now in theaters
ABOUT ELLY A group of young married Iranians arrive at a seaside destination. They have persuaded Elly (Taraneh Alidoosti), a teacher, to come along. A little boy nearly drowns, and when the crisis settles, Elly is nowhere to be found. Has she left? Has she drowned? Director Asghar Farhadi (A Separation) builds the tension as more complications emerge and the situation spirals into a nightmare of doubt and fear. Remove the headscarves and the Persian language and this riveting drama of well-intended lies and unintended consequences could easily be happening in the Hamptons. Not rated. 92 minutes. In Persian with subtitles. The Screen, Santa Fe. ( Jonathan Richards)
THE AGE OF ADALINE Blake Lively plays a woman who is immortal and eternally young. For years, she has lived alone. When she meets a man (Michiel Huisman) she could love, but who could also cause her to lose her immortality, she faces a big decision. Rated PG-13. 110 minutes. Regal Stadium 14, Santa Fe. (Not reviewed)
AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON Marvel’s all-star superhero squad is back, with director Joss Whedon at the wheel again. This installment is darker and a little less focused than before. The original lineup (Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, Black Widow, Hulk, and Hawkeye) is already kind of a smorgasbord, but now the gang has new adversaries, twins Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch (Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen) and the AI robot Ultron (voiced with smooth, deepthroated creepiness by James Spader), who insists the only way to save the planet is to kill off the human race. Whedon hangs on to the humor, and he lends less-developed characters some depth. We get a few too many wild action sequences, and sometimes it’s hard to tell exactly what’s happening, but the special effects are eye-popping, as usual, and with all that going on, you won’t have time to check your watch. Rated PG-13. 141 minutes. Screens in 3-D and 2-D at Regal Stadium 14, Santa Fe. Screens in 2-D only at Violet Crown, Santa Fe; DreamCatcher, Española. (Laurel Gladden)
CLOUDS OF SILS MARIA Olivier Assayas (Carlos) creates a fascinating drama about age and recurrence. Actress Maria Enders ( Juliette Binoche) comes face to face with the specter of her younger self when she is cast in the older role in a revival of a play she starred in at the dawn of her career. Kristen Stewart, a superstar for her Twilight vampire films, is excellent as Maria’s young assistant. Assayas muddies the line between real life and his movie characters and between his movie characters and the play they are rehearsing. (Thirty years ago the director co-scripted
Rendez-vous, the André Téchiné film that made Binoche a star.) Rated R. 123 minutes. In English and French with subtitles. Violet Crown, Santa Fe. ( Jonathan Richards)
DANNY COLLINS Al Pacino is this film’s title character, an aging rock star who has been coasting by on his old material for years. When his manager (Christopher Plummer) discovers a never-seen letter of encouragement to Collins from John Lennon, the singer is motivated to write his own songs and tend to his personal life once more. Inspired by folk singer Steve Tilston’s story. Rated R. 106 minutes. Regal DeVargas, Santa Fe. (Not reviewed)
DESERT DANCER Afshin Ghaffarian (Reece Ritchie) aspires to dance professionally and have his own company in Iran, where his dreams are thwarted in the culturally repressed state. Based on Ghaffarian’s true story, this film also stars Freida Pinto and features dances by renowned choreographer Akram Khan. Rated PG-13. 98 minutes. Regal DeVargas, Santa Fe. (Not reviewed)
EX MACHINA Novelist Alex Garland, who wrote screenplays for some of Danny Boyle’s films, tries his hand at directing with this sci-fi thriller about a computer coder (Domhnall Gleeson) who is chosen by his billionaire boss (Oscar Isaac of Inside Llewyn Davis) to test the AI of a prototype for a fully humanlike android. Garland shows a keen visual eye with minimalist coolness, and the intimacy of the small cast lets the big questions hang in the air nicely. His story steers clear of convention, thanks in part to the sturdy acting. Rated R. 108 minutes. Regal DeVargas, Santa Fe. (Robert Ker)
FURIOUS 7 This long-running franchise began with fairly simple street racing as The Fast and the Furious and now includes a star-studded cast that travels the globe using wildly implausible methods to combat terrorists, shadow armies, elaborate hacking schemes, and more. The formula clearly works — each film seems more successful than the last. This entry is the first for Kurt Russell, Djimon Hounsou, and Jason Statham (discounting an uncredited cameo) but the last for Paul Walker, who died during filming and is given a touching send-off. Furious 7 is more of the same — revenge, family, bad jokes, and vroom vroom — but bigger than ever. It runs a bit long, and the series has always had third-act struggles (How do you go over the top of
over the top?), but as ever, fans will get their money’s worth. Rated PG-13. 137 minutes. Regal Stadium 14, Santa Fe; DreamCatcher, Española. (Robert Ker)
HOME An alien named Oh (voiced by Jim Parsons) arrives on Earth and meets a human named Tip (Rihanna). He turns her set of wheels into a hover car, and they go on a road trip around the world. This comedy from DreamWorks Animation looks vaguely like Lilo & Stitch, only with Steve Martin as an alien who delivers lines like “Give daddy some sugar.” Rated PG. 94 minutes. Screens in 2-D only at Regal Stadium 14, Santa Fe. (Not reviewed)
HOT PURSUIT Reese Witherspoon plays a cop who is tasked with bringing a witness (Sofia Vergara) to testify against a dangerous money launderer. The whole escapade is quickly revealed to be a setup, which puts the unlikely pair through a series of situations that are comedic or deadly — or both. Rated PG-13. 87 minutes. Regal Stadium 14, Santa Fe; DreamCatcher, Española. (Not reviewed)
LA SAPIENZA Director Eugène Green, an expatriate American living in France, takes us on a gorgeous tour of the work of the 17th-century Italian Baroque architect Francesco Borromini. The principals are Alexandre Schmidt (Fabrizio Rongione), a successful Swiss architect, and his wife, Aliénor (Christelle Prot Landman), a psychologist and social scientist. During a crisis in his career and life, they go to Italy. There they meet Goffredo (Ludovico Succio), a young architecture student, and his sister Lavinia (Arianna Nastro) and learn some important life lessons from them. The movie is styled with rigid formalism, but it works in drawing us into the emotional lives of the characters. In the end it’s all about space and light, form and meaning, passion and ideals. We’re never too old to learn and never too young to know. Not rated. 101 minutes. In French and Italian with subtitles. The Screen, Santa Fe. (Jonathan Richards)
MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Director George Miller returns to the film series that first made him famous, putting Tom Hardy in Mel Gibson’s old driver’s seat as Mad Max, a loner steering a militarized vehicle through the post-apocalyptic Australian outback. This time, Max often rides shotgun to a terrific Charlize Theron, as they try to shuttle a handful of women away from a corrupt warlord. The movie is essentially one long action sequence, crafted with incredible art design, imaginative mayhem, and strong acting. Fury Road is proud of its 1980s B-movie roots and feminist slant, and it is pulled off with a flair that few contemporary blockbusters can match. Rated R. 120 minutes. Screens in 3-D and 2-D at Regal Stadium 14, Santa Fe; Violet Crown, Santa Fe. Screens in 2-D only at Jean Cocteau Cinema, Santa Fe; DreamCatcher, Española. (Robert Ker)
MONKEY KINGDOM The latest documentary from Disneynature follows a young monkey as it grows up and fights for survival in an elaborate simian society in the ancient ruins of Southeast Asia. Tina Fey narrates. Rated G. 81 minutes. Violet Crown, Santa Fe. (Not reviewed)
PAUL BLART: MALL COP 2 The Oscar season begins early this year, as Kevin James once again grows out his mustache and hops aboard a Segway to provide us all with more misadventures. This time, the action spills out of the food court and over to Las Vegas. Rated PG. 94 minutes. Regal Stadium 14, Santa Fe; DreamCatcher, Española. (Not reviewed)
PITCH PERFECT 2 It’s easy to see why the
Pitch Perfect series, about an upstart women’s a cappella group, is so beloved. Not only is the cast strong and the music lively, but it’s a rare film series in which young women pursue their aspirations and careers, not men and romance. Even the character known as Fat Amy (Rebel Wilson), the butt of so many cheap gags, is treated seriously as an object of a man’s affection — and she (initially) turns him down to focus on herself. It’s all quite refreshing. If only the jokes, which are broad, lame, and often rooted in stereotypes, were funnier. Regal Stadium 14; Santa Fe; Violet Crown, Santa Fe; DreamCatcher, Española. (Robert Ker)
THE SALT OF THE EARTH The possibility of a mega-drought in the Southwest makes it relevant that we acquaint ourselves with the work of Sebastião Salgado, a Brazilian photographer who is the subject of this documentary, co-directed by Wim Wenders and Juliano Salgado, the photographer’s son. The elder Salgado began his career as an economist, but he soon realized that the photographs he took with his wife’s camera on trips to Africa gave him more joy than the economic-development reports he wrote. With his wife’s consent, he made a risky, and ultimately satisfying, decision to switch course and attempt a career as a photographer. Rated PG-13. 110 minutes. Violet Crown, Santa Fe. (Priyanka Kumar)
THE SECOND BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL Everyone’s back — most notably Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, and Bill Nighy — for another stay in the hotel for retired Brits in India. This time, Richard Gere brings an American twist to the proceedings, getting a few of the women all atwitter. Rated PG. 122 minutes. Regal DeVargas, Santa Fe. (Not reviewed)
SEYMOUR: AN INTRODUCTION A chance meeting with the remarkable musician Seymour Bernstein inspired actor Ethan Hawke to direct this intimate and beguiling documentary. Bernstein withdrew from a serious career as a concert pianist when he decided that touring did not make him happy, and he devoted himself instead to teaching, contemplating, and loving music. He strews nuggets of wisdom without being self-conscious or pompous about it. Bernstein is the sort of elder sage anyone would benefit from spending time with, and viewers cannot help but derive inspiration from their exposure to this kind, sensitive, compassionate soul. No music lover should miss this opportunity — nor should anyone else. Rated PG. 84 minutes. Center for Contemporary Arts, Santa Fe. ( James M. Keller)
THE WATER DIVINER Russell Crowe directed and stars in this historical drama about an Australian farmer in 1919 who learns that his sons died in the Battle of Gallipoli. After his wife kills herself, he travels to Turkey to bring his sons’ bodies home and learns that one of them may still be alive. Rated R. 111 minutes. Regal DeVargas, Santa Fe. (Not reviewed)
WOMAN IN GOLD Helen Mirren plays Maria Altmann in this art-world thriller, based on true events. More than 50 years after a 1907 portrait of Altmann’s aunt is taken from her husband by the Nazis during World War II, their niece teams with an American lawyer (Ryan Reynolds) to fight the Austrian government for her inheritance. The painting is Gustav Klimt’s iconic Portrait of Adele
Bloch-Bauer I. Rated PG-13. 109 minutes. Regal DeVargas, Santa Fe. (Not reviewed)