Tuesday, May 21, 2013
Movie Picks
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Are We There Yet (PG)
A romantic comedy starring Ice Cube, about a road trip that throws his character for a loop when he offers to drive his girlfriend's kids 350 miles to see her in time for New Year's Eve. -- Not reviewed
Carmike 10, Chapel Hills 15, Cinemark 16, Tinseltown
Assault on Precinct 13 (R)
A remake of the 1976 film written by John Carpenter, this version is directed by Jean-Francois Richet and stars Ja Rule and Laurence Fishburne. A police officer rallies officers and prisoners to save themselves from a mob when their station is under attack on New Year's Eve. -- Not reviewed
Carmike 10, Chapel Hills 15, Cinemark 16, Tinseltown
*The Aviator (PG-13)
Leonardo DiCaprio gives an eloquent and sympathetic portrayal of Howard Hughes, one of the 20th century's most creative and tragically flawed figures. Cate Blanchett's extraordinary rendition of Katharine Hepburn, and their resulting love provides scenes both brilliant and complex. Martin Scorsese delivers a movie that is a glorious biographical view of Hughes as a futurist. -- Cole Smithey
Chapel Hills 15, Cinemark 16, Tinseltown
Blade Trinity (R)
Wesley Snipes returns as the day-walking vampire hunter in this third and final film in the Blade franchise. -- Not reviewed
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Christmas with the Kranks (PG)
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Coach Carter (PG-13)
Samuel L. Jackson stars as a controversial high school basketball coach who benches his undefeated team, demanding better academic performance. Directed by Thomas Carter (Save the Last Dance). -- Not reviewed
Carmike 10, Chapel Hills 15, Cinemark 16, Tinseltown
Elektra (PG-13)
A female warrior is released from the hospital following a near-death experience. She becomes an assassin for Kirigi and the Order of the Hand and is forced to make a decision that will destroy her or change her life forever. Starring Jennifer Garner as Elektra. -- Not reviewed
Carmike 10, Cinemark 16, Tinseltown
Fat Albert (PG)
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Fighter Pilot: Operation Red Flag (NR)
The movie depicts a young pilot's progression through the challenging and dangerous exercises of Operation Red Flag, the international training program for air forces of allied countries. -- Not reviewed
Cinemark 16 IMAX
*Finding Neverland (PG)
A whimsical, warmhearted and heart-wrenching film about J.M. Barrie, the playwright who wrote Peter Pan, that builds to a moving climax like a teakettle over a flame. A film set apart from Hollywood's standard sex-and-violence fare for adults, it's a story about never growing up, and never giving up on a place called Neverland. Starring Johnny Depp as Barrie; co-starring Kate Winslet. -- Dan Wilcock
Cinemark 16
Flight of the Phoenix (PG-13)
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The Grudge (PG-13)
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*Hotel Rwanda (PG-13)
In 1994, Rwanda became a slaughterhouse when conflict erupted between two ethnic populations, the then-ruling Hutus and the once dominant Tutsis. Hotel Rwanda focuses on one of the most heartening true stories to emerge from Rwanda that year. Don Cheadle (Traffic) shines as Paul Rusesabagina, a Hutu married to a Tutsi and manager of the Mille Collines, an elegant European hotel in Kigali. Paul emerges as the film's hero, sheltering 1,268 refugees in the hotel and using his wits to fend off the Hutu killers. Because Hotel Rwanda is such a good movie, solidly directed with excellent acting, hundreds of thousands of people will watch it. Hopefully in this way the net separating society from the darkness of genocide will be drawn tighter. -- Dan Wilcock
Tinseltown
*House of Flying Daggers (PG-13)
Two army captains Leo (Andy Lau) and Jin (Hong Kong heartthrob Takeshi Kaneshiro) receive word that one of the dagger clan's deadliest assassins has taken a job as a dancer at a local brothel. Posing as a rich loafer, Jin enters the brothel's stunningly multicolored chamber and begins to play drinking games with some of the girls. After he's solidly drunk, or pretending to be drunk, he pays to see the new girl. Into the room steps Mei (Ziyi Zhang), a girl he's told is blind. Problems arise when it becomes clear that both Leo and Mei conceal much about their true identity, and that Jin's deepening love for Mei puts everyone at risk. Here the movie strives for haunting poignancy, the kind perfected by Crouching Tiger, but falls into standard soap opera fare. Still, the final battle scene, involving a dramatic and symbolic shift of the weather, is as breathtaking as the rest of this visual tour de force. -- Dan Wilcock
Kimball's Twin Peak, Tinseltown
In Good Company (PG-13)
Dan Foreman (Dennis Quaid) is a 52-year-old advertising executive for the popular weekly Sports America. Dan works in Manhattan but commutes to the suburbs every night where he is the lone male among three luscious females -- wife Ann (Marg Helgenberger), college-age daughter Alex (Scarlett Johansson) and a younger teenage daughter. Enter Carter Duryea (Topher Grace), a 26-year-old all-purpose hitter for corporate giant Globecom, the company that has bought the media company that owns Sports America, who becomes Dan's boss and his daughter's lover. Quaid's youthful cockiness has turned into a naturally commanding earnestness that makes him far more attractive as an actor in middle age, and Grace has a sweet puppy dog quality that makes Carter Duryea, potentially an unbearable character, downright loveable in this sweet but forgettable male bonding flick. -- Kathryn Eastburn
Chapel Hills 15, Cinemark 16, Tinseltown
Ladder 49
John Travolta and Joaquin Phoenix co-star in this fire-fighting drama, set in New York City. -- Not reviewed
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Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (PG)
Three wealthy children's parents are killed in a fire. When they are sent to a distant relative, played by a ghoulish Jim Carrey, they find out that he is plotting to kill them and seize their fortune. Also featuring Meryl Streep. -- Not reviewed
Cinemark 16, Tinseltown
Meet the Fockers (PG-13)
Sequel to Meet the Parents, starring Ben Stiller and Robert DeNiro. This time the family visits the groom's parents, played by Barbara Streisand and Dustin Hoffman. Not reviewed
Carmike 10, Chapel Hills 15, Cinemark 16, Tinseltown
Napoleon Dynamite (PG)
Napoleon Dynamite's protagonist (Jon Heder) is a teenager whose mouth is forever agape and whose disposition hops between extreme dopiness and standard-issue adolescent indignation. While the indie film is littered with hilarious bits and pieces, they add up to only a few hard laughs and not much else. -- John Dicker
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National Treasure (PG)
Ben Gates (Nicolas Cage) descends from a family of treasure hunters who have long looked for a chest hidden by the founding fathers of the United States. When he learns of a plot to steal the treasure, his only option is to find it and steal it first. -- Not reviewed
Chapel Hills 15, Cinemark 16, Tinseltown
Ocean's Twelve (PG-13)
Bland inside jokes, perpetual self-referencing dialogue, and foreign heists that will put babies to sleep fill up this truncated sequel starring George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon and a bunch of other beautiful people, directed by Steven Soderbergh. Catherine Zeta-Jones adds a wrinkle to the plot as a hotshot Europol detective romantically attached to Pitt's character when she isn't trying to solve robberies. -- Cole Smithey
Cinemark 16
Phantom of the Opera (PG-13)
A cinematic adaptation of the play by Andrew Lloyd Webber. --Not reviewed
Carmike 10, Chapel Hills 15, Tinseltown
*The Polar Express (G)
A Christmas classic for the wired generation. Breathtaking state-of-the-art computer animation combined with a fast-paced storyline make for dazzling eye candy, and Tom Hanks (who plays most of the characters) and director Robert Zemeckis craft a worthy homage to the animated Christmas movie genre that people of all ages really can appreciate. -- Dan Wilcock
Chapel Hills 15, Cinemark 16 IMAX (in IMAX 3D)
Racing Stripes (PG)
A zebra with a voice on loan from Frankie Muniez, is mistakenly abandoned during a rainstorm and finds refuge on a farm where he grows up believing he is a racehorse. With the help of his barnyard friends and a teenage girl, he sets out to achieve his dream of racing with thoroughbreds. Celebrity voices include Dustin Hoffman, Whoopi Goldberg, Jeff Foxworthy, Mandy Moore, Joshua Jackson, and Snoop Dogg. -- Not reviewed
Carmike 10, Chapel Hills 15, Cinemark 16, Tinseltown
*Ray (R)
The film biography of America's beloved soul man, Ray Charles, who died last year at the age of 73. The surprise of Ray is not the music; it's fabulous. It's not Jamie Foxx's performance -- tour de force is putting it mildly. The surprise is that despite a blocky, chronological, somewhat plodding story line, the development of a public character we all felt we knew well contains revelations that, while not particularly pretty, enrich the legend of Ray Charles, bringing him a bit closer to the ground. The 20 years depicted in the film are spent predominantly on the road, with Ray womanizing, shooting up and making glorious music born of a complicated and utterly unique genius. -- Kathryn Eastburn
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Shall We Dance (PG-13)
Richard Gere plays a middle-aged accountant who finds transformation in a ballroom dance studio. Also starring Jennifer Lopez and Susan Sarandon. -- Not reviewed
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Shark Tale (PG)
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The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie (PG)
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White Noise (PG-13)
A man is contacted by his dead wife from beyond the grave. Michael Keaton stars. -- Not reviewed
Carmike 10, Chapel Hills 15, Cinemark 16, Tinseltown
Work and Glory (PG)
A family moves to Central New York and finds itself in the middle of Mormon religious controversy in Palmyra. Two brothers end up on opposite sides of this religious fence and in contention over the daughter of a wealthy landowner. -- Not reviewed
Cinemark 16
