Tools
* ABC Africa
See review this issue. Grand Illusion, Fri at 5:45, 7:30, 9:15 pm, Sat-Sun at 4, 5:45, 7:30, 9:15 pm, Tues-Thurs at 7:30, 9 pm.
ALLIGATOR
The competition gets fierce when a giant reptile challenges Robert Forster's contract with Lubriderm. Grand Illusion, Fri-Sat at 11 pm.
Crackpot Crafters
Lens-less films by the Crackpot Crafters collective, a group of animators who manipulate celluloid with various techniques by hand to create bizarre short works of film. 911 Media Arts, Fri at 8 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 Castle Films, Joanne Woodward, Iron Man and Frank Tashlin, among others. For more info: www.scn.org/pscs. University Heights Center, Thurs at 8 pm.
Divine Intervention
See review this issue. Varsity, Fri-Sun at 2:10, 4:30, 7, 9:20 pm, Mon-Thurs at 7, 9:20 pm.
Independent Spirit Awards Screening
Rendezvous hosts the Independent Feature Project's screening of works nominated for the Independent Spirit Awards. Rendezvous, Sun at 3:30 pm, Mon at 5:30 pm.
Night of the Living Dead
"They're coming to get you, Barbara...". Rendezvous, Thurs at 7:30 pm.
The Reckless Moment
Death, double-cross, blackmail, love, suicide: A smorgasboard of drama drenches yet another film in the Max Ophuls canon. Seattle Art Museum, Fri at 7 pm
Saturday Night Fever
"I work a long time on my hair, and he hits it." JBL Theater, Wed at 7, 9:15 pm.
Wild at Heart
"You're gonna hear a deep sound from Bobby Peru." Egyptian, Fri-Sat at midnight.
NOW PLAYING
25th Hour
We spend the first half trying to figure out who turned in heroin dealer Ed Norton. Then, the mystery is solved summarily, and we're left with nearly another hour to go and not a single three-dimensional character to fill it with. (BARLEY BLAIR)
About Schmidt
Overall, an entertaining film, whose comedy alone sustains the entire picture. (CHARLES MUDEDE)
* Adaptation
Charlie Kaufman and Spike Jonze have created a rich entertainment, stuffing it with enough meta-plot twists to fuel half a dozen lesser movies, and bringing it to the screen with brilliant performances by Chris Cooper and Meryl Streep. (DAVID SCHMADER)
Antwone Fisher
Although not a great movie, it is actually refreshingly restrained. (MATT FONTAINE)
Biker Boyz
A shit-eating redux of that golden cinematic nugget known as The Fast & the Furious, Biker Boyz puts our urban heroes atop whining Hondas.
Bowling For Columbine
Moore wants to say something great, but ultimately doesn't. Can't, maybe. (SEAN NELSON)
Catch Me If You Can
Long stretches of Catch Me If You Can are filmed so lazily, in a manner so devoid of energy, that the entire enterprise falters. The end result is a thrilling, near-unbelievable story rendered dull and even more unbelievable. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)
* Chicago
Basically, the last hour of Chicago is a mess. Nevertheless, I recommend it.You'll have to endure Richard Gere as Billy Flynn, of course, but it's a small price to pay to watch the Fosse-inspired choreography and Catherine Zeta-Jones' star-turn as Velma Kelly. (DAN SAVAGE)
City of God
Fernando Meirelles' Cidade de Deus (City of God) draws its energy, visual flourishes, and narrative strategies from two American sources: Spike Lee and Martin Scorsese. Though great to watch, Cidade de Deus curiously fails to comment on the reason why most of the people who live and die in the ghetto are brown, beige, and black. (CHARLES MUDEDE)
* Confessions of a Dangerous Mind
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind is audacious and ridiculous and completely fucked, both on the page and on celluloid, and for that its subject Chuck Barris should be recognized for what has long been ignored: his undeniable genius. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)
Daredevil
First some good news: Just four months until Ang Lee's The Hulk arrives. Now the bad news: Daredevil is stunningly bad. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)
Dark Blue
See review this issue. Factoria, Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16, Redmond Town Center, Woodinville 12
Darkness Falls
A ghost is haunting the town of Darkness Falls. Said ghost is that of Matilda Dixon, an old bat wrongfully slaughtered by the town over 100 years ago. And how does she exact revenge? By killing children who have lost their baby teeth. Zzzzz. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)
Deliver Us From Eva
A tragic loss of parents left oldest sibling Eva the boss of her sisters, and now that they've grown up, the men in the sister's romantic scope want Eva to get her own guy. Enter LL Cool J, or just ignore him and enjoy another chick flick where the bonding is done at the beauty salon. (KATHLEEN WILSON)
Die Another Day
After about two hours of workmanlike action and suspense, and a battery of sexual innuendo about as subtle and charming as a herpes sore, the 20th James Bond film finally surrenders to its own muddled identity. (SEAN NELSON)
Drumline
Of course we all know that you can take the boy out of the 'hood, but you can't take the 'hood out of the boy. What this film presupposes is, maybe you can? (JONATHAN MAHALAK)
* Far From Heaven
In both style and substance, Far from Heaven pays homage to Douglas Sirk's classic 1956 melodrama All That Heaven Allows, upping the ante by introducing intricate new threats to his heroine's true love--threats that would've landed Sirk's film in the studio censor's blender. But Todd Haynes' pitch-perfect inclusion of sexual confusion and racial bigotry into Sirk's original mix gives him the power to transcend his source material and create a melodramatic masterpiece all his own. (DAVID SCHMADER)
Final Destination 2
No, Final Destination 2 does not have good acting, nor a compelling plot. It does not blur the lines of reality or explore the dark reaches of the director's mind. All it has to offer you is awesome killing. You feel sorry for one character as they scream, "I don't want to die," but does the film give them any sympathy? NO! HA! They get their head ripped off just like everyone else. It's great. (KATIE SHIMER)
Frida
Frida is yet another artist's story that has been stripped of nuance and turned into a paean to something indiscriminately called "living," here with requisite Latin heat and groaning tables of erotically charged food. (EMILY HALL)
* Gangs of New York
Combining real history, richly imagined historiography, and classical melodrama, Gangs of New York tells the story of Amsterdam Vallon, a young Irish immigrant (Leonardo DiCaprio) in mid-19th-century New York City seeking to avenge the murder of his father by a rival gang leader (Daniel Day-Lewis) who has since grown into a powerful crime boss. Scorsese invests the picture with increasingly biblical gravity in an attempt to portray the birth of a nation as a violent, ritualistic collision between two men. Day-Lewis gives the kind of performance that makes you feel proud to be a member of the human race. (SEAN NELSON)
Gods and Generals
See review this issue. Factoria, Meridian 16, Metro, Redmond Town Center, Woodinville 12
A Guy Thing
It's official: Guys ARE the new girls. And as if there was any doubt, A Guy Thing is the final proof. Jason Lee is at his best when he's angry, ranting, and spouting philosophical bullshit, not when he's a spineless, henpecked, about-to-be-married guy who gets the thrill of his life by (via his involvement with Julia Stiles) discovering that pressing the accelerator just before reaching the top of a hilly street causes the car to leap into the air a foot or two. Whee. (KATHLEEN WILSON)
Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets is a thunderous bore. The plot is some garbage about destiny and magic and spiders and snakes--if you're planning on seeing it, you either already know the plot or won't want to. Only a kid could stand it, but no kid worth a damn is going to want to sit through a 161-minute movie in which nothing exciting or funny happens, and in which our hero is never truly jeopardized. Harry is just a charmed little guy who gets everything he wants and always saves the day. (SEAN NELSON)
* The Hours
I was prepared to hate this movie. Script by David Hare, whose previous work I regard as self-absorbed Brit-babble, from a novel I haven't read by Michael Cunningham that won a Pulitzer, kiss of death, about a writer whose life is a lightning rod for stupidity about mental illness and feminism, and whose work has never meant much to me. Direction by Stephen Daldry, whose Billy Elliot was terrific in part because it was so self-confidently slight, here with a cast of thousands, every single one of them a Major Dramatic Star. And the nose! Nicole Kidman plays Virginia Woolf in a large, deforming nasal prosthesis; I had seen it in the previews and shuddered. Altogether, I hoped the movie was a shapeless pasticcio that would let me make cruel fun. I was so wrong. This is a really good movie. (BARLEY BLAIR)
How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days
Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey star in this romantic comedy about a cad who makes a bet and the journalist who loves him. Pardon me while I vomit into my popcorn bag.
The Jungle Book 2
AKA Clear Cut!
Just Married
Ashton Kutcher is SO FUCKING SEXY. (DAN SAVAGE)
Kangaroo Jack
If there's one thing that I love more than talking animals in sunglasses, it'd have to be Christopher Walken. Well I'll be damned! Two great tastes....
The Life of David Gale
See review this issue. Grand Alderwood, Metro, Woodinville 12
The Lion King
"Slimy... yet satisfying."
Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
The Two Towers becomes a deeply rousing tribute to the spirit of resistance in the face of certain defeat. The film resonates so deeply, despite its potentially embarrassing fantasy trappings, because the filmmaker recognizes that violence and sacrifice are unavoidable aspects of the survival of civilizations. What separates The Two Towers is its faith in the possibility of heroes, and its admission, as one of those heroes plainly states, that "good is worth fighting for." (SEAN NELSON)
* Lost in La Mancha
What makes Lost in La Mancha (a behind the scenes look at a movie left unfinished) worthy of wider interest is that the payoff we expect from such a film--AKA the happy ending, after the premiere, when all the hard work and craziness is rewarded--isn't forthcoming. Which we know going in. So the whole creative process, which is founded on the expectation of filming the unfilmable, winds up feeling not like the noble endeavor we imagine art to be, but rather like an exercise in futility. But that's where things become really interesting, and really depressing. Because Lost in La Mancha is, let's face it, a kind of genre piece--in the mad-filmmaker genre; there are certain tropes we know to look for. (SEAN NELSON)
Love Liza
Love Liza is solely about grief, but the needed emotional payoff doesn't solve anyone's problems. That's not the only twist that makes the film so rewarding, but it's high on the list. At the top of that list, predictably, is Philip Seymour Hoffman--here playing a widower who spirals into drug addiction and despair as his grief goes unacknowledged, like the unopened suicide note he carries around while huffing gasoline, sabotaging his career, and alienating his friends. (SEAN NELSON)
Maid in Manhattan
While pretending to tell the truth about class distinctions, Maid depends too hard on the pretty American fiction that such distinctions are only a matter of money--which of course we have to humanistically believe, otherwise we'd be, uh, British. That said, it's not nearly as bad as I thought it would be; Lopez and Fiennes have almost no chemistry at all, but they're pretty graceful about it, and the presence of Bob Hoskins, Chris Eigeman, Amy Sedaris, and Stanley Tucci has got to count for something. Doesn't it? (EMILY HALL)
* My Big Fat Greek Wedding
I love how this movie has been playing for like 25 years and has made 200 grillion dollars and no one I know has seen or even heard of it. (SEAN NELSON)
Narc
This cop drama, which depicts the investigation of a murdered undercover narcotics officer, succeeds thanks to the absolutely brilliant pace of its story. Nick (Jason Patric) is a suspended cop called back into duty to assist in the case and hold the leash on veteran loose cannon, Henry Oak, played by a marvelous Ray Liotta, with ash-colored hair and an extra 30 pounds. As the two drive around town sharing their lives and beating up druggies for information, you start to think Narc will play out the standard formula about solving the case. But there are deeper forces at work, as we get to see the toil the narc job inflicts and how police develop their own moral code when it comes to enforcing the law. (SEAN REID)
National Security
The sea of advertising for this Martin Lawrence vehicle (that mandatorily buses in whitey Steve Zahn) features the image of a crazed Lawrence stalking the streets of California wielding a handgun. How quickly we forget.
Nicholas Nickleby
Douglas McGrath's adaptation of Charles Dickens' 800-page novel is simply entertaining. This is the substance of the film: It has funny moments, dramatic moments, Victorian costumes, and convincing street scenes of bustling 19th-century London; the English is often proper and lyrical; there are jocular people, loathsome people, and loving people, and their world is filled to the brim with pleasant music. As I've never read the book (and don't intend to), I can't determine what was removed and what was preserved in this adaptation, or know how such changes affected the original content or purpose of the story. Nevertheless, at times the film does feel a bit rushed. (CHARLES MUDEDE)
Old School
See review this issue. Factoria, Grand Alderwood, Oak Tree, Woodinville 12
* The Pianist
Despite appearances to the contrary, the film is not about the indomitable spirit of a survivor. It's about how low a human being can sink in order to live, and the depths of abasement a race is capable of withstanding in order to avoid extinction. There's no heroism in the picture, and all redemption is tempered by the knowledge of what's coming next. It's here, in the deeply Eastern European black comedy of this knowledge, that the film and its maker mark their territory most boldly. (SEAN NELSON)
The Quiet American
Michael Caine deserves all the praise he's received for his role as Fowler, while Brendan Fraser slightly overplays the wide-eyed idealism that inspired America's misguided involvement in Vietnam. The metaphor of the love triangle doesn't work here nearly as well as the more overt politics, but the movie is worth seeing if only because it shows how America can do the wrong thing with the best of intentions. (ANDY SPLETZER)
Rabbit-Proof Fence
Director Phillip Noyce makes all the right decisions in telling what could have (justifiably) been a big slab of moist, liberal liver and onions; a tale of indomitable metaphor and sackcloth villainy. Instead it is a measured tale of a secret history, and of basic human desires asserting themselves in the most inspirational of ways. (SEAN NELSON)
Real Women Have Curves
Every major scene devolves into sloganeering, a champagne socialist's daydream of life in the po' house. (MICHAEL SHILLING)
The Recruit
A perfect example of no-risk filmmaking. Recent M.I.T. grad Colin Farrell is recruited by CIA agent Al Pacino. Why does Farrell spurn possible millions with Dell computers to become a spook? The disappearance of his father, who may have been an agent himself--oh, and the really hot CIA trainee he has his eye on might also have something to do with it. Predictably, everything is not what it seems, and predictably The Recruit, though solidly made, doesn't really add up to much. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)
* Russian Ark
For all its technical marvels, Russian Ark is essentially a monologue of Eastern European cynicism fleshed out with visual aids from history. The film's insufferable theatrical conventions--mainly a function of the actors--can be forgiven because of the magnificent scope of the production; but when you peel away the technical novelty, you're basically watching a bunch of old paint. (SEAN NELSON)
Shanghai Knights
A sequel to the fairly entertaining Shanghai Noon, the 2.0 version re-teams Owen Wilson (funniest guy ever) and Jackie Chan (who is still brilliant, if a lot slower than he used to be) and, through some plot device involving a sacred seal (or something), sends them to London. Hilarity does not ensue, but a couple of cool fights do. (BRADLEY STEINBACHER)
* Star Trek: Nemesis
To be honest, Picard's crew appears to have exhausted its usefulness. (KUDZAI MUDEDE)
Talk to Her
Talk to Her, Spain's camp bad boy Pedro Almodovar's latest film, contains no drugs or sex, and I didn't even notice until it was over. That's because the movie unfolds with grace and still manages to shock while being funny, strange, morally complex, and moving. (NATE LIPPENS)
Treasure Planet
Updating Robert Louis Stevenson's pirate classic for the space-age is a fun conceit. Unfortunately, this kid's movie is far too wholesome to thrill. (JOSH FEIT)
Two Weeks Notice
Well, I didn't cry, but I'm still ashamed to admit that I actually liked Two Weeks Notice, mostly because there is no "rescuing" going on in the movie--just a rich guy and a dedicated lawyer trying like hell not to fall in love with each other. (KATHLEEN WILSON)
The Wild Thornberrys
Nickelodeon's marginally successful animated series--the movie!
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