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Also this issue: Lost and Found Cops and Bobbles Get Your War On Screen Picks |
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February 20-26, 2003
movie shorts
ABOUT SCHMIDT
From the outside, Nicholson's insurance salesman Warren Schmidt may seem like an average schmo, but seen through his eyes, he's King Lear. One night soon after retiring, he calls a number off the television to sponsor a young Tanzanian boy; before long he's sending letters off to the other side of the world on a regular basis, pouring out his heart in a way you sense he never has. The Midwest serves director Alexander Payne's satire because it's easy to play off coastal assumptions of heartland virtue: Schmidt has lost any reason to put on a good face, and any conviction that it would help.--S.A. (Baederwood; Narberth; Ritz East; Ritz 16)
ADAPTATION
Flush with the success of Being John Malkovich, Charlie Kaufman (Nicolas Cage) is hired to write a screenplay based on New Yorker writer Susan Orlean's The Orchid Thief. Wrestling a series of related concepts -- adapting someone else's book, making that adaptation original, making that adaptation comprehensible not to mention vaguely marketable -- he frets, a lot. He frets himself right into the movie you're watching. The movie includes L.A. scenes in which Charlie and twin Donald (both played by Nicolas Cage) argue and Charlie works on his screenplay, as well as scenes where Orlean (Meryl Streep) meets with her book's subject, John Laroche (Chris Cooper). Meanwhile,Charlie feels pressure to perform and produce, to make art.--C.F. (Bridge)
BIKER BOYZ
The undisputed "King of Cali" is Laurence Fishburne's Smoke, president of the Black Knights biker club and speedster nonpareil, who meets with cyclists from all walks of life at night to burn sweet, sweet rubber. When beloved Black Knight Slick Will is killed in a freak racing accident, his young, photogenic son Kid (Antwone Fisher's Derek Luke) decides he doesn't want to wait his turn as a BK acolyte any longer, and forms his own club, Biker Boyz, with the intention of unseating Smoke as the chopper chieftain.--R.G. (Bridge; UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Riverview)
BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE
Michael Moore has deliberately taken on a subject -- the American propensity for violence -- that can't be explained, just to see how close to the impossible he can get. Bowling begins, of course, with our fondness for guns, but Moore pushes past that answer, pointing fingers at retailers who offer cut-rate ammunition, at racial and economic disparities, and at a media that makes it seem like we're more violent than we actually are..--S.A. (Roxy)
CHICAGO
Set in Depression-era, tabloid-driven Chi, Chicago splits off Kander and Ebb's cracking songs from the rest of the story, setting them in a fantasy nightclub space that is interwoven with the real-life setting. Though the faux-retro salaciousness sometimes comes off more Broadway crass than le jazz hot (and Catherine Zeta-Jones is too hippy for her high-cut costumes), Renée Zellweger proves to be an honest-to-goodness triple threat; while hardly a belter, she finds her way into Roxie's go-getter bite, and she's as light on her feet as any good comic actress. Chicago may not rank with the classics, but it's the best traditional movie musical in many a moon. --S.A. (Bala; Ritz Five; Ritz 16; UA Grant)
CONFESSIONS OF A DANGEROUS MIND
Chuck Barris's (Sam Rockwell) autobiographycomes to the big screen via an adaptation by Charlie Kaufman and directed by George Clooney. The result is a brilliant mix of television history, artistic license and self-inflation. Just as ABC rejects Barris' initial pitch for The Dating Game,he's tapped by Jim Byrd (George Clooney). Informed that he "fits the profile" of the international spy, Chuck signs up, anticipating exciting missions. Soon, Chuck evinces a newfound sense of confidence and performance. In order to maintain his "cover," his assignments coincide with excursions he must chaperone for winners ofhis now-successful The Dating Game. The film elaborates on lifelong desire for approval through his womanizing self-image.--C.F.(Ritz at the Bourse)
DAREDEVIL
With its in-joke references to Marvel artists, a cameo by glory-hound Stan Lee and a bit part for Kevin Smith (who's recently taken a turn writing the comic), Daredevil is the comic-book geek movie par (lack of) excellence. Despite the fact that it's a story about a blind man who's given amplified senses after being dunked in chemical waste, then decides to dress up in an oxblood leather suit and fight crime, the movie unfolds with the portentousness of a Sunday school class. Like Spider-Man, Daredevil demands a setting that appears to be seedy but is actually nostalgic -- one where the villains are colorful crimelords and self-advertising underworld types are so obviously criminals that even a blind man (heh) could see it. Like Spider-Man, the comic-book version of Daredevil tied his foes up and left them for the police; now he either dispatches them with bone-crunching force or maneuvers them into situations where the elements (or the C train) can finish them off. Aren't these things supposed to be fun? As blind defense attorney Matt Murdock, Ben Affleck seems like he doesn't know how to spell "law," let alone practice it. When billionaire businessman (and not-so-secret baddie) Michael Clarke Duncan tries to engage Murdock's services, he retorts, "We only handle innocent clients." So justice really is blind.--S.A. (AMC Orleans; Bridge; Bryn Mawr; UA Grant; UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; Ua Main St; UA Riverview)
DARKNESS FALLS
Presumably the filmmakers used up all their imagination devising a fresh motivation for their vengeance-prone demon, the ghost of a woman with a disease making her sensitive to light who was unfairly burned at the stake by the town's residents.A movie whose villain is repelled by light would seem to be a goldmine for any noir-loving auteur, but instead Chaney Kley and Emma Caulfield (Buffy's Anya) spend most of the movie diving for flashlights.--S.A. (UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Riverview)
DELIVER US FROM EVA
LL Cool J (keeping his abs under wraps for once) plays the player hired to take Eva (Gabrielle Union) off the hands of three very harried fellows, each dating one of three sisters and menaced by Eva, the fourth. The premise is pure beer-commercial misogyny -- the guys would all be happy if Eva would stop warping the sisters' priorities, which she only does because she's a frigid bitch. LL's supposed to seduce Eva, get her to move away with him, and then dump her (oh, the chuckles), but wouldn't you know it, they end up falling for each other -- which might be a cliché, but at least comes close to being tolerable. --S.A. (AMC Orleans; UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; ; UA Riverview)
FINAL DESTINATION 2
FD2 recaps everything from its first installment -- that Death is a malevolent force surrounding us at all times that takes being cheated very personally. When Kimberly (A.J. Cook) has a premonition of a horrific -- and imaginatively choreographed -- traffic accident, she blocks the highway on-ramp just long enough to save her life and those of a handful of strangers behind her. This group's still-aliveness apparently causes "a rift in Death's design" that Death wastes no time in rectifying. This would all be really scary if people ever actually died like this; I guess we can be grateful that Death is not yet a second-rate horror screenwriter. Still, there's a certain amount of fun to be had: No matter how ridiculous the premise, it's all in the execution.--R.G. (AMC Orleans; Cinemagic; UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant;UA Main St.;UA Riverview
The Guru
Dance instructor Jimi Mistry comes to New York to become a star. The first acting job he lands is a porn movie, where he meets the self-assured Heather Graham. Silly plot turns and energetic Bollywood-style song-and-dance numbers lead him into the arms of a rich girl (Marisa Tomei), seeking spiritual guidance. With Tomei's financial support and Graham's lessons in healthy sexual performance, Mistry becomes the Guru of Sex, a star as beloved and desired as Deepak Chopra. Lively, smart, and executive produced by Shekhar Kapur (Bandit Queen), the film challenges typical trajectories of cultural influence by reversing and celebrating them. It's also so completely charmed by itself that it's impossible to resist.--C.F. (Ritz East; Ritz 16)
HE LOVES ME, HE LOVES ME NOT…
Audrey Tatou takes another whack at l'amour fou in Laetitia Colombani's convoluted poison valentine. Angelique (Tatou) is an art student who's carrying on a passionate affair with a married doctor (Samuel Le Bihan) -- or maybe not. Confined to her point of view, the film's first half suggests that the relationship might be all in her head; shot from his, the second half proves it is. No surprise spoiled there -- He Loves Me belongs to, or at least borders on, a by-now familiar form: the POV movie. Trouble is, the format has been used so much that it takes a real whopper of a surprise to make the endless jiggery-pokery worth waiting through, and He Loves Me has neither. Clever without being smart, it's no more than a mirage.--S.A. (Ritz at the Bourse)
HIS SECRET LIFE
After Massimo (Andrea Renzi) is mowed down crossing the street, his wife Antonia (Margherita Buy) finds a painting with a romantic inscription on the back in his office, which betrays the shocking knowledge that her husband had been having an affair for seven years. The surprises don't end there -- she tracks down the painting's sender and finds not a bottle-blond tootsie but a trim, attractive young man: Michele (Stefano Accorsi). That His Secret Life develops beyond this hoary, 50s-melodrama premise is both to director/co-writer Ferzan Ozpetek's credit and his detriment, the latter for having started in such over-fished waters.--S.A (Ritz at the Bourse).
THE HOURS
Essentially three separate films, The Hoursopens on the suicide of Virginia Woolf (Nicole Kidman), in the London suburb of Richmond, 1941. From here the film cuts back in time, to 1923, as Woolf is writing Mrs. Dalloway, visiting with her sister, Vanessa Bell (Miranda Richardson) and confronting her own evolving madness. The second story takes place in 1951 Los Angeles, where housewife Laura Brown (Julianne Moore) is reading Mrs. Dalloway and facing doubts about her marriage to gentle Dan (John C. Reilly).The third piece, set in 2001 Manhattan, follows Clarissa Vaughan (Meryl Streep) as she puts together a party for ex-lover Richard (Ed Harris), a novelist now dying of AIDS-related illness.--C.F. (Bala; Bridge; Ritz 16)
HOW TO LOSE A GUY IN 10 DAYS
Andie (Kate Hudson) decides to write a what-not-to-do article, using her own experience with an actual Guy to be named later and an actual span of 10 Days in which to make said Guy first fall for her and then drop her like a spoonful of black hole. Ben (Matthew McConaughey) bets his boss that he can make a girl fall in love with him in the same 10-day span. What really strains the credulity, though, is that the plot centers on the Knicks being in the NBA Finals; is this a romantic comedy or science fiction? Still, if you don't mind rooting for liars, there is some fun to be had here. --Ryan Godfrey (AMC Orleans; Bridge; UA Main St.; UA Grant; UA Riverview)
THE JUNGLE BOOK 2
(Not reviewed.) A haiku:
John Goodman's the bear;
Haley Joel is the man cub.
Plus Phil Collins squawks.
(AMC Orleans;UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Riverview)
KANGAROO JACK
(Not reviewed.) A haiku:
"He stole the money
And he's not giving it back."
Because he stole it.
(UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Riverview)
the pianist
A Polish Jew hiding from the Nazis in Warsaw, sometimes looked after by friendly non-Jews, Wladyslaw Szpilman (Adrien Brody), the titular artist, refuses to acknowledge that life has already changed forever, that the Germans had invaded weeks before. The film mostly takes Szpilman's view, showing the atrocities he sees; cinematographer Pawel Edelman hardly lingers on any of these images. Finally forced to evacuate, Szpilman keeps out of sight. While the "action," such as it is, now decreases, the film becomes almost unbearably acute, approximating the man's psychic state, his process of internalization.--C.F. (Ritz Five; Ritz 16)
THE QUIET AMERICAN
Phillip Noyce's adaptation of Graham Greene's avowedly "anti-American" novel makes the political personal, collapsing a pivotal moment in the history of American involvement in Vietnam into the story of two men battling over a woman. When British journlist Fowler (Michael Caine) introduces Pyle (Brendan Fraser) to the beautiful Phuong (Do Thi Hai Yen), his girlfriend of two years, Pyle seizes on the fact that Fowler cannot get a divorce from his long-estranged English wife and begins to woo Phuong, always in the name of what's best for her, but ruthlessly all the same. However, we're stuck looking through Fowler's eyes, never getting a sense of what life was like for the Vietnamese, any more than, for all the arguing Fowler and Pyle do over Phuong, we get a chance to hear her own thoughts on the subject.--S.A. (Ritz at the Bourse; Ritz 16)
THE RECRUIT
In director Roger Donaldson's version of this recurring "troubled agent" scenario, Colin Farrell is the gifted CIA trainee, Al Pacino his brilliant recruiter/father figure, and Bridget Moynahan his rocky romantic interest. Trained at "the Farm," they learn that "everything is a test" and "nothing is what it seems." Apparently, this is news for the newbies, who miss obvious cues concerning plot turns, all of which suggests they're not exactly cut out for the spy biz, where acumen and precision are reputedly valued.--C.F. (Bridge; Ritz 16; UA Grant;UA Riverview)
SHANGHAI KNIGHTS
Jackie Chan and partner Owen Wilson are tracking Chan's father's assassin in London, which grants them excuses to visit the wax museum, commit homoerotic slapstick on the hands of Big Ben, and for Wilson to make fun of British wussiness, Scotland Yard and the Queen's guards. Chan has a sister this time, too, played by Fann Wong, and her martial arts are faster and more wire-worky than Chan's own (though he also submits to wires and a couple of stunt double moments, too). --C.F. (AMC Orleans; UA 69th St.; UA Main St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; ; UA Riverview)
TALK TO HER
Pedro Almodóvar's newest movie takes so many turns, it's unfair to reveal too much, but its basis is the relationship that develops between two men -- Benigno (Javier Cámara) and Marco (Darío Grandinetti) -- who are both attached to comatose women, the former professionally, the latter romantically.Almodóvar's real subject is the way fictions, either those created for us or the ones we create ourselves, fill gaps between people. Making nods to other types of art, Talk to Her perhaps spreads itself too thin, but it's about passions, so if they overrun, it's almost appropriate.--S.A. (Ritz Five)
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