Film listings are edited by Cheryl Eddy. Reviewers are Robert Avila, Kimberly Chun, David Fear, Dina Gachman, Susan Gerhard, Dennis Harvey, Johnny Ray Huston, Laurie Koh, Patrick Macias, and Chuck Stephens. The film intern is Melissa McCartney. See Rep Clock and Movie Clock for theater information.

Opening

*The Code After a prison stint, Dris (Samuel Le Bihan) is determined to stay clean – hoping to raise a family with straight-arrow wife Lise (Marie Guillard), humbly working at the loading dock of a fruit-and-vegetable market, etc. But Yanis (Samy Naceri), his former partner in crime in a Parisian Arab-French syndicate, isn't willing to let Dris go quite so easily. He dangles tempting elements of the old high life – mostly notably Nina (Clotilde Couau), the somewhat over-the-top Gypsy sexpot who, when aroused, announces, "Hurry, or I'll burst into flames." Meanwhile, a turf war heats up between hotheaded Yanis's gang and a larger rival one; Dris gets dragged into the middle, particularly after his dumb, reckless younger brother blunders there first. There's nothing very original about this crime drama, whose basic setup strongly recalls Kiss of Death. Even the possessive, faintly homoerotic vibe between "jilted" buddy Yanis (who at one point says, "We're married, pal," while forever protesting he's "not a faggot") and hero Dris has been done before. Still, Manuel Boursinhac's film is engrossing, well acted, and nicely detailed, a Gallic genre piece in the Melville tradition. (1:56) Opera Plaza. (Harvey)

Dawn of the Dead George Romero's classic tale of a shopping mall overrun with zombies is "re-envisioned" with a cast that includes Sarah Polley, Ving Rhames, and Mekhi Phifer. (1:40) Century Plaza, Century 20, Jack London.

*Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind See "'Animal' Instinct." (1:48) California, Century Plaza, Century 20, Empire, Piedmont.

*Love Object Creepy loner Kenneth (Desmond Harrington) toils in a cubicle farm writing instructional user manuals. He doesn't socialize with his coworkers or his neighbors, least of all his nosy landlord next door (Udo Kier, patron saint of creepy loners everywhere). Kenneth's seemingly firm grip on reality begins to crumble when his boss (Rip Torn) entrusts him with a hugely important new assignment – and a comely assistant, Lisa (Melissa Sagemiller), to help him complete it. After a rocky start, the pair hit it off: she loves vintage clothes, zines, and waltzing; he loves ... Nikki, the $10,000 sex doll he's bankrupted himself to acquire. Nikki is so realistically rendered that it almost makes sense when she starts to get jealous of Lisa. Almost. Like any good thriller, torture and mayhem dominate the film's second half, but Robert Parigi's Love Object burrows deeper than the standard slash-'em-up. It's an unsettling piece of work, sharing a thing or two about the dangers of isolation, and of folding too far into one's fantasy world – as well as some sly asides about office politics and bungling police work. (1:24) Act I and II, Opera Plaza. (Eddy)

The Reckoning See Movie Clock. (1:40) Lumiere, Shattuck.

Stupidity This snarky Canadian documentary purports to be a history and analysis of the titular quality that has perhaps influenced the course of humanity more than any other. There are some interesting educational tidbits (the origin for the dunce cap and word moron, etc.), but mostly what we've got here are rote potshots at reality TV, dumbed-down news coverage, George W., and other de-evolutionary signs o' the times. Writer-director Albert Nerenberg treats his subject less as a thesis than as a catchall into which everything from lying politicians, police violence, and interviewed people-on-the-street saying "Um" can be dumped. He decries the short-attention-span pandering of modern media culture, yet Stupidity itself is a perfect example of that approach. It's also padded out with irrelevant footage from Nerenberg's Trailervision Internet trailers for fake Hollywood movies (e.g., Rave Cops, Harry Potter, Hidden Dragon), which kinda blows the whole "documentary" conceit. A few among the 136 Trailervision titles to date will be screened before this thinly amusing, short feature. (1:10) Roxie. (Harvey)

Taking Lives Angelina Jolie stars as an unconventional FBI profiler on the trail of (what else?) a serial killer. (1:40) Century Plaza, Century 20, Four Star, Jack London, Oaks.

*The Tracker An excellent antidote to the upcoming whitewashed Australian history lesson Ned Kelly, this harsh, primal drama is based on an actual manhunt that occurred in 1922. The aboriginal tracker (David Gulpilil from Walkabout and Rabbit-Proof Fence) leads three lawmen on the flight trail of a white woman's purported murderer. The party includes the racist, by-the-book leader (Gary Sweet), who views all bush natives as "cannibals, very treacherous," and whose taste for violence verges on the psychotic; the baby-faced greenhorn of the group (Damon Gameau), soon to be badly disillusioned; and the grizzled veteran (Grant Page) who'd just as soon turn tail and pretend they'd executed justice without actually finding the fugitive. Their tracker shucks and jives, parroting wisdoms like "The only innocent black is a dead black," while in fact keeping the party strategically just far enough behind that their quarry might yet escape. When this hidden agenda is sussed out, a already grim situation gets much worse. Reminiscent of early '70s revisionist westerns, with its zoom lensing, gorgeous landscapes, and protest song-cycle soundtrack (by Graham Tardif), The Tracker balances lyricism and horror with terse, imaginative confidence. It's perhaps the best film yet from Rolf de Heer, the underrated Dutch-born director of such prior Aussie cult films as Bad Boy Bubby and Encounter at Raven's Gate. (1:38) Smith Rafael. (Harvey)

Ongoing

Agent Cody Banks 2: Destination London A deranged CIA agent flees to London with a secret mind-control device – so, naturally, U.S. intelligence sends a 16-year-old trainee to get it back. MGM may be milking a dry cow with yet another spy movie for youngsters, but rocket-launching flashlights, exploding Mentos, and souped-up English cabs will help this one be a hit with the preteen crowd. Hey, Spy Kids got two sequels; not giving one to Cody Banks would just be unfair. Teen star Frankie Muniz flashes his signature facial expressions (panic-stricken, utterly bewildered, etc.) and does his best as Agent Banks, who has to stop his own CIA trainer from implanting "mental-dental transmitting thingies" into the world's leaders. Obviously, a believable plot is not first on the agenda for adolescent action flicks, but there are plenty of chase scenes and crude humor (farting will always be funny) to keep the audience happy. Anthony Anderson (Kangaroo Jack) provides most of the comic relief as Cody's bumbling sidekick, although several effeminate British men say a lot of silly things as well. (1:40) Century Plaza, Century 20, Jack London, Kabuki, 1000 Van Ness. (Kim)

Balseros "Freedom has a price," a Cuban emigrant tells his partner, and he means the phrase literally. After attempting a dangerous trip across the ocean from Cuba to South Florida in a rickety raft during the "balseros crisis" of 1994, then being picked up by the U.S. Coast Guard and taken to Guantanamo Bay, then eventually being escorted to the United States, he's now buying what he considers "freedom": a car. This Academy Award-nominated nonfiction film follows seven refugees from the Cuban coast to the American heartland, keeping in touch with them as well as with the families they left behind, exhaustively documenting hope, heartbreak, and the sad fallacy of American "dreaming." (2:00) Roxie, Smith Rafael. (Gerhard)

Barbershop 2: Back in Business Calvin's barbershop is back, and once again this cornerstone of the neighborhood is in trouble. What made the original Barbershop so unique was its quirky and loving look at urban culture as seen through the eyes of a group of coworkers and friends. Calvin (Ice Cube) and his crew of comedic employees (Eve and Cedric the Entertainer most notably) ripped on each other while arguing about politics and love, and it was magic. In the sequel the focus is still on the community, but it's hard to say if Barbershop 2 goes too far – or holds too much back. Often the characters fall short of regaining the banter and relationships that worked so well before. The film guarantees a ton of laughs, but in developing tighter story lines and working with a bigger budget, something got lost. Barbershop 2 lives up, but it hardly surpasses. (1:40) 1000 Van Ness. (Melissa McCartney)

*The Battle of Algiers Not many movies can boast a continual presence on many greatest-film-ever lists and the dubious "privilege" of being name-dropped by Pentagon officials as a tool for understanding terrorism some 39 years after its release, but Gillo Pontecorvo's masterpiece is not your typical Saturday afternoon matinee. It's truly revolutionary in every sense of the word, from the you-are-there newsreel aesthetic (it's hard to register that you're watching a work of fiction even after several viewings) to its cast of real-life Algerian Liberation Front members dramatizing their guerrilla struggle against French colonialists. History won't be weighing in on any current imperialistic parallels viewers might recognize in Pontecorvo's ticking agitprop time bomb for several generations, but if there's a lesson to be drawn from this classic, it's that the fight for hearts and minds by any other name still comes with a price: the humanity of both oppressors and resistance alike. (2:03) Smith Rafael. (Fear)

*City of God City of God is a Rio de Janeiro housing project, but rather than simply present it as a setting, director Fernando Meirelles views it as a character – perhaps the dominant one – in the film. In one vivid segment a single fixed point of view witnesses the deterioration of an apartment as it's passed down from one drug dealer to another. The stronger and younger the kingpin, the trashier his kingdom. But static points of view aren't Meirelles's specialty. Working with codirector Kátia Lund, he's stylistically giddy in the face of much adolescent and preadolescent violence, running circles around the surface linearity of the plot's chapter structure and uncorking an array of techniques: God's-eye aerial shots that suggest the almighty has a finger on the fast-forward button, freeze-frame character intros that revive blaxploitation swank, and camera movements that follow the paths of ricocheting bullets or circle around the violence with the speed of a meth-addled figure skater. (2:10) Four Star, Shattuck. (Huston)

*Cold Mountain A more reliable literary adapter than Merchant Ivory (at least of late), Anthony Minghella, director of The English Patient and The Talented Mr. Ripley, brings admirable cinematic sweep, intelligence, and detail to Charles Frazier's hugely popular historical novel. Jude Law is astutely cast as Inman, the young laborer turned Confederate soldier who makes a long, dangerous trek back to his rural North Carolina town during the waning days of the Civil War. Egging him onward through various hardships and bounty-hunter perils is the promise of a reunion with Ada (Nicole Kidman), pampered, Charleston-bred daughter of a minister (Donald Sutherland) whose premature death leaves her alone and helpless amid wartime deprivation. The original, tentative romance between principals is flash-backed between scenes from their variously harrowing present: traveling on foot, he's nearly killed several times over; she almost starves to death before spunky hillbilly Ruby (Renée Zellwegger, dynamic if borderline cartoonish) shows up to commandeer cultivation of the late minister's neglected farmland. Starting with a memorably horrific depiction of the era's savage yet impersonal warfare (dramatizing the July 1864 siege of Petersburg, Va.), Cold Mountain is never less than engaging, with passages by turns lyrical, ironic, brutal, and tender. Still, it's not quite as moving as one would like – and actually becomes least so when Ada and Inman are finally reunited in the last act. (2:35) 1000 Van Ness. (Harvey)

Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen Big-city hip meets suburban drab in this syrupy teen flick, and never before has Disney's shamelessness looked so fashionable. The drama begins when Lola (Lindsay Lohan) moves from the shiny Big Apple to a lamentably uncool suburb in New Jersey, where even an up-to-the-minute wardrobe can't help her fit in at her new high school. She still manages to land the lead in the school play, but finds a formidable rival in Carla Santini (Megan Fox), the neighborhood's popular, all-purpose bitch. Lola's only hope is to meet her favorite rock star, Stu Wolff (Adam Garcia) – "the greatest poet since Shakespeare" – and pray that her classmates believe he's her buddy. Stuffed with maudlin subplots and one-liners ("May choirs of rock stars sing you to sleep"), the film's only saving grace is its moral message: you have to know someone famous to be popular. But assailing this ridiculous movie is like scolding a mercurial teen – entirely apt, but what's the point? (1:30) Century 20. (Kim)

The Cooler William H. Macy is a sadder-sack Bogart, and Maria Bello an updated Gloria Grahame, in this slick indie gloss on retro-Hollywood "B" conventions. He's a former gambler so pathetically ill-starred that he's employed as a "cooler" at a fading-out Vegas casino – a man whose luck is so bad he can be counted on to end winning streaks simply by passing the tables. She's a much younger cocktail waitress with (what else?) a "past." When they fall in love, love redeems them – and their luck, which unfortunately earns the wrath of a casino boss (Alec Baldwin) who can't endure such status quo shifts in the face of his own imminent corporate-management phaseout. The acting is very good, of course – how could Macy disappoint in yet another "lovable loser" role? – and director and coscenarist (with Frank Hannah) Wayne Kramer's story is crafty and flavorful enough in an MGM-circa-1955 way. But even then the story wasn't very fresh or especially interesting, save as a showcase for actors who deserved better. Which they still do. The final reel springs some decent surprises, yet the scent of reheated genre formula is still the strongest smell to emerge from The Cooler. (1:41) Galaxy. (Harvey)

*Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights It's 1958, the eve of the Cuban revolution, and teenager Katey Miller (Romola Garai) finds herself suddenly uprooted to Havana and living at the elite Hotel Oceana. Enter young Javier (Diego Luna), add some Latin rhythms Katey never learned back home, and the rest is, well, history, sort of. Those looking for a movie in which the climactic moments of the Cuban revolution aren't back-burnered in favor of true romance and dance fever should keep walking. Those looking to have the time of their lives may also be disappointed because come on, it's not the original Dirty Dancing, and it never will be (plus, the cameo awarded to Patrick Swayze is a little creepy). However, Havana Nights has plenty of hot, sweaty, dry-humping dance action, and Katey and Javier manage to demonstrate some moments of actual chemistry. (1:26) Century 20, 1000 Van Ness. (Rapoport)

The Dreamers Romantic, atmospheric, nostalgic, offhandedly stunning, and extremely silly, the first minutes of The Dreamers are a not-quite-straight dose of Bernardo Bertolucci. His unmatched directorial flair for shadows that dart from the corner of the screen functions as a flirty counterpoint to the severe blocks of black in Samuel Fuller's Shock Corridor, watched by a rapt crowd at Henri Langlois's famed Cinémathèque Française. The audience includes American in Paris Matthew (Michael Pitt), who is about to meet cute twins Theo (Louis Garrel) and Isabelle (Eva Green). It's extraordinary that Bertolucci – the masterful stylist whose filmic flesh caresses famously sent Pauline Kael reeling – hasn't indulged a movie-length ménage à trois so thoroughly before. The Dreamers' turning point occurs when conservative Matthew faints after a shake-it-like-a-Polaroid-picture moment of exposure. Reawakened, he finally enters the twins' childish playland only to discover a sheltered, decaying realm he only half comprehends. The resulting psychological and political insights verge on trite. (2:01) California. (Huston)

Eurotrip It's no Road Trip, but for most of its running time this Continental knockoff from the former's producers is pretty funny. Scotty (Scott Mechlowicz) is mortified – on high school graduation day – to discover that not only is his girlfriend dumping him, but that she's also done half the class of '04 behind his back. He subsequently decides, with best friend Cooper (Jacob Pitts), to join twins Jenny (Michelle Trachtenberg) and Jamie (Travis Wester) on a summer trip to Europe, with Scotty's as-yet-unmet German Internet pen pal (Jessica Boehrs) the ultimate goal. The first stop is London, thronged with soccer hooligans (led by actual soccer "hard man" Vinnie Jones); then Paris, to prove that beating up on mimes can still be très amusing; Amsterdam, where attractions include ex-Xena Lucy Lawless as a dominatrix; and so forth, until Rome, where inspiration suddenly lapses amid tasteless but tepid Vatican gags. Still, a good three-quarters of Eurotrip is hilarious in a low-brow yet likable, non-mean-spirited way. (Even the myriad gay jokes land on the right side of silly.) Showing up briefly are Joanna Lumley, Fred Armisen, Rade Serbedzija, and Matt Damon, the latter mysteriously easy to overlook (though he's very conspicuously placed) thanks to a shaved head and a few tattoos. (1:32) 1000 Van Ness. (Harvey)

50 First Dates Adam Sandler should thank his lucky stars for Drew Barrymore. After a string of loser films (Little Nicky, Mr. Deeds, Anger Management) he's finally back on top with Barrymore by his side. The duo don't quite recapture the magic of The Wedding Singer, but thanks to Barrymore's quirky charm and endless charisma, they manage a hilarious romantic comedy, which, oddly enough, isn't a chick flick. While the ludicrous premise is a bit hard to swallow – Barrymore's character loses her memory every night – Sandler makes it work and thankfully doesn't push the gross-out humor too far. The supporting characters, played by Lord of the Rings' Sean Astin and Sandler fave Rob Schneider, steal most scenes they appear in. Sandler is at his best when matched with Barrymore and would do well to remember that. (1:36) Century Plaza, Century 20, Kabuki, 1000 Van Ness. (McCartney)

*The Fog of War Faced with the unspeakable, say, the killing of 100,000 civilians in one night of firebombing in Japan, an artist could be excused for choosing not to speak. You certainly can't blame Errol Morris for offering up Philip Glass's assertive soundtrack as a fig leaf for Robert McNamara as he stands naked in a survey of a half century of horrific war footage he had some part in creating. Morris's primary challenge in The Fog of War, a documentary about the frightening fallibility, the terrible inevitability of the American war machine, is that he doesn't just have images of chemical warfare, missiles dropping, nations destroyed. He also has a speaker, a practiced one, to explain and reflect and second-guess – to, in essence, misdirect. Which may be why Morris gives this former secretary of defense under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson so much room to speak, even when he's evading; it's Glass who gives us the real interpretation. Glass's take comes through loud and clear in wind and strings: be afraid, be very afraid. (1:46) Act I and II, Orinda. (Gerhard)

Girl with a Pearl Earring Lost in Translation It girl Scarlett Johansson plays another passive protagonist in Peter Webber's debut film, an accomplished yet oddly distanced translation of Tracy Chevalier's acclaimed novel. She's forced to work as a servant in the household of master painter Johannes Vermeer (Colin Firth) when her own family's fortunes take a downturn in 1665 Delft, Holland. Uneducated yet naturally inquisitive, she gains the attention of the master as model and apprentice – both roles scandalous for a lower-class girl of the era. Girl with a Pearl Earring is nothing if not artful: domestic strife, moral hypocrisy, and class consciousness are neatly interwoven with an artistic inspiration that would eventually loom large in art history. It's handsomely done in aesthetic terms, polished in performance terms. Yet for all its intelligence and skill, Girl just kinda sits there, emotionally, and becomes more schematic than moving. (1:39) Balboa, Kabuki, Shattuck. (Harvey)

*Good Bye, Lenin! A huge hit at home in Germany and throughout Europe, Wolfgang Becker's dramedy cocktail is mixed with such crowd-pleasing astuteness you might almost feel guilty – there's nothing very art house going on here past the subtitles. Resistance is futile, however: Good Bye, Lenin! is easily the most satisfying release of the year so far. Fiercely dedicated East German Christiane (Katrin Sass) collapses into a coma after she witnesses the impossible: hordes openly defying the state, marching in the streets for the right to "take walks without a wall getting in the way," as son Alex (Daniel Bruehl) puts it. When she wakes months later, history's course has drastically shifted. But since the doctor urges that her weak heart be protected from any excitement, Alex is determined to hide this news at any cost. Thus the family flat becomes a tenuously sealed bubble of prereunification life – but reality keeps finding new cracks to leak through. Good Bye, Lenin! transcends a gimmicky premise to make the central charade's construction and teardown work on several levels. The ingenious script might be accused of emotional string-pulling – that is, if its characters didn't seem so full-bodied or the cumulative effect weren't so unexpectedly poignant. (1:58) Albany, Empire. (Harvey)

*Greendale You can't credit the new musical by Bernard Shakey (a.k.a. Neil Young) with being exactly modern – it looks like it was shot with the camera equivalent of a horse-drawn carriage – but it is kinda radical in a way or three. Visualizing the titular CD song cycle, it tells a loosely woven tale of small-town tragedy, a world gone mad, and individuals who ain't gonna take it anymore. Greendale is an idyllic burg (if it looks familiar, you've been to Half Moon Bay) being dragged kicking and screaming from bedrock porch-jawin' Thornton Wilder traditionalism into a craptastic post-9/11 tomorrow. Symptoms abound, like the local gallery dumping hand-painted psychedelia for installation electronica. Worse, good old boy Jed (Eric Johnson) shoots a good old cop under the influence of blow; before you can say, "what in tarnation?," an (improbable) feeding frenzy of glib media types descends on the town as a result. Meanwhile Grandpa (Ben Keith) feels the pain of things generally going to shit, while granddaughter Sun (Sarah White) protests the same. The politics here aren't especially sophisticated, but Young's cranky-liberal sensibility, part Garrison Keillor and part twirly-dancing hippie pot grower, is as whole-grain as it comes. (1:23) Act I and II. (Harvey)

*Hidalgo Dogs may have a lock on being man's best friend in the animal world, but never underestimate the bond between a gentleman and his horse. Especially if that man is Frank Hopkins (Lord of the Rings' Viggo Mortensen), the stallion is his titular mustang steed, and the two are racing across the Bedouin desert against a mare prized by a powerful shiek (the majestic Omar Sharif). This being a Disney film, the expectation for horsey cutesyness isn't unfounded, but director Joe Johnston (The Rocketeer) and company instantly dispel any international velvetine notions by opting for a boys'-adventure-tale gallop rather than a Black Beauty pony-show trot. The former Spielberg-Lucas employee's knack for pacing and ability to highlight a small detail – the chapped lips of a rider, the movement of an old Edison Vitagraph – without fetishizing it fuels the film with both kinetic movement and subtle depth, and Mortensen's naturally range-rugged charisma gives what should have been a B movie lark a surprising amount of Saturday-matinee horsepower. (2:13) Century Plaza, Century 20, Grand Lake, Jack London, Kabuki, Oaks, 1000 Van Ness, Orinda. (Fear)

House of Sand and Fog Kathy Nicolo (Jennifer Connelly) is a recovering addict whose husband left a few months ago and who ekes out a living cleaning other people's houses. She's depressed. Hence she's not very quick to catch a serious bureaucratic error: nonpayment of an (erroneously charged) business tax ends up getting her evicted from her own home, which has been put up for public auction. The house is sold to Massoud Amir Behrani (Ben Kingsley), a former colonel in the Iranian air force who sees it as the lucky fiscal break he's desperately sought since fleeing his native country. As mutual obstinacy, legal snafus, and some very poor tactical decisions heat up resentment on both sides, Kathy and Massoud head toward a tragic showdown. Commercial director Vadim Perelman's debut feature shaves and/or downplays some of the more extreme melodrama in Andre Dubus III's original literary potboiler. But House takes itself awfully seriously, to diminishing results – the last reel goes over the top, with Sir Ben chewing scenery beyond duty's call. (2:06) Orinda. (Harvey)

In America It's tough to put a magical sheen on living in a drug-addled tenement, but writer and director Jim Sheridan (In the Name of the Father) gives it a shot with In America, a modern Irish immigration story based on his own experience. Attempting to escape the memory of their lost son, Johnny (Paddy Considine) and Sarah (Samantha Morton) move to New York City with their two young girls. Dirt poor but determined, wannabe actor Johnny struggles almost inhumanely to make his family's life bearable, but he can't connect to them given his refusal to grieve. Sisters Sarah and Emma Bolger give amazingly natural performances as the daughters who take the ghetto in stride, expressing genuine delight at the flock of pigeons hogging their new digs. Still, Sheridan's gritty New York is too tangible for the ethereal touch to work beyond the eyes of the sisters, and the film's reliance on cosmic intervention at key moments actually injects predictability into an otherwise engaging story. (1:43) Balboa, Shattuck. (Koh)

Kitchen Stories Forging a path on the post-World World II road to maximum peace-front efficiency, Sweden's Home Research Institute is conducting studies in domestic habit – the better to streamline every manse into a well-oiled engine for meal production and added quality leisure time. Having already "done" the average housewife, the HRI's new focus is the single male. One group of "observers" is dispatched to rural Norway. Pen and clipboard dutifully in hand, perched owl-like atop what appears to be a giant baby's ceiling-scraping high chair, Folke (Tomas Norström) must spend hours each day recording the scullery movements of Isak (Joachim Calmeyer) in his frigid farmhouse. Gradually, the two middle-age men breach officialdom's prescribed barriers, finding they enjoy one another's company very much. No, Kitchen Stories isn't a coming-out tale. Rather, this third feature from Bent Hamer is another writ-small portrait of gently funny, well-observed, moderately eccentric humanity whose charm creeps up on you slowly but surely. (1:35) Smith Rafael. (Harvey)

*The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King The quest to deliver "The Greatest Fantasy Trilogy Ever Made" has been completed. The hype is right. The Return of the King is the best of the three, but only in part. And it all depends on which part you're talking about. In the first act, we're still mucking about with various monarchs, noble families, and peasants as the film unfolds. Our main characters, hobbits Frodo (Elijah Wood) and Sam (Sean Astin), are still on their dangerous trek to the volcanic Mount Doom. Gandalf (Ian McKellan) and plucky halfling Pippin (Billy Boyd) have arrived at the kingdom of Gondor – ground zero for the long-awaited War of the Ring – where the tone of Return becomes quiet and hushed. Heroically, director Peter Jackson decides to slow down and take a breath himself. From here on out, Jackson assumes a total mastery of the material, and even the deviations from Tolkien's text start to look like improvements. The long, arduous journey to the credits may not have been perfect, and perilously few of those character subplots ever pay out, but for a hearty share of its 3-hour-and-18-minute running time, there can be no doubt that King rules. (3:21) Century 20, 1000 Van Ness. (Macias)

Lost in Translation Halfway through Lost in Translation, it's clear director Sofia Coppola misplaced something other than language somewhere in the air between LAX and Narita. She obviously lost the plot (what glassine, paper-thin bits of it existed, by all accounts) and decided instead to just leave the camera running on her assembled beautiful or amusing characters-slash-objets – a preppily lush Scarlett Johansson, the sleek playground of Tokyo's Park Hyatt, and a resigned Bill Murray – hoping they'd provide the in-flight impromptu entertainment. Maybe in a perfectly art-directed world, they would suffice to fill the pretty vacant spaces of this barely outlined tale. But that's assuming we're as easily amused by Lost in Translation's 105 minutes of good-looking images and vacuous chitchat as we are by sound bites about celebrity cribs. That's assuming we've never glimpsed the sci-fi Tokyo skyline, tried our hand at karaoke, or followed Murray as he navigated a real, meaty part. Instead, Coppola succumbs to the same mistake made by pop stars who get lazy, believe their own hype, and decide everyone can relate to songs about their distorted experiences. (1:45) 1000 Van Ness. (Chun)

*MC5: A True Testimonial Like New York City's Velvet Underground, Detroit's MC5 were a late '60s-early '70s rock outfit that enjoyed a fervent regional fan base, if not much larger commercial success. Their muscular sound – closer to garage and "heavy" music than then-fashionable psychedelia – won critical praise, while their revolutionary politics attracted less welcome attention from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. After the breakup, however, they acquired legendary status among the next generation's punks and indie rockers. David C. Thomas's in-depth chronicle MC5: A True Testimonial draws on extensive archival materials to etch an absorbing portrait of a singular counterculture mini-phenom. He tosses in everything from race-riot news footage and vintage TV studio and concert performances (which bear out the band's rep for being much better live than on LP) to interviews with bemused ex-wives. Like The Cockettes and The Weather Underground, this is the rare acid-flashback memento that really makes the era's volatile and exhilarating complexity come alive again. (1:59) Roxie. (Harvey)

Miracle Miracle dramatizes the story of the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team's victory over the previously unbeatable USSR ice jockeys; any modest pleasures derived from the stock underdog true story come from recognizing the familiar signposts along its well-worn path – the Ditka-esque coach (Kurt Russell) whose methods are eccentric but effective, the tortuous training montages, the kids who need to prove they've got what it takes, the inspirational speeches, and finally the against-the-odds climactic game that plays like tryouts for Valhalla. Director Gavin O'Connor (Tumbleweeds) has a knack for capturing the era's Northeastern blue-collar landscape, giving the story a concrete sense of place and time. But the movie's insistence on treating the event as if it were myth ludicrously pushes the proceedings into the stratosphere, starting with the sucking-in-the-'70s credit sequence and building toward the idea that this match was the only salve for a beleaguered nation. (2:25) Kabuki. (Fear)

*Monsieur Ibrahim If you only see one cinéaste's dream of Paris in the '60s this year – well, Monsieur Ibrahim doesn't have the fake sex, but in all other respects it's a whole lot better than The Dreamers. Monsieur Ibrahim is a coming-of-age nostalgia flick no edgier than that phrase implies. But its sweetness is genuine, and the showcased performances are very, very good. His mother having died, Momo (Pierre Boulanger) is stuck playing underappreciated housekeeper to a sullen father (Gilbert Melki). But the poor, working girl-dominated environs that depress dad are catnip to Momo's flaring adolescent nostrils. By the time pop has fled in general shame and self-loathing, our young Jewish protagonist has already lost his virginity, earned points toward a respectable first girlfriend, and landed a much better substitute father figure in M. Ibrahim, aka "the Arab" (Omar Sharif), who runs the dusty corner market. Slowly expanding from chamber dramedy as their relationship gradually deepens, François Dupeyron's feature turns into a road movie as soulful as it is picturesque. I could have done without the final turn to melodramatic tragedy, but that's a minor quibble. Sharif's performance suggests he's been waiting a lifetime for this role, which awakens something beautiful behind those famously liquid eyes. (1:35) Albany, Empire. (Harvey)

*Monster As de-glamming makeovers go, Charlize Theron's dumpification in this dramatization of the late Aileen Wuornos's 1989-90 serial killing spree sure kicks the bejesus out of Nicole Kidman's Oscar-winning nose cap last year. You can believe it when characters here identify her as indigent and/or crazy by just a glance. Without going into much tortured-childhood backgrounding (a few discreet, disturbing flashbacks under the opening credits suffice), this first feature by writer-director Patty Jenkins effectively conveys the accumulated psychological and physical damage that perhaps inevitably turned Wuornos into a menace. The film charts a span when her life got both better and a whole lot worse: A committed if awkward relationship with a younger woman (Christina Ricci, just so-so) gets her off the streets, determined to improve her circumstances. Without means, education, or any (legal) work experience, however, that goal proves near impossible. And once she crosses a line – killing a brutal roadside-pickup prostitution client in self-defense – financial desperation, suppressed rage, and a faint grip on reality push her to cross it again and again. While the murders are handled bluntly enough, Monster is more depressing than scary or lurid. Its principal aim is as a cautionary character study: used or abandoned by family, institutional help and society in general, Wuornos embodied how extreme human need can warp into "monstrous" toxicity. A worthy movie, driven by a very strong lead performance. (1:51) Shattuck. (Harvey)

*My Architect Told from the vantage of a son who barely got to know his famous father before his death, bankrupt and unidentified in a men's room at New York City's Penn Station, newcomer Nathaniel Kahn's My Architect is a kind of exploded view of a family melodrama. Kahn, we learn, was Louis's third child, the son of the mysterious architect's second mistress, and officially unacknowledged by Louis's wife at his father's funeral. But what comes into focus over the course of the film isn't just the elder Kahn's unconventional sense of domestic relations but also his equally self-centered devotion to the aesthetic ideals of his work (at the expense of commissions and wealth). Nathaniel's filmmaking doesn't begin to pretend to equal the mastery of Louis's architecture, and indeed there are some fabulously irritating aspects to My Architect. But there's no denying the respect and maturity Kahn the younger displays in the way he photographs his father's buildings: he really gets what it means to stand at some crucial vantage point in one of those astonishing creations, watching light murmur through those mysterious angles and cut-ins. (1:46) Smith Rafael. (Stephens)

Mystic River After a poorly executed prologue – and before the plot goes to hell in the last reel – this adaptation of Dennis Lehane's novel plays ideally to Clint Eastwood's strengths as a levelheaded, respectful director of both talented actors and meat-and-potatoes drama. A childhood incident in which 11-year-old Dave was kidnapped by pedophiles before the eyes of playmates Jimmy and Sean still hangs over their adult lives. All remained in their original rough, Boston neighborhood, though the three have maintained an awkward distance from each other ever since. That ends when the daughter of corner store owner Jimmy (Sean Penn) is murdered after a night of barhopping – a night when Dave (Tim Robbins) comes home at 3 a.m. to wife Celeste (Marcia Gay Harden) bloodied by what he claims at first is an altercation with a mugger. Guess who's the homicide detective assigned to the case? Sean (Kevin Bacon), of course, alongside his partner, Whitey (Laurence Fishburne). Underplaying the material's potentially clichéd tough-guy milieu and pulp-thriller aspects, Eastwood and scenarist Brian Helgeland orchestrate an engrossing drama. Just the kind of starry, serious, conventional project sure to be remembered at awards time, Mystic River is nonetheless seriously compromised – in my book at least – by a last act that throws away the credible resolution we've been led toward, instead springing a left-field one wildly dependent on coincidence and contrivance. (2:20) Balboa, Century 20, Piedmont, Shattuck. (Harvey)

NASCAR 3D: The Imax Experience Spectacular car crashes and position jockeying at 200 mph outta be perfect fodder for the pie-in-face immediacy of 3-D Imax. Yet somehow this routine short feature about "America's most popular spectator sport" mysteriously fails to offer much vicarious, visceral excitement. It's also a blandly politic, corporate promo-style look at an inherently trashy sport, with no room for the colorful star drivers or fans to fly their freak flags. There are scattered behind-the-scenes points of interest, and the 3-D technology is the best (i.e., least headache-inducing) I've ever seen, even if it's not used very vividly. But as coproduced by the NASCAR organization itself, this "experience" is as stolidly patriotic, wart free, and unrevealing as an Army recruitment reel. Similarly, it is best appreciated by those who would like to join up, and/or are males between the ages of 7 and 14. (:48) Metreon IMAX. (Harvey)

*Osama Writer-director Siddiq Barmak's Osama describes the strategies and consequences of a world turned upside down, of a life continually perverted into its opposite. The first Afghan feature film since the rise and fall of the Taliban centers on a 12-year-old Afghan girl (an affecting Marina Golbahari) who lives with her mother and grandmother in Kabul during the reign of the Taliban (1996-2001). Her male relatives were lost earlier to the war with the Soviets and the subsequent civil war, and with her mother unemployed (the hospital she worked at was closed down by the Taliban), the family faces starvation. Mother and grandmother take the desperate step of cutting the girl's hair and dressing her as a boy. In a nearly constant state of fear, the girl shoulders the responsibility of finding work and bringing home food. In the facial expressions and body language of his excellent amateur cast, Barmak, who fled Kabul two weeks after the Taliban invasion, captures the physiognomy of a war-shattered people, physically and mentally exhausted yet necessarily alert. A few of Barmak's directorial choices are heavy-handed, but the film compels the viewer with its aesthetically rich lingering on the details of life, a style obviously influenced by, among other things, Iran's decidedly humanist cinema. (1:22) Shattuck. (Avila)

The Passion of the Christ Mel Gibson has attained the top it's lonely at, where one can only lie down on stinging nettles of depression and paranoia. By his account, making The Passion of the Christ was a cleansing experience – more, it pulled him back from confessed suicidal urges. The clearest (secular) way to view this movie is as an act of penance. But just as Gibson's heroes recently have become humorless champions of family values against barbarian invasion – e.g., Signs, The Patriot, Vietnam apologia We Were Soldiers – so the directorial effort Passion uses sadism to express masochism. It stages the ultimate story of "faith, hope, and love" (Gibson's words) as unending slaughter. If you thought Braveheart almost lunatic in its brutality, welcome to the ninth circle of this mortal coil's hellfire. The rare mainstream film rated R solely for violence, it's not about the higher good but rather the lower bad. Choosing to portray only Jesus's last 12 mortal hours, Gibson has über-mall-flicked the Greatest Story Ever Told: there's nothing left now but jolting climax after climax, the Savior's body here profaned as Los Angeles freeways in yet another Lethal Weapon. (2:07) California, Century Plaza, Century 20, Galaxy, Grand Lake, Jack London, Kabuki, Orinda. (Harvey)

Red Trousers: The Life of the Hong Kong Stuntmen This oddity is partly a documentary about the lives of Hong Kong stuntmen; it's also part generic B-grade fantasy-action flick. But mostly it feels like a feature cobbled together out of spare parts to salvage footage from an abandoned prior project. That latter would be Lost Time, in which first-time director Robin Shou (Mortal Kombat) stars as one of the last "Forest Devils," assassins commissioned to destroy evildoers and restore the "path of righteousness" in a vaguely near-future world. These segments are fun in a hokey way; the behind-scenes explications of how the stunts are done are interesting enough. Barely related to either element are interviews with various old-school Hong Kong stunt personnel – most notably Sammo Hung and Lar Kar Leung, both of whom rose from that profession to acting-directing superstardom – plus visits to extant acrobatic training schools like the Shanghai Opera Institute. There are also clips from Chinese action movies of the last four decades, unfortunately none identified until the final credits. A hodgepodge whose various watchable elements never really cohere, Red Trousers is worth a look for H.K. cinema fans on a rainy afternoon. Make that a slow, very rainy afternoon. (1:33) Galaxy. (Harvey)

Secret Window Holed up in a rural cabin, best-selling author Mort Rainey (Johnny Depp) suffers from writer's block. He also suffers from a painful split from his two-timing wife (Maria Bello). He tends to both afflictions by taking extended couch naps and limiting his diet to Doritos and Mountain Dew. This depressing existence takes an outstanding turn for the worse when a sinister stranger (John Turturro) knocks on the door, drawlin' about how Mort's gone and ripped off one of his stories. And he wants some amends made, or else. Mort freaks out – then starts crackin' up. Working from an adaptation of a Stephen King novella, writer-director David Koepp (Stir of Echoes) does what he can to keep tension running high in what's really a fairly predictable story; the main event here is Depp, who elevates the so-so material with yet another inventive, eccentric performance. (1:45) Century Plaza, Century 20, Four Star, Jack London, Kabuki, 1000 Van Ness, Shattuck. (Eddy)

*Spartan Protagonists do not come boiled harder than Robert Scott (Val Kilmer), a no-nonsense commando brought in to deal with a crisis: the president's daughter has gone missing and must be retrieved before the press catches the scent of scandal. This being terrain trod on by writer-director-bard of machismo David Mamet (Heist), however, Scott has to maneuver through triple-crosses and terse dialogue exchanges to unravel what may be one executively engineered con. All this would be typical political thriller hooey were it not for the filmmaker's trademark use of repetitive, contraction-less language – every line comes delivered like a verbal right angle, spoken tight as a trip wire – and his fascination with how the machinations of power can feign and parry as dangerously with words as they can with actions. The third act counteracts any earlier suspension of disbelief with some outrageous turns, but Mamet's tight rein on the material makes the cinematic cubic zirconium plot shine like one tattered tough-guy diamond. (1:58) Century 20, Piedmont, Shattuck. (Fear)

Starsky and Hutch Every superficial thing about this high-concept Cheetoh is so right that I still can't believe the result ended up so profoundly ... feh. Ben Stiller as a pissy little Starsky and Owen Wilson as swinger's-lounge-edition Hutch are well cast. There's also nothing wrong with Snoop Dogg as Huggy Bear (though his Acapulco Gold vibe pales beside original player Antonio Fargas's angel-dust one), or Vince Vaughn reprising his Old School tantrum act as a coke-kingpin villain. David Soul, Paul Michael Glaser, and blaxploitation icon Fred Williamson are on board for good luck. The Me Decade hairdos, threads, wheels, interior decors, and hideous hits (shine on, Barry Manilow!) are perfect. The throwaway gags are funny. But wait – shouldn't there be non-throwaway gags? Hilarious climaxes? Why does the script feel less like a parody of a mediocre second-season episode than the real thing, elongated and slightly camped up? Another step down from the heights of Road Trip for director and coscenarist Todd Phillips, Starsky and Hutch isn't overblown and overbearing à la Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle. Instead, it's amiable and underwhelming, a clock-punchin' B flick on an A budget. One good thing this movie needed more of (and more things like): Juliette Lewis as Vaughn's deliciously dumb mistress. (1:37) Century Plaza, Century 20, Grand Lake, Jack London, Kabuki, 1000 Van Ness. (Harvey)

The Station Agent Along with Pieces of April, this was part of Patricia Clarkson's one-two punch at the Sundance Film Festival; actually, Clarkson was in four films there, but the other two weren't award winners. In The Station Agent she plays a divorcée grieving her son's death, and the movie's strongest scenes involve her cold-shoulder response when people misguidedly reach out to offer comfort. Tom McCarthy's film is choreographed so that a triad of misfits – two loners (Clarkson and Peter Dinklage) and one extrovert (Bobby Cannavale) – meet up on the train tracks of small-town life, only to break apart again. Dinklage's dwarf protagonist alternately faces and escapes a patronizing world, but it's his rejection by Clarkson's character that truly stings. If all this sounds depressing, rest assured The Station Agent doesn't forget to add moments of hope and whimsy; they just aren't as interesting as its dark side. (1:28) Balboa. (Huston)

Touching the Void Mountaineering documentaries generally suffer from the fact that you aren't there, while dramatized ones are either physically unconvincing or have jaw-dropping stunts but wooden characters. Hitherto a notable nonfiction director (One Day in September), Kevin Macdonald chose to realize this adaptation of Joe Simpson's classic 1988 bum-adventure memoir as a mix of documentary and reenactment, which brings its own problems but overall works pretty well. Simpson and his hiking partner Simon Yates alternate telling the tale in talking-head style while two actors (Brendan Mackey and Nicholas Aaron) register varying degrees of panic, exhaustion, and horror high in the Alps (standing in for the Andes). Touching the Void defines the subgenre of "armchair near death-experience travel;" the story is an incredible triumph over impossible odds. But as a viewer who actually enjoys grueling, steep hikes but draws the line when falling equals death, I couldn't help thinking, "These dumb suckers were sooooooo lucky!" from the opening titles to the final credit crawl. (1:46) Piedmont, Shattuck, Smith Rafael. (Harvey)

*The Triplets of Belleville Perhaps the first major animated export from France since René Laloux's sci-fi epics Fantastic Planet (1973) and Light Years (1988), comic book artist Sylvain Chomet's feature debut is a uniquely vinegary comedy that's like a grown-up 101 Dalmatians. A champion Tour de France bicyclist is kidnapped by bad guys and taken to America for ill purposes. His abduction spurs cross-Atlantic pursuit by grandmother Mme Souza and their corpulent, waddling dog Bruno. Their principal helpers are the titular trio, 1930s music-hall stars since fallen into decrepit eccentricity. Dialogue-free Triplets is funny, inventive, and endlessly referential. The only minus is an overpoweringly dour comic tilt that may strike some viewers as a tad too dyspeptic and cranky for full enjoyment. Like Ralph Bakshi's cartoon features of yore – albeit in a much less racy vein – Triplets is dazzling at times yet so misanthropic you might leave the theater feeling a tad soiled. (1:20) Shattuck. (Harvey)

*21 Grams 21 Grams is a good movie hobbled most by its certainty of greatness; its entire construction, nonstop emotional urgency, and near complete lack of humor signal as much throughout. It's better than most "prestige" efforts – certainly the concurrent Sean Penn vehicle Mystic River, which similarly orchestrates several personal tragedies into contrived sentimental-existential narrative symphonies – due to the makers having one foot in art-house cred and another in starry Hollywood uplift. Amores perros director Alejandro González Iñárritu and scenarist Guillermo Arriaga should be congratulated for making a film that was first conceived for Mexico City seem not at all awkward in the English-language U.S. milieu; what's more, there's a grittiness of tenor and texture that's brave for a commercial film. 21 Grams is so frequently so good on a scene-by-scene basis that one wishes only it hadn't gotten some very big ideas. It's bleak, inventive, and heartfelt to degrees that feel right until they don't. (2:18) Shattuck. (Harvey)

Twisted Is there another Philip Kaufman making movies out there? Seriously, does the Director's Guild list another filmmaker working under that name, because I'm not sure the man who's built a career on cine-erotic literary luncheons and pleasurably pulpy snacks is responsible for this ramshackle thriller. The temptation to blame some look-alike Body Snatcher pod for this genre jalopy about a homicide detective (Ashley Judd) with a penchant for rough trade, blackouts, and a sudden slew of serially murdered lovers is overwhelming, though not even a genuine auteur could have made silken purses out of the sow's ear script or convinced Judd not to fall back on a phoned-in tough cookie-victim performance. Bay Area viewers can at least pass the time between rote red herrings and tattered "twists" by picking out favorite local haunts (hey, that's Tosca! And there's Red's Java House!), but the real mystery here is how one truly genuine talent could have produced something so generically god-awful. (1:37) Century 20, Kabuki, 1000 Van Ness. (Fear)

Rep Picks**

Absolute Time Film Festival If you've ever wanted to see a movie about a Romanian taxidermist who falls for a discontented lap dancer, then you're in luck. Director Bruno Coppola's "Stuff That Bear!" is one of many works featured in this week's second annual Absolute Time Film Festival, which celebrates films written, directed, or produced by women and people of color. Twelve low-budget shorts and features, ranging from documentaries to animated folk tales, have been selected from various countries to fill the three-day program. Notable works on the bill are Chel White's "Eclipse," a personal collage film that pays cinematic tribute to Stan Brakhage and other avant-gardists of yesteryear, and Helen Lee's "Sophie," which addresses alcoholism and domestic violence problems in a Korean-American family. Artists Television Access. (Kim)

*'Another Hole in the Head: 7 Nights of Unrelenting Terror' See Critic's Choice. Kabuki.

*'The Case for Pavel Jurácek' A neglected figure in the Czech New Wave, Pavel Jurácek was nonetheless key to that amazing cinematic era's achievements as both scenarist and director. Unlike some better-remembered talents (Milos Forman, Ivan Passer, etc.), he didn't emigrate. Instead, he stuck around after the Soviet invasion to be censored, fired, and blamed for frittering away state money on decadent art – two final decades of thwarted creativity that, alas, ended with his death just months before glasnost began its thaw. This PFA retrospective reveals a boldly imaginative yet human-scaled sensibility in projects of all types. After making an acclaimed Kafka-inspired short ("Josef Kilián: A Character Needing Support"), his first feature, 1965's Every Young Man, is a tenderly absurd comedy of Army life that's like a less cruel M*A*S*H. Two of his produced screenplays were intelligent science fiction: Jindrich Polák's 1963 Ikarie XB-1 is a tale of travel to Alpha Centauri in the 25th century, the contrast between cool, claustrophobic techno-environ and fraying human emotions anticipating both 2001 and Solaris. Jan Schmidt's 1967 The End of August in the Hotel Ozone offers a postapocalyptic wasteland whose sole survivors are nomadic hunter women – not fantasy Amazon babes but the nearly feral results of civilization's collapse. Jurácek also penned the script for famed animator Karel Zeman's medieval satire The Jester's Tale. His magnum opus as writer-director was 1970's A Case for the Young Hangman, a very free contemporary update of Gulliver's Travels that brings all Jurácek's strengths – a flair for the surreal, striking visual confidence, distrust toward authority and mob rule, artfully juggled wit and despair – into their most ambitious showcase. It was, of course, loathed by the new regime. Jurácek was very much the tortured artist (even before the Soviet crackdown), and his life is beautifully portrayed in next-generation Czech auteur Martin Sulík's hour-long The Key to Determining Dwarfs, or The Last Travel of Lemuel Gulliver, which mixes excerpts from his extensive journals, archival footage, and staged sequences (in which he's played by his surviving son) to very touching effect. PFA Theater. (Harvey)