“The Alamo”
2.5 reels (out of four)
See review
“Ella Enchanted”
Miramax Films
Rated PG
(out of four)
Once upon a time, there was a girl who was trapped
in a mildly clever medieval fairy tale that kids
might like, but was so slow-moving and clunky that
even the best child psychologist couldn’t watch
it with them.
In “Ella Enchanted,” Anne Hathaway plays
Ella, who is cursed with a gift of obedience when
her fairy godmother visits her as a baby. If someone
says “bite me,” she does it; if someone
tells her to hand over her beloved necklace, she
does it. After her mom dies, her father makes like
Cinderella’s and Ella’s nasty stepsisters
soon realize her weakness. Ella has no choice but
to go on a quest to get her fairy godmother to take
back the gift. The quest will also lead her to the
arms of a hunky prince (Hugh Dancy), who falls for
Ella because her political conscience stops her from
swooning over him like all the other girls. You see,
the current king, the prince’s uncle (Cary
Elwes), has segregated the kingdom and abused the
elves, giants and ogres since the king’s death.
Hathaway’s spunky, politically active character
is fun, but poor pacing and direction and half-baked
production design prevent an enchanting film from
emerging.
“The Girl Next Door”
3 reels (out of four)
See review
“Intermission”
3 reels (out of four)
See review
“Johnson Family Vacation”
Fox Searchlight Pictures
Rated PG-13
(Not reviewed)
Remember all your family road trips and those National
Lampoon movies that tried to make a farce out of
them? “Johnson Family Vacation” attempts
to pump some more life into the genre with a cast
including Cedric the Entertainer, Bow Wow (formerly
Lil’ Bow Wow, who brought a lively energy to “Like
Mike”), Shannon Elizabeth and Steve Harvey
as the unlucky family.
“Monsieur Ibrahim”
Sony Pictures Classics
Rated R
(out of four)
“I just know what’s in my Quran…when
you’re ready to learn, you don’t go to
a book.” So the title character repeatedly
says in “Monsieur Ibrahim.” Despite all
the lessons the film throws out, the most valuable
one is that a great actor like Omar Sharif can almost
make a string of thoughts seemingly stolen off of
Hallmark cards worth watching.
Sharif plays a Turkish shop owner in a Jewish neighborhood
in Paris who befriends a motherless teenager with
a depressed father. The boy, Momo (Pierre Boulanger),
spends his time saving up for prostitutes after paying
$30 from his piggy bank to pay for his first sexual
experience in the opening scene. He steals from the
shop and tries to cheat his depressed father. Ibrahim
encourages the theft and takes the boy under his
wing.
A little twist at the end reveals that Ibrahim had
apparently planned to wait until he died to teach
the kid his real lesson, but that doesn’t make
up for us or the kid having to listen to his beautifully
acted nonsense for 90 minutes.
Director François Dupeyron really wants his
film to be touching and it almost is thanks to Sharif,
but it gets to the point where you’d rather
the characters be silent than recite the same old
crap for the 18th time.
“The Same River Twice”
Next Life Films
Not rated
(out
of four)
As a documentary, “The Same River Twice” alternatively
uses its intriguing concept for self-important but
shallow character studies and quietly touching observations.
The latter qualities sometimes seem unintentional,
but make the film successful for those looking for
an exploration of aging.
Director Robb Moss combines footage of his 1978 film “Riverdogs,” which
followed a series of naked hippie types on a month-long
trip of rafting and hiking through Colorado, with
footage of the people 20 years later, now middle-aged
and in different states of life.
Jim, the leader of the expedition, still acts as
a river guide, and is very slowly building a small
house in the woods. (The film’s best gag is
a “One Year Later” cut to his building
progression.) All but one of the other four characters
became involved in politics, but have also found
meaning in family life, either by obtaining it or
after losing it.
Even after much of the film had made me skeptical
with shallow meandering, the ending made up for it
with a combination of interesting shots and poignant
interviews. The basic truth is that most of the people
have grown up, or in Jim’s case, proved that
he truly found himself on that river. But even if
that hippie life was a silly waste of time, what
a delightful month it was.
“The Whole Ten Yards”
Warner Bros.
Rated PG-13
(out
of four)
(See “hackneyed sequel” for more information.)
If you thought the killer-gone-domestic story pretty
much exhausted its possibilities in “The Whole
Nine Yards,” “The Whole Ten Yards” proves
you right. The sequel combines overacting and awkwardly
forced comedy to avoid any distraction from how stupid
the entire story is.
Matthew Perry plays Oz, a dentist who has been completely
paranoid about the Hungarian Mafia killing him since
the death of their boss at the end of the first film.
He plays the aggravated, nervous shtick nonstop to
the point that he never needs to act slightly perturbed
in front of the camera again. The Mafia kidnaps Oz’s
wife (Natasha Henstridge), who happens to be Jimmy’s
ex-wife.
He hasn’t seen the former hit man, Jimmy, played
by Bruce Willis for a long time, but he goes to him
for help once the Mafia patriarch gets out of jail
to speak with an allegedly humorous Hungarian accent
and broadly hit his idiot son over and over and over
and over again.
Willis and Amanda Peet
as his wife, Oz’s former
dental assistant who is turned on by murder, almost
come out unscathed with their performances, but the
script is so formulaic (to the point of repeating
the same formula for every scene) that nothing can
save them. “The Whole Ten Yards” is proof
that subtlety is usually better than repeatedly hitting
someone in the face really hard.
jeremy@red-mag.com
