Cinematical

As with most any other genre, pitching a thriller seems to go that much more swimmingly once one finds an ideal blockbuster reference point with which to do half of the leg work. It's 'Die Hard meets this', 'Speed on a that', and, when in doubt, just say the damn thing is 'Hitchcockian'.

Post-2001, the likes of TV's '24' and 'Sleeper Cell', and film's Jason Bourne franchise, have tapped into both our political climate and pop culture zeitgeist, into a globe-trotting, gun-toting fear of the here and there and always now. Jeffrey Nachmanoff's Traitor feels like the first film that has itself been directly spawned in the wake of those successes, as opposed to merely being bolstered by it, and while it may overtake, say, Vantage Point in terms of plausible plotting and worldly knowledge, it remains a film that is good enough to grasp the bar and yet not quite enough to raise it.

Last year I saw Gracie, a movie about a teenage girl who wants to play high-school soccer in the late 1970s, when the game was considered a males-only sport in America, and faces a lot of opposition from her school. I finished my review with the line, "If it were football, would we be agreeing more with Gracie's opponents?" The Longshots gives us the opportunity to consider that question. Can we sympathize with, and cheer on, a girl who wants to succeed as a quarterback in an all-boys' football league? The answer is yes, because The Longshots focuses on characters and personal relationships and as a result, feels richer and more satisfying than the standard sports-genre film.

The story is simple and except for the girl-quarterback angle, old-fashioned in a Capra-esque way. Jasmine (Keke Palmer) is a middle-school loner and misfit in a small town hit by economic troubles. Her mom Claire (Tasha Smith) has to work longer hours at the diner -- dad ditched town and family several years ago -- and Jasmine is still too young to be left alone after school. So Claire pleads, nags and finally bribes her husband's brother Curtis (Ice Cube), an unemployed ex-football player, to keep an eye on his niece Jasmine. Of course they can't stand each other at first, but eventually Curtis discovers that Jasmine has an excellent throwing arm and teaches her how to be a quarterback. Meanwhile, the town's playground football team is languishing, and one thing they're missing is a decent quarterback, sooo ...

A brief, sum-it-all-up-in-one-line description of The House Bunny would probably go something like this: Imagine if a sequel to Legally Blonde and a sequel to Clueless had a child and it was adopted by a sequel to Revenge of the Nerds. That's The House Bunny. Thankfully, a strong and very funny performance from Anna Faris -- as well as decent-enough turns from Emma Stone and Kat Dennings -- save this late summer slacker from flunking out of theaters completely. It's familiar, it doesn't make you work for a laugh and, heck, for some it might be a nice way to cap off a long, dark, foul-mouthed summer full of superheroes, stoners and sequels.

To Shelley Darlingson (Faris), living in the Playboy Mansion is a fairytale come true. Sure, she's not a centerfold ... yet ... and was only featured in a few pictorials (Girls with GEDs, Girls with Charlie Sheen), but that doesn't stop her from bringing half-naked cheer and joy to anyone within shouting distance. Things take a turn for the worse, however, when Shelley's told that Hef doesn't want her in the mansion anymore -- that 27 is, like, 59 in Bunny years. With nowhere to go, a suitcase full of skimpy outfits and the rusty, beaten-up station wagon she arrived in, Shelley wanders the streets until eventually she stumbles upon a whole bunch of mansions that look just like home ... only they're fraternity and sorority houses ... but good ol' Shelley don't know the difference.

Medical science tells us that there's a portion of the brain called the R-complex that, nestled low and close to the spinal cord, governs simple, automatic brain functions like respiration and reflex and heart rate; other outlying, larger brain structures cover language, culture, memory and art. I mention this because Death Race, writer-director Paul W.S. Anderson's re-visitation of the 1975 trash-classic Death Race 2000, is wholly, entirely and perfectly designed to appeal to the R-complex portion of your brain. Death Race roars, rages and races down the track, all velocity and visceral violence, unencumbered by logic, sense, reason or dignity. My more evolved brain structures kept objecting to Death Race's more ludicrous contortions as it whipped around its curves, but my R-complex didn't want to hear the high-pitched whining voice of logic and reason; it simply grunted, settled into a soft cushion of popcorn topping and said "Shut up, bigger brain; bald man who talk cool killing now."

(We're re-posting our CineVegas review of The Rocker to coincide with the film's theatrical release today)

I like the premise of The Rocker so much -- middle-aged wannabe rock star insinuates himself into his teenage nephew's band -- that I'm inclined to go easy on it solely out of good will. It's likable enough, a lightweight rock 'n' roll comedy punctuated by several belly laughs -- but those laughs are all in response to the one-liners, and mostly from one minor character (more on that later). The story, the central personalities, and the uninspired slapstick are bland.

The title wannabe is Robert "Fish" Fishman, played by Rainn Wilson (of TV's The Office) in his first major film role. Fish was the drummer for Vesuvius, a mid-'80s heavy-metal band, but was kicked out on the eve of the group's success. Now, two decades later, Vesuvius is huge and Fish is a bitter has-been (or, rather, never-was).

In a marketplace of increasingly generic titles and often disingenuous marketing, the horror genre tends to bring a certain honesty to the table. Think about it: the words 'The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2' can simply never paint as vivid a mental picture as, say, 'Zombie Strippers'. These offerings may be comparatively lower in brow and budget, and no, not for all tastes, but with a film like that -- a title like that -- or Evil Aliens, or Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer, for that matter, what-you-see-is-what-you-get chutzpah is on their side, and while that quality might not alone do the trick when it comes to their ultimate entertainment value, it certainly doesn't do any harm.

That said, like those films (well, okay, maybe not that Pants one), Jack Brooks may not quite be the cult classic in the making that it so clearly sets out to be, but at least its influences and intent are always worn plainly upon its blood-stained sleeve.

It's too bad that more movies don't have the courage to explore faith and spirituality in a direct way; studios are usually too worried about appealing to all religions -- and all pocketbooks -- to be very specific about the subject. The other reason is that it's difficult for Hollywood movies to wrap up their neat, bow-tie happy endings with everything resolved, since the idea of faith is based on lack of proof, lack of finality. One of my favorite movies is Dreyer's The Passion of Joan of Arc, which uses an unconventional, off-kilter visual scheme to document some exciting, endlessly fascinating arguments: which side is God on and what does He really want with us? The new Henry Poole Is Here bucks the trend with the appearance of a "miracle" in the life of its ordinary, everyday character. Does it raise any interesting, life-changing questions? Sadly, no. The film is too bored and lackadaisical with its subject to change much of anything. It's too uninspired to be inspirational.

Henry Poole (Luke Wilson) is a man with "movie disease." This means that he's going to die, and he'll have absolutely no symptoms until he does. Sometimes "movie disease" comes with a cough, but not this time. Sometimes "movie disease" has a name, like "brain cloud," but not this time. In preparation for the dark day, Henry buys a house in his old neighborhood, loads up on booze, doughnuts and pizza and waits. Meanwhile, his nosy neighbor Esperanza (Oscar nominee Adriana Barraza, from Babel) brings him tamales and pokes around his backyard. (Her late boyfriend used to live in the same house.) She notices that a badly done stucco job has produced a water stain, and that the water stain looks a bit like a familiar guy with a beard. The picture even produces a drop of blood.

With Toy Story (1995), a studio called Pixar blew the lid off of animated movies as we knew them. Thirteen years later, the other studios have yet to even approach that early level of excellence, let alone match the advancements Pixar has made since. Oddly similar to the most recent clunker Space Chimps, the new Fly Me to the Moon looked infinitely more promising in that it was based on an actual idea: the 1969 Apollo 11 mission as seen through the eyes of three stowaway flies -- in 3D! But sadly it proves itself as technically dull and as creatively stifled as Space Chimps as well as nearly every other non-Pixar movie.

After a totally useless, noisy black-and-white prologue, we get a very cool establishing shot. The camera flows smoothly through the back lots behind Cape Canaveral in Florida. It swoops into a patch of dirt and a tangle of weeds, through some bits of discarded junk, to the world where our little flies live (like humans, in little dollhouses). During this and other traveling sequences, the 3D works beautifully, engulfing us comfortably in this tiny world. But as soon as we meet the characters, the movie starts to sputter. In real life, houseflies can zip across the kitchen pretty darn fast relative to their size, but these flies drift lethargically from place to place, and the movie bogs down in their lackadaisical pace.

I felt, after seeing Woody Allen's latest, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, the way I do after I've been to an excellent tapas restaurant; I'd been presented with a series of small moments of flavor and texture and presentation, some more pleasant than others, and while the overall experience didn't add up to a full meal, it was still a sincere pleasure. Allen's been globetrotting lately -- although you can suggest that's been motivated less by some muse of artistic inspiration than by the equally beguiling, if less dignified, seductress of international financing. After several films set in London, Allen's now in Barcelona, Spain, as recently-graduated friends Vicky (Rebecca Hall) and Cristina (Scarlett Johansson) are taking some time to see the world before going back to America and futures as bright and unfixed as a sunlit fogbank.

Staying with family friends Mark and Judy Nash (Kevin Dunn and Patricia Clarkson), Vicky and Cristina take in the sights and experiences of Barcelona. Cristina's able to lose herself in the moment; for Vicky, each summer day's tempered by the certainty that summer will soon end. But one night after an art gallery showing, at an appropriately bohemian venue, Vicky and Cristina are approached by the painter whose work they've just seen, Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem), who proposes they join him as he flies to a small town so they might spend the weekend making love. Vicky's appalled; Cristina's intrigued; Juan Antonio is a laid-back seducer with a ready counter-argument to every objection: "Life is long; life is dull; life is full of pain." Why not have a little fun? It's not enough to talk the girls into agreeing to go to bed with him, but it is enough to get them on-board the plane. ...

When a film called Mirrors opens with a man fleeing desperately from said objects, it doesn't bode all that well. When that individual soon falls victim to a grisly demise at the sight of them, well, there's something to be said for the fact that there is ultimately nothing to see in Mirrors that is worth grabbing something sharp over. Unfortunately, there is also nothing that you probably haven't seen before in The Ring, The Grudge, or any number of exhaustingly similar American remakes of Asian spook stories.

And what a shame that we find ourselves having to associate the likes of Alexandre Aja with lackluster horror. Well, to be more accurate, luster is just about all he has to offer here, a slick sheen on a stale story. It's nice to have a legitimately menacing score in between shameless jolts!, and if we're to be treated to the same 'gotcha!' shots with depressing frequency, at least the lighting and lensing bring an equal amount of polish to the proceedings. Who knows: With enough technical prowess at play, maybe Aja can get someone to mistake this film for Shinola after all.

If Star Wars: The Clone Wars were a simple board game stacked up in a toy store aisle, the side of the box would read: "Ages 7 through Check Your Star Wars Ego at the Door." While the recent onslaught of superhero movies have brought us darker, more complex (and adult) storylines, one of our most beloved franchises has decided to travel in the opposite direction. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing; it's actually somewhat comforting to find a film with the word 'Wars' mentioned twice in the title alone and know that it's suitable for all ages. When I first watched a Star Wars film on the big screen, my feet could barely touch the sticky theater floor -- and so if a fun-filled, action-packed animated adventure story helps usher in a whole new legion of fans -- subsequently turning younger kids on to three live-action movies that came out, like, a billion years ago -- then right friggin' on!

Almost immediately we're clued into the fact that this big-screen Star Wars flick was gift-wrapped by another department store. That classic, drum-hoppin' 20th Century Fox intro is replaced with a much more subdued Warner Bros. logo, and the film's title swings into frame accompanied by different music. In replace of the classic story scroll, we get a newsreel-esque voiceover bringing us up to date on the main characters and their current mission. No one's trying to trick us here -- this is Star Wars for the need-it-now generation, and whereas previous films seemed to spend too much time rolling around in political-speak, Clone Wars is all about the action, the battles and the cheesy one-liners.

Tropic Thunder, starring Ben Stiller as one of a group of runaway actors whose work on a big-budget Vietnam epic goes horribly awry, is a funny, far-fetched mockery of modern Hollywood; the laughs don't maintain anything like a coherent intensity, but when they come, they're big enough to get you through the spaces between them. Some will mistakenly call Tropic Thunder a satire, but Tropic Thunder is in fact an example of satire's boisterous, bumbling sibling, the spoof. A satire's held with a light but precise grip, so the point can slice and the blade can cut; a spoof's more of a club, landing with blunt force and broad impact.

Star and director Stiller attacked the celebrity-industrial complex before, in 2001's Zoolander, and Tropic Thunder has more in common with that film than you might think; Stiller manages to mock action and thrills while also delivering them, and he's got a fine grasp of coarse celebrity behavior. Stiller seems drawn to characters whose self-centered arrogance is mixed in equal measure with self-loathing insecurity. We see an interview clip where Stiller's character, box office star Tugg Speedman, is informed by an interviewer how "Someone close to you said 'One more flop and it's over for him.'" Speedman pauses, and then asks his follow-up: "Somebody said they were close to me?"

I'm not partial to overtly subjective reviews, yet I can't seem to find any better way of relating my response to Isabel Coixet's latest film, Elegy, an adaptation of Philip Roth's novel "The Dying Animal," which follows the romance between a college professor and his much younger former student. First, though, a note of appropriateness: early in the film, this professor, the Roth regular David Kepesh, who previously appeared in the novels "The Breast" and "The Professor of Desire," is lecturing about how literature, specifically Tolstoy's "War and Peace," will be appreciated differently by a reader at different points in his or her life. In ten years, for example, it may seem like a new book entirely.

Perhaps in ten years, then, or more likely in thirty, I will be able to watch Elegy again and have a new perspective. Maybe I will be able to relate to Kepesh, here portrayed by Ben Kingsley, when I am in my sixties and have similarly lived and experienced as much. Yet the fact that Coixet's film is so depressing makes me almost hope that I never actually live so long to find out. I should have known, what with the filmmaker's past films, such as My Life Without Me, with their gray atmospheres and dreary dealings with illness and death. While appearing on the outside to be a sexy drama about how one lecherous old man discovers love, Elegy is on the inside really just a slow, uninteresting depiction of a selfish fool who possibly too-late realizes that he's grown old before he's actually grown up.

I figure I'm about 20 years older, at least, than the target demographic for The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2. I understand that there are some movies where I'll always feel a little old or out of touch, because they're just not made with me in mind, no matter how good or bad those movies are. Fortunately, I had no trouble empathizing with the four young women who are bound to friendship through their magical bifurcated nether garment -- more so than I did with the Sex and the City gang, who are much closer to my age.

Like Sex and the City, Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 works better if you know the characters already through their previous appearances, because you're already emotionally invested in them. I hadn't read the young-adult novels by Ann Brashares, but my sister, who is a big fan, filled me in and we determined that this movie is based mostly on the fourth book in the series, with a few changes, so even if you've read the books you get some surprises.

Hell Ride is a deliberate, calculated throwback, referencing and recycling the cheapie bike-sploitation flicks of the '60s and early '70s as a band of burly brothers roar, rage and ride their way through the American Southwest on a rampage of revenge. Written by, directed by and starring Larry Bishop, Hell Ride thrums and roars with attitude; problem is, the drive shaft components of plot and character and logic just aren't there, meaning that even when Bishop hits the throttle, the roar and rattle can't hide the fact nothing's really happening.

Hell Ride revolves around a cycle gang known as The Victors, led by Pistolero (Bishop), with the tuxedo-shirt clad The Gent (Michael Madsen) riding on his right and recent inductee Comanche (Eric Balfour) an up-and-coming lieutenant in the organization, on his left. The Victors are trying to take care of business -- although what business it is they're in is never quite explained -- and the only thing interfering with that is Pistolero's obsession with righting the wrong done decades ago to Cherokee Kisum (Julia Jones), slain on the 4th of July in 1976. The Gent and Comanche are rubbed the wrong way by Pistolero's campaign of retribution, especially with the Six-Six-Six'ers and their kill-crazy leader Billy Wings (Vinnie Jones) edging in on Victors turf. ...