NOW IN THEATERS
ANNIHILATION
Filmmaker Alex Garland follows his directorial debut Ex Machina (2014) with another terrific science-fiction story, this time adapting the first book of the popular trilogy by Jeff VanderMeer. Garland eschews the more obtuse approach of VanderMeer’s “unfilmable” prose, yet still creates a rich, thoughtful acid trip of an adventure that meditates on heavy themes of life, personal identity, and the link between destruction and evolution. Oscar Isaac plays Kane, a soldier who enters an environmental disaster zone known as the Shimmer and emerges as the only survivor in his troupe. His wife Lena (Natalie Portman), a biologist, volunteers to join a team of women scientists heading into the area to find out what happened, soon discovering that the DNA of the wildlife has been drastically altered by the incident. Before long, they realize their own DNA is not exempt. Their encounters with the flora and fauna range from beautiful to unsettling to downright disturbing, but like the movie itself, they never lack for imagination. Rated R. 120 minutes. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Robert Ker)
BLACK PANTHER
Marvel Studios continues its run of superhero movies, this time focusing on T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman), aka Black Panther. The real star, however, is not the Black Panther but his homeland of Wakanda, a fictional, futuristic African country that director Ryan Coogler (Creed) and his crew impressively imbues with a level of detail and
world-building typically reserved for movies like Lord of the
Rings. T’Challa returns to this land to rule as king after his father’s death, and soon finds himself battling enemies old (an arms dealer played by Andy Serkis) and new (a usurper to the throne played by Michael B. Jordan), while confronting concerns about Wakanda’s isolationism. It’s bracing to see a diverse, utopian society portrayed on screen, with attention to people who have long been underrepresented in cinema: not only does the cast feature an incredible array of people of color, but the women are powerful and brilliant, led by Letitia Wright as an inventor, and Lupita Nyong’o as a member of a Wakanda all-women special forces unit. Some typical Marvel problems muddy the waters (dodgy CGI and a cluttered climax), but the studio has never made a picture that feels this fresh. Rated PG-13. 134 minutes. Screens in 3-D and 2-D at Regal Stadium 14. Screens in 2-D only at Violet Crown. (Robert Ker)
CALL ME BY YOUR NAME
Nothing happens very fast in this sun-drenched, languorous love story adapted by director Luca Guadagnino and screenwriter James Ivory from André Aciman’s much-acclaimed novel of sexual awakening. Seventeen-year-old Elio (Timothée Chalamet) whiles away his summers in the early 1980s at his parents’ vacation villa in northern Italy, waiting for something important to happen in his life. Then Oliver (Armie Hammer) — a tall, blond Adonis of an American graduate student — arrives to fill a summer internship with Elio’s father, an American classics professor (Michael Stuhlbarg). The young men circle each other warily. When they finally come together, it is the teenager who makes the decisive move. The filming is discreet, but the combustion is intense. Call Me By Your Name has garnered three Oscar nominations: Best Picture, Best Actor (Chalamet), and Best Adapted Screenplay. Rated R. 130 minutes. In English, French, and Italian with subtitles. Center for Contemporary Arts; Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Jonathan Richards)
DARKEST HOUR
Gary Oldman, up for an Academy Award for this role, is extraordinary as Winston Churchill. Wreathed in fat, lumbering through the halls of Parliament or the rooms of his private residence with a cigar lodged firmly in his mouth, the actor disappears, and the legendary British wartime prime minister is all there is to see. Director Joe Wright gives us Britain at her darkest hour, with Adolf Hitler running roughshod over Europe and poised to cross the channel. King George VI (Ben Mendelsohn), with considerable reluctance, invites Churchill to form a cabinet. The movie shows us a man isolated and with the burden of his country’s survival squarely on his shoulders. But despite the stakes, Darkest Hour struggles to get us involved. The movie is also nominated this year for Best Picture. Rated PG-13. 125 minutes. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Jonathan Richards)
DUNKIRK
In 1940, as the German army closed in, more than 300,000 Allied troops were evacuated from the port city of Dunkirk in northern France, aided by commercial and private vessels that sailed from the English coast. Many made repeat trips. Writer-director Christopher Nolan’s telling of this story is wrapped around the captain of one of the small boats (Mark Rylance), a young soldier trying to escape the doomed city (Fionn Whitehead), and a fighter pilot on a mission to protect the ships and soldiers (Tom Hardy). Catastrophically loud and traumatically tense, it’s a precision-crafted descent into the maelstrom of war and a visceral experience. Nominated for eight Academy Awards including Best Picture. 106 minutes. Rated PG-13. Jean Cocteau Cinema; Regal Stadium 14. (Jeff Acker)
EARLY MAN
The latest feature by Aardman Animation and Nick Park (creator of Wallace & Gromit and Shaun the Sheep), takes us all the way back to the waning days of the Stone Age, where Chief Bobnar (voiced by Timothy Spall) leads a tribe of rabbit hunters. When the arrival of a Roman-like army led by Lord Nooth (Tom Hiddleston) kicks the tribe out of their land, it’s up to a young caveman named Dug (Eddie Redmayne) to save the day via soccer matches. Rated PG. 89 minutes. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Not reviewed)
FACES PLACES
French New Wave legend Agnès Varda teams up with the charismatic young French photographer JR to visit a series of out-of-the-way places in the French countryside, taking pictures of the locals, printing them out in mural proportions, and pasting them on the side of barns, houses, and anything else that comes to hand. Some of the mural images they create smack of social commentary, while others simply celebrate the lives of real people who otherwise would sink into oblivion. The humanity and the joy of this movie make it impossible to watch without a smile on your face. There are moments of vulnerability and pathos as well. As a coda to Varda’s life in film, or as the last movie before her next one, this is a gem. Rated PG. 89 minutes. In French with subtitles. Center for Contemporary Arts. (Jonathan Richards)
THE 15:17 TO PARIS
With American Sniper and Sully, director Clint Eastwood has spent much of his eighties telling stories about real-life Americans who emerge triumphant from difficult situations. He continues that streak with this take on the Aug. 21, 2015, terrorist attack on a train from Amsterdam to Paris, which was thwarted by several civilians, including three off-duty American servicemen. The soldiers — Spencer Stone, Anthony Sadler, and Alek Skarlatos — all play themselves in this movie version of the event. Rated PG-13. 94 minutes. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Not reviewed)
GAME NIGHT
In this dark comedy, a group of friends get together regularly for “game night.” One week, they decide to play an elaborate murder-mystery game that gets kicked up a notch when the organizer (Kyle Chandler) is kidnapped. The remaining players assume it’s a game and play along, growing increasingly uncertain as to whether or not an actual murder needs to be solved. As the plot twists pile up, the friends — including those played by Rachel McAdams, Jason Bateman, and Michael C. Hall — attempt to figure out what’s real, what’s play, and who among them can be trusted. Rated R. 100 minutes. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Not reviewed)
JUMANJI: WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE
This sequel to the 1995 Robin Williams-led adventure film Jumanji finds the board game of the original transformed into a video game for modern audiences. Four teenagers stumble upon the game while serving detention, and when they press “start,” they’re sucked into its world. Now finding themselves embodied by the avatars they selected (played by Dwayne Johnson, Kevin Hart, Jack Black, and Karen Gillan), they must find a way to survive the dangers of the jungle and return to their normal lives. Whereas the 1995 film stacked disparate perils and goofy jokes atop each other to whip up a frenzy of cartoonish chaos, this update escorts viewers from one action sequence to the next at a sluggish pace. The cast is lively, charismatic, and ideal for the scenes of bonding and blossoming romances, but these moments are not staged with enough zip to keep up with the actors’ wit. Rated PG-13. 119 minutes. Screens in 2-D only at Regal Stadium 14. (Robert Ker)
LIVES WELL LIVED
Award-winning photographer Sky Bergman undertook this project as an homage to her thenninety-nine-year-old Italian grandmother, who had been an inspiration through her example of a life well lived — filled with family, cooking, and nuggets of wisdom. Bergman then expanded her scope, interviewing dozens of other elderly people. They range in age from the disconcertingly young (seventy-five) to the impressively ancient (over 100). This pleasant movie offers few revealing insights, but a lot of spiritual comfort food. It covers some of the questions you may wish you’d thought to ask your parents and grandparents when you still had the chance. There are family histories, old film footage, survival stories, and a lot of “Live every day to the fullest” and “Age is only a number” observations from a spry gallery of cooking, loving, dancing, painting, exercising elders. Not rated. 71 minutes. The Screen. (Jonathan Richards)
LOVING VINCENT
Vincent van Gogh was a brilliant artist who was also a bit mad. That might apply as well to Dorota Kobiela and Hugh Welchman, the creators of Loving Vincent ,a movie that is being billed as the world’s first fully hand-painted feature. The story follows a letter from Vincent (Robert Gulaczyk) to his brother Theo (Cezary Łukaszewicz), which is discovered by Joseph Roulin (Chris O’Dowd), the postmaster at Arles, two years after the painter’s death. Roulin dispatches his son Armand (Douglas Booth) to deliver it. The story, which raises questions about Vincent’s suicide, is serviceable, but the real appeal of
Loving Vincent is in its extravagant visuals of van Gogh paintings brought to animated life and used as armatures for movie scenes. Nominated for Best Animated Feature Oscar. Rated PG-13. 94 minutes. Center for Contemporary Arts. (Jonathan Richards)
PETER RABBIT
Beatrix Potter’s beloved 1902 literary creation gets a slick Hollywood update — which is to say that the pastoral story of Peter Rabbit’s attempts to steal vegetables from Mr. McGregor’s garden have been replaced by the tale of a sassy CGI rabbit (voiced by James Corden) who stages an all-out war against Mr. McGregor (Domhnall Gleeson) over his treatment of animals and battles him for the affections of the kindly neighborhood gardener Bea (Rose Byrne). Peter’s siblings Flopsy (Margot Robbie), Mopsy (Elizabeth Debicki), and Cotton-Tail (Daisy Ridley) join in on the series of pranks. Rated PG. 93 minutes. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Not reviewed)
PHANTOM THREAD
In Paul Thomas Anderson’s new movie, Reynolds Woodcock (Daniel Day-Lewis) is a couturier in ‘50s London. At a country inn he meets a waitress, a lissome wench named Alma (Vicky Krieps), and before you can say Balenciaga, she has become his mistress, model, and muse. Alma recognizes that she is only the latest in Woodcock’s string of companions, but she is determined to also be the last. He’s an obsessivecompulsive tyrant; but, she discovers, he can be a sweet, cuddly
lad when he’s under the weather. The love potion that she dreams up to keep him close adds the spice of intrigue and suspense to the film’s second half. The three stars are riveting. Day-Lewis in particular commands our attention every moment he’s on screen. The movie has received Oscar nominations that include Best Picture, Actor, and Director. Rated R. 130 minutes. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Jonathan Richards)
THE POST
This is the story of Katharine “Kay” Graham and her reluctant stewardship of her family newspaper,
The Washington Post, following the suicide of her husband, Post publisher Philip Graham. Directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Meryl Streep as Graham and Tom Hanks as
Post editor Ben Bradlee, the movie has two fish to fry. One is feminism. The other is the role of a free press in a democracy.
The Post arrives at a time when both of these issues resonate with a particular force. But it’s the press issue that must have galvanized Spielberg. The script landed on his desk last fall at a time of national shock and trauma, and the prospect of a movie celebrating honest, fearless, fact-based reporting must have seemed a moral mandate. Unfortunately, despite its powerhouse acting, the movie too often moves forward by the numbers. It’s not bad, but it lacks the power to grab you. Academy Award-nominated for Best Picture and Best Actress (Streep). Rated PG-13. 105 minutes. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Jonathan Richards)
THE SHAPE OF WATER
Elisa (a magical Sally Hawkins) is a mute janitor who works the night shift at a government facility where a heavily guarded package is delivered. It’s a tank containing a humanoid amphibian (Doug Jones) that Strickland (a malevolent Michael Shannon), the facility’s head of security, has captured. Elisa finds herself drawn to the creature, and gradually her feelings ripen into a full-fledged attraction. Meanwhile, Strickland decides to cut the creature up for study. This is resisted by one of the facility’s top scientists, Dr. Hoffstetler (a soulful Michael Stuhlbarg), who turns out to have secrets of his own. Del Toro has created a story that moves effortlessly forward through multiple genres, encompassing gothic romance, fairy tale, Cold War spy thriller, and fantasy. The sumptuous visuals are dominated by water themes. The film is up for 13 Oscars, including Best Picture, Actress (Hawkins), Supporting Actor (Richard Jenkins), Supporting Actress (Octavia Spencer), and Director. Rated R. 123 minutes. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Jonathan Richards)
THE SQUARE
Swedish director Ruben Östlund’s latest film features a story that sits back and watches a man and his world destroyed by the irresistible force of events that, once set in motion, he is powerless to halt. The man is Christian (Claes Bang), the lanky, handsome, affable director of a major Stockholm modern art museum. The avalanche that sweeps across his landscape is triggered by two related actions early in the film: his attempt to recover a stolen wallet, and the installation of a piece of conceptual art (the titular square) in the museum’s forecourt. Östlund builds his story slowly, and it can feel loosely packed, but it is seldom without passages that make us vaguely uncomfortable, and when it picks up momentum it hits hard. Nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. Rated R. 142 minutes. English and Swedish with subtitles. Jean Cocteau Cinema. (Jonathan Richards)
THREE BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING, MISSOURI
Filmmaker Martin McDonagh is like a mad chemist, throwing together elements that have no business being in the same pot except to fizz and explode. In this tale of revenge, violence and humor rub shoulders with tragedy and pathos, knit together with the rawest of language and a script that scatters loose ends like birdseed. But it’s a tour de force, riveting from start to finish. Frances McDormand is extraordinary as the embittered Mildred, who hires three derelict billboards along a lonely road in a Burma-Shave-like sequence to protest the police’s inability to solve her daughter’s rape and murder. Woody Harrelson brings a gentle nobility to Chief Willoughby, and Sam Rockwell is a racist deputy with the subtlety of a blunt instrument. The film has been nominated for seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Actress (McDormand), and Supporting Actor (Harrelson and Rockwell). Rated R. 115 minutes. Regal Stadium 14; Violet Crown. (Jonathan Richards)
2018 OSCARNOMINATED ANIMATED SHORT FILMS
This year’s crop of Oscar-nominated animated shorts are all family friendly, aside from a few seconds of jarring footage in the otherwise lovely Garden Party. The best of the bunch is Negative Space, a clever short from France that plumbs depths beyond its six-minute running time. Pixar’s Lou, a story of a lost-and-found box come to life, is bizarre, clever, and among the best of Pixar’s estimable short films. Revolting
Rhymes, based on author Roald Dahl’s offbeat take on fairy tales, doesn’t tread new ground but boasts fine production values and an easygoing tone. Only Dear Basketball, the beautifully hand-drawn ode to Kobe Bryant, feels somewhat trifling, but all five films are winsome. Not rated. 83 minutes. The Screen. (Robert Ker)
2018 OSCARNOMINATED DOCUMENTARY SHORT FILMS
The Academy Award nominees for Best Documentary Short are long enough that they need to be split into separate programs for their annual screening. Program A includes Traffic Stop, about an African American woman’s attempts to recover from a traumatic incident of police violence against her; Heaven Is a
Traffic Jam on the 405 freeway, about a woman struggling from mental illness; and Edith + Eddie, which shows viewers America’s oldest interracial couple (at ages ninety-five and ninety-six). Program B includes Heroin(e), which looks at the opioid crisis in Huntington, West Virginia, and those trying to rescue the community; and Knife Skills, about a restaurateur’s attempts to create America’s top classic French restaurant using only people who were recently released from prison. Not rated. Program A: 102 minutes. Program B: 82 minutes. The Screen. (Not reviewed)
2018 OSCARNOMINATED LIVE ACTION SHORT FILMS
Extraordinary filmmaking abounds in this suite of Oscar-nominated shorts. Watu Wote/All of Us is a gripping tale of a young woman caught in the conflict between Muslims and Christians in Kenya. The empathetic DeKalb Elementary tackles the subjects of school shootings and mental illness.
My Nephew Emmett tells the story of an African-American man in 1950s Mississippi who must shield his nephew, Emmett Till, from local townspeople after he whistles at a white woman. These heavy themes are lightened with The Eleven O’Clock, a clever bit of British comedy in which a psychiatrist treats a patient who thinks he is a psychiatrist treating a patient. The program serves as a good excuse to see some stellar short films while filling out your Oscar scorecard. Not rated. 97 minutes. The Screen. (Robert Ker)