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January 1-7, 2009
buzz@boulderweekly.com
Australia
En route to love, and to save his ranch from the clutches of a rival, a cattleman known as “The Drover” (Hugh Jackman) guides a prim Englishwoman (Nicole Kidman), a crew of mixed-race outcasts and 1,500 head of cattle across thousands of miles of Australia during World War II. The second half of director Baz Luhrmann’s first project since Moulin Rouge! develops some momentum. But you have to pass through the first half to get to the second, by which time you may find yourself drowning in high-fructose Aussie corn syrup. Rated PG-13 (a scene of sensuality, brief strong language and some violence). At Flatiron. — Michael Phillips
Bedtime Stories
Adam Sandler plays Skeeter, a hotel handyman under the thumb of the owner (Richard Griffiths) and manager (Guy Pearce). Skeeter and his sister (Courteney Cox) grew up in a motel bungalow court, and Skeeter longs for a crack at running the hotel that’s built on the site. While Sis is away, Skeeter must baby-sit for his niece and nephew, and the adventure stories he spins become fantasy vignettes that somehow manage to improve his disappointing life. It’s an adequate idea, dutifully delivered. Rated PG (some mild rude humor and mild language). At Flatiron and Century. — Michael Phillips
Bolt
Voiced by John Travolta, the chief asset in a bland ensemble struggling with its material, Bolt is a canine who headlines a TV show co-starring his longtime owner, Penny (Miley Cyrus). Bolt has never been told that his life-or-death adventures are fake, so he’s the star of his own depressing version of The Truman Show. Complications separate Bolt from Penny, sending him to New York City, where his superpowers, which he believes to be real, are useless. This animated Disney feature is stingy on wit, charm, jokes and narrative satisfactions. Rated PG (some mild action and peril). At Flatiron. — Michael Phillips
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
This is a tall tale of a man aging in reverse while bobbing serenely on life’s unpredictable seas. The colorful supporting characters spill their guts to the wonder of nature played by Brad Pitt, as he begins his life a very old man, ages into late-middle age, ripens into... well, Brad Pitt, then embarks on the big fade into childhood, infancy and check-out time. It’s worth seeing because the sights are truly something. As with his earlier Zodiac, director David Fincher applies the right technology in the right way. Rated PG-13 (brief war violence, sexual content, language and smoking). At Flatiron and Century. — Michael Phillips
The Day the Earth Stood Still
The year’s least necessary remake stars Keanu Reeves as interplanetary visitor Klaatu, first introduced in the 1951 original. This time, Earth’s sins are more climate-based than warfare-based. Klaatu has come to issue a warning to Earth’s leaders: Either treat your planet with more care or prepare for mass extinction. Reeves’ portrayal offers little spark or surprise. Klaatu is a blank, and all around him, the flying spheres and Mummy-inspired digital swirls of schmutz are strictly routine. Rated PG-13 (some sci-fi disaster images and violence). At Flatiron and Century. — Michael Phillips
Doubt
A deft, beautifully built play has made it to the screen with its dramatic juice intact. John Patrick Shanley adapted and directed his stage piece set in a Catholic school in the Bronx in 1964, pitting Meryl Streep’s Sister Aloysius against Philip Seymour Hoffman’s Father Flynn, who’s suspected of an improper student relationship. Rated PG-13 (thematic material). At Flatiron, Century and Mayan. — Michael Phillips
Four Christmases
Christmas itself will survive this acrid, wince-worthy holiday film, but barely. Reese Witherspoon and Vince Vaughn (who both need new agents) play a carefree couple who routinely lie to their respective divorced parents about being unable to visit around the holidays. But bad weather ruins their trip to Fiji and strands them in an airport, they’re interviewed on TV, and their families see it, so to save face they speed-visit all four sets of caricatures. The cast, which also includes Sissy Spacek and Robert Duvall, is far better than its material. Rated PG-13 (some sexual humor and language). At Flatiron. — Michael Phillips
Frost/Nixon
Director Ron Howard’s screen version of the Peter Morgan play allows Michael Sheen and Frank Langella to re-create their stage roles as David Frost and Richard Nixon, respectively. Frost’s people paid Nixon’s people $600,000 for the disgraced former president to sit for a series of television interviews taped in 1977, not quite three years after Nixon resigned. Watching Frost lock rhetorical horns with his subject made for a riveting postmortem on a fall from power. Howard’s film pours old-fashioned theatrical juice into a cinematic bottle and lets the actors drink it up. Rated R (some language). At Century. — Michael Phillips
Happy Go Lucky
This is accomplished director Mike Leigh’s most buoyantly comic feature, and it’s a marvelous showcase for Sally Hawkins, who stars as the perpetually cheery Poppy, a grade-school teacher in North London. Happy-Go-Lucky is an ode to the power of irrational exuberance, and Leigh keeps the narrative machinery to a minimum. Everything is a bit neat, but a lot of Leigh’s work tends toward a heightened theatrical neatness. When it works, the result is a slice of life that, in terms of honest cinematic storytelling, is more like a slice of cake. Rated R (language). At Starz. — Michael Phillips
I’ve Loved You So Long
Kristin Scott Thomas may be a more subtle and expressive performer in French than in English, and in this absorbing if schematic French-language drama, she’s superb as a doctor recently released from a 15-year prison sentence. The particulars of her crime, and her uneasy adjustment to a new life, form the basis of writer-director Philippe Claudet’s debut feature. Expect an Oscar nomination for Thomas. Rated PG-13 (thematic material and smoking). At Starz. — Michael Phillips
Marley & Me
The misadventures of a lovable Labrador retriever frame this sweet, surprisingly moving chronicle of a young couple’s struggle to simultaneously build a family, advance their careers and maintain their sanity. Owen Wilson plays journalist John Grogan, whose popular 2005 memoir spawned this film, and Jennifer Aniston plays Jenny, his wife. Dog lovers will laugh delightedly for the first hour and spend the second hour weeping openly. Rated PG (thematic material, some suggestive content and language). At Flatiron and Century. — Jessica Reaves
Milk
The story of Harvey Milk is a tragedy, but not since Jeff Spicoli in Fast Times at Ridgemont High has Sean Penn played such a serenely happy individual. Penn is superb as the martyred San Francisco city supervisor, America’s first widely acknowledged openly gay elected official. He was killed by Milk’s former colleague, Dan White (Josh Brolin, also excellent), minutes after White’s fatal shooting of Mayor George Moscone in 1978. Rated R (language, some sexual content and brief violence). At Mayan, Century and Chez Artiste. — Michael Phillips
Quantum of Solace
Chilly-eyed Daniel Craig is the right man for the James Bond franchise, and his second outing confirms it. The trouble is, Marc Forster (Finding Neverland, Monster’s Ball) demonstrates that not every director is well-suited to Bondland. There’s plenty of action, but half the time it’s visually incoherent. The tale picks up minutes after the end of 2006’s Casino Royale. Bond is after the shadowy Quantum organization for killing his lady friend. Rated PG-13 (intense sequences of violence and action, and some sexual content). At Flatiron and Century. — Michael Phillips
The Reader
Kate Winslet stars in the film version of Bernhard Schlink’s 1995 novel about a 15-year-old West German boy who, in 1958, embarks on an affair with a 36-year-old trolley conductor with more on her mind, and in her past, than she admits. The novel was hugely popular as well as controversial worldwide and an Oprah’s Book Club selection besides. However, it needed a different set of interpreters to make any emotional sense of it on screen. Even in the scenes dominated by Winslet, you never quite believe the way anything unfolds. Rated R (some scenes of sexuality and nudity). At Flatiron, Century and Chez Artiste. — Michael Phillips
Revolutionary Road
Based on a novel by Richard Yates, this is the tale of a young couple struggling with personal problems during the 1950s. Rated R. At Esquire.
Seven Pounds
This movie has a big heart, but it’s made out of high-fructose bull. Will Smith plays an IRS agent who has committed a terrible deed and appears to be investigating the cases of a carefully selected group of people, including a seriously ill heart patient (Rosario Dawson) and a blind pianist (Woody Harrelson). This specious tale of redemption is likely to be the sternest test to date of Smith’s box-office prowess. If he puts this one over, he can do anything. Rated PG-13 (thematic material, some disturbing content and a scene of sensuality). At Flatiron and Century. — Michael Phillips
Shoot the Piano Player
Part thriller, part comedy, part tragedy, Shoot the Piano Player relates the adventures of mild-mannered Charlie Koller (Charles Aznavour), a former concert pianist reduced to playing honky-tonk rags in a side street bar. When his past catches up with him in the form of his wayward brother Chico (Albert Rémy), Charlie stumbles into the criminal underworld and a whirlwind love affair with admiring waitress Léna (Marie Dubois). Both a sly tribute to American film noir and a moving rethinking of its key tropes, Truffaut’s second feature is pure nouvelle vague. At Starz. — Denver Film Society
 Slumdog Millionaire
Slumdog Millionaire is a ruthlessly effective paean to destiny, leaving nothing to chance. It also has a good shot at winning this year’s Academy Award for best picture, if the pundits have anything to say about it. Every arrow plucked from director Danny Boyle’s quiver takes aim at the same objective: to leave you exhausted but wowed. An 18-year-old (Dev Patel) in the former Bombay, India, is suspected of cheating his way to national fame on the Hindi version of Who Wants To Be a Millionaire? Rated R (some violence, disturbing images and some language). At Flatiron, Century, Esquire and Chez Artiste. — Michael Phillips
The Spirit
This achingly poor screen version of The Spirit is based on the comic book series begun in 1940 by Will Eisner. Frank Miller wrote and directed this adaptation, in a visual style lazily close to that of his Sin City. Miller chops the action into awkwardly paced illustrations of a scene rather than keeping the scene in fluid motion. Cast members Scarlett Johansson, Samuel L. Jackson and Eva Mendes play their roles like comic book characters stuck in a cruddy movie. Rated PG-13 (intense sequences of stylized violence and action, some sexual content and brief nudity). At Flatiron and Century. — Michael Phillips
The Tale of Despereaux
This earnest, emotional film is a mixed but pretty interesting bag, though its G rating may mislead some parents into taking 4- or 5-year-olds to it, which could lead to some freakouts. Much of the movie, based on a Newbery Medal-winning book, has a grim narrative. But this rodent story featuring the voices of Matthew Broderick, Emma Watson and Kevin Kline, among others, is still better-than-average animation. Rated G. At Flatiron and Century. — Michael Phillips
Twilight
This highly anticipated, surprisingly low-key vampire movie is a film of intelligent strengths and avoidable weaknesses, a modest adaptation of Stephenie Meyer’s publishing phenomenon. It’s faithful to its source material, and it’s better written than Meyer’s frothy book. Teen Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) relocates from Arizona to Washington, where she falls for tortured, sensitive vampire Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson). Director Catherine Hardwicke was right to concentrate on getting the smoldering down between her stars, but her film lacks visual magic. Rated PG-13 (some violence, and a scene of sensuality). At Flatiron. — Michael Phillips
Valkyrie
See full screen review on page 39. Rated PG-13. At Flatiron and Century.
Were the World Mine
If you had a love potion, who would you make fall madly in love with you? Timothy, prone to escaping his dismal high school reality through dazzling musical daydreams, gets to answer that question in a very real way. After his eccentric teacher casts him as Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream, he stumbles upon a recipe hidden within the script to create the play’s magical, purple love-pansy. Armed with the pansy, Timothy’s fading spirit soars as he puckishly imposes a new reality by turning much of his narrow-minded town gay, beginning with the rugby jock of his dreams. Ensnaring family, friends and enemies in this heart wrenching chaos, Timothy forces them to walk a mile in his musical shoes. The course of true love never did run smooth, but by the end of this moving musical comedy of errors based on director Tom Gustafson’s prolific Award-winning short film, Faeries, the bumpy ride comes to a heartfelt conclusion. with vibrant imagery, a first rate ensemble cast and innovative music rivaling the best of pop/rock and contemporary Broadway, Were The World Mine attempts to push modern gay cinema and musical film beyond expectation. Not rated. At Starz. — Denver Film Society
Yes Man
Jim Carrey plays a loan officer who can’t get out of his self-pitying rut three years after a breakup. Then he encounters a self-help guru (Terence Stamp, in his first genuinely funny screen appearance) who challenges his followers to say “yes” to every single thing that comes their way. Zooey Deschanel plays the love interest, a bohemian L.A. girl. The tone of Yes Man isn’t predominantly manic, which may throw some die-hard Carrey fans expecting the old shtick. But the interplay between Carrey and Deschanel makes this one worthwhile. Rated PG-13 (crude sexual humor, language and brief nudity). At Flatiron and Century. — Michael Phillips
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