Category: Film

Cinephilia: Opening This Week

After last week’s pathet­ic attempt at weath­er fore­cast­ing, I will refrain from sug­gest­ing any­thing oth­er than there are three new films at the movies this week.

First up, slip­ping in to the wee cin­e­mas at the back of the Para­mount is French roman­tic com­e­dy Change of Address. Musi­cian Emmanuel Mouret has arrived in Paris with­out accom­mo­da­tion and is approached by Fred­erique Bel about shar­ing her flat. Ignor­ing the life-rule that goes “Don’t f*ck your flat­mates, don’t mix your drinks” they become, er, acquaint­ed. Com­pli­ca­tions ensue. Change of Address is described by Urban Cine­file in Aus­tralia as “play­ful and amus­ing”. Para­mount only.

I saw Nev­er Back Down yes­ter­day and I’m not giv­ing too much away if I tell you that it is then most repul­sive and objec­tion­able film I have wit­nessed in a long time. As Ken Dun­cum once said (in anoth­er con­text) not only should this film nev­er have been made but all those respon­si­ble should have to atone for hav­ing made it. Read­ings (and maybe Regent-on-Man­ners but their web site is down).

Final­ly Def­i­nite­ly, Maybe is a roman­tic com­e­dy star­ring Ryan Reynolds and Abi­gail Bres­lin (relax, they’re not the roman­ti­cal­ly entwined cou­ple — give her a few more years yet). Bres­lin plays Reynold’s 11-year-old daugh­ter who wants to know why Dad­dy is get­ting divorced. Through the medi­um of extend­ed flash­back, Reynolds then tries to explain his life and how he and her moth­er fell in love. The twist: we don’t find out which of his three sig­nif­i­cant for­mer lovers is his one true love until the end. Read­ings.

I’ve slipped a bit behind in review­ing cur­rent releas­es thanks to the Show­case but these three plus Ram­bo, Bon­neville and The Eye will be reviewed at Funer­als & Snakes next Wednes­day.

Cinephilia: Opening This Week

Looks like the week­end is going to be beau­ti­ful, again. Per­fect weath­er for, ahem, sit­ting in a dark­ened air-con­di­tioned room watch­ing a flick­er­ing light on a screen. And Hol­ly­wood has come to the par­ty with a cou­ple of films that are going to make sit­ting in the sun­shine seem like the most nat­ur­al thing in the world.

Sly Stal­lone brings John Ram­bo out of retire­ment for his first film since 1988 at Read­ings and Regent-on-Man­ners. Liv­ing in qui­et retire­ment in Thai­land, Ram­bo is forced back into action to res­cue Chris­t­ian mis­sion­ar­ies in Bur­ma. In Ram­bo tra­di­tion it’s rat­ed R18 for vio­lence and offen­sive lan­guage.

The sec­ond asia-hor­ror-remake to come out in two weeks (Shut­ter was last week) is The Eye. Jes­si­ca Alba plays a blind woman who gets a haunt­ed cornea trans­plant and can see more than she bar­gained for. Read­ings and Regent-on-Man­ners.

[The rest of this week’s new releas­es after the jump]

Cinephilia: Opening This Week

The Fes­ti­val of the Arts has been soak­ing up almost every spare minute of my work­ing day so this is going to be a bare bones update.My high­light: Simon “Shaun of the Dead” Pegg back on screen in Run Fat­boy Run about a mar­riage-shy waster who tries to win the love of his life (Thandie New­ton) back by run­ning the Lon­don Marathon. Read­ings, Empire, Regent-on-Man­ners, Light­house Petone, Pent­house.

For the kids who like those dance-as-a-sub­sti­tute-for-gang-war­fare movies we have Step Up 2 The Streets, sequel to the mas­sive 2006 hit that launched Chan­ning Tatum on an unsus­pect­ing world. He returns for the sequel. Read­ings only.

[The rest of this week’s new releas­es after the jump]

Cinephilia: Opening This Week

After the excite­ment of the pre-Oscar rush it’s anoth­er qui­et week at the cin­e­ma. Open­ing all over town (that’s Read­ings, Empire, Pent­house, Regent-on-Man­ners and Light­house Petone) is the his­tor­i­cal dra­ma The Oth­er Boleyn Girl fea­tur­ing the dream team of Natal­ie Port­man and Scar­lett Johans­son along with Eric Bana as ‘Enery the Eighth.

Even more his­tor­i­cal (at least in terms of dis­tance if not accu­ra­cy) is 10,000 B.C. which stars our own Cliff Cur­tis as a char­ac­ter called Tic’Tic (I kid you not). Direct­ed by Inde­pen­dence Day’s Roland Emmerich, 10,000 B.C. was par­tial­ly filmed in New Zealand last year and tells the sto­ry of a young mam­moth hunter’s des­per­ate efforts to save his tribe. There’s no sign of Raquel Welch but Camil­la Belle (When a Stranger Calls) comes off the bench to play eye-can­dy: Read­ings and Regent-on-Man­ners.

If nei­ther of these take your fan­cy, there are sneak pre­views again this week­end of the Simon Pegg rom-com Run Fat­boy Run (direct­ed by his good mate David Schwim­mer). You’ll find that at Read­ings, Empire, Regent-on-Man­ners and Pent­house today, Sat­ur­day and Sun­day only.

All three of these titles will be reviewed at Funer­als & Snakes next Wednes­day (and in the Cap­i­tal Times on the same day). Mean­while, tick­ets have gone on sale for the 2008 World Cin­e­ma Show­case which is an absolute doozy this year — a wor­thy com­peti­tor to the main Fes­ti­val. And the Film Soci­ety got under way on Mon­day which must mean that Sum­mer is near­ly over.

Cinephilia: Opening This Week

Just in time for the week­end, here’s a quick run down of the films open­ing this week in cin­e­mas across town.

Return­ing from last year’s Film Fes­ti­val is Lady Chat­ter­ley, a French adap­ta­tion of an ear­li­er (“kinder, gen­tler” accord­ing to Ebert) ver­sion of D. H. Lawrence’s famous erot­ic nov­el Lady Chat­ter­ley’s Lover. It sounds like it could have been titled There Will Be Sex: Rial­to only.

Also return­ing, but from the more recent French Film Fes­ti­val is big-bud­get cos­tume dra­ma Molière, about the great drama­tist played by Romain Duris.That one is a Pent­house exclu­sive.

Final­ly this week, 300’s Ger­ard But­ler romances Hilary Swank from the dead in P.S., I Love You. Described by one review­er as hav­ing a “high ick fac­tor”. Read­ings and Regent-on-Man­ners.

All these films will be reviewed at Funer­als & Snakes by next Wednes­day (and in the Cap­i­tal Times on the same day).

Cinephilia: Opening This Week

In 1998 Wern­er Her­zog made an acclaimed doc­u­men­tary called Lit­tle Dieter Needs to Fly about Ger­man-born Viet­nam hero Dieter Den­gler and his adven­tures as a US Navy pilot. He obvi­ous­ly had a big con­nec­tion to that sto­ry as he has now gone back and made a fea­ture about the most amaz­ing chap­ter of Dengler’s life: the escape from a jun­gle-bound Viet Cong prison camp after 6 months of near star­va­tion. The Dark Knight’s Chris­t­ian Bale stars. Rial­to exclu­sive.

Jack Nichol­son and Mor­gan Free­man star togeth­er as two old men on their last legs in The Buck­et List, direct­ed by Rob Rein­er. It opens today at Read­ings, Empire, Light­house Petone and Pent­house. Also, from the com­mer­cial depart­ment is tele­port­ing adven­ture Jumper star­ring Hay­den Chris­tensen and Samuel L. Jack­son. Rumours that the pro­posed sequels to Jumper will be called Sweater and Pullover are sim­ply reck­less. Read­ings, Empire, Regent-on-Man­ners.

[The rest of this week’s new releas­es after the jump]