Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Starring Bill Hader, Anna Faris, James Caan, Bruce Campbell, Andy Samberg, Mr. T, and Tracy Morgan
Overall, the movie is getting rather sunny reviews. Claudia Puig in USA Today calls it "a surprisingly savory treat." "Inspired lunacy," is the way Daniel M. Gold describes it in the New York Times. And Roger Moore in the Orlando Sentinel describes it as an "unexpected delight." Elizabeth Weitzman in the New York Daily News predicts that the movie "is very likely the most fun your family will have this month." Kyle Smith, whose judgments are sometimes ... er ... clouded by his conservative sensibilities, says that while the movie offers a "clever and engaging first half" its second half becomes preachy, especially when it offers yet another lecture about global warming. Says Smith: "The comedy turns into The Day After Tomorrow plus marinara sauce." And Stephen Cole in the Toronto Globe and Mail agrees, writing, "The film feels like a zany spitball fight that comes to a sobering conclusion when the principal enters the room."
RATING: PG for brief mild language.
Zombieland
Starring Woody Harrelson, Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone, and Abigail Breslin
Clearly Zombieland is not the kind of movie Roger Ebert can sink his teeth into. "Vampires make a certain amount of sense to me, but zombies not so much. What's their purpose?" He asks, in his Chicago Sun-Times review, followed by other questions about the nature of zombies. "I ask these questions only because I need a few more words for this review," he explains. Here's one horror film that critics have taken to heart, probably because it's not so much a horror film but a comedy version of a horror film -- that kind that had its antecedents in Abbot and Costello Meet the Wolfman. "It's just wicked fun," writes Claudia Puig in USA Today. Kyle Smith in the New York Post praises it as "the funniest broad comedy since The Hangover. And if you thought the British Shaun of the Dead was the zombie comedy to end all zombie comedies, Gary Thompson in the Philadelphia Daily News is here to tell you that it was not. "Its Americanized mutation," he writes, "is an unexpectedly funny repatriation of the form." Woody Harrelson is receiving much praise for the comedic chops -- in both senses of the term -- that he displays in the movie. "Is there a cooler guy in the movies this minute than Woody Harrelson?" Roger Moore asks in the Orlando Sentinel.. And Mick LaSalle in the San Francisco Chronicle writes, "Harrelson is the best thing in the movie. Because Harrelson never tips his hand and shows the intelligence that guides his performances, he rarely gets the credit he deserves. ... He shows us the limits of the character's thinking, a totally distorted vision of himself and the world, and he's very funny." There's also a cameo appearance by Bill Murray. And, returning to Roger Ebert's filler conclusion: "I will close by observing that Bill Murray is the first comedian since Jack Benny who can get a laugh simply by standing there."
RATING: R for horror violence/gore and language.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
Starring Tim Curry, Susan Sarandon, and Barry Bostwick.
What can I say? This film has become a cult hit. It was practically ignored when it was first released in 1975, but now it's more of a performance film. The Anacortes Cinemas has scheduled it for 11:59pm on Saturday night, but I bet it doesn't start on time. Besides being Halloween, Saturday night is also when we (finally) lose Daylight Saving Time, thus everyone gains an extra hour. Set your clock BACK on Saturday night.
RATING: R.
Where the Wild Things Are
Starring Catherine Keener, Max Records, Mark Ruffalo, Lauren Ambrose, James Gandolfini, Catherine O'Hara, and Forest Whitaker
The film tells the story of Max, a rambunctious and sensitive boy who feels misunderstood at home and escapes to where the Wild Things are. Max lands on an island where he meets mysterious and strange creatures whose emotions are as wild and unpredictable as their actions. The Wild Things desperately long for a leader to guide them, just as Max longs for a kingdom to rule. When Max is crowned king, he promises to create a place where everyone will be happy. Max soon finds, though, that ruling his kingdom is not so easy and his relationships there prove to be more complicated than he originally thought.
RATING: PG for mild thematic elements, some adventure action and brief language.
Bright Star
Starring Ben Whishaw, Abbie Cornish, Paul Schneider, and Kerry Fox
London 1818: a secret love affair begins between 23 year old English poet, John Keats, and the girl next door, Fanny Brawne, and outspoken student of fashion. This unlikely pair started at odds, he thinking her a stylish minx, she unimpressed by literature in general. It was the illness of Keats' younger brother that drew them together. Keats was touched by Fanny's efforts to help and agreed to teach her poetry. By the time Fanny's alarmed mother and Keats' best friend Brown realized their attachment, the relationship had an unstoppable momentum. Intensely and helplessly absorbed in each other, the young lovers were swept into powerful new sensation, "I have the feeling as if I were dissolving," Keats wrote her. Together they rode a wave of romantic obsession that deepened as their troubles mounted. Only Keats' illness proved insurmountable.
RATING: PG for thematic elements, some sensuality, brief language and incidental smoking.
The Vampire's Assistant
Starring John C. Reilly, Ken Watanabe, Josh Hutcherson, Chris Massoglia, Ray Stevenson, Patrick Fugit, Orlando Jones, Willem Dafoe, and Salma Hayek.
16-year-old Darren was like most kids in his suburban neighborhood. He hung out with his best friend Steve, got decent grades and usually stayed out of trouble. But when he and his buddy stumble upon a traveling freak show, things begin to change inside Darren. That's the exact moment when a vampire named Larten Crepsley turns him into something, well, bloodthirsty. Newly undead, he joins the Cirque Du Freak, a touring sideshow filled with monstrous creatures from a snakeboy and a wolfman to a bearded lady and a gigantic barker. As Darren flexes his newfound powers in this dark world, he becomes a treasured pawn between the vampires and their deadlier counterparts. And while trying to survive, one boy will struggle to keep their brewing war from devouring what's left of his humanity.
RATING: PG-13 for sequences of intense supernatural violence and action, disturbing images, thematic elements and some language.