April 2, 2003

film

Film listings are edited by Cheryl Eddy. Reviewers are Robert Avila, Meryl Cohen, David Fear, Dina Gachman, Susan Gerhard, Dennis Harvey, Johnny Ray Huston, Patrick Macias, and Chuck Stephens. See Rep Clock and Movie Clock, for theater information. Opening

Assassination Tango Robert Duvall wrote, directed, produced, and stars in this idiosyncratic homage to the tango. Duvall plays John J. Anderson, a hotheaded but basically good killer-for-hire, just trying to settle down with a nice girlfriend (Kathy Baker) and her 10-year-old daughter (Jenny Katherine Micheaux Miller). He gets sent on a short assignment to kill a general in Buenos Aires, but is stuck there waiting as the military leader is delayed in the countryside. In the meantime, Anderson becomes enthralled by the tango and by gorgeous Manuela (Duvall's real-life girlfriend, Luciana Pedraza), a wry instructor who guides him into the dance's culture. Duvall is great at playing out the shortcomings of age and character while maintaining a likable dignity. The plot meanders a bit, but that is not the point in this film. What lights the way is Duvall's passion for the tango and enthusiasm for improvisational acting. On the whole, Tango is eccentric and lovely, even if it does border on fantasy. (1:53) Lumiere. (Koh)

*By Hook or By Crook See "Partners in Crime," page 36. (1:38) Red Vic.

Chaos The opening flurry of cocktail jazz and impatient movement in Coline Serreau's new French feature tells us all we need to know about the marriage of Helene (Catherine Frot) and Paul (Vincent Lindon). A functioning but meaningless machine, it continues to manufacture the upper-caste image required for his business contacts and social circle, but has long since run out of more affectionate motivations. All that temporarily jerks to a halt when their luxury car almost runs into a scantily clad woman fleeing attackers, who beat her senseless before fleeing an approaching police car. Paul's first impulse is to lock the doors. He then speeds away, mops blood off the windshield, and proceeds to a dinner party as though nothing had happened. Helene can't shake the incident so easily, however. She tracks the young woman to a local hospital, spending whole days, then weeks there as Algerian émigré Malika (Rachida Brakni) slowly wakes from a coma and regains her faculties. What starts out as incisive if amusingly barbed clash of cultures and classes turns into something more frivolous -- albeit quite entertaining -- as the revived Malika enlists Helene in an elaborate plot to avenge herself against the family who'd misused her and the organized criminals who'd done far worse. She also orchestrates come-uppance to the husband and bratty grown son who've taken Helene for granted all these years. The caper flick Chaos turns into grows so improbable (requiring Helene to demonstrate near-superhero-like resources) and so rotely quasi-feminist you might expect "Sisters Are Doin' It For Themselves" to underscore the final credits. But as caper flicks go, it's a clever, guilt-free pleasure. (1:49) Act I and II. (Harvey)

Cowboy Bebop The popular anime series from which Cowboy Bebop the movie sprang is a thoroughly modern and aggressively cool collision of film noir, cyberpunk, and about half a million other influences (Bob Dylan, Don Siegel, etc). The big-screen version offers more of the same plus a new dizzying attention to detail, and a whole lot of prescient millennial dread. The year is 2071 and Mars looks like a combination of Casablanca and upper Manhattan. Quite naturally, some bearded lunatic wants to destroy it with rush-hour car bombings and elaborate bioterror plots (that the film was originally released in Japan in September 2001 is an eerie coincidence). A gargantuan bounty reward on the culprit attracts lanky, semi-heroic cash-seeker Spike Spiegel and his motley crew of "Cowboys," who move in on the lone terrorist only to find a labyrinth of government conspiracies and military experiments. Under the hand of director and series creator Shinichiro Watanabe, the ambitious Bebop is fantastic when it sticks to a breezy tone punctuated by bursts of action. Things get more slippery when it strays into extended spiritual and existential musings, which dominate the overlong final act. Either way, sci-fi anime (usually the most escapist of genres) has seldom been this closely tied to current events intentionally or otherwise. (1:55) Shattuck. (Macias)

Dysfunktional Family Comedian and actor (Undercover Brother, Malcolm and Eddie) Eddie Griffin's slickly packaged concert film finds him back on the scene of his original crimes – none all that bad, it seems, but duly treated at the time as execution-worthy by his very tough-loving mom. He credits her with steering him (and thrashing him, and smacking him, and almost hit-and-running him) away from various Kansas City, Mo., paths of sin and ruination, ultimately toward wealth and success. And she is still proud of him (if not so much of such routines as "Pussy Eatin' 101"); as are Uncle Curtis, who's always happy to share the amateur porn tapes, and another uncle who prefers spending his leisure hours on heroin and has been in and out of the pen for decades. These real-life folk are so gregarious, frank, funny, and relaxed on-camera that they frequently lift Dysfunktional Family into a sphere of divine "reality" comedy." Most of the time, however, we're stuck on Earth with Griffin's actual stand-up stuff. I liked his making public the undeniable visual link between latter-day Michael Jackson and Helena Bonham Carter's Planet of the Apes character, and his impressions of Bill Cosby, Richard Pryor, and Sammy Davis Jr. are pretty good. But otherwise, his routine is all "white folks do this, black folks do that" and the division of women into (a) Mom, or (b) pussy. Griffin is talented, but he needs better material – maybe his relatives should start writing some. (1:24) California, Century Plaza, Century 20, Jack London. (Harvey)

A Man Apart A vengeful DEA agent (Vin Diesel) teams up with a crime boss to hunt down his wife's killer. (2:00) Century Plaza, Century 20, Jack London, Shattuck.

Nowhere in Africa Fleeing Germany on the eve of Hitler's rise to power, an upper-class Jewish woman (Juliane Köhler) and her five-year-old daughter relocate to Africa. Helping her husband manage a farm in Kenya, she bristles at her new surroundings while the girl must adjust to the confinement of English boarding school rules. But thanks to a kindly cook (Sidede Onyulo) and their new environment's "primitive" charms, the family slowly falls in love with their adopted homeland. The inexplicable winner of this year's Best Foreign Film Oscar, director Caroline Link's melodramatic travelogue seems constructed from spare parts of typical nondomestic favorites: a pinch of historical tragedy made personal here, a dash of inner-journey cliché there, a hefty amount of semipatronizing attitudes toward the "other" (when, really, we're all the same underneath!). It's a familiar enough safari through foreign film-lite landscapes perfect for the toothless section of Blockbuster Video's import shelf, though anyone expecting anything past pretty scenery will find themselves heading nowhere fast. (2:18) Castro. (Fear)

Phone Booth See Movie Clock. (1:21) Century Plaza, Century 20, Grand Lake, Jack London, Oaks, Orinda.

Unprecedented: The 2000 Presidential Election Watch this searing doc about the voting "irregularities" that plagued Florida polls during the 2000 presidential race, and prepare to be even more depressed the next time you see George W. smirking from his presidential perch. Familiar elements – the confusing butterfly ballot, the plague of the "hanging chad" during the recounts – are revisited, but even scarier than Florida secretary of state Katherine Harris's dragon-lady visage are the hard facts underreported by the mainstream media, especially a Republican-driven plot to purge voter rolls of citizens (mostly African American Democrats) incorrectly identified as convicted felons. Filmmakers Richard Ray Perez and Joan Sekler are clearly anti-Bush, but even Al Gore's camp gets taken to task here; after seeing Unprecedented, you'll be hard-pressed to think of elections or our so-called democracy with any amount of optimism. (1:00) Red Vic. (Eddy)

What a Girl Wants A spunky American teenager (Amanda Bynes) travels to London to spend time with her long-absent politician father (Colin Firth). (1:44) Century Plaza, Century 20, Grand Lake, Jack London.

Ongoing

About Schmidt (2:04) Four Star, 1000 Van Ness.

Adaptation (1:52) Four Star, 1000 Van Ness.

Agent Cody Banks (1:42) Century Plaza, Century 20.

Amandla! A Revolution in Four-Part Harmony (1:43) Four Star, Rafael, Shattuck.

Basic A take-no-prisoners Army Ranger commander (Samuel L. "Bad Motherfucker" Jackson) stages an impromptu jungle exercise for six of his soldiers. Only two return alive, with wildly conflicting stories as to what happened. It's up to a brash Army lieutenant (Connie Nielsen) and a wild-card former Ranger (John Travolta) to find out what really happened, but can anyone be trusted? Still licking his wounds from that ill-advised Rollerball remake, director John McTiernan commandeers this ego-driven Hollywood star vehicle into the predictable territory of Military Thriller 101; even the 11th-hour plot twists and land mines of surreality (you've got to admire any film that stops its narrative to break for an inexplicable tango-choreographed fight/love scene) feel bland and safe. Much has been made of the Pulp Fiction twins' reunion, but anyone expecting the dynamic duo's chemistry redux will simply have to settle for Rashomon-lite asides and the sense that some actors may need a break from both their shtick and the spotlight. (1:35) California, Century Plaza, Century 20, Jack London, Kabuki, Metreon, 1000 Van Ness. (Fear)

Bend It like Beckham With a witty screenplay, feel-good story, and kick-ass soundtrack, Gurinder Chadha's Bend It like Beckham (named, by the way, for the soccer star who's also known as Mr. Posh Spice) has already broken box-office records in the U.K. and arrives in the United States with a worldwide $50 million gross already under its belt. Jess, Beckham's protagonist, is a reluctant challenger who's driven by her passion for soccer to deviate from the expectations of her old-world family. Beckham pointedly punctures English, Indian, and immigrant foibles despite a few jokes that are broad enough to hit the side of a barn. But its pseudo-lesbian subplot is unlikely to ruffle viewers of any lifestyle. More satisfyingly, the film's climactic wedding scene erupts into high drama with mistaken-identity mischief delicious enough to ensure it won't be mistaken for Monsoon Wedding. (1:42) Shattuck. (B. Ruby Rich)

Boat Trip Where's a mammoth iceberg when you need one? Boat Trip is spectacular in its badness. The antics begin when an irate travel agent books the straight Cuba Gooding Jr. and Horatio Sanz on – horror of horrors! – a gay cruise, stranding them aboard a floating stereotype of whips, thongs, and penis-shaped ice sculptures. Good thing there's a hot female dance instructor (Roselyn Sanchez) for Gooding to romance – though he has to play gay because she's fed up with men. Meanwhile, Sanz gets busy chasing tail when the cruise ship rescues the Swedish National Suntanning Team. Both guys manage to make complete asses of themselves in this "gaynormous" mess (Sanz's word) of tasteless humor. Worse, violins actually swell whenever the filmmakers sprinkle a tolerance message among the cheap jokes. Boat Trip's saving grace is that it's the most ridicule-worthy film I've seen in a long while. (1:35) Century 20, Kabuki, Metreon, 1000 Van Ness. (Koh)

*Bowling for Columbine (1:59) California, Piedmont.

Bringing Down the House (1:45) Century Plaza, Century 20, Jack London, Kabuki, Metreon, 1000 Van Ness, Orinda.

*Chicago (1:47) Century 20, Empire, Galaxy, Grand Lake, Jack London, Metreon, Presidio.

*City of God (2:10) Four Star, Opera Plaza.

The Core The main thing The Core has going for it, besides the Aaron Eckhart eye candy, is the fact that it has a somewhat original premise: instead of a threat from outer space, the human race is forced to deal with the consequences when a top-secret government weapon (an earthquake-making device dubbed "Project Destiny") causes the planet's core to stop rotating. Magnetic fields are horribly disrupted, causing atmospheric nightmares that see pacemakers and pigeons go haywire and Rome reduced to rubble in an electrical superstorm. Naturally, a ragtag team of scientists and astronauts (in addition to Eckhart, the surprisingly strong cast includes Hilary Swank, Delroy Lindo, Bruce Greenwood, and Stanley Tucci) is assembled to pilot a makeshift subterranean transport and "jump-start the core" with nukes. From there, familiarity abounds – beady-eyed military villains, corny dialogue, obvious plot foreshadowing – and The Core easily falls short of gelling into the kind of cheesy goodness that so served the likes of Armageddon and Independence Day. (2:15) Century Plaza, Century 20, Jack London, Kabuki, Metreon, 1000 Van Ness. (Eddy)

*Divine Intervention Palestinian director Elia Suleiman's Divine Intervention is neither documentary nor docudrama, nor even a Costa-Gavras-style feature designed to prompt international action. Rather, shooting in Nazareth and on the road to Jerusalem with a largely Israeli crew and an irreverent eye, Suleiman translates his riven, battle-weary homeland into a comic parable full of slapstick provocation. Consider the opening: Santa Claus gets mugged. A spoof on local violence? A gloss on racial intolerance? A salvo in an ongoing argument about symbolism versus action? It's a bracing opening for a film that fuses humor with inchoate rage but only much later deploys fantasy violence to make a political point, albeit a surreal one. Distilling tragedy from tedium, Divine Intervention invites the viewer into a meditation on the absurdity of daily existence in today's Middle East, as seen from the perspective of Palestinians relentlessly occupied with occupation. Could anything be braver or more taboo at this moment than humor? It is a brave filmmaker who can set aside the easy posture of outrage to mine conundrums and contemplate deeper truths. It is a truly exceptional one who can do all of that without compromising the history that lies at the heart of the self. (1:29) Rafael, Shattuck. (Rich)

Dreamcatcher The mind of Stephen King hath wrought some wonderful movies. Dreamcatcher is not one of them. As directed by Lawrence Kasdan from an inconsistent script by Kasdan and William Goldman, this tale of four friends facing an alien menace in snowy isolation mixes recycled King motifs (including elements of Stand by Me, It, and The Shining) into an increasingly incomprehensible story, the obvious product of a zillion-page book being winnowed down into two hours of cinema. The only scene worth noting is Jason Lee's blood-and-guts battle with a "shit weasel" from outer space – unless you're looking to yuk it up, in which case, stay tuned for the Morgan Freeman master class in villainous overacting. (2:16) Century 20, Metreon, 1000 Van Ness, Shattuck. (Eddy)

Frida (1:58) Balboa.

Gangs of New York (2:57) Galaxy.

Gaza Strip American director James Longley's crucial Gaza Strip is a must-see. Ariel Sharon's election in January 2001 led to an eruption of violence that persuaded Longley, who originally intended to stay in the area for two weeks, to film for the next three months. The film's focus is children, especially a group of newspaper boys whose numbers dwindle and whose profound sense of despair (so jarringly out of place in 10- and 12-years-olds) leads some to wish out loud for death and a chance at paradise instead of a world of grief and increasing degradation. (1:14) Roxie. (Avila)

He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not (1:42) Four Star.

Head of State First-time director Chris Rock stars as Mays Gilliam, a D.C. Alderman who becomes the first African American major-party presidential candidate just weeks before the election (the scheme behind this, which includes a plan to have an unknowing Gilliam lose on purpose, proves hardly important). At first, Gilliam follows the orders of his tightly wound campaign advisors (Dylan Baker, Lynn Whitfield), but he's soon convinced by his brother/running mate (Bernie Mac, underused but spot-on as always) to unleash his true personality, which includes for-the-people speeches delivered stand-up style ("How many of you have two jobs so you can afford to be broke?") Rock is less polished a director than a performer, but when he's on, there's nobody funnier, as this largely enjoyable comedy proves. (1:35) Century Plaza, Century 20, Jack London, Kabuki, Metreon, 1000 Van Ness. (Eddy)

The Hours (1:54) 1000 Van Ness, Shattuck.

The Hunted (1:34) Kabuki, Metreon, 1000 Van Ness.

Laurel Canyon (1:43) Albany, Empire, Piedmont.

The Lion King IMAX (1:29) Metreon IMAX.

The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2:59) Metreon.

Old School (1:30) Kabuki, Metreon, 1000 Van Ness.

The Pianist (2:28) Albany, Grand Lake, Piedmont.

Piglet's Big Movie The latest Disneyfication of A.A. Milne's classic stories has all the sweetness of the characters with none of the whimsical spice. This time, after failing to appreciate their little pal's heroism, Pooh and friends search for the missing Piglet by using his book of memories. It's a plot familiar to anyone who's seen a television flashback show, with the same results: if you love the cast, you'll enjoy the show, but you'll spend much of the hour and a half wishing you were watching the original episodes, or wishing they'd thought up a fresh story. (1:15) Grand Lake, Oaks, 1000 Van Ness. (Jean Field)

The Quiet American (1:52) Piedmont, Shattuck.

Rabbit Proof Fence (1:34) Balboa, Rafael, Red Vic, Shattuck.

Russian Ark (1:48) Balboa, Rafael.

Sandstorm A potter in rural India (Nandita Das) organizing a women's rights group is gang raped as a "warning." She then finds that her search for justice only proves India's male-centric society runs rotten to the core. Basing Sandstorm on a true story, director Jag "Jagmohan" Mundhra courts controversy from the outset. While the film certainly aims high by setting its crosshairs on the rampant sexism, caste-ism and corruption in India's social landscape, its central motif of gender-specific struggling is undone by Mundhra's broad, kitchen-sink approach to directing. Everything from sly satire to courtroom drama to gaslight theater caricatures is paraded out in lieu of a consistent narrative style, while elemental thematic factors, such as the westernized Anglo-Indian journalist covering the persecuted woman's story, go unexplored in favor of melodramatics. As an exposé of the country's medieval treatment of women, Sandstorm seems stilted and stillborn; should India ever start up its own Lifetime channel, however, it will have at least one film perfect for programming. (2:00) Galaxy, Oaks. (Fear)

Shanghai Ghetto (1:35) Balboa.

Spirited Away (2:04) Galaxy, Grand Lake, Kabuki, Metreon, Shattuck.

Spun Following the doings of a loosely connected gang of SoCal drug addicts, Spun accurately approximates a crystal meth high by being hilarious, grotesque, and annoying in equal parts. Swedish director Jonas Åkerlund has a wicked fascination with the low end of American life (the kind in which trailers figure prominently), and he lays out the environs and inner worlds of his speed freaks with every music-video edit and visual gimmick in the armory. Meanwhile, a not entirely convincing air of "slumming it" hovers around Jason Schwartzman, Brittany Murphy, and Mena Suvari as they toot, jabber, and interact with an odd collection of cameo players (including Deborah Harry, China Chow, and Rob Halford). John Leguizamo's bug-eyed hyperactive shtick gets by on sheer volume alone, but it is Mickey Rourke's quietly monstrous performance as the cook that holds Hurricane Spun together – at least until the third act, which trades in intense black humor and grimy close-ups for overreaching dramatics that reduce something wild to nothing more than another Just Say No piece. (1:36) Act I and II. (Macias)

Talk to Her (1:52) Shattuck.

Tears of the Sun (2:01) Century 20, Metreon, 1000 Van Ness.

25th Hour (2:26) 1000 Van Ness.

View from the Top Gwyneth Paltrow has won an Oscar. Mike Myers is a prolific and inventive comedic genius. Mark Ruffalo stunned audiences and critics alike with his award-winning performance in 2000's You Can Count on Me. The fact that all three of these accomplished actors star in View from the Top proves conclusively that sometimes the whole is worth significantly less than the sum of its parts. Even the supporting cast, which includes big names like Kelly Preston and Rob Lowe, brings a broad and long résumé to the table. So what went wrong? Screenwriter Eric Wald probably had the right idea when he wrote a spoof about the surreal world of flight attendant training programs, complete with beauty classes and mock airplane cabins. But somewhere along the way this filmmaking team forgot they were joking. Instead of a parody they made a formulaic romantic comedy, and a bad one at that. (1:27) Century 20, Metreon, 1000 Van Ness. (Cohen)

Rep picks

'Beyond Black and White: Films on the Black Panthers' See "Loaded Images", page 33. PFA Theater.

'The Films of Frederick Wiseman' Judging from the way the "stars" of Frederick Wiseman's epic documentaries (he prefers the more apt term reality fictions) continually seem to damn themselves with their own words, actions, and inactions, it would be easy to think the person operating that shuttered apparatus had simply set it up and let the reels run. Lacking music, voice-overs, and linear narratives, Wiseman's films don't resemble typically subjective cinematic journalism so much as undiluted transmissions from a fly on the wall. He merely provides the information in pieces, trusting viewers to complete the finished big-picture puzzle. Though PBS intermittently airs his three-hour-plus films, screenings are rarer than comet sightings, and none of his work is widely available on video. Thus, the Pacific Film Archive's partial retrospective of Wiseman's oeuvre is a dream come true. Seventeen of his films are scheduled, including his infamous mental hospital exposé Titicut Follies (1967), the devastating critique of crushed individuality known as High School (1968), and the devolutionary science friction of Primate (1974). Long praised but scarcely seen, his work has garnered a reputation for being the best that "direct cinema" has to offer. PFA Theater. (Fear)