Continuing

Goldie Hawn loses her job at the Whiskey a-Go-Go and, finding herself unable to work the street as she once did, decides to head to L.A. to ask one-time best friend and fellow groupie Susan Sarandon for a little stopgap cash. When her car breaks down, she hitches a ride with twitchy, neurotic writer Geoffrey Rush, whom she quickly beds in her expert manner, transforming him suddenly into a happy, generous soul. She has a similar experience with Sarandon, whose currently uptight beige family life (with stiff lawyer husband Robin Thomas and rebellious daughters Erika Christensen and Eva Amurri) needs serious retooling. How heartening to see that a haircut, followed by a night of drinking, dancing and perusing collected photos of rock-stars’ cocks, brings on such miraculous self-recovery! Put another way: as everyone knows, it’s perennially difficult for women over 40 to get much action in Hollywood, and seeing the enormously vibrant and courageous Sarandon and Hawn reduced to these schematic roles only underlines the problem.--C.F. (Ritz 16)

As The Girl in Barbershop, Philadelphia’s own E-V-E shows again that she plays very well with boys. In her first extended film role (that is, more than the few lines she had in XXX), she holds her own on screen with some very charismatic actors, including Ice Cube, Sean Patrick Thomas, Cedric the Entertainer, Anthony Anderson, Michael Ealy and Keith David. The film, directed by Tim Story, has the sort of charm and easy pacing of one of Cube’s Friday films -- the characters, most of whom work in Cube’s Chicago barbershop, share experiences and jokes (with Cedric, unsurprisingly, generating most laughs). The plot is basic, though more strained than it needs to be, with Cube selling the shop (in his family for over 40 years) to gangster David in the morning, then endeavoring to reverse the decision over the rest of the day, and Anderson and his partner Lahmard Tate wrestling, quite literally, with an ATM they’ve stolen, transporting it from place to place in hopes of getting access to its hidden riches. Cube comes to realize the importance of the shop as community gathering place. And everyone learns a useful lesson.--C.F. (AMC Andorra; AMC Orleans; Cinemagic; Roxy; UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Main St.; UA Riverview)

The shock of the Stanford Prison Experiment was its demonstration that “ordinary” human beings, given the power and left to their own devices, would discover fascism on their own. Oliver Hirschbiegel’s fictionalized account, set in modern Germany, builds backwards from that conclusion, so you always know what’s coming. Tarek (Run Lola Run’s Moritz Bleibtreu) is a reporter who goes undercover within a scientific experiment whose parameters are devilishly simple: break a group of men in half, assign half of them to be prisoners and half to be guards, and watch what happens. Since the results are foreordained, the drama has to come from character, but the film gives us so little insight into who these people were before the experiment that they never seem like more than puppets, pawns in a grad-school thesis. Though it mercifully holds off invoking the Holocaust until near the end, Das Experiment’s not-so-sub-text couldn’t be clearer: the Germans are just waiting to turn back into fascists at the first opportunity. Of course, given Germany’s steadfast opposition to a U.S. invasion of Iraq, you have to wonder that says about us. --Sam Adams (Ritz at the Bourse)

Though Shekhar Kapur’s tale of bloodshed in the Sudan is front-loaded with former colonial subjects -- Kapur is Indian, while stars Heath Ledger, Kate Hudson and Wes Bentley hail from Australia and the U.S. -- it’s a surprisingly non-revisionist take on British imperialism. Beginning, almost literally, on the playing fields of Eton, the film focuses on issues of character rather than politics -- Ledger quits the military as his regiment is about to ship out to Khartoum, then follows on his own to make up for his cowardice. As in his Elizabeth, Kapur is too enamored of royal splendor to mount a serious critique. Though Ledger has a (conveniently English-speaking) native (Amistad’s Djimon Hounsou), the ending still comes down to who fares best against the “Mohommadan fanatics.” It’s a little late for Lawrence of Arabia II, don’t you think? --S.A. (Ritz 16)

Burr Steers’ first feature is populated by extremely quirky characters, most related by blood. Bad mom Susan Sarandon dies in the first scene, attended by her sons, harried Igby (Kieran Culkin) and supercilious Oliver (Ryan Phillippe). Flashbacks recount how they’ve come to this moment, part liberation, part horror show. Participants in this disaster include increasingly incapacitated dad Bill Pullman, wealthy godfather Jeff Goldblum and Igby’s inadvertent girlfriend Claire Danes, who really wants to be sensible but can’t help but be sucked into the eccentric vortex. Though it’s structured as a series of clever dialogue exchanges, striking compositions (shot by Wedigo von Schultzendorff), and dire, occasionally violent vignettes, Igby Goes Down doesn’t feel remote, strangely. --C.F. (Bala; Ritz 16; Ritz Five)

Werner Herzog’s Invincible is a tidier, quieter film than you’d expect from the dedicated chronicler of monomaniacs and delusional obsessives. It also features perhaps his first wholly good character: Zishe Breitbart (Jouko Ahola), a Jewish strongman from a Polish shtetl who travels to Weimar Berlin to seek his destiny. There, he’s employed by one Erik Jan Hanussen (Tim Roth), an occultist and fakir who stages vaudeville spectacles for Nazi higher-ups, all in the hopes of being Hitler’s Minister of the Occult. (Both characters are based on real people.) With his grandiose dreams and flexible ethics, Hanussen is a more familiar Herzog character, but what’s surprising about Invincible is how doggedly it sticks by Zishe’s side, as he’s initially transformed, via a cheap blond wig, into “Siegfried, the Iron King,” the better to please his Aryan audience. His eventual change of heart and self-proclamation as “the new Samson” give this sometimes static movie its forward motion. But if Ahola has no acting experience, he still radiates purity and determination off the screen, enough to push against the historical inertia. The closing, with Zishe trying to warn his shtetl against the coming holocaust, is uncharacteristically mawkish, without the operatic sentiment of Herzog’s most ecstatic creations, but what’s gone before is an intriguing variation, if not the start of a new corpus. --S.A.(Ritz at the Bourse)

As Moonlight Mile begins, Joe (Jake Gyllenhaal) is dressing for his fiancee’s funeral, in her parents’ home on Boston’s North Shore. Jo (Susan Sarandon) and Ben (Dustin Hoffman) are very nice; still, understandably, the mood is somber and tense. The townsfolk give. Jo a pile of self-help books, one titled These Things Happen. The truth is, these particular things don’t happen very often: Diana was shot in an ice cream parlor, hit by a bullet meant for the killer’s estranged wife. Loss is hard any time, but the suddenness and violence of Diana’s death, not to mention the lingering duress of the trial, make this “thing” especially difficult. Such details also make Brad Silberling’s movie fit a little too neatly with the recent popularity of media grieving and death ritualsAs Ben, Jo and Joe try to get on with their lives, they handle their horror, anger and despair very differently. Joe specifically wants to please Ben, by accepting his offer of partnership in business. But soon he starts dreading the future he’s falling into, out of an inability to move, a combination of depression and sympathy. Meanwhile, Jo, so sensible, spirited and generous (and so crisply played by Sarandon), is yet brought low by her heartache, sometimes more visibly than others, and always apparently surprised by her vulnerability. When she learns that Joe has been sneaking out to see a woman he’s met, Jo is momentarily undone, but speaks her piece straight-up, confessing that she has trouble with “this next part, you with another girl.” Moonlight Mile also has trouble with this part, as it stumbles toward its efficient resolution, where everyone can come away feeling better.--C.F. (Bala; Ritz at the Bourse; Ritz East; Ritz 16)

Martha (Martina Gedeck) lives a precise life. The much-acclaimed chef at a fine Hamburg restaurant, she makes perfect food, and sees a shrink because her boss (Sibylle Canonica) thinks she’s neurotic. All this changes when her niece Lina (Maxime Foerste) comes to live with her. Suddenly, Martha’s routine is undone: Almost worse: there’s a new chef hired to helped out in her kitchen, an Italian (Sergio Castellitto) who plays “Volare” and dances while working. While the rest of the plot is wholly unsurprising, Gedeck’s convincingly taut performance (food is full of “issues” for her) and director Sandra Nettelbeck’s preference for crisp, careful compositions help the film avoid both the mushiness of a “food” movie.--C.F. (Bala; Ritz Five)

Toula (Nia Vardalos) falls in love with Ian (John Corbett) and everything’s just wonderful with her Greek family -- except he isn’t Greek. What follows is essentially Meet the Greek Parents: The large, gregarious family is suspicious of Ian the Protestant and -- gasp -- vegetarian.--Ryan Godfrey (UA Grant; UA Main St.; Ritz Five; Ritz 16)

For 20 years, Sy (Robin Williams) has been the “photo guy,” working the Phototek counter down at the SavMart, meticulously calibrating the processor so all the colors on all customers’ pictures turn out just right. Timid and lonely, he obsesses over the photos he develops for one perfect-seeming family, the Yorkins (read “your kin”): Nina (Connie Nielsen) and Will (Michael Vartan), and their son Jake (Dylan Smith). Making extra prints of all their pictures, Sy covers his TV room wall with them -- and he imagines himself inside the scenes, posing all-smiles with Jake, mom, and dad. From the start, of Mark Romaneck’s One Hour Photo, you know he’s headed to a bad end, as he appears in a police interrogation room, questioned by the sober Detective Van Der Zee (Eriq La Salle). The film, however, complicates its mundane stalker plot by its own attention to composition, which mirrors but also refracts Sy’s. It takes you inside Sy’s desperation, modeled on photos and happy family images that photo counters use to promote their services, images that ask, “Don’t you want these memories to be yours?”--C.F. (Ritz Five)

As Red Dragon begins, we’re invited to titter as Hannibal Lecter, many years before The Silence of The Lambs, serves the brains of an inept flautist to the symphony orchestra’s board; Lecter’s transformation into a cannibalistic comedian is complete. Serial killer movies have spread like mold in the years since Silence, often featuring a profiler who can catch the killer because somewhere, deep down, they’re just alike. Never mind that profiling is a borderline sham science with a success rate about equal to ESP; the profiler’s presence is the rationale for the movie’s existence -- it’s not prurient or seedy or exploitative, it’s about us. Red Dragon, based on the same book that spawned 1986’s Manhunter, steals more than a few pages from Silence’s book; plot dictates that Lecter be found in the same cell where he’d be visited by Clarice Starling years later, but director Brett Ratner (the Rush Hours) seems like he’s determined to copy the infinitely superior film shot for shot, at least in the confrontations between Lecter (Anthony Hopkins, once again) and profiler Will Graham (Ed Norton). The setup is similar to Silence, with Lecter enlisted to help catch a killer (Ralph Fiennes) who’s been murdering families and replacing their eyes with shards of mirror. It’s the most vicious of Thomas Harris’ books -- at one point, the killer bites the lips off a tabloid reporter who’s gotten in the way -- but Ratner’s affectless hack direction abandons any moral sense; it’s all show business, folks. At this point, you’d have to say the series’ true auteur is producer Dino de Laurentiis, who’s steered the films ever more towards cheap sensationalism, to the point where they’d have to climb up to be in the gutter. --S.A. (AMC Andorra; AMC Orleans; Baederwood; Bryn Mawr; Cinemagic; UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Main St.; UA Riverview)

Secretary is about anxiety, depression, the inability to communicate. It also turns into a romance, when Lee Holloway (Maggie Gyllenhaal), a depressivewith ahabit of cutting herself, gets a job as a secretary for attorney E. Edward Grey (James Spader). Lee works hard, but still, she makes mistakes, typos that Edward marks with a big red pen. Nervous as she is, Lee finds herself liking his reprimands, and starts making errors on purpose, so he’ll call her into his office. At the same time, he’s noting her tremulous behavior, the cuts on her legs, and, no small thing, her beautiful behind. Finally, Edward confronts. One thing leads to another and then, he spanks her. And Lee, bent over his desk, her face red from hurt and ecstasy, has found the man of her dreams. Adapted by playwright Erin Cressida Wilson from a Mary Gaitskill short story, Steven Shainberg’s first feature juggles several attitudes at once: Lee’s narration establishes not only her self-awareness, but also her insights into those around her. She’s no simple victim, but evolves into a submissive partner in a relationship predicated on desire. That her desire might not be yours makes her difficult, even “freaky.” That she comprehends and articulates her journey -- away from her clueless family, toward a relationship that makes sense of her pain -- makes the film’s focus less Lee’s various abilities than your willingness to go along with her.--C.F. (Ritz at the Bourse; Ritz 16)

Somewhere between the phantasmagorical revolving station of 2001: A Space Odyssey fame and the cramped quarters of a Volkswagen bug (and a major improvement over Mir -- the decrepit Soviet space home that deserved a tabloid headline of “Oy, Vey Is Mir”) the International Space Station is lofty testament to the wonders of worldwide cooperation in the name of science. It also makes for some amazing cinematography. Space Station, the latest IMAX film, gives viewers the typical IMAXian bird’s-eye view of things -- in this case, life aboard a space station -- with a twist. The film, a co-production of IMAX and Lockheed Martin, was shot by astronauts, who not only master the elements of space travel, but do a very fine job taking pictures as well. As astronaut Brian Duffy explained at a press conference, he and his fellow space travelers spent nearly three years not just training for their mission, but they learned the intricacies of filmmaking as well. All in all, Space Station is one small step for man, one giant leap for audiences.--Howard Altman (Tuttleman Imax Theater, Franklin Institute)

The most successful director in Japan, Hayao Miyazski pursues his visions with unbridled imagination, and Spirited Away is as pure an expression of that vision as we’ve seen. Melding the child’s-eye view of Kiki’s Delivery Service and My Neighbor Totoro with the dark, spiritualist overtones of Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away takes Chihiro, its young female protagonist, into an enormous bathhouse for wayward spirits, where she’s mystified, occasionally enchanted, and often threatened, most notably by the tyrannical Yubaba, who resembles John Tenniel’s drawings of the Queen of Hearts -- if her head inflated to equal size with the rest of her body. Miyazaki never fails to reimagine each aspect of his world; you can get the greatest joy from tiny details. Chihiro’s escapades don’t always proceed one from the other, but let yourself go and you’ll be swept away as well. --S.A.(Ritz East)

Juni (Daryl Sabara) and Carmen Cortez’s (Alexa Vega) adventures form the center of Robert Rodriguez’s Spy Kids 2: The Island of Lost Dreams. Their perspective, part convincingly ingenuous and part movie-kid wise, organizes the film’s general view of things: Adults tend to err and children tend to save the world. More cute diversion than thrillsville outing, Spy Kids 2 shows Juni having more trouble dealing with Carmen’s crush on a rival than with any of the island’s ostensible --C.F. (AMC Andorra; UA Main St.; UA Riverview)

Golden girl/good sport Reese Witherspoon has been calling this lackluster romantic comedy a “return” to her own Southern roots (including her sweet home accent). But Andy Tennant’s film only revisits a pile of clichés. She plays a fancy-pants NYC fashion designer, planning to marry up-and-coming Patrick Dempsey, son of snippy, egotistical NYC Mayor Candice Bergen. But before she does, she has to go home to sort out her secret past. First, she is not the daughter of a plantation owner, but of poor folks (Fred Ward and Mary Kay Place) and second, she’s still married to childhood sweetheart (Josh Lucas), once a good old boy and now -- to her surprise -- turned cute, thoughtful and successfully entrepreneurial. This last allows her to make the right decision (the one indicated by the film’s title) and not have to live in a double-wide. The performances are pert, the characters stale and the inevitable showdown between suitors (and mothers) quite humdrum. Tellingly, the most enthusiastic audience response came not when Witherspoon and her beau clinch, but when her gay designer mentor from the city (Nathan Lee Graham) exchanges meaningful glances with her gay best friend from the country (Ethan Embry): Perhaps that’s the movie that Tennant should have made.--C.F. (AMC Andorra; AMC Orleans; Baederwood; Cinemagic; Ritz 16; UA Grant; UA Main St.; UA Riverview)

(AMC Andorra; AMC Orleans; Narberth; UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Riverview)

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