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April 30-May 6, 2009
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  Adventureland
This sweet, sharp coming-of-age romance is a little warmer, a little funnier and a lot more truthful than the last 20 or 30 of its ilk. You know the kind: R-rated comedies about socially maladroit horndogs on the brink of adulthood, partying and setting their sights on the rest of their lives. All this happens in Adventureland — set in 1987, mostly within the confines of a Pittsburgh amusement park — yet the characters, female as well as male, interact like real people. It’s my favorite American movie so far this year. Rated R (language, drug use and sexual references). At Century. — Michael Phillips
Earth
See full screen review on page 37. Rated G. At Flatiron, Century, Colony Square and Twin Peaks.
Fast & Furious
If you’re in the mood for a lot of vroom, vroom, thump, thump, the fourth installment in the metal-twisting series that began with The Fast and the Furious (2001) should leave you satiated for a long time. The return of Vin Diesel restores energy to the franchise, and director Justin Lin infuses the necessary full-throttle bits with a dynamic lyricism. The plot isn’t really important as long as you know there are plenty of extreme and extended demolition derbies — countless cars gave their lives to make this movie possible. Rated R (language, drug use and sexual references). At Flatiron. — Michael Phillips
Fighting
It’s called Fighting, and its unpolished fracases are among the film’s highlights. But there’s much more to it than that. Channing Tatum plays a drifter who’s drawn by a two-bit hustler (Terrence Howard) into New York’s underground fighting scene. This vivid picture continues the exciting trend of realistic combat that helped make Taken a surprise hit. The heart of the movie, though, is the Midnight Cowboy-esque relationship between the two main characters. Rated PG-13 (intense fight sequences, some sexuality and brief strong language). At Flatiron, Century and Colony Square. — Michael Ordona
Gigantic
Brian Weathersby (Paul Dano of Little Miss Sunshine and There Will Be Blood) is a 28-year-old salesman at a high-end Swedish mattress company. The afterthought child to elderly parents (Ed Asner, Jane Alexander), and the youngest son in a trio of successful brothers, Brian is searching for his place in the world. Unfulfilled by his work he spends a good portion of his day pursuing his goal of someday adopting a baby from China. He gets swept up in a romance with the lovely but loopy Harriet Lolly (Zooey Deschanel) when she comes in to his store one day and falls asleep on one of the beds. To win her over, he must contend with her bear of a father, Al Lolly (John Goodman), an art-collecting loudmouth with a bad back and deep pockets. Gigantic is a funny, surreal love story about the anxiety that comes when two people with crazy families collide unexpectedly and fall for each other. Not rated. At Starz. — Denver Film Society
 Hannah Montana: The Movie
Miley Cyrus, 16, stars in a big-screen expansion of the Disney Channel TV series in which Ms. Cyrus splits herself in two, trying to be both down-home Miley Stewart from Tennessee and, in disguise, Hannah Montana, L.A. rock star adored by millions, with only a dirty-blond wig to conceal her identity. Miley/Hannah must save her hometown of Crowley Corners, Tenn., from a developer (Barry Bostwick) who wants to build a mall and ruin the scenery. Alas, this isn’t a very funny film. Millions of kids will disagree, but they deserve better. Rated G. At Flatiron and Twin Peaks. — Michael Phillips
I Love You, Man
This minor but enjoyable entry in the boy-man comedy genre stars Paul Rudd as a heterosexual L.A. real estate agent engaged to be married but short on straight-up male companionship in general and a best man for his wedding in particular. Along comes a sometime investment whiz (Jason Segel) living the life of a Venice Beach slacker. How these two meet and bond leads to much engaging time-wasting. Rated R (pervasive language, including crude and sexual references). At Flatiron and Century. — Michael Phillips
Ink
As the light fades and the city goes to sleep, two forces emerge. They are invisible except for the power they exert over us in our sleep. These two groups battle for our souls in our dreams. Through good dreams one force supports our hopes and gives us strength. Through nightmares the other force leads us toward desperation.
In this high-concept visual thriller, part It’s a Wonderful Life and Sin City, John and his daughter Emma are thrust into a fantastical dreamworld battle between good and evil where the most precious elements — love, loss and redemption — are at stake. At Starz. — Denver Film Society
Knowing
Nicolas Cage plays a man privy to the details of upcoming disasters — when, where and how many people will die. Until it jumps the tracks into self-righteousness, Knowing can be as unnerving as the best episodes of The Twilight Zone. This slice of disaster porn dabbles in faith and doubt and has no patience for fence-sitters. And by the way, isn’t Cage due to make a high-quality film one of these days? Rated PG-13 (disaster sequences, disturbing images and brief strong language). At Flatiron. — Christopher Borrelli
Monsters vs. Aliens
DreamWorks’ animated 3-D feature is blessed with a high-concept title and Seth Rogen’s serenely dense line readings in the role of a genetically altered tomato gone wrong. But much of the project went wrong somewhere, along with the tomato. The script piles on the mayhem and forgets the funny. To add insult to a paucity of jokes, the look of the picture is cold and oddly flat. This story of imprisoned monsters and rampaging aliens centers on a woman (voiced by Reese Witherspoon) who is creamed by a meteor that turns her into a giant. Rated PG (sci-fi action, some crude humor and mild language). At Flatiron, Century and Twin Peaks. — Michael Phillips
17 Again
This halfhearted fantasy is about a former high school basketball star given the chance to return to high school and infiltrate his kids’ classes under a transfer-student guise. Matthew Perry plays the older version of the ex-jock, with tween idol Zac Efron starring as the younger version. The movie, which makes high school seem only slightly less grim than Lord of the Flies, tries to deal with teen sexuality and social pressures, but it’s the same old song, sung out of key. Rated PG-13 (language, some sexual material and teen partying). At Flatiron, Century, Colony Square and Twin Peaks. — Michael Phillips
Skills Like This
Twenty-five-year-old Max Solomon would like to be a writer, but has to admit he’s just not going to make it with his pen when his play, The Onion Dance, meets with a catastrophic reaction in its opening performance. His best buddies are Dave, who brown-noses his way to a monumentally boring mid-level sales job with no future, and Tommy, a slacker best suited for hanging out in a coffee shop and being funny. With career options like these in front of him, Max commits an impulse bank robbery — of an absolutely unique, but effective, sort. Holding a gun on his own head, he relieves interested teller Lucy of the cash in her register and rejoins his disbelieving but admiring friends. In the next three days, more unusual robberies happen and a compelling romance blooms between Max and Lucy while Dave and Tommy have their lives equally changed and Max has to question his newfound success. Skills Like This is a hilarious, original and freewheeling comedy with a real heart, winner of a well-deserved Audience Award at the South by Southwest Film Festival. Not rated. At Starz. — Denver Film Society
 The Soloist
See full screen review on page 37. Rated PG-13. At Flatiron, Century, Colony Square and Twin Peaks.
The Song of Sparrows
Karim works at an ostrich farm outside of Tehran, Iran. He leads a simple and contented life with his family in his small house, until one day when one of the ostriches runs away. Karim is blamed for the loss and is fired from the farm. Soon after, he travels to the city in order to repair his elder daughter’s hearing aid but finds himself mistaken for a motorcycle taxi driver. Thus begins his new profession: ferrying people and goods through heavy traffic. But the people and material goods that he deals with daily start to transform Karim’s generous and honest nature, much to the distress of his wife and daughters. It is up to those closest to him to restore the values that he had once cherished. Grammy-nominated composer and musician Hossein Alizadeh, a master tar and setar player, provides the haunting score. Not rated. At Starz. — Denver Film Society
State of Play
Like Steven Soderbergh’s Traffic, State of Play compresses a British television miniseries into a stand-alone American thriller and does a pretty good job of it. Russell Crowe plays a star newspaper journalist pursuing strands of a conspiracy involving a shadowy private defense firm. The cast also includes Helen Mirren, Ben Affleck, Rachel McAdams and Robin Wright Penn. This is a sleek, reliable Hollywood package, wrapped in a mournful last hurrah for print investigative journalism. Rated PG-13 (some violence, language including sexual references, and brief drug content). At Flatiron, Century and Colony Square. — Michael Phillips
Sugar
This rich and moving baseball movie follows a 19-year-old from the Dominican Republic, making his way to Arizona, then Iowa, in the employ of the (fictional) Kansas City Knights farm system. What happens to this kid, Miguel “Sugar” Santos (Algenis Perez Soto), feels like the stuff of life. In America we tend to like our baseball stories the way we like our immigration stories: triumphant, reassuringly lucky. A little adversity, a lot of will, a mound of happiness. Sugar has all that, but not in the expected order. Rated R (language, some sexuality and brief drug use). At Mayan. — Michael Phillips
Sunshine Cleaning
Amy Adams and Emily Blunt play sisters who start up an unlicensed crime-scene cleanup business. They’re haunted by the suicide death of their mother; for them the biohazard removal biz is a way of processing their grief, and bringing to survivors the comfort they themselves seek. Certain narrative events are more about dramatic convenience than the mess of real life. But it helps to have actresses as vibrant as Adams and Blunt around. Director Christine Jeffs loosens the plotting as best she can, letting the interactions breathe. Rated R (language, disturbing images, some sexuality and drug use). At Mayan. — Michael Phillips
Tokyo!
Tokyo! features the work of three directors with international cult followings, Michel Gondry, Leos Carax, and Bong Joon-ho. Each contributes to this film a story about modern-day urban Japan. Gondry’s surreal “Interior Design” centers on a woman who moves to a cramped apartment in Tokyo with her increasingly successful filmmaker boyfriend. To support his goals, she begins to blend into their surroundings. Carax’s “Merde” is about a creature who lives in the sewers and emerges to harass Tokyo’s residents, eventually being brought to trial for his crimes. In “Shaking Tokyo,” Korean director Bong Joon-ho tells of a “hikikimori,” a shut-in, who falls in love with a delivery person who brings him food. Not rated. At Mayan. — IFS
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