Center of the World, Eureka, In a Lonely Place, The Legend of Rita, The Long Run, The Mummy Returns

20th Anniversary Video Shorts Festival
911 Media Arts presents an evening of rarely screened, independent short films from across the land. Curated by Mike Cady. Fri only. 911 Media Arts

*Battles Without Honor and Humanity
There are times when not even strong, strong coffee can part the fog of a Saturday morning. If this is the case, I heartily suggest you haul your hung-over body down to the Grand Illusion for an eye-opening rendezvous with Japan's foremost cinematic nihilist/comedian, Kinji Fukusaku. In the first six minutes of this nonstop descent into the mania of the honor-bound Yakuza universe, you will witness a chase, a rape, two murders, and three arms being chopped off, neon-red blood spurting everywhere. A few minutes later, someone cuts his belly open to get out of jail. Some large explosions follow; then our hero cuts off his own finger with a sushi knife. This movie is completely hilarious. (Jamie Hook) Sat-Sun. Grand Illusion

The Circle
Reviewed this issue. The labyrinthine city of Tehran is the setting for this scathing study of how women are criminalized in Iranian society. Opens Fri. Varsity

Driven
Sly Stallone tries to revisit his Rocky glory by tackling the always-challenging subject of race car driving. Opens Fri. Metro

Everyone's Child
A film by Zimbabwean director Tsitsi Dangarembga, addressing the AIDS crisis in Africa and the prediction that by the end of 2001, the continent will be home to more than ten million AIDS orphans. Presented by Ustawi; discussion to follow. Wed May 2. Little Theatre

The Forsaken
If you've ever piked up a vampiric teenage hitchhiker while driving to your sister's wedding, you'll no doubt identify with this movie. Opens Fri. Metro

Harvest
Based on the 1930 novel by Jean Giono titled Regain, Harvest (made in 1937) is a simply-told, lyrical story about two French peasants--a scissors grinder and his female companion--who pass through a village populated by only one man. This simple construction leads to beautiful complexity when the woman decides to stay in the village. French actor Fernandel's performance as the peasant Urbain, all sad smile and tousled hair, is the highlight of the film. Black and white. Thurs April 26. Seattle Art Museum

Himalaya
Reviewed this issue. A pastoral Tibetan thriller featuring the best high-altitude Yak caravan chase scene you've ever seen. Opens Fri. Egyptian

*North By Northwest
Hitchcock's most inspired entertainment is also considered as an artistic lightweight by some of our more overeducated cineastes, who are forever arguing the greater merits of Vertigo or Strangers on a Train. Oh well... sucks to be them, 'cause North by Northwest is flat-out fantastic. The master never again reached a peak so high as the Mount Rushmore finale here. Cary Grant stars as Roger Thornhill, an adman mistaken for a nonexistent espionage agent and framed for a murder. Chased from New York to South Dakota--by way of Chicago, where the funniest auction scene in the history of cinema occurs--Thornhill stays one confused step ahead of his pursuers, and one forlorn step behind the lovely FBI Agent, Eve Kendall (Eva Marie-Saint). Thrilling, hilarious, romantic, and just plain brilliant frame-by-frame. (Jamie Hook) Opens Fri. Majestic Bay

One Night at McCool's
Three men (Matt Dillon, John Goodman, and Paul Reiser) fall in love with one woman (Liv Tyler). Michael Douglas' hair and John Goodman's gut should turn your comedic tricks for you. Opens Fri. Varsity

pickAxe
The Pacific Crest Biodiversity Project presents a free screening of pickAxe, a documentary about the citizen blockade that prevented logging in Oregon's Warner Creek. Sat only. Speakeasy

Ralph Bunche: An American Odyssey
A documentary about Dr. Ralph Johnson Bunche, the first person of color to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Sat only. Benaroya Hall

Sam Phillips: The Man Who Invented Rock 'N' Roll
A documentary about the founder of Sun Records, narrated by Billy Bob Thornton. Wed May 2. JBL Theater at EMP

Sex, Lies, and Videotape
Steven Soderbergh's debut film was much lauded at the time, and is wrongfully credited with jump-starting the "indie film boom." A decade later, and the film seems perhaps a bit too clever for its own good. To be sure, the story--impotent boy meets friend's wife, boy videotapes wife, everyone becomes enemies--is admirably simple and refreshingly devoid of heroics. The film is nicely realized, as well, with the various truths of media--video being truth, film being fiction--giving wonderful performances in their own right. It's just that the whole contraption seems a bit too tight. Soderbergh holds our hands too much; you can feel his fingers pointing stuff out. Thankfully, later in his career, he learned how to forget to do that. (Jamie Hook) Thurs-Sun. Little Theatre

Shafted
See Stranger Suggests. A white guy thinks he's the black private dick who's the sex machine to all the chicks in this blaxploitation parody. Fri-Sat. Grand Illusion

Soylent Green
In the 1973 sci-fi classic Soylent Green, New York City is home to more than 40 million people. There is no room, space, peace--just swarms of desperate people. The police department is, of course, corrupt; garbage is out of control; and the gross green stuff everyone eats for breakfast, lunch, and dinner is actually... well, I can't tell you that. What I can tell you is the movie stars Charles Heston and Edward G. Robinson, who concluded his long and remarkable career with this depressing vision of the future. (Charles Mudede) Fri-Sat. Egyptian

Town and Country
Warren Beatty slides into a world of sexy sleaze with other women, only to find out who he really loves: himself! No, this is not a documentary. Opens Fri. Metro

Twisted Flicks
Jesse James Meets Frankenstein's Daughter gets the Mystery Science Theater 3000 treatment from Jet City Improv. Fri-Sat. University Heights

*With a Friend Like Harry
This Hitchcockian thriller took France by storm last year, winning several Cesar awards (France's version of the Oscar). The blackest hue of comedy tints the tale of Harry (Sergi Lopez), a wealthy bon vivant with an unshakable affinity for Michel (Laurent Lucas). Harry, firm in his belief that Michel's child-strewn, moneyless life could be made more easy, begins to use his influence--and cash--to remove various obstacles to Michel's happiness. A new car here and a case of champagne there escalates to a predictably absurd degree. The film is plain in comparison to its obvious inspiration, Hitchcock's oeuvre. But a deft French wit, and that oh-so-well-done trick of Euro-allegory (this film is about the difficulty of making art) rise like cream to the top of this film: The first taste is awfully sweet, even if it doesn't linger long. (Jamie Hook) Opens Fri. Harvard Exit

The Adventures of Joe Dirt
A mullet stars as David Spade's hairstyle in the story of a down-and-out redneck in search of his parents. This film was co-produced by Happy Madison, and features everything (an affable loser, a nostalgic '80s butt-rock soundtrack) that made Adam Sandler so successful that he now has his own production company. Everything, that is, except for Adam Sandler. You'd be amazed at what a difference that makes. (Jason Pagano) Factoria, Metro, Oak Tree, Pacific Place 11, Redmond Town Center

Along Came a Spider
Along Came a Spider is a prequel to Kiss the Girls. Again, Morgan Freeman plays Dr. Alex Cross, a detective who deals with the most psychotic white men in America. Though Kiss the Girls is the better of the two thrillers, I still enjoyed Along Came a Spider because Morgan Freeman is Morgan Freeman. (Charles Mudede) Factoria, Meridian 16, Metro, Oak Tree, Redmond Town Center

*Amores Perros
Amores Perros begins at a screaming dead run and maintains one kind of intensity or another over the next two-and-a-half hours. Pungently translated as Love's a Bitch, Amores Perros comprises three stories of life, love, and aggressively twisted fate in the most polluted metropolis on the planet. Alejandro González Iñárritu and screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga have enrolled in the Tarantino school of storytelling, but González Iñárritu's own style and vision is so distinctive and assured in this directorial debut that no one should dwell on that point. This is a breakthrough work for Mexican cinema, and for a bold and powerful new talent. (Richard T. Jameson) Egyptian

*Best In Show
The latest from the folks who brought you Waiting for Guffman follows several dog owners on their quest for the blue ribbon at the 2000 Mayflower Kennel Club Dog Show. Dogs are always funny. (Jason Pagano) Broadway Market

*Billy Elliot
Granted, the story is unoriginal (a small town boy beats the odds and becomes a ballet dancer), but its setting (a working-class family struggling through the worst of the Thatcher years) disrupts the sleep of the tired narrative and unexpectedly, steadily, it comes to life. (Charles Mudede) Broadway Market

Blow
Blow is much, much better than Steven Soderbergh's incredibly ridiculous and racist Traffic. It's more realistic and complex, and yet is by no means an art film or have any such pretensions. Blow is Hollywood all the way to the bank. But despite all its predictability--young man (Johnny Depp) rises to the top of the international drug trade and then falls to the bottom of the prison system--its portrayal of Mexicans, Central Americans, and middle America is unexpectedly sympathetic. Forget Traffic, denounce fucking Soderbergh, and give Ted Demme a chance. (Charles Mudede) Factoria, Meridian 16, Oak Tree, Redmond Town Center, Varsity

Bridget Jones's Diary
Bridget Jones's Diary features a successful career woman (Renée Zellweger) with a personal life that leaves one wondering how she attained any success at all. She desires a boyfriend, sets her sights on the office cad (Hugh Grant), and moans when he dumps her. The film banks on "the eye-rolling sisterhood of solidarity," the notion that girls love to grumble over a lying, dog-ass guy. Hollywood seems to be saying, "You may not identify with her professional success, but we bet you'll identify with the mess she's made out of her personal life." (Kathleen Wilson) Aurora Cinema Grill, Factoria, Majestic Bay, Metro, Pacific Place 11, Redmond Town Center

The Brothers
The Brothers is a coming-of-age comedy/drama about four successful young black men coming to terms with commitment and adult relationships, a sort of Waiting to Exhale for men. I will, however, vindicate this film, if only because seeing four black men in the same place at the same time is such a novelty in the Northwest. (Kudzai Mudede) Lewis & Clark, Pacific Place 11

Chocolat
My straightforward review will open with a detailed plot summary ("The movie is about a French village whose serenity is shattered by a mysterious woman who moves into town with her illegitimate daughter and opens a sexy chocolate store."), and then state the truth ("The movie is unremarkable!"). (Charles Mudede) Metro, Pacific Place 11, Redmond Town Center

The Claim
Michael Winterbottom adapts Thomas Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge (guy "sells" wife and child, the evil deed haunts him). I haven't liked Winterbottom's previous work, including his version of Hardy's Jude the Obscure, but I loved The Claim. Winterbottom sets the story in the Gold Rush, with the gigantic Canadian Rockies overplaying the part of the merely big-shouldered Sierra Nevada. Wes Bentley is beautiful, Milla Jovavich is strong, Michael Nyman's score saws away dramatically in the background, Joanne Hansen's costume design makes everyone look better than real, and the hush in which Winterbottom requires almost all the lines to be delivered for me served as a useful equivalent to Hardy's literary airs. High-toned hooey, extremely enjoyable. (Barley Blair) Broadway Market

Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles
The film is a likable old dog. It performs its tricks as dependably as it did the first time around 15 years ago, albeit it's a bit slower now. It will neither surprise nor excite you, but it won't irritate you either. Its story is really too slight to bother to recount further than the title suggests. Crocodile Dundee winds up in L.A., gets in a couple of pickles, gets out, and goes home. Nobody gets hurt, nobody dies. If you paid money to see it you won't feel cheated, because you will only pay to see this because you have the money to spend. This is as dependable as entertainment gets. (Riz Rollins) Factoria, Grand Alderwood, Oak Tree, Pacific Place 11, Southcenter

*Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
The film is an attempt to wed emotionally reticent drama with the exhilarating freedom of Hong Kong-genre filmmaking, but director Ang Lee can't quite pull off the combination. The film finds its rhythm and earns the accolades it has received once it leaves the stars behind and gives its heart over to the young and engaging Zhang Ziyi. (Bruce Reid) Grand Alderwood, Majestic Bay, Neptune, Uptown

*The Day I Became a Woman
A tripartite parable, Marzieh Meshkini's directorial debut commemorates Iranian maiden, wife, and crone in unique, cumulatively mythic styles. The most viscerally affecting chapter in Meshkini's film begins in exhilarating motion: the brilliantly choreographed bicycle-ride and horse-chase scene takes your breath away and breaks your heart. The Day I Became a Woman exemplifies the subversive visual poetry that flows through the best Iranian cinema. (Kathleen Murphy) Uptown

The Dish
Here at last is a film that is about a radar dish and it really is about a radar dish! The huge dish, which is in the middle of Australia (which is another way of saying nowhere), is the star of the film. In fact, it overwhelms even the stars (Sam Neill, Patrick Wharburton) and the plot (which is about Australia's participation in the Apollo 11 moon mission of 1969). (Charles Mudede) Guild 45th, Meridian 16

Enemy at the Gates
Enemy at the Gates is the story of a Russian World War II sniper (Jude Law) and the German sniper (Ed Harris) who is sent to eliminate him. When the dueling snipers embark on a cat-and-mouse chase to assassinate each other, the movie becomes genuinely exciting. And if the film is at times rather silly... well, it's from Britain and its a minor miracle that they even have running water out there let alone significant movies. (Kudzai Mudede) Aurora Cinema Grill, Meridian 16, Redmond Town Center

Freddy Got Fingered
Reviewed this issue. MTV prankster Tom Green co-writes, directs, and stars in a film you have either been anticipating for months or are just now hearing about. Factoria, Grand Alderwood, Lewis & Clark, Metro, Oak Tree, Pacific Place 11

Gladiator
War hero General Maximus (Russell Crowe) is stripped of his position by a scheming new Caesar (Joaquin Phoenix). Escaping too late to save his family, Maximus falls into the hands of a slaver, and with the help of a former love, seeks his revenge by finding glory within the Coliseum. (Tom Spurgeon) Cinerama

Heartbreakers
Sigourney Weaver and Jennifer Love Hewitt play a mother-and-daughter con team with a fervent understanding that men will screw them over, and that they must beat those suckers at their own petty game. But as every cool-headed dealer knows, the revenge con never works. Heartbreakers is certainly amusing, but its unimaginative approach will disappoint viewers who want to feel the wicked cinch of the complex con. (Traci Vogel) Grand Alderwood, Lewis & Clark, Pacific Place 11

Josie & The Pussycats
A grotesquely cynical live-action update of the flimsy 1970s cartoon, Josie and the Pussycats is set in a manic present-day fantasia of corporate space, a parallel world in which no space, be it in two or three dimensions, lacks for corporate sponsorship. Logos proliferate madly: sidewalks pulse with Target targets; storefronts beam forth golden arches, and skyscrapers scream Starbucks; carpets read "Revlon." It is as if the youth-market-driven multinationals had tattooed the entire body of the city, leaving no part of its flesh unadorned. (Jamie Hook) Grand Alderwood, Metro, Oak Tree, Pacific Place 11

Kingdom Come
Kingdom Come should have been a television sitcom. It has passing moments of interest that should have been juxtaposed with amusing car insurance advertisements. It should have had a laugh track to distract the viewer from the suspicion that there's not an awful lot going on here. And most importantly it should have been edited down to about 30 minutes in length. A movie about an African American family (played by a superb ensemble cast, LL Cool J, Jada Pinkett, Whoopi Goldberg) from the South coming together to mourn the death of a despised relative should have been a surer bet, unfortunately this movie just wasn't nearly developed thoroughly enough. (Kudzai Mudede) Lewis & Clark, Pacific Place 11

The Low Down
With a name like The Low Down you'd think this movie actually goes somewhere, but it doesn't. It is at heart a plain and unremarkable British movie about plain and unremarkable British twenty-somethings drinking, falling in love, and essentially going about their rather plain and unremarkable lives. In order to escape these trappings, the movie blends a lively soundtrack with interesting camera angles and well-rehearsed, snappy British banter. (Kudzai Mudede) Uptown

*O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Set in Depression-era Mississippi, George Clooney stars as Everett Ulysses McGill, a suave and well-groomed petty criminal doing hard time on a chain gang. Shackled to Pete (John Turturro) and Delmar (Tim Blake Nelson), he convinces them to join him in escaping by promising to split a fortune in buried treasure. (Andy Spletzer) Harvard Exit

Pokemón 3
Pokemón 3 is about a little rich girl who is traumatized by her parents inexplicable deaths. One night, a magical lion appears in her bedroom. "Papa, you've come back," she says to the magical lion. "If that is what you think I am," says the magical lion, "then that is who I am." Then, the whole world is slowly turned into crystal. This film is a must for all child psychologists. (Charles Mudede) Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16, Metro, Redmond Town Center

Pollock
This is actor Ed Harris' directorial debut (he also stars), and seems in too big a hurry to establish the iconic events of painter Jackson Pollock's life--see Pollock urinate in Peggy Guggenheim's fireplace, see Pollock overturn the Thanksgiving table, see Pollock accidentally discover drip painting--without letting any of these moments achieve any natural resolution. (Emily Hall) Seven Gables

See Spot Run
See Spot Run was a great movie about a dog named Agent 11 who was trained by the F.B.I. since he was a puppy. Agent 11 is trying to catch these bad Mafia guys. The head Mafia guy hires these two other Mafia guys to kill Agent 11, but he escapes and winds up staying with the main character played by David Arquette. The funniest part was David Arquette doing his great George Jefferson breakdance. (Maggie Brown, age 10) Grand Alderwood

Someone Like You
In the lead role, Ashley Judd chews, licks, and snacks her way through nearly every scene, all the while remaining trim and fit despite no apparent exercise regime. So much for empowerment. As for the rest of Someone Like You's message, don't expect anything more than feisty Judd getting a bee in her bonnet after getting dumped. (Kathleen Wilson) Meridian 16, Redmond Town Center

Spy Kids
Fellow earthlings, I regret to inform you that even now as we speak, it is too late. Spy Kids is headed towards us like a juggernaut and only the childless have means of escaping. (Suzy Lafferty) Factoria, Grand Alderwood, Lewis & Clark, Majestic Bay, Meridian 16, Metro, Northgate

The Tailor of Panama
Brit superspy Andy Oxnard (Pierce Brosnan) has been banished to Panama for overindulging his appetites. He sizes up the tense, complicated international scene at the Canal and finds himself a hapless ex-pat British tailor (Geoffrey Rush) to squeeze for information. Boorman's film is far too awkward and self-conscious to allow the audience to sink into spy fantasia; as a result, Brosnan's absurdly dashing spy becomes utterly grotesque, even sickening. (Evan Sult) Grand Alderwood, Meridian 16, Metro

Traffic
The big message in Traffic is perfectly laid-out by its tagline: "Nobody gets away clean." All the flashy directorial touches and sterling performances in the world can't cover the fact that Traffic is just another example of Hollywood tackling a complex problem with the simplest and most conservative of solutions. (Bradley Steinbacher) Grand Alderwood, Pacific Place 11, Varsity, Varsity Calendar

Voyages
At first, you wonder if Voyages has any plot at all. What's with these half-heard snatches of conversation among tourists, representatives of the great post-war Jewish Diaspora? But let yourself go into this film's idiosyncratic itinerary, as it circles around to embrace half a century of transports, "disappeared" families and memories, exiles. There's mystery afoot everywhere in these journeys; a trick of the eye, and time seems to slip backwards in memory trips that measure the Holocaust's ongoing aftershocks. Allow this haunted journey time to unreel, for it brings home both terrible and wonderful truths about humanity in the aftermath of the unthinkable. (Kathleen Murphy) Grand Illusion

*You Can Count on Me
In Kenneth Lonergan's You Can Count on Me, "adult" and "sadness" and "American" become a knot of synonyms as the story focuses on the pure inability a brother and sister have with one another now that they're adults. (Paula Gilovich) Metro