See review this issue. JBL Theater, Wed at 7 pm, 8:45 pm.

NOW PLAYING


* 8 Women
On the surface, jealousy is the combative common ground the film's eight women share in the home of a murdered man--who is a husband, a father, a brother, a son-in-law, and a philanderer in relation to the various characters. The women candidly sing and dance to their inner feelings, while hiding away their jealousies or hurling bold suspicions at one another. (KATHLEEN WILSON)

Abandon
The Dawson's Creek crew continues this month's theatrical blitzkrieg, as Joey is forced to confront the buried shroud of mystery that surrounds the disappearance her an old flame.

Ballistic: Ecks Vs. Sever
Lucy Liu is, of course, hot. Antonio Banderas appears to be asleep throughout the film. And the director, "KAOS," appears to be harboring a substantial grudge against train boxcars, since at least twenty are incinerated during the film's finale. In short, yes, it's pretty bad. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)

The Banger Sisters
After her daughter's eye-catching turn as a young groupie in Almost Famous, Goldie Hawn plays an aging one in this cloying, aggravating piece of false, middlebrow claptrap. After being fired from her bartending job (for drinking on the job! Whatta buncha fascists!) she road trips to Phoenix, where her former partner in fashionably random sex with musicians Lavinia (Susan Sarandon, squandered), has sold out to become a rich, anal-retentive soccer mom. (SEAN NELSON)

* Baraka
This movie is what's known in cinephile circles as a "tone poem." All that means is there's no plot, no characters, and no literal meanings. All you get instead are some of the most beautiful images ever rendered for the screen. (SEAN NELSON)

The Barbershop
Starring two popular rappers, Ice Cube and Eve, Barbershop is about a young man (Ice Cube) who reluctantly runs a barbershop he inherited from his recently departed father. He has big ambitions and so does not recognize the social importance of the small business. The best parts of the movie take place in the barbershop--the most complete or sophisticated argument in the movie concerns the scientific difference between good booty and bad booty. (CHARLES MUDEDE)

Blood Work
Blood Work is a total bore. (MICHAEL SHILLING)

Blue Crush
The plot's trite and cheesy--girl from Hawaii kicks ass at surfing, meets boy from the mainland, almost gives up surfing, until a crucial competition arises and he rallies behind her--but the surf scenes are awesome. (AMY JENNIGES)

Bowling For Columbine
See review this issue.

Brown Sugar
Hollywood's first hiphop romance, Brown Sugar is fucking filled with rappers, who are on the whole bloated and boring. (CHARLES MUDEDE)

City By the Sea
De Niro faxes in a performance as--what else?--a world-weary cop coming to terms with his own homicidal history while searching the picturesquely derelict town of Long Beach for a murderer who turns out to be his own son (James Franco, doing his methody best to obscure his insanely good looks) in this dull and labored film soon to be clogging video-store shelves everywhere. (TAMARA PARIS)

* Das Experiment
The good news is, this movie's about a journalist who takes part in an interesting scientific study of power dynamics. In the study, half of the volunteers play guards and the other half play prisoners. The bad news is, this study was done in real life, and they had to stop the experiment because the "guards" got too violent. If you believe that humans have a core of decency within them, you may want to skip this one. (SEAN NELSON)

* The Fast Runner
Although the filmmakers have lovingly reconstructed every detail of prehistoric Inuit culture--this being the first feature-length film entirely in the Inuktitut language--by recording life on the infinite tundra with digital-video intimacy, they keep the characters palpably real. Inside glowing igloos and behind roiling teams of sled dogs, the viewer sees a legend sprout from the ice. (MATT FONTAINE)

Formula 51
In his fourth unconscionably shitty film released in the last year (and yes, that includes that Yoda bullshit), Samuel L Jackson stars as Elmo McElroy, a kilt-wearing chemist (?) who stumbles upon the recipe for a new and exciting illegal substance--the titular formula. Traveling to Liverpool in hopes to hawk his creation in the heart of the city's rave scene, McElroy's "one last score" goes (surprise!) horribly array. Featuring token Brits Robert Carlyle and Rhys Ifans.

Four Feathers
This adaptation of the A.E.W. Mason novel about the glory of Her Majesty's Empire is a good deal more skeptical than its predecessors. But while director Shekhar (Elizabeth) Kapur's revisionist eyes find some chilling contrasts, the overall effect is that of a pre-built battleship being crammed into a whiskey bottle. (SEAN NELSON)

* The Good Girl
When it comes to deep, dark cinematic comedy, Miguel Arteta and Mike White have cornered the market. Following 2000's Chuck & Buck comes The Good Girl, which explores similarly perverse terrain--the soul of a woman trapped by fate and circumstance, driven to commit acts of deeply iffy morality and legality. Starring Jennifer Aniston (who, incidentally, aces the role, bringing a beautifully understated gravity to the character), doe-eyed Jake Gyllenhaal, and John C. Reilly (who scores another supporting-role home run). (DAVID SCHMADER)

Heaven
See review this issue.

* Igby Goes Down
A sharply-observed film down to the upturned collars and half-Windsor knots, Igby gets to the heart of its characters without either indicting or apologizing for its cultural framework. (SEAN NELSON)

Jonah: A Veggie Tales Movie
The computer-animated version of the pamphlets you find at bus stops.

Just a Kiss
Marisa Tomei only improves with age. Always a fine comedienne, she has become a fantastic actress, as well, and if you'll forgive me, is foxier than ever. She is also the ONLY good thing about this execrable "quirky" romanticom about the sexual escapades of a bunch of overwrought and overwritten New Yorkers. (SEAN NELSON)

Knockaround Guys
The story of four young associates of La Cosa Nostra lost in a small Montana town, looking for a suitcase of money gone missing, Knockaround Guys has nothing original to offer in matters of plot or themes. So unless you'll watch anything wiseguy-related, you can wait for this one to come out on video. But then you should rent it, because there are several entertaining moments when the culture of Shrimp Scampi and black stretch-limosines crashes head-first into the world of Merle Haggard and Ford pickup trucks. This is a fine film to watch while doing something else. (MICHAEL SHILLING)

The Last Kiss
This movie stars a lot of beautiful Italian people you've never heard of, and it's set in Italy, where everyone cheats on each other and it's always raining. (MEG VAN HUYGEN)

Lilo & Stitch
Lilo is the studio's best since Aladdin, and it's a tad less racist, too. (ANNIE WAGNER)

* Lovely & Amazing
This follow-up to the similarly graceful Walking and Talking is a shrewdly respectful character study of a fractured family of women trying to ride herd on their raging neuroses. Fantastic acting and sensitive writing underscore the simple DV directorial approach. (SEAN NELSON)

The Man From Elysian Fields
See review this issue.

* Minority Report
Steven Spielberg and Tom Cruise team up for this well-made futuristic thriller. (SEAN NELSON)

* Moonlight Mile
I know this film looks like a sappy weeper, and it kind of is, but as a story of bereavement, commitment, and coming of age (and finding the limits of each), it is also funny, smart, and exquisitely well acted by Dustin Hoffman, Susan Sarandon, and Jake Gyllenhaal. (SEAN NELSON)

Mostly Martha
American audiences are hot for foreign films about food. Sandra Nettelbeck's Mostly Martha, a German production, is compatible with this American fantasy--but the result feels much less crude than the escapist "foreign" fantasies American audiences have become accustomed to. (ANNIE WAGNER)

My Big Fat Greek Wedding
This romantic comedy is based on the one-woman show of Second City alumna Nia Vardalos, who also directs. It tells the story of 30-year-old Toula who searches for love and self-realization.

One Hour Photo
Directed by Mark Romanek (who has made some amazing music videos), One Hour Photo is at best a mildly surprising thriller, and at worst a rather dull affair. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)

Pokémon 4ever
The fourth (4ever, get it?) Pokémon film features another series of absurdly named, unbarably cute beasties that inexplicably shoot fire from every pore. And don't the kids just love it?

Punch-Drunk Love
See review this issue.

* Red Dragon
So here it is, the trifecta for Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter, and it's sure to make piles of money. But is Red Dragon any good? The answer is kinda and no--kinda, thanks to Edward Norton, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Emily Watson, and Ralph Fiennes; no, thanks to Sir Anthony himself, who seems so utterly bored with the role that you can almost hear him snoozing with his eyes open. Clunky and breathtakingly unoriginal, Brett Ratner's film is an absolute paint-by-numbers affair. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)

The Ring
See review this issue.

Road to Perdition
Sam Mendes has done the impossible: He has made a film that is even more smug, phony, and wasteful than American Beauty. (SEAN NELSON)

The Rules of Attraction
An artfully mediocre adaptation of a sub-mediocre novel, in which college life is reduced to hammy venality, vindictive promiscuity, and literal toilet humor. Full to bursting with fatal flaws, Roger Avary's film is at least nice to look at; but James van Der Beek's lead performance as a self-hating lothario is an unconscionable embarrassment for the ages. SEAN NELSON

* Secretary
Maggie Gyllenhaal plays Lee Holloway, a slightly retarded nymphet secretary just released from a loony house, who develops a subversive relationship with her employer, played by James Spader. Part of Secretary's singular quality is that the heroine's problem is never resolved. She entrenches herself deeper and deeper in her "sick" dependency, and ultimately, it becomes her virtue. (MEG VAN HUYGEN)

Signs
Signs would have been exceptional if not for the necessity of elaborate surprises. All the things I like about M. Night Shyamalan's movies (the X-Files-like moodiness, the theological questions, etc.) are imprisoned by the necessities of plot twists. (CHARLES MUDEDE)

Skins
Skins is set on the most impoverished reservation in America, Pine Ridge Reservation, South Dakota, and describes the day-to-day world of a reservation cop (Eric Schweig) who has an eccentric understanding of the law and how it should be administered. At the end of Skins, we don't so much have a story or a clear idea of the cop than an impression of the deep sorrow that suffocates him and his fallen community. (CHARLES MUDEDE)

Spider-Man
As filmed by Sam Raimi, Spider-Man trots out a predictable (and cloyingly Victorian) boy-girl story. (JOSH FEIT)

Spirited Away
In spite of its conspicuous cute deficiency, Spirited Away is by all means a striking visual composition--just make sure you're not drowsy going in. (ZAC PENNINGTON)

Spy Kids 2
Spy Kids 2 isn't a bad movie. (MEGAN SELING)

Stealing Harvard
Completely unnecessary. The plot: Usually funny Jason Lee, and perpetually unfunny Tom Green, turn to criminal endeavors in an attempt to send Lee's niece to Harvard. Hilarity is nowhere near this debacle. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)

Sweet Home Alabama
A lesson that's already been taught in one hackneyed comedy after another--namely, that poor white Southern folk are fat, dumb, and wear Jaclyn Smith, but the boys are hot and they ain't as stupid as city folk think, 'cause they have heart. (JENNIFER MAERZ)

Swept Away
Blah blah Wertmuller remake. Blah blah swarthy Italian guys. Blah blah unintentionally farcical piece of shit. Madonna and her director husband Guy Ritchie are the only two that matter in this mostly hilarious, partially unbearably awful film. Once Madonna blows a hole in the dingy with a flare gun and maroons herself with her lowly servant who soon becomes her master, just walk out of the theater. No one needs to see what comes afterward. Before that, however, is a hilarious 40 minutes or so of Madonna portraying a gloriously spoiled bitch (based on real life one would guess), scowling and snarling as she orders around foreigners while refusing to call them by their actual names ("PeePee, this fish is bad!"), lying topless on a private yacht or hanging out in posh clubs with her girlfriends as they guzzle booze, pop pills, talk shit and stay up late while the men retire to bed. Swept Away also raises the best bad toast I've ever heard-"Champagne for all my friends and pain for all my sham friends!" Oh yeah, Guy Ritchie should be commended for all the cutting he must have done to get the film down to a mere 75 minutes, credits included. What lies on the cutting room floor must really be atrocious. KATHLEEN WILSON

Swimfan
Fatal Attraction for teens, with neither tension, nor boobies. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)

* Tadpole
Tadpole is a witty, intelligent, and unsentimental coming-of-age comedy in which the a precocious preppie teen's lustful projections (onto his stepmom, whoa!) are part of a much larger picture, and the lusty boy is a too-smart-for-his-own-good kid who learns a lesson about snobbery and poseurdom. (SEAN NELSON)

The Transporter
You see, there's this guy, a kinda shady guy, who's British but is a master of Kung Fu, and his job is to transport materials--shady materials, of course, because, as stated before, he's a kinda shady guy--for various individuals, and he has this rule that he never wants to know exactly what he's transporting, but, you see, here's the thing: This bad guy, who's American, hires him to transport something and when he does he opens it, breaking his big rules, and it turns out to be a really hot Chinese woman, and once that happens, well, you know, all hell breaks loose--not spectacular hell, but more of a muddling, dimwitted hell. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)

Trapped
The screening of this kidnapping drama, starring Charlize Theron, Kevin Bacon, and Courtney Love, was yanked at the last minute. Draw your own conclusions on that one.

Tuck Everlasting
A wonderful cast, lovely cinematography, and an almost Zenlike pace cannot overcome the fact that this story is about a 104-year-old guy who's doing it with a teenager! He is approximately six times her age! Yuck! (TAMARA PARIS)

The Tuxedo
The Tuxedo is a bad kung fu film because it spends too much time and energy developing its sorry plot (a spy spoof), and the fight scenes are worth shit. (CHARLES MUDEDE)

Wasabi
If you are into action films, do not go see Wasabi. It is a hackneyed buddy picture about a violent Parisian cop who goes to Japan to settle an old romantic score and in the process dispatches most of the Yakuza without breaking a thumbnail. However, if you want to see blockbuster cinema that accidentally reveals some acute differences between French and American men, ones that will balance out the memory of the foul French guy who always tries to pick you up in the coffee shop, this film has a number of interesting and revealing moments. (MICHAEL SHILLING)

Welcome to Collinwood
Made by the writer-director team of Joe and Anthony Russo, this comedy is the best of the movies I've seen that take its cues from the stylistic holy trinity of the Coen Brothers, Wes Anderson, and Paul Thomas Anderson. Bright, pointed colors, an ornamentally goofy script, a Buster Keaton-meets-marijuana physicality, unique facial hair: it's all here. After a slow start, Collinwood takes off under the steam of the chemistry between the actors, who attain moments of sublime slapstick. Another reason to see this film is the brilliant Michael Jeter, who plays a sad and sweet Quasimodo-esque thief with a powerful and lovely humanity. MICHAEL SHILLING

White Oleander
Oleander is a waste of talent (Michelle Pfeiffer and Renée Zellweger may not be great actresses, but they're better than this movie lets them be) as well as time. (SEAN NELSON)

XXX
Just how bad is XXX? Worse than you've imagined. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)