W.
– All he wanted to do was watch baseball and drink beer all day.
Sounds like a reasonable request. Instead, George W. Bush ended up
being chosen as leader of the free world. Twice. That’s Oliver
Stone’s surprisingly fair and balanced take on the president, who
truly needs no further parodying. Bus
h is an easy target anyway, and he inadvertently supplies enough
ammunition on his own. From the earliest announcements about the
film, it seemed inevitable what we’d be in for: an
evisceration.
No other depiction could be possible from any director in
Hollywood and especially not from Stone, who previously dug up the
White House dirt with
”
JFK
”
and
”
Nixon.
”
Instead, Stone has come up with a rather conventional biopic,
albeit one about a person whose decisions have affected the entire
planet for the last eight years. Considering its potential shock
value,
”
W.
”
hits all the expected notes: It could be
”
Walk the Line
”
or
”
Ray
”
in that regard. We see young Dubya as a drunk fraternity pledge
at Yale, where he foreshadows his legendary method of handing out
nicknames; as a swaggering party boy meeting Laura Welch, the woman
who would become his wife and his rock, at a backyard barbecue; and
as a reluctant worker in the West Texas oil fields, where he asks
in twangy Spanish before noon,
”
Donde esta la cerveza?
”
He runs for Congress and loses, runs for Texas governor and
wins, loses the booze and finds the Lord.
Stone, working from a script by Stanley Weiser, doesn’t shed
much new light on the 43rd U.S. president and often tries to
explain away Bush’s flaws with pop-psychology insights about
”
daddy issues,
”
but he makes his evenhanded case in entertaining fashion. As
Bush himself, Josh Brolin certainly gets the innate humor within
the frequent buffoonery
– and he’s got the voice and the demeanor down pat – but he also
seems to recognize the tragedy of this figure, a man who was in way
over his head for one of the toughest jobs in the world. Brolin’s
so good, he almost makes us feel sorry for Bush. Almost. Biopic,
PG-13.
Hitting the theaters
Opening this week
By The Associated Press
Happy-Go-Lucky – Poppy, our perpetually sunny heroine, finds that her beloved bicycle has been stolen from outside a London bookstore at the film’s start. Not only is she not angry when she makes this discovery, but rather she says to herself, wistfully and with a wry smile, that she never even got to say goodbye to it. The bully who torments his fellow students in the elementary-school class she teaches isn’t a naughty boy to be scolded but rather a child in need of patience and understanding. And the homeless man she runs into while walking home alone one night isn’t scary and potentially dangerous – he’s just longing for a friend, like the rest of us.
That last example pushes the limits of what we’re willing to accept, but you get the idea. Poppy is an extraordinary creature, but in the hands of engaging star Sally Hawkins and veteran writer-director Mike Leigh, she becomes real, vibrant and alive. Leigh is known for far more serious fare like “Vera Drake” and “Secrets & Lies.”
“Happy-Go-Lucky” would seem to be a trifle by comparison, but he uses the collaborative improvisational technique that’s become his trademark to create a warm, comfortable vibe around his characters. And if you look past the film’s blithe veneer, it’s really about something that’s universally relatable: the quest for a deep and fulfilling happiness. A little bit of Poppy goes a long way, but two hours with her is perfect. Much of what makes her so compelling is the contradiction that lies within her. She seems to see the innate absurdity of the world, but instead of letting it get her down, she makes a game out of toying with it. She’s not Forrest Gump – life isn’t a box of chocolates for Poppy, it’s a bag of Sweet Tarts. Foreign, R.
The Secret Life Of Bees – How can a movie populate a house with Queen Latifah, Alicia Keys and Jennifer Hudson and NOT give us a song? Though the cast might suggest a musical, “The Secret Life of Bees” is an earnest, saccharine adaptation of Sue Monk Kidd’s best-selling 2002 novel, brought to the big screen by director Gina Prince-Bythewood (“Love & Basketball”).
The novel, set in South Carolina in 1964, came out of nowhere to sell millions in paperback, so this adaptation arrives with much anticipation from its readers. The film stays close to the novel in telling the story of Lily Owens (Dakota Fanning), a 14-year-old girl who runs away from an abusive father, fleeing with her caretaker (Hudson). They end up serendipitously at the house of the bee-keeping Boatwright sisters (Latifah, Keys and Sophie Okonedo). The three, particularly Latifah’s motherly character, rejuvenate Lily and teach her about love through bees. Keys is by far the most riveting thing in the otherwise one-dimensional, overly simplistic film. All distrust and uptight anger, she dominates the screen with a tension the movie can’t find anywhere else – in the plot, in Lily, even in the early 1960s racial turmoil. Drama, PG-13.
W. – All he wanted to do was watch baseball and drink beer all day. Sounds like a reasonable request. Instead, George W. Bush ended up being chosen as leader of the free world. Twice. That’s Oliver Stone’s surprisingly fair and balanced take on the president, who truly needs no further parodying. Bush is an easy target anyway, and he inadvertently supplies enough ammunition on his own. From the earliest announcements about the film, it seemed inevitable what we’d be in for: an evisceration.
No other depiction could be possible from any director in Hollywood and especially not from Stone, who previously dug up the White House dirt with “JFK” and “Nixon.” Instead, Stone has come up with a rather conventional biopic, albeit one about a person whose decisions have affected the entire planet for the last eight years. Considering its potential shock value, “W.” hits all the expected notes: It could be “Walk the Line” or “Ray” in that regard. We see young Dubya as a drunk fraternity pledge at Yale, where he foreshadows his legendary method of handing out nicknames; as a swaggering party boy meeting Laura Welch, the woman who would become his wife and his rock, at a backyard barbecue; and as a reluctant worker in the West Texas oil fields, where he asks in twangy Spanish before noon, “Donde esta la cerveza?” He runs for Congress and loses, runs for Texas governor and wins, loses the booze and finds the Lord.
Stone, working from a script by Stanley Weiser, doesn’t shed much new light on the 43rd U.S. president and often tries to explain away Bush’s flaws with pop-psychology insights about “daddy issues,” but he makes his evenhanded case in entertaining fashion. As Bush himself, Josh Brolin certainly gets the innate humor within the frequent buffoonery – and he’s got the voice and the demeanor down pat – but he also seems to recognize the tragedy of this figure, a man who was in way over his head for one of the toughest jobs in the world. Brolin’s so good, he almost makes us feel sorry for Bush. Almost. Biopic, PG-13.
What Just Happened – Hollywood is full of liars, back-stabbers, sycophants, would-be power players and egomaniacs. And your point is … what? In skewering the movie business, “What Just Happened” treads delicately and benignly on some well-trampled territory, but offers no new insights. It comes from people who’ve been around a long time, so there’s no doubt they know their way. Barry Levinson directs. Longtime producer Art Linson wrote the script based on his memoir. And Robert De Niro stars as a middle-aged producer juggling actors and agents with ex-wives and kids.
You just wish these veterans had used their collective decades of experience to come up with a satire that has more freshness and bite to it. Maybe that’s impossible, though. The navel-gazing is so commonplace now – look no further than the continued existence of HBO’s “Entourage” – that it’s long since grown tiresome. Truly, does anybody east of Barstow care about traffic patterns on the 405? That’s the freeway De Niro’s character, Ben, repeatedly finds himself on as he shuttles among various studio lots, restaurants and women. Ben is the producer of an action picture which stars Sean Penn and is set to premiere on opening night of the Cannes Film Festival. But the brash British director (Michael Wincott) refuses to recut it, even after it tests horrifically, in the name of artistic integrity. (Maybe it was that last scene, in which Penn’s dog gets shot in the head, that turned the audience off.) Everyone is so shallow and self-serving, there isn’t a single person worth caring about, but De Niro does some of his best work in a while. Comedy, R
Playing Oct. 17 – Oct. 23
Pinnacle staff report
Appaloosa – Two friends are hired to sherriff a western town, but things are complicated when a widow shows up in town. Drama, R.
Beverly Hills Chihuahua – Warning: This film contains talking animals – and their not animated. In the film from Raja Gosnell, a shi-shi Beverly Hills Chihuahua gets parted from her owner while on vacation from Mexico. Voiced by Drew Barrymore, Chloe runs into a motley crew of Mexican dogs as she tries to find her way back home across the border. Comedy, PG.
Body of Lies – Based on the novel of the same name by Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, whose knowledge of the subject matter would seem to be unimpeachable, “Body of Lies” follows undercover CIA operative Roger Ferris (DiCaprio), who’s trying to ferret out the mastermind behind a series of anonymous bombings around the world. At the same time, Ferris’ boss, Ed Hoffman (Crowe), is running surveillance and plotting strategy from home with the help of his ever-present cell-phone headset and laptop. But despite their shared goals and mutual dependence, Ferris and Hoffman often end up miscommunicating and undermining each other. This becomes especially true when Ferris tries to chat up the smooth Jordanian intelligence chief (Mark Strong, who nearly steals the whole movie). Drama, R.
Eagle Eye – When Jerry Shaw (Shia LaBeouf) and Rachel Holloman (Michelle Monaghan) receive mysterious phone calls, they have to stick together to protect their families and to stay alive. Each phone call pushes the pair to put themselves in even more dangerous situations and makes them watned fugitives. Action, PG-13.
The Express – When Ernie Davis (Rob Brown) joined the football team of the Syracuse Orangemen, he started on a journey that would change history. His work as a running back earned him the Heisman Trophy, and he became the first African-American ever to earn that honor. The film follows his journey on the field and his relationship with his coach Ben Schwartzwalder (Dennis Quaid). Though his NFL career never got off the ground, he became a symbol for the civil rights movement. Drama/Biography, PG.
Max Payne – When a DEA agent’s (Mark Wahlberg) family is murdered, he joins forces with an assassin (Mila Kunis.) The movie promises to create a dark world that reflects the videogame on which it is based. Action, PG-13.
Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist – Someday, Michael Cera will show us what else he can do. He surely must have someone else inside him besides the poignantly verbal but sweetly awkward nerd we’ve come to know and love in such movies as “Superbad” and “Juno,” and the late, great TV series “Arrested Development.” For now, though, Cera is that guy again, but he also shows some potential as a viable romantic lead – albeit an unconventional one. He and Kat Dennings have a lively, easy chemistry with each other as a couple of high school seniors prowling the streets of New York on an all-night quest to find their favorite underground band. Cera’s Nick is an average middle-class New Jersey kid who is obsessed with Tris (Alexis Dziena), the unfaithful ex-girlfriend who dumped him, and the CD mixes he makes for her of his favorite indie rock tunes aren’t winning her back. But they do win the heart of Dennings’ Norah, a classmate of Tris’ who thinks Nick must be the coolest guy in the world, based solely on his musical taste. One night, through a convoluted confluence of events, Nick and Norah find themselves thrown together. The comedy from Peter Sollett (“Raising Victor Vargas”), based on the book by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan, is aimed squarely at 20-something hipsters, but it’s a worthy successor to those 1980s John Hughes movies that were sweetly romantic without trying hard to be. Romantic comedy, PG-13.
Quarantine – Angela (Jennifer Carpenter) is a young reporter looking for the big story that will jumpstart her career. She and her cameraman (Steve Harris) go out at night in search of stories, one night tailing a local fire crew. When the crew gets a call from an old lady trapped inside an apartment building, they start a rescue mission. But the tenants of the building have been trapped for a reason and film quickly spirals into a thriller. Also starring Jay Hernandez and Johnathon Schaech. Horror, R.
Hitting the couch
Movies out on DVD and Blu-Ray Oct. 21
Incredible Hulk – Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) is back and this time he needs to use the mutation that transforms him into a rampaging green monster to stop a former soldier who has used the same genetic accident for even more dangerous means. Starring Liv Tyler, Tim Roth and Tim Blake Nelson. Action, PG-13. On DVD and Blu-ray
The Strangers – The Strangers – A couple staying at an isolated vacation home are terrorized by three strangers. Starring Scott Speedman and Liv Tyler. Horror, R. On DVD and Blu-ray
