SHORTCUTS

NEW RELEASES

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2: The four-film saga of Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence)comes to a conclusion in this finale to the dystopian sci-fi action series about a rebel uprising against an autocratic regime structured around gladiatorial spectacle. ★★★★ He Named Me Malala: Davis Guggenheim’s documentary paints a portrait of Malala Yousafzai, the 18year-old activist and Nobel Peace Prize winner, whose courageous advocacy for girls’ education has resonated through the world. ★★★★ Maggie: This unusual zombie drama starring Arnold Schwarzenegger as Wade, a taciturn farmer, is not your typical Hollywood blockbuster. Wade’s teenage daughter Maggie (Abigail Breslin), has been bitten, but so far shows no symptoms of transforming into a zombie – but she will. Much of the film deals with Wade wrestling with his decision about what to do with her. The film suffers a bit for its slowness. But once you get used to the fact that this is not World War Z, it has its small pleasures – both cerebral and emotional. ★★★ No Escape: In their new (unnamed, in the film) overseas home, an American family find themselves caught in the middle of a coup, and they frantically look for an escape as foreigners are being executed. In this suspenseful but borderline racist thriller, every Asian character is either a ruthless murderer or anonymous collateral damage. A lot of locals have to die, the film suggests, in order for one white family to survive. ★★★ ’n Man Soos My Pa: This drama explores familial devastation and the wide rippling effects of addiction. News of a terminal illness draws one family together for the first time in several years. Dealing with imminent death, a father, mother and son must find the courage to forgive the terrible mistakes of the past. ★★★

ON CIRCUIT

Grandma: Elle Reid, a tart-tongued septuagenarian author who charges through life like a bull in a china shop, is the sort of character Lily Tomlin might have created decades ago. But it’s doubtful the 75-year-old Tomlin could have played Elle then with the same deep reserves of anger and sorrow she brings to Grandma, an