FLUSHED AWAY (PG) The latest project from those ever-reliable genius types at Aardman Studios (Wallace and Gromit, Chicken Run) is the animated tale of two mice — posh urban rodent Rodney (voiced by Hugh Jackman) and his scruffy female counterpart Rita (Kate Winslet) — sharing an amazing adventure in London. More accurately, the movie situates itself in a miniaturized clone of London located in the sewers below the real city, and populated by a wonderfully eccentric menagerie of mice, frogs and slugs of indeterminate origin (the later being the movie's biggest scene stealers who break out in song at the most bizarre moments). The Anglo-centric humor may occasionally drift over the heads of younger viewers (there's wordplay here on distinctly British patter such as "diverting" and "smashing," and at one point a cockroach can be seen reading Kafka), but the movie is basically good, silly fun for everyone. The characters all have personality to spare, elements of slapstick, adventure and romance are expertly fused and paced, and the classy CGI animation skillfully emulates the charming stop-motion style for which Aardman is so well known. Also featuring the voices of Ian McKellen, Jean Reno, Bill Nighy and Andy Serkis. 3.5 stars
FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION (PG-13) A worm's-eye view of Hollywood, For Your Consideration should have been Christopher Guest's ready-made masterpiece. Guest and his collaborators are some very funny people, and they know this terrain as well as anybody does, but For Your Consideration rarely offers much beyond some pretty mild amusements, and the level of satirical insight on display here is a notch or two below even the filmmaker's recent A Mighty Wind. The new film revolves around a little independent film (an unintentionally kitschy item called Home for Purim) that's inexplicably managed to generate some Oscar buzz, but, to no one's surprise, Guest and cowriter Eugene Levy use the storyline as a jumping-off point for a series of sketches skewering actors, agents, publicists, critics and various other sundry members of the movie industry. Curiously, though, much of the humor comes off as flat, toothless this time around, and even weirdly dated (jokes about out-of-touch agents exploring the "world Interweb," anyone?), to the point where even a standout performance by Guest regular Catherine O'Hara can't quite turn it all around. Also stars Harry Shearer, Parker Posey, Fred Willard and Jennifer Coolidge. 2.5 stars
FREEDOM WRITERS (PG) In the days immediately following the Rodney King blow-up, with racial tensions soaring at inner city schools around the country, naïve and ridiculously perky first-time teacher Erin Gruwell (Hilary Swank) walks into her scary new classroom with a big smile and a string of perfect pearls around her neck. "I give this bitch a week," smirks one of her wildly misbehaving students. But Erin is a teacher who genuinely cares and, as if you couldn't guess, these rough and embattled kids quickly begin responding. She gives them diaries in which to express themselves, makes stirring speeches about the horrors of prejudice,and eventually takes them on a field trip to the Holocaust Museum, where these dyed-in-the-wool gang members suddenly see the light (and the soundtrack similarly transforms from de rigueur rap to schmaltzy strings). Despite the movie being based on true events, Freedom Writers feels thoroughly canned, with sincere but soft-edged performances, transformations that occur far too neatly,and an overly symmetrical story arc that has our hero's success with her students rising as her relationships with peers (school bureaucrats and a neglected hubby) hit road bumps. It's all as predictable as it is well-meaning, an utterly unsurprising retread of a dozen other movies you've seen and barely remember. 2.5 stars
