JOHNSON FAMILY VACATION (PG-13) This is an African-American National Lampoon's Vacation, which raises the question: Why would Cedric the Entertainer want to be Chevy Chase when he has the potential to be much funnier, without the premature burnout? The incidents on the road prove too stupid for words, and while Cedric has some good one-liners, you can hear most of them in the trailer. —Steve Warren
KILL BILL, VOLUME TWO (R) There's still a goodly amount of blood and guts to be found here, but if KB1 was all form and slick, shocking exteriors, then KB2 often appears to be the inside of the story, the so-called heart. KB2 is still basically a cartoon, albeit a more elaborately illustrated one, but it's also where the story behind the story of the first film starts opening itself up and, eventually, turning itself inside out. Tarantino's new movie sometimes almost seems to be on the verge of becoming a blood-spattered chick flick about the, uh, complicated relationship between Uma Thurman's retired assassin and her former employer and lover, Bill (David Carradine). In the end, KB2 is more interesting for how it defies expectations than for what it actually achieves, but it's nice to see that Tarantino hasn't completely turned his back on the idea of telling a genuine story peopled by real-live humans with real-live emotions. Also stars Michael Madsen and Darryl Hannah.
KITCHEN STORIES (NR) Norwegian director Brent Hamer's eccentric but ultimately endearing comedy is a classic example of less is more. The story here is a bit odd but rigorously minimal — a Swedish statistician comes to Norway to observe the domestic habits of local bachelors — and the movie's dry, deadpan humor often hangs on just a look, a gesture or an extra beat of anticipation. The film is slight but slyly ingratiating, with its droll sight gags and social observations eventually giving way to a fairly standard bonding story between a middle-age Swedish observer and the old Norwegian bachelor he's supposed to be dispassionately tracking. There's even a tiny undercurrent of the homoerotic here, although it's all about as stirring as a warm pair of feetie pajamas. Stars Joachim Calmeyer and Tomas Norstrom. Opens April 23 at Madstone Theaters.
THE LADYKILLERS (PG-13) The latest oddball odyssey from those wacky Coen Brothers remakes the beloved British comedy about a gang of crooks and con men using the home of an elderly widow as a base from which to pull off a heist. The movie's edges have been dutifully smoothed out and its characters, while colorful and eccentric, are never memorably odd in the best Coen tradition. Despite the occasional signature touch — a cat with a human finger in its mouth, a running gag involving Irritable Bowel Syndrome, a man giving mouth-to-mouth to a bulldog — the movie feels like another exploration of the mainstream vein recently opened up, to similarly mixed results, in Intolerable Cruelty. Most frustrating of all is the film's finale, a reduction of the original's elaborate last act to what feels like a rushed, 10-minute afterthought. Stars Tom Hanks, Irma P. Hall, Marlon Wayans and J.K. Simmons.
MAN ON FIRE (R) Reigning action hero/sensitive guy Denzel Washington and precocious cutie-pie Dakota Fanning star in this Tony Scott-directed thriller about a disillusioned bodyguard who goes ballistic when the child he's sworn to protect is abducted. Also stars Radha Mitchell. Opens April 23 at local theaters. (Not Reviewed)
MYSTIC RIVER (R) Clint Eastwood's latest directorial offering dives into somewhat unfamiliar waters, with mostly successful results. Mystic River is an epic tragedy about how two devastating events, a quarter-century apart, change a handful of lives in a Boston working class neighborhood. Eastwood's film is uncharacteristically filled with charged symbols and nakedly emotional Big Speeches, but the top-notch ensemble cast is good enough to pull it off and leave us wanting more. Tim Robbins is particularly effective as the damaged man-child who never quite recovered from being molested as a child, and Sean Penn burns up the screen as a man with a dead daughter and one too many secrets. Also stars Kevin Bacon, Laura Linney, Laurence Fishburne and Marcia Gay Harden. 1/2
NASCAR 3-D: THE IMAX EXPERIENCE (PG) There are moments of thunderous sound and fury here (primarily the beginning and end), but the bulk of Nascar 3-D is a surprisingly sober, well-rounded and informative look at the history, science and even (gasp) philosophy behind high-speed racing. Likewise, the 3-D effects are less about in-your-face money shots and more, well, subtle and well-integrated throughout, pushing this documentary's all-important visuals to an even more pleasing level of vividness than many similar 3-D projects. It all culminates in a super-intense race-day sequence that is all about speed and volume, and nothing but. Narrated by Keifer Sutherland. 1/2