Thursday, May 29, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury

Film shorts

Anger Management

1/2 star (PG-13, 101 min.) Adam Sandler is sentenced to anger therapy with a patently certifiable Jack Nicholson. Cue sophomoric jokes. Director Peter Segal isn't mediocre; a mess of this magnitude requires total incompetence.--JC

Bend It Like Beckham

1 star (PG-13, 112 min.) It's "My big formulaic Sikh soccer romance." Parminder Nagra ignores sister Archie Panjabi's wedding preparations to join a soccer team coached by hunk Jonathan Rhys-Meyers. Gurinda Chadha's feel-good mix of sports flick and culture-clash satire is the painful epitome of "crowd-pleaser." With Keira Knightley.--AA

Bringing Down the House

1 1/2 stars (PG-13, 105 min.) Steve Martin and Queen Latifah can't save Adam Shankman's insulting mess about a tight-assed lawyer helping an ex-con clear her name. All sorts of warm and fuzzy racial slurs are thrown in our faces.--BG

Bruce Almighty

3 stars (PG-13, 101 min.) When TV reporter Jim Carrey rails at God (Morgan Freeman), the indulgent deity endows him with his powers. Tom Shadyac (Liar Liar) hasn't crafted a Capraesque masterpiece. But although Jennifer Aniston's comedic talents are wasted, the film is undeniably sweet and poignant.--TM

Chicago

4 stars (PG-13, 113 min.) Renee Zellweger, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Richard Gere might not be stage ready, but they shine In Rob Marshall's film of the Bob Fosse musical. Maybe too slick and tidy, but always entertaining. 6 Oscars incl. picture, supporting actress Zeta-Jones.--MP

Confidence

2 stars (R, 97 min.) Dustin Hoffman's merest Method twitch overpowers James Foley's plodding con trick drama, starring Ed Burns as a grifter ripping off shady banker Robert Forster. Contrived, formulaic and over obvious. With Morris Chestnut, Andy Garcia, Rachel Weisz.--AA

Daddy Day Care

2 stars (PG, 93 min.) Steve Carr's formulaic Mr. Mom ripoff wastes the talents of Eddie Murphy, Anjelica Huston and Steve Zahn. Have a snack and a nap instead.--TM

The Dancer Upstairs

4 stars (R, 135 min.) Adapted by Nicholas Shakespeare from his own novel, John Malkovich's directorial debut is a stylish, sensual film about love, loyalty and the difficulty of remaining honest in dishonest times. Javier Bardem is magnificent as a Latin American cop tracking an elusive revolutionary leader, who's increasingly attracted to his daughter's enigmatic ballet teacher (Laura Morante). Alternately elegant and electrifying.--JC

Down with Love

3 stars (PG-13, 98 min.) Womanizer Ewan McGregor pursues proto-feminist '60s writer Renee Zellweger in Peyton Reed's pastiche of Doris Day/Rock Hudson sex comedies (Pillow Talk, Lover Come Back). With Eve Ahlert and Dennis Drake's witty script, Reed has fun re-creating antediluvian filmmaking techniques, David Hyde Pierce steals the show in the Tony Randall sidekick role, and Randall himself has a crowd-pleasing cameo.--AA

Ghosts of the Abyss

2 stars (G, 59 min.) James Cameron coasts on past glory with a 3-D documentary "excavating" the Titanic's corpse. Plenty of belief-defying shots, but the subject has become so uninteresting. Narrated by Bill Paxton.--MP

The Good Thief

4 stars (R, 109 min.) Neil Jordan's big bet (remaking Jean-Pierre Melville's Bob le flambeur) pays off, thanks to granite-faced Nick Nolte as a junkie who joins Gerard Darmon's scheme to rob a Monaco casino. Only marred by weird editing (distracting freeze frames) and zero chemistry between Nolte and love interest Nutsa Kukhianidze. With Ralph Fiennes, Tcheky Karyo.--AA

Grand Canyon: The Hidden Secrets

2 stars (NR, 40 min.) Kieth Merrill's 1984 Imax movie mixes spectacular footage with a brief history lesson about early explorers John Wesley Powell and Garcia de Cardenas.--AA

Haunted Castle

Not reviewed (PG, 38 min.) Aspiring rock star Jasper Steverlinck visits dead mom's spooky English mansion and learns that rock 'n' roll really is the devil's music, in this 2001 3-D Imax horror flick from Belgian director Ben Stassen.--AA

Holes

3 1/2 stars (PG, 117 min.) Shia LeBeouf digs holes at a Texas juvenile detention camp run by Sigourney Weaver and Jon Voight. Andrew Davis brings Louis Sachar's teen novel to the screen with its teasing plot and sardonic humor miraculously intact. With Patricia Arquette, Eartha Kitt.--AA

Identity

1 1/2 stars (R, 90 min.) John Cusack, Ray Liotta, Amanda Peet and seven other dimwits check into a lonely Nevada motel during a thunderstorm, in James Mangold's mangled mix of Psycho with And Then There Were None. With Rebecca DeMornay, Alfred Molina, Pruitt Taylor Vince.--AA

The In-Laws

1 1/2 stars (PG-13, 94 min.) Andrew Fleming's remake of the 1979 Peter Falk/Alan Arkin spy spoof has CIA agent Michael Douglas and neurotic podiatrist Albert Brooks embroiled in international intrigue as their kids prepare to marry. A miserable affair with lame, offensive comedy, disjointed pacing and no chemistry between the leads. Call off this wedding.--TM

Into the Deep

1 1/2 stars (NR, all ages, 35 min.) The Luxor resurrects Howard Hall's 1994 3-D Imax flick, exploring the kelp forests off the California coast, with footage of sea lions, bat rays, jellyfish and opalescent squid having an orgy. Dull narration by Kate Nelligan.--AA

It Runs in the Family

Not reviewed (PG-13, 109 min.) Nepotism rules as Michael Douglas acts with dad Kirk for the first time, in Fred Schepisi's "comedy" about a dysfunctional family trying to reconcile their differences.--AA

The Lizzie McGuire Movie

1 1/2 stars (PG, 94 min.) Grating Hilary Duff is mistaken for Italian pop star Yani Gellman's partner. Cue Roman Holiday travelogue footage. Only Alex Borstein rescues Jim Fall's Disney Channel spinoff with her contempt for the "mouth-breathing trailer trash" in its audience.--AA

The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

5 stars (PG-13, 179 min.) While this reviewer has a few "geek" quibbles, this terrific continuation of Tolkien's grand adventure qualifies as the best film of 2002. Further proof that director Peter Jackson is the right man for the job. With Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen. 2 Oscars: sound editing, visual effects.--GS

Malibu's Most Wanted

Not reviewed. (PG-13, 80 min.) Wannabe rapper Jamie Kennedy's hip-hop persona threatens dad Ryan O'Neal's bid for governor, so spin doctor Blair Underwood hires actors Taye Diggs and Anthony Anderson to teach him a lesson, in John Whitesell's "comedy."--AA

The Man Without a Past

4 stars (PG-13, 97 min.) [Mies vailla menneisyytta] After being brutally beaten and robbed, hulking metal worker Markku Peltola enters a new life with neither memory nor shoes. Finnish director Aki Kaurismaki is a master of minimalism and deadpan humor. But his comedy never makes you laugh out loud. It's romance devoid of beautiful people, Ken Loach on cannabis. A curious mix of hard surfaces and soft centers, the mixture of droll and dry, pop and pain gives the movie a strange, guilty giddiness. (Finnish dialogue, English subtitles)--JC

The Matrix Reloaded

2 1/2 stars (R, 138 min.) Since the excitable Wachowski brothers delighted us with their vision of a world controlled by a computer program, we've been trembling over the fate of Neo, Trinity and Morpheus (Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss and Laurence Fishburne). The sequel shows Andy and Larry going for breadth over depth, adolescent comic-book sex and stretching the familiar fight scenes beyond boredom. The riffs on religion and mythology and college-freshman philosophizing have given way to the sense of a film disappearing in its own computer-coded fakery. With Monica Bellucci, Jada Pinkett Smith, Hugo Weaving.--JC

A Mighty Wind

3 1/2 stars (PG-13, 91 min.) Christopher Guest's folk mockumentary has the Folksmen (Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer) and duo Mitch & Mickey (Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara) contending with old issues and newfound obscurity. More believable than you'd expect.--MP

Phone Booth

3 stars (R, 81 min.) In a Manhattan phone booth, a voice informs Colin Farrell that if he hangs up, he's dead. Joel Schumacher's flimsy thriller whizzes along with surprising energy and focus. With Forest Whitaker, Katie Holmes, Radha Mitchell.--JC

X2: X-Men United

3 stars (PG-13, 135 min.) Bryan Singer's seesaw act in 2000's X-Men (blowing stuff up without dumbing down the film), works in this fairly smart sequel whose narrative parallels our current international travails. After a White House attack by embittered mutant Nightcrawler (Alan Cumming), Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and Magneto (Ian McKellen) unite to stop hawkish Gen. Stryker's (Brian Cox) genocidal plans. With Halle Berry, Hugh Jackman, Famke Janssen, Anna Paquin, Rebecca Romijn-Stamos.--MP

Reviews by: AA: Anthony Allison; BG: Bob Grimm; GS: Geoff Schumacher; JC: Jeannette Catsoulis; MP: Mike Prevatt; TM: Tammy McMahan