Outtakes

AGAINST THE ROPES (PG-13) "Make yourself invisible" are practically the first words we hear uttered to Meg Ryan's character when she's just a little girl, so it's a sure bet that the grown-up version will turn out to be anything but. Against the Ropes is the absurdly inept and by-the-numbers biopic of Jackie Kallen (Ryan), a gutsy female who became a boxing manager and rose to the top ranks of that poisonously sexist world. With Kallen's quasi-feminist posturing and outlandish outfits, the movie seems to want to be considered as some sort of ringside Erin Brockovich, but the shallow stereotypes, hackneyed dialogue and narrative cliches put it much closer to the unintentional camp of Showgirls. There's a clumsy, generic feel to just about every minute of this soulless project, culminating in the inevitable big championship bout between Ryan's independent fighter and a nasty company man. Guess who wins? Also stars Omar Epps and Tony Shalhoub. 1/2

AGENT CODY BANKS 2: DESTINATION LONDON (PG) Frankie Muniz (Fox TV's Malcolm in the Middle) reprises his role as the plucky young spy saving the world from whatever. This time the action takes place in London, where Muniz's character is chasing down a rogue agent in possession of a stolen mind-control device. Also stars Hannah Spearritt and Anthony Anderson. (Not Reviewed)

ALONG CAME POLLY (PG-13) As its title more than suggests, what we have here is a romantic comedy that feels like a series of slapped-together outtakes from There's Something About Mary. The relationship at the center of the movie is a by-the-numbers case of opposites attracting (Ben Stiller's uptight insurance analyst falls for Jennifer Aniston's free-spirited eccentric), with semi-funny physical humor and Farrelly Brothers-ish toilet jokes abounding. There's even a blind ferret subbing for the little pooch in Mary. On the plus side, Aniston makes her underwritten character feel surprisingly real, and Philip Seymour Hoffman and Alec Baldwin deliver a few solid chuckles on the sidelines. Stiller plays the same character he always plays, and is usually much better when reacting to situations than when he's trying to drum up some laughs on his own. Also stars Debra Messing and Hank Azaria.

THE BARBARIAN INVASIONS (R) Anyone with an affection for Denys Arcand's 1986 The Decline of the American Empire — a Big Chill-ish account of self-possessed baby boomers, Euro-style — will want to check out this film, which is essentially a companion piece to the director's earlier work. Arcand revisits Remy (Remy Girard), the sophisticated sensualist of Decline, now bald, bed-ridden with terminal cancer and watched over by his estranged, uptight son Sebastien (Stephanie Rousseau), who uses his considerable wealth to make his father's final days as comfortable and interesting as possible. Sebastien keeps his father happily stoned and brings together many of Remy's old friends and lovers (virtually the entire cast of Decline), as the movie offers up a stream of stylishly witty observations, eventually taking the form of a bittersweet reverie to lives well lived. The movie's not nearly as profound as it seems to think it is, but as far as elegant odes to love, sex, youth and its passing, God and art, you could do worse. Don't come expecting Proust's Remembrance of Things Past in 99 minutes (as the movie sometimes seems to consider itself), and be prepared for loads of cyclical conversations, and you'll do just fine. Also stars Marie-Josee Croze. 1/2

BARBERSHOP 2: BACK IN BUSINESS (PG-13) Ice Cube and Cedric the Entertainer star in this sequel to last year's popular comedy about a group of folks frequenting a small barbershop on Chicago's South Side. This time out, the movie's got gentrification on its mind, as the mom and pop stores in the barbershop's neighborhood begin losing ground to an invasion of Starbucks-esque establishments. Also stars Sean Patrick Thomas and Eve. (Not Reviewed)

BUS 174 (NR) Another extraordinary documentary in a year fairly bursting with them. Part edge-of-your-seat thriller, part social critique, Bus 174 offers a gripping, if somewhat over-long account of a Rio de Janeiro bus robbery that turned into a no-win hostage situation and a national scandal. The film mixes actual footage of the event with interviews with many of the participants (the police, the hostages, friends of the perpetrator, reporters), telling its tale from multiple perspectives, and achieving an impressive sense of realism and emotional depth. Simultaneously, Bus 174 probes the history of the young street person who committed the crime, ultimately presenting itself as a powerful but not particularly subtle condemnation of the racism and class injustices that create similarly lost souls. Directed by Jose Padilha. 1/2

COLD MOUNTAIN (NR) There's more than a whiff of dread hanging in the air in director Anthony Minghella's wildly tragic-romantic opus, and it won't be giving away much to mention that it all ends badly. Jude Law and Nicole Kidman (sporting not-too-embarrassing Southern accents) star as a pair of absurdly clear complected, Civil War-era lovebirds buffeted by the cruel winds of destiny. The film practically begs for consideration as Minghella's Gone With the Wind, or maybe his Pilgrim's Progress, a panoramic study of a vanished America, bolstered by handsome cinematography and oodles of lively performances. For all the epic sprawl, there's a scattered, episodic quality to the film that makes even the better performances feel a bit like cameos. Also stars Renee Zellweger and Natalie Portman.

CONFESSIONS OF A TEEN DRAMA QUEEN (PG) Expect coming-of-age cuteness galore as big city gal Lindsay Lohan (Freaky Friday) is dragged kicking and screaming to suburban hell when her parents relocate to a small town in New Jersey. Also stars Adam Garcia, Alison Pill and Carol Kane. (Not Reviewed)

DAWN OF THE DEAD (R) One might ponder the reasons for remaking George Romero's nearly perfect horror classic, but, hey — the bottom line is that you can never have too many zombie movies. Actually, the word "zombie" is never even uttered in the 2004 version, and the creatures themselves more closely resemble the shrieking sprinters of 28 Days than the lumbering icons from Romero's original. Also missing in action are the original's famous images of the living dead strolling about the shopping mall where our heroes are trapped, or any other swipes at our happily zombified consumer culture. What we get instead is a competent but much more conventional thrill machine, filled with a steady stream of decent scares and even more flying hunks of bloody flesh than you'll see in Mel's Passion. It's an adequate fright flick but not much more, with a final 20 minutes that degenerates into just another extended and overly chaotic chase scene. The whole thing is bolstered by a self-consciously ironic soundtrack of heavy metal and jazzy lounge tunes about "the sickness" that seems to think it might actually work as a stand-in for the original movie's wit. It's not. Stars Sarah Polley, Ving Rhames, Jake Weber, Mekhi Phifer and Ty Burrell.

DIRTY DANCING: HAVANA NIGHTS (PG-13) Not so much a sequel as a "re-imagining" of the 1987 hit, told from the perspective of an 18-year-old American girl in Cuba on the eve of the revolution. Diego Luna from Y Tu Mama Tambien plays the Yankee babe's sexy pool boy, who also just happens to be the island's best dirty dancer. Stars Romola Garai. (Not Reviewed)

ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND (R) The new movie from screenwriter Charlie Kaufman (Being John Malkovich, Adaptation) is a wistful tale about the end of a love affair. It's also a wicked black comedy/sci-fi yarn that deconstructs its own narrative through an almost maddeningly complex structure that inevitably mirrors the workings of the human mind itself. Two lovers, Joel (Jim Carrey) and Clementine (Kate Winslett), end their relationship and, through some strange (but, in accordance with the movie's own wacko logic, totally mundane) procedure, have each other wiped from their memories. It's here that the bulk of Eternal Sunshine unfolds, within Joel's brain during the erasing process, as his memories play out, mutating into ever more wildly exaggerated forms before finally folding in on themselves, then withering and disappearing. It's a strange trip, to be sure, sort of like what Fantastic Voyage might have been if some acid-gobbling metaphysicians had been at the helm. Director Michel Gondry pulls out all the stops depicting what goes on inside Joel's brain, assaulting the viewer with a relentless barrage of audacious effects, ultra-rapid edits and all other manner of edgy, convoluted flourishes. Not all of it works, of course, but there are moments of considerable beauty and insight, not to mention a couple of awfully funny bits. Also stars Kirsten Dunst, Tom Wilkinson and Elijah Wood.

THE FOG OF WAR (PG-13) Errol Morris' Oscar-winning documentary offers a rare and somewhat perplexing look at Robert S. McNamara, the controversial Secretary of Defense who presided over the Vietnam War and the Cuban Missile Crisis. Philip Glass' richly dramatic score bubbles away just beneath the surface, amplifying the ironies, contradictions, nuances and horrors of history, McNamara-style. The former Secretary of Defense displays a blazing intelligence and what appears to be a deeply felt sense of morality, although Morris allows McNamara's own words to occasionally paint the speaker into a corner, even calling into question his status as a reliable narrator. That's ultimately part of the considerable pleasure in this aptly titled film, though: sifting through the wealth of information and insights to arrive at some sort of truth. 1/2

THE GIRL WITH A PEARL EARRING (PG-13) A beautiful but ultimately shallow account of the unspoken bond that develops between the 17th-century Dutch painter Vermeer (Colin Firth) and the 17-year-old housemaid who becomes his model. The film's look is ravishing — there's a lovely quality to the light and compositions that deliberately emulates Vermeer's own paintings — but the movie unfolds in a painfully slow, static way that goes against the grain of its sensual imagery. Girl with a Pearl Earring is all hushed tones and stolen glances, with performances so subdued as to be nearly unreadable. That's probably by design, but it all still feels too detached to make much of an impression. Also stars Tom Wilkinson. 1/2

HIDALGO (PG-13) Viggo Mortensen is Frank Hopkins, a moral man in the morality challenged America of the 19th century (not unlike Cruise's Last Samurai). Hopkins also loves his horse, Hidalgo, a scrappy mixed breed that all too clearly represents the melting pot ideal of all that's best in America. And so when pesky foreigners start bad-mouthing the horse and challenge its master to participate in a grueling 3,000-mile race across the Arabian desert, Hopkins jumps at the chance. There's a big digital effect of a sandstorm midway through the movie, and Arab bandits skulk about calling Hopkins an infidel, but most of the movie has all the suspense and dramatic gravity of an overly sanitized Disney cartoon. Also stars Omar Sharif, Zuleikha Robinson and Louise Lombard. 1/2

JERSEY GIRL (PG-13) Lord knows what was going on in Kevin Smith's mind to cause him to make this stinker, but the movie's sheer awfulness almost renders the question moot. Ben Affleck stars as a single dad living at home with his widower dad (George Carlin) and raising an impossibly cute 7-year-old daughter (Raquel Castro). Whether you love or hate Smith's previous films, it's impossible not to see Jersey Girl as the exact opposite of everything he's ever done. Smith's new movie is as sentimental, as by-the-numbers and, frankly, as brain-dead as any conventional romantic comedy you've ever seen, with most the big drama involving Affleck's character getting together with a cute video store clerk (Liv Tyler) or trying to get his former job back. The morbidly curious may feel compelled to see the film just to catch a glimpse of Affleck's ex, J Lo, but you'll have to look sharp: she dies in childbirth, less than 15 minutes into the movie. Also stars Stephen Root. Opens March 26 at local theaters.

MADE-UP (NR) Tony Shalhoub's directorial debut adapts Lynne Adams' play about an independent filmmaker (Adams) making a documentary about the beautification of her aging sister (Adams' real-life sister and Shalhoub's real-life wife, Brooke Adams). The film has an engagingly loose, improvised feel, and there are wonderful moments of insight and humor here and there, but Shalhoub's film is ultimately as unfocused as the one that Adams' character is supposed to be making. Made-Up seems to want to be all things to all people — romantic comedy, self-mocking mockumentary, and satire on our culture's obsession with image, aging and beauty in general — but it never sticks with one element long enough to let it sink in. For what it's worth, the movie's preoccupations with female self-imaging will probably make the film more appealing to women than to men, but only marginally. Also stars Gary Sinise, Eva Amurri and an actress with the best name since Ultra Violet — Light Eternity. Opens March 26 at Madstone Theaters.

MIRACLE (PG) There are no real surprises in Disney's latest inspirational, based-on-fact sports story, but the actors are refreshingly natural, and the production is considerably less glossy and saccharine than what you'd expect. The movie's real strength, however, is Kurt Russell (sporting a Fargo-esque Minnesota accent, the world's worst haircut and an even more atrocious wardrobe) as the tough but fair coach of the United States ice hockey team, circa 1980. Miracle is basically an account of Russell whipping his boys into shape as an apprehensive America — demoralized by long gas lines, hostages in Iran and a candy-ass President — roots for their underdog home-team against the seemingly invincible Soviet players. As if the title weren't enough of a tip-off, the movie's arc and ending are absolutely predictable, but it does have its charms. Also stars Patricia Clarkson and Noah Emmerich.

MONSTER (R) First-time director Patty Jenkin's movie is harrowing stuff, topped by Charlize Theron's astonishing turn as real-life female serial killer Aileen Wuornos. Monster is one long howl of pain, focusing on the relatively brief period when hate-wracked Aileen Wuornos made the leap from bargain basement hooker to insatiable serial killer. The movie manages to paint Wuornos as a victimizer and as a victim, eliciting both our horror and empathy (sometimes in the same breath), and the frame of mind we're put in is anything but a simple one. As for Theron's spine-tingling performance, it will make it difficult to ever look at this actress in the same way again. It's the sort of performance that starts in a very physical place and then extends outward in all directions, devastating everything in its path with its sheer intensity. Also stars Christina Ricci. 1/2

MY ARCHITECT: A SON'S JOURNEY (NR) Nathaniel Kahn's provocative and deeply poetic exhumation of his famous and impossibly complicated father, the great architect Louis I. Kahn, yields both more and less than what was bargained for. The filmmaker revisits the old haunts and architectural glories of his father, tracking down virtually everybody who ever knew Louis and conjuring up a world of memory and theory. The talking heads don't always offer much, but plenty is revealed through the architect's art. What eventually emerges in My Architect is a portrait of a visionary artist and an infuriatingly enigmatic human being, and a film with all the passion, mystery, tears and joy of first-rate, fully fleshed fiction. Held over at Madstone Theaters. Call theater to confirm.

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. Before you start thinking that this might be too sedate for your tastes, be aware that it all culminates in a super-intense race-day sequence that is all about speed and volume, and nothing but. Watch out for the tires flying off the wrecked cars and straight into your face. Narrated by Keifer Sutherland. 1/2

NEVER DIE ALONE (R) Rapper DMX stars as a badass big city criminal who returns to his hometown to settle scores. David Arquette plays the young journalist hanging on his every word. Opens March 26 at local theaters. (Not Reviewed)

THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST (R) Mel Gibson's controversial account of Jesus' last 12 hours is a visceral and deliberately punishing experience that goes to great lengths fetishizing its copious pain, suffering, gore and instruments of torture. Gibson seems to be striving for an epiphany of excess, hammering us with lurid, loving close-ups of wood and metal piercing flesh, chunks of human gore flying into people's faces, and buckets of blood gushing from each and every open wound. For all of its classy production values, in fact, The Passion often feels uncomfortably close to a basic, whips "n' chains exploitation flick, albeit one produced with God on its side. It's all quite beautiful, though, in a grim and grisly sort of way, and detractors of the film might even think of it as the most ravishing snuff film ever made. There's also the little matter of the movie's thinly veiled anti-Semitism, whereby the Romans are the ones doing the heavy lifting but the Jews are seen as the ones pulling the strings in this cosmic tragedy. The real problem here, however, is that all that endless, bloody excess eventually becomes redundant, then numbing, and finally just boring. Stars Jim Caviezel, Monica Bellucci, Maia Morgenstern, Mattia Sbragia and Hristo Shopov.

THE RECKONING (R) An ultimately unsatisfying mish-mash of genres, starring Paul Bettany as a conflicted priest in 14th-century England, who hooks up with a troupe of struggling actors. The troupe's leader (Willem Dafoe) gets the bright idea to put on a play based on an actual local crime, but complications arise, and the characters are drawn into the murder, even as the movie eventually transforms into a detective mystery. The period details of The Reckoning are worth a look, but the film's whodunnit aspects seem a lame attempt at recreating The Name of the Rose, while the production eventually bogs down even further with too many ponderous speeches about everything under the sun. Also stars Brian Cox. Opens March 26 at local theaters. 1/2

SCOOBY DOO 2: MONSTERS UNLEASHED (PG) This sequel to last year's big screen Doo isn't much more than you might expect, but it does beat the original on several counts. The CGI effects are more interesting and better integrated with the live action, beginning with the computer generated title pooch, who doesn't look nearly as grotesque this time around. Even more importantly, Scooby Doo 2 gets the crucial mix of scares to laughs down pat, with an array of monsters that, while spooky, rarely come off as too intense for the movie's core audience of 6- to 8-year-olds. For the grownups, there are some wonderfully tacky '70s fashions to snicker at, a few semi-clever throwaway gags involving dot-coms and the like, and the indelible image of Scooby in an enormous Afro-wig and purple thigh-high go-go boots. There are also no less than two major product placement plugs for Burger King within the movie's first 15 minutes. Also stars Seth Green and Peter Boyle. Opens March 26 at local theaters.

SECRET WINDOW (PG-13) As with so many recent Johnny Depp projects, it often seems like Depp is pretty much the whole show in Secret Window. The plot itself is nothing special — a distraught writer (Depp) is menaced by an ominous redneck (John Turturro) who accuses him of plagiarism — but the movie is filled with pleasantly eccentric touches that you wouldn't expect with routine thriller material like this. Chief among those pleasant eccentricities is Depp himself, who spends much of the movie in a ratty bathrobe and perennially mussed, fright-wig hair, ranting and mumbling to himself. Likewise, there's a lushly mysterious musical score by Philip Glass that makes us feel that there's more going on here than there really is. Unfortunately with Secret Window, what you see is what you get. The film is based on a very minor short story by Stephen King, and even Depp's performance can't save what boils down to a thinly derivative version of Cape Fear meets Psycho. Maybe Robert Mitchum in Turturro's role would have helped. Also stars Maria Bello and Timothy Hutton.

SPARTAN (R) David Mamet is in full hard-boiled mode with his latest feature, a stripped-down political thriller about a seasoned special ops veteran (Val Kilmer) charged with rescuing the kidnapped daughter of a powerful politician. Spartan is a strange bird, filled with typically edgy, incisive moments, but also with implausible plot turns and flashes of uninspired business where Mamet appears to be eager to enter John Clancy territory but unsure about how to do it. As a result, the film occasionally winds up seeming phony and even a little bit trite, like a Hollywood action movie directed by someone who just flew in from Mars. As with most Mamet projects, the writer-director's attention to language and details is what allows the movie to breathe, but only in fits and starts. Spartan's themes and tone are compelling, but its narrative lacks the focus we expect from Mamet. The film lurches about, arriving at dead-ends, backtracking and then going for undesirable short-cuts, resulting in one of Mamet's least satisfying efforts in some time. Also stars Derek Luke, Kristen Bell, William H. Macy and Ed O'Neill.

STARSKY AND HUTCH (PG-13) The jokes are hit-or-miss and the action is routine in this shizoid and scattershot adaptation of the late '70s television series about buddy cops. Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson display more of that easygoing chemistry that made Zoolander so enjoyable, but that's about all Starsky and Hutch has going for it. The movie can't decide if it wants to be a spoof, an homage or some sort of quirky but more-or-less serious crime caper, and it's not particular adept at any of those. Even the whole '70s nostalgia thing feels disappointingly bland and joyless here. Also stars Vince Vaughn, Snoop Dogg, Fred Williamson and Jason Bateman.

TAKING LIVES (R) Nothing sets Taking Lives apart from countless other crime thrillers (except Academy Award-winner Angelina Jolie's bare breasts). Jolie plays the foxy, fearless Illeana Scott, a top FBI profiler hired to track down a serial, chameleon-like killer who steals the identities of his victims. The movie takes a twist when Jolie's character finds herself the victim of deception. Certain aspects of the story are confusing and irrelevant, which is sort of a hallmark of this genre, as is the predictable ending and the inhospitable local police team threatened by a talented, methodological agent helping to solve a case. As holes gape in the plot, the movie's appeal fades. Director D.J. Caruso (The Salton Sea) doesn't seem to realize it takes more than a luscious set of lips to make a good movie. Also stars Ethan Hawke and Keifer Sutherland.1/2—Whitney Meers/Cooper Cruz

TWISTED (R) Ashley Judd is the only thing remotely worthwhile about this depressingly sub-generic thriller from once-reliable director Philip Kaufman (The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Henry and June). Judd stars as a newly promoted homicide detective investigating a series of murders in which she's the prime suspect. (It seems the gal's given to self-destructive one-night stands, slurping mass quantities of wine, then passing out and waking up with her bed-partner dead.) Then again, this is one of those idiotic movies where everyone acts guilty and where everyone's a potential killer, but none of it matters because nothing makes sense and no characters are developed enough for us to remotely care about them. Samuel L. Jackson's here too, walking through this mess of a movie just long enough to collect a paycheck. Also stars Andy Garcia. Reviewed entries by Lance Goldenberg unless otherwise noted.

YeelenSo, when was the last time you saw a movie by Ousmane Sembene, the 80-year-old "father of African cinema"? Or what about anything by Djibril Diop Mambety, Cheick Oumar Sissoko or any of the many other major filmmakers currently working in Africa?With exotic imports from Iran to Iceland finding their way onto the arthouse screens of 21st-century America, African cinema might just be the final frontier. That final frontier might be just a touch closer to melting away, however, thanks to a wonderful new series of important African films released on DVD by Kino on Video.

The best of this series, and probably the most acclaimed of all African films (it won the 1987 Jury Prize at Cannes), Malian director Souleymane Cisse's Yeelen combines magical realism and distinctly African iconology to forge a hypnotic tale of a young warrior's coming-of-age. Based on a 13th-century tribal legend, Yeelen tells the story of Niankoro (Issiaka Kane), a young Bambara warrior whose quest for spiritual enlightenment culminates in an uber-Oedipal battle to the death with his shaman father.

Long celebrated in the oral poetry of the Bambara, Yeelen is a creation myth in which spiritual struggle, death and rebirth chase each other's tails in an endless cycle of cosmic cause and effect. Similarly, Cisse's film unfolds in an unconventional, nonlinear manner, underscoring the Bambara concept of time as a circular phenomenon that repeats itself without end. The film's very title refers to the brightness in which the world is created and destroyed, again and again and again.

Yeelen is filled with ravishing imagery both mystical and elemental, some of which is grounded in specific West African lore and symbolism bound to leave at least a few western viewers scratching their heads. The essence of the story Cisse relates, however, is as accessible as it is epic, a tale of universal appetites to be happily gobbled up by any lover of world cinema. Beyond that, the film offers a visual experience of such exquisite beauty that it's easy to overlook the occasional cultural obscurity or the stray, stilted performance from one of the non-professional actors.

There are no extras on the Kino on Video DVD of Yeelen, but the subtitles are clear and well translated, and the vivid and mostly blemish-free picture does full justice to the film's crucial imagery and its palette of warm earth tones. In any event, it's simply a treat to finally be able to lay eyes on Yeelen, which, at its best, is a work of profound visionary power, the likes of which most of us have never seen.

This article appears in Mar 25-31, 2004.