You can’t keep a Death Dealer down; that doesn’t stop them from trying.
“Underworld:” Blood Wars” and other new movies
‘Hidden Figures’
With the most critical mission in the history of the U.S. space program in the balance, three African-American women took on the crucial work to make it happen.
No, you don’t typically find math mavens as the heroes of a Hollywood movie. Then again, “Hidden Figures” isn’t a typical movie in many respects.
First, it’s a true story. Second, it has a pretty impressive cast. And third, it’s a serious Oscar contender.
Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer and Janelle Monáe play the smart women who battled expectations, prejudice and history to help get John Glenn into orbit in 1962. Kevin Costner plays the guy in charge, with Jim Parsons as one of the white male mathematicians in Henson’s path (at least at first). Mahershala Ali, Kirsten Dunst and Aldis Hodge also co-star.
Spencer, Henson and Costner have been getting Oscar buzz, and the movie is a contender for best picture. Pharrell Williams’ music is in the awards-season mix, too.
Critics are loving “Hidden Figures,” saying it fires on multiple cylinders, including strong story lines and all-round solid performances. USA TODAY critic Brian Truitt gave it 31⁄2 stars, saying the movie “equals one satisfying slice of history that’ll entertain adults as well as kids looking to the stars.” “Hidden Figures” is rated PG for thematic elements and some language. It runs for 126 minutes.
‘A Monster Calls’
When his nurturing mother falls deathly ill, 12-year-old Conor deals with an unfeeling grandmother, bullying classmates and his own sorrow by conjuring up a Monster — a giant creature that takes him on a journey of self-discovery.
With a little destructive mayhem thrown in.
J.A. Bayona, who captured the largerthan-life horrors of the 2004 tsunami in “The Impossible” and crafted a spooky ghost story in the Spanish film “The Orphanage,” takes adolescent fantasy to a different level in “A Monster Calls.” The stylish tale starring Lewis MacDougall as Conor, Felicity Jones as his doting mother, Sigourney Weaver as his less-than-doting grandmother and Liam Neeson, in a motioncapture and voice-over performance as the titular Monster.
What looks like a children’s horror fable is getting bonus points — and awards-season consideration — for grown-up storytelling.
“‘A Monster Calls’ isn’t so much a journey into terror as into a terrified child’s mind — a mind that’s confused by hidden hopes and guilty wishes,” critic Stephen Witty wrote in his 31⁄2-star review in the Newark Star-Ledger.
‘Underworld: Blood Wars’
You can’t keep a Death Dealer down, but that doesn’t stop them from trying.
In “Underworld: Blood Wars,” the fifth movie in the “Underworld” series, Kate Beckinsale returns as the vampire who specializes in killing off werewolves, the vampires’ sworn enemies, even as she takes on the clan of bloodsuckers who betrayed her. Theo James (the “Divergent” movies) and Charles Dance (”Game of Thrones”) play two of her few allies in the fight.
Why are we getting No. 5? The first four “Underworld” movies took in nearly $450 million worldwide.