CINEMA
At the Movies
Opening
The Departed
Leonardo DiCaprio and director Martin Scorsese team up again in this remake of the 2002 Hong Kong police thriller "Infernal Affairs." Caprio plays a Boston undercover cop who infiltrates a mob syndicate, while at the same time a criminal (Matt Damon) has infiltrated the police department as an informer. When it becomes clear to both the gangsters and the police that there's a mole in their midst, each informant must race to uncover the other's identity. Review on Page 17. (R)
Employee of the Month
1/2
Standup superstar Dane Cook and Dax Shepard face off as stock boy slackers at a Costco-style store who compete for the love of a new checkout girl, played by Jessica Simpson. Review on Page 18. (PG-13)
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning
In this prequel to the 1974 horror classic, we find out how the psychopath murderer Leatherface was manipulated by a crooked sheriff into being a tool for evil. And teenagers will be sacrificed again! Review in Friday's Today section(R)
Now Playing
G | General audiences.
Everyone's Hero
A CGI-animated story about a boy who crosses the country to return a very special baseball bat to his hero, Babe Ruth, on the eve of the 1932 World Series. It's a sweet, inspirational kids' movie tailormade for family viewing.
PG | Parental guidance suggested.
Barnyard: The Original Party Animals
1/2
An CGI-animated movie about a free-wheeling cow named Otis and his misfit farm animals who live the high life when humans aren't looking. But when a pack of coyotes attack, sending the entire farm into fear and turmoil, Otis must reluctantly step up to the grown-up role he's been avoiding his whole life. This movie actually has a clever concept and handles such sensitive topics as birth and death with unexpected grace.
An Inconvenient Truth
A documentary about former Vice President Al Gore's touring multimedia talk about the moral challenge of global warming. The film's not so much about Gore but mainly on his presentation on the alarming effect of carbon-dioxide emissions on the world's climate, a talk he's given many times over the last few years. For that, it's a necessary film.
Invincible
Mark Wahlberg takes on the inspiring role of real-life zero-to-hero Vince Papale, a 30-year-old substitute teacher and part-time bartender who was plucked out of obscurity at an open tryout for the Philadelphia Eagles and won a spot on the team in 1976 as a wide receiver. The period detail is uncanny and the performances are solid all around.
Open Season
1/2
An animated feature about a domesticated girzzly bear (voiced by Martin Lawrence) who gets deposited in the woods during hunting season. The bear and his pal, a scrawny, one-antlered mule deer (Ashton Kutcher), rally all the other forest animals to turn the tables on an evil poacher (Gary Sinise). It has three strong funny scenes, and the rest is filler, good moments to take the kids to the restroom and the concession stand.
Step Up
A troubled rebel becomes the dance partner of a beautiful ballet student at a prestigious performing arts school in Baltimore. It's a thoroughly formulaic but mildly enjoyable dance movie.
Zoom
1/2
A retired superhero (Tim Allen) is called back to work to transform an unlikely group of ragtag kids into new heroes at a private academy. Lacking the punch and good cheer of similar movies as "The Incredibles" and "Sky High," this is a dull and laugh-free affair.
PG-13 | Parents strongly cautioned.
All the King's Men
1/2
Sean Penn plays a corrupt Southern politician in this adaptation of Robert Penn Warren's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, loosely based on the life of Louisiana Gov. Huey Long. Despite the use of a classic novel and Penn's powerful and painstaking acting, director-writer Steve Zillian's adaptation is uninspiring and not at all provocative.
The Covenant
It's studly teenage warlocks trying to destroy each other at an elite New England boarding school! Hack director Renny Harlin serves up a dreary movie that lacks genuine supernatural thrills.
The Devil Wears Prada
1/2
More college drab than haute couture, a hapless young woman (Anne Hathaway) becomes the assistant to a demanding editor (Meryl Streep) who oversees the fashion bible of New York. Like the hottest new fashion trend, the movie is initially irresistible -- fun, flirty, spirited and sexy. But then it drags the audience down through a love triangle plotline that gets too complicated and heavy.
Flyboys
A tribute to the real-life Lafayette Escadrille, American volunteers who flew for the French during the early days of World War I. While the high-altitude combat is thrilling and should satisfy aviation buffs, the characters are corny and the situations clichéd in the hackneyed storyline. The planes are the real stars here.
Gridiron Gang
Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson stars as a true-life probation officer who coaches a football team made up of rival gangbangers in a youth detention camp. Director Phil Joanou is relentless in his attempts to inspire the audience. Instead, the result is just overbearing and redundant.
The Guardian
Kevin Costner plays a Coast Guard rescue swimmer who's struggling with life on the water after losing his squad in an accident. He ends up being the mentor of a hotshot swimmer (Ashton Kutcher) training for his elite military unit. Though the movie has its potent action moments, it basically drags on like a slow boat ride, its standard-issue heroics and flavorless dialogue gone stale long before it arrives at the big, valorous finish.
The Illusionist
While fine technical wizardry went into this period film set in early 20th-century Austria, it lacks the magic of romance, drama, longing and faith you think would be generated in a tale about a love triangle involving a magician (Edward Norton), a noblewoman (Jessica Biel) and the heir to the throne (Rufus Sewell). Their supposed ardor is as illusory as the title character's stage magic.
Jet Li's Fearless
Billed as Li's final martial arts movie, it's an underwhelming farewell, rife with tepid drama and mixed messages. While filled with impressive fight choreography by Yuen Wo Ping, it's still a pretentious biopic about Chinese fighting legend Huo Yuanjia, who emerged as a populist hero challenging foreign rivals during the early 20th century.
Little Man
Brothers Marlon and Shawn Wayans' latest screwball comedy is about a short-statured criminal who poses as an adopted baby to recover a stolen diamond from an unsuspecting couple. While big on gross-out humor and slapsticky sight gags that appeal to the lowest common denominator, the movie is small on genuinely clever laughs.
School for Scoundrels
1/2
A beleaguered New York City meter maid tries to overcome his feeling of inadequacy by enrolling in an unorthodox and top-secret confidence-building class. Billy Bob Thornton and Jon Heder basically play weaker versions of their "Bad Santa" and "Napoleon Dynamite" characters, the clash of those two opposing forces generating only a few laughs in this overlong movie.
Superman Returns
1/2
The Man of Steel returns to Metropolis after a five-year absence, as he begins his life on Earth again as his alter ego Clark Kent, all the while trying to restart his romance with Lois Lane and doing battle with his arch-nemesis Lex Luthor. Bryan Singer's big-budget movie is reverential to the source material, joyous with the possibility of discovery, yet deeply moving in its melancholy.
Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby
Will Ferrell plays a NASCAR driver who must face his own demons and fight to retain his place at the top when he is challenged by the arrival of a flamboyant French Formula One star (Sacha Baron Cohen). Like the sport it spoofs, the movie has its thrilling moments but mostly feels repetitive, and it runs out of gas at the end.
R | Restricted.
The Black Dahlia
Crime novelist James Ellroy and director Brian De Palma present a classic noir Hollywood period drama of a struggling actress who winds up a murder victim, her frozen grin mocking the detectives on the case. The film begins as a slow but intriguing character study that gradually unravels into a turgid mess. The convoluted story gets choked amid the flash of director De Palma's visual excess, and characters who start out promisingly idiosyncratic become caricatures by the end. Of the all-star cast, Hilary Swank and Mia Kirshner come off the best.
Confetti
A British mockumentary charts the journey of three couples as they battle it out to win the title of Most Original Wedding of the Year. It's a pallid imitation of Christopher Guest's work, particularly "Best in Show." Content to go only a third of the way to getting to the bottom of its characters, the film only gives each a few comic tics and leaves it at that.
The Descent
1/2
A group of women friends encounter rabidly carnivorous humanoids during a trek into an Appalachian cave system. Something of a low-budget retread of the "Alien" films, this bloody fright flick is still far better than most of the cliché-ridden dreck that passes for horror these days.
Jackass: Number Two
1/2
Johnny Knoxville and his original crew of reprobates return for another round of pointlessly dangerous, absurd and disgusting stunts. But because of the gleeful attitude and friendship shared amongst the guys, all of this bawdy, earthy, puerile humor is shamelessly entertaining.
Little Miss Sunshine
A hit at this year's Sundance Film Festival, the film follows an oddball clan as they race across three states to get their 7-year-old daughter to a beauty pageant. It's a sunny, prefabricated charmer of a comedy, looking at the all-American obsession with winning and chortles darkly.
The Protector
Martial arts superstar Tony Jaa plays a Thai fighter who must battle his way across Australia to recover stolen elephants, and in doing so protect a traditional way of life that has been ruined by outsiders. Ah, forget the plot, and just watch the thrilling Jaa in full-tilt action.
The Science of Sleep
A shy graphic designer (Gael Garcia Bernal) caught in a mundane job at a Parisian calendar publisher has his dreams of a perfect life and true romance constantly invade his waking life. Blurring the boundary between fantasy and reality, whimsy and delusion, director Michel Gondry creates a hallucinatory love story with a twisted sense of humor.
Snakes on a Plane
1/2
Samuel L. Jackson cusses up a storm as an FBI agent trying to protect a mob murder witness from hundreds of nasty serpents (real and CGI-generated) while trapped in an airliner hurtling across the Pacific 30,000 feet in the air. The movie delivers on its promise of reptilian fun, with a camp mix of comedy, horror and suspense.
NR | No Motion Picture Association of America rating.
Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont
Dame Joan Plowright and newcomer Rupert Friend star in the story of a lonely London retiree who befriends a struggling young writer who conspires with her to act as her grandson.
Art House | Revival
THE DORIS DUKE THEATRE, HONOLULU ACADEMY OF ARTS
900 S. Beretania St.; $7 general; $6 seniors, students and military; $5 Academy members (532-8768):
Viva Pedro!: Pedro Almodóvar Film Retrospective
See feature and schedule on Page 26 and 27.
Stolen
At 1 p.m. Oct. 12
MOVIE MUSEUM
3566 Harding Ave.; $5, $4 members; reservations recommended due to limited seating (735-8771):
The Wicker Man (British original from 1973)
At 2, 4, 6 and 8 p.m. Friday.
Thank You for Smoking
At 2, 4, 6 and and 8 p.m. Saturday and Oct. 9.
Infernal Affairs
At 2, 4, 6 and 8 p.m. Sunday.
School for Scoundrels (British original from 1960)
At 12:30, 2:30, 4:30, 6:30 and 8:30 p.m. Oct. 12.
UH CINEMA SERIES: BEYOND OIL: ALTERNATIVE ENERGY SOLUTIONS
Spalding Hall Auditorium, University of Hawaii at Manoa; $5 general and $3 UH students/faculry:
Biogas from the Sea / Hydrogen: The Safe & Clean Fuel
At 7 p.m. Oct. 11.
Special Screening
Locally made independent film
"The Hidden Battle" will be shown at 7 p.m. Oct. 10 at the rRed Elephant, 1144 Bethel St. $5 admission at the door. For more info, go online at
www.thehiddenbattle.com.