JANE GOODALL'S WILD CHIMPANZEES Over the years, Discovery Place has shown numerous IMAX titles in its OMNIMAX Theatre, but Jane Goodall's Wild Chimpanzees has personal ties with the museum: Not only is the venue cited as one of the production companies behind this endeavor, but former DP head Freda Nicholson served as an executive producer. Still, these local tie-ins presumably won't be needed to draw Charlotteans to what proves to be a worthy tribute to a great humanitarian and her vibrant "co-stars." Shot primarily in Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania, the film opens with 40-year-old footage of the young Jane Goodall and her first revolutionary experiences with chimpanzees. From there, it brings us to the present, with the still-active, still-beautiful Goodall (now 68) introducing us to her swinging friends, all of whom have names because Goodall initially didn't realize that the scientific community preferred to number its study subjects. We learn that humans and chimps share about 98 percent of the same DNA; we watch as the kinder chimps snuggle with Goodall while the more rambunctious ones throw rocks at her; and we nod approvingly at this remarkable woman's complete adoration of her animal pals, displayed not only through her up-close-and-personal interactions but also through her extensive touring around the world, speaking passionately about the need for wildlife preservation.
PUNCH-DRUNK LOVE After the grandiosity of both Boogie Nights and Magnolia, writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson works on a decidedly smaller scale with Punch-Drunk Love. Yet while his canvas (and running time) may be significantly lessened, his imagination runs unfettered (indeed, he earned the Best Director prize at Cannes this year), resulting in a romantic comedy that operates by the rules of its own self-contained universe. Adam Sandler, stretching about as far here as Jim Carrey did in The Truman Show (in other words, both comedians didn't reinvent their screen personas as much as they simply toned down the expected schtick), delivers an interestingly off-center performance as Barry Egan, a toilet-plunger business owner whose lifelong mental abuse at the hands of his six sisters would seem to go a long way toward explaining his delicate emotional state and his social ineptitude. Driven by his loneliness, Barry finally elects to call a phone sex service, a decision he regrets once he starts getting harassed by members of this shady outfit. And things potentially get even more complicated once he finds himself attracted to one of his sisters' co-workers (Emily Watson), though the love of this good woman might be just what he needs to pull him out of his disturbed state. Anderson, who packed the Boogie Nights soundtrack with 70s hits and the Magnolia one with haunting Aimee Mann tunes, uses Shelley Duvall's rendition of Harry Nilsson's "He Needs Me" (from the Popeye score) as the centerpiece song here, just one tip-off to this film's radical, off-the-wall approach. Sandler's character, an insecure introvert prone to destructive outbursts, isn't exactly cut from the Cary Grant mold, and if the film fails to use its exemplary supporting players (Watson, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Luis Guzman) to their fullest potential, it still scores points for displaying how the redemptive power of love could transform even a seeming lost cause like Barry Egan.
CURRENT RELEASESBALLISTIC: ECKS VS. SEVER Here's a question to ponder: Why did Warner Bros. elect to hide The Adventures of Pluto Nash from critics yet willfully preview Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever in advance? Yet another motion picture that owes its allegiance to the video game market, the stridently simplistic Ballistic is an absolute failure on even its most basic level as an action movie. Ineptly directed by a Thai filmmaker who bills himself as Kaos (short for Wych Kaosayananda), this 90-minute equivalent of having one's head trapped between two clanging cymbals Chuck Jones-style might contain more explosions, gun battles and car chases per square foot of film footage than any other movie around, yet every boring moment of it is highly derivative, clumsily executed and stridently illogical (one of the heroes keeps setting off explosions away from the villains rather than next to them; what's the point of that?). When a filmmaker goes on record citing director Michael Bay (Armageddon, Pearl Harbor) as a major influence without even tossing an honorable mention to the likes of John Ford or Howard Hawks (who knew a thing or two about action), it's enough to send a cold chill through the entire industry. As a villainous lackey, Ray Park reveals himself to be an incredibly dull actor when he's not buried under makeup as The Phantom Menace's Darth Maul or X-Men's Toad. And as Ecks and Sever, two former government agents who square off against each other until they learn they have a common foe, Antonio Banderas and Lucy Liu mumble their lines to the point of unintelligibility (not that the dialogue is even needed to follow this dum-dum plot). Both stars have made crisp action heroes in the past -- he in Desperado, she in Charlie's Angels -- but here they wearily trudge through a bog of ennui, dragging the rest of us right behind them.
BROWN SUGAR As far as I'm concerned, Brown Sugar is nothing if not aptly titled, seeing as how my review for director Rick Famuyiwa's previous film, 1999's The Wood, dismissed it as "a movie so light and sugary that it could easily be mistaken for an artificial sweetener." His follow-up feature is equally as saccharine, a predictable romantic comedy about two lifelong best friends, music business executive Dre (Taye Diggs) and music magazine editor Sidney (Sanaa Lathan), who spend the entire movie fighting the fact that they're meant for each other. Or at least that's what Famuyiwa would have us believe, but Lathan (so terrific in Love & Basketball) and Diggs (so bland in just about everything) are never able to convince us that their characters are truly meant to be together. What's more, the movie's whole point is that these two are forever linked through their love of hip-hop, but aside from the obligatory music biz cameos and lots of lip service from the leading characters, hip-hop rarely comes alive as its own fire-breathing entity in this picture, meaning that Dre and Sidney might as well be joined together by a mutual love of pro wrestling, Alan Rudolph flicks or Pokemon trading cards. Rapper Mos Def, memorable in a small role in Monster's Ball, effortlessly steals this film in the key supporting role of a wisecracking hip-hop musician whose integrity won't allow him to sell out as an artist.
MOONLIGHT MILE It's hard to imagine anyone managing to steal a movie not only from charismatic rising star Jake Gyllenhaal (The Good Girl, Donnie Darko) but also from accomplished Oscar winners Susan Sarandon, Dustin Hoffman and Holly Hunter, yet newcomer Ellen Pompeo pulls off the feat with aplomb. She's one of the main reasons to see Moonlight Mile, a highly likable if somewhat calculated melodrama partly inspired by an incident in writer-director Brad Silberling's life. Silberling, who was dating actress Rebecca Schaeffer (TV's My Sister Sam) when she was murdered back in 1989, has taken that tragedy as the basis for this film about a young man (Gyllenhaal) who, after the senseless slaying of his fiancee, moves into the home of her parents (Sarandon and Hoffman) so they can retain a connection with their daughter. Hiding his own secret regarding his relationship with the bride-to-be, he finds his emotions becoming even more tangled once he falls for a local bar owner (Pompeo) working through her own personal pain. A few plot developments seem extraneous and certain conclusions feel too glib, but overall, this is a moving and occasionally insightful study of how individuals learn to cope with loss and grief in their own idiosyncratic manner. Hunter has little to do as a prosecuting attorney, but Sarandon and Hoffman haven't been this interesting to watch in years, while Gyllenhaal gets to show more emotion here than in his previous roles. Still, the big story here is Pompeo, a striking newcomer who will get to build on this early promise with upcoming roles in Daredevil and Speilberg's Catch Me If You Can.
RED DRAGON Manhunter, the 1986 adaptation of Thomas Harris' novel Red Dragon (and the first film to bring Hannibal Lecter to the screen), was directed by Michael Mann, a master visualist whose works (The Last of the Mohicans, The Insider) almost always shimmer with tasteful artistry. Red Dragon, on the other hand, is helmed by Brett Ratner, a more commercially mindful filmmaker whose past efforts (the Rush Hour pair, The Family Man) have exposed him as the sort of director who churns out product without bothering to give it his own distinct stamp. That Manhunter should remain the better movie should surprise no one, and yet, the contest is a lot closer than it would appear at first glance. Red Dragon works on its own terms, thanks largely to the efforts of scripter Ted Tally (who won an Oscar for The Silence of the Lambs) and a dream cast that makes the most of the material. Anthony Hopkins, of course, is the star attraction, essaying the role of Hannibal for the third time. Set before the excellent Silence and the execrable Hannibal, this one begins with the good doctor being captured by FBI agent Will Graham (Edward Norton), who promptly retires from the bureau until he's asked to help track down a serial killer (Ralph Fiennes) who's been carving up entire families. Graham needs help tracking down this madman, and he's soon forced to seek advice from his old nemesis, the unflappable Hannibal. Hopkins' Lecter has lost much of his menace over the years, but he's still enjoyable to watch, as is the rest of this sharp thriller.
THE RULES OF ATTRACTION In one sense, this adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis' novel might be one of the best "youth" movies ever made, but we'll never know because its salient points are simultaneously buried, drowned and smothered in the excesses of writer-director Roger Avary (not having read the book, I don't know how much of the blame falls on Ellis himself). Equally as heavy-handed as the screen versions of the author's American Psycho and Less Than Zero, this college-set satire nevertheless serves as a much-needed affront to the numerous teen comedies that view those coming-of-age years as a time of great joy tempered with just a smidgen of awkwardness and insecurity. Rules mercilessly explores the dark side of this period in one's life, centering on some of the troubled students attending a New England college: Sean Bateman (James Van Der Beek), who uses and abuses people (especially women) as he sees fit; Paul Denton (Ian Somerhalder), a bisexual infatuated with Sean; and Lauren Hynde (Shannyn Sossamon), a virgin whose basic decency stands no chance of survival amid all the casual cruelty surrounding her. The Rules of Attraction dares to bring up issues that other movies of this nature wouldn't even consider touching, but Avary scarcely gives them their due because he's too busy trying to gross out audiences at every turn (nose picking, ass wiping, puking on one's partner during sex -- Avary films it all in living color) while also using numerous cinematic techniques to further distance viewers from the action -- aside from an expertly edited sequence detailing one student's European vacation, the show-off stylistics prove about as pointless as anything else in this thoroughly obnoxious endeavor.
SPIRITED AWAY If there's a film genre that qualifies as an open invitation for moviemakers to let it all artistically hang out, it would be the animated field, where writers and directors don't have to worry about special effects proving too costly or stars turning too temperamental. In the animated kingdom, the imagination is truly king, and it's depressing to note just how small-minded most of its product has turned out over the years. A wonderful exception, however, is Spirited Away, Japan's all-time top moneymaker and the best animated feature since Beauty and the Beast 11 years ago. Creative beyond all reason or expectation, this latest effort from the revered Japanese filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki is a phenomenal achievement, a gorgeous-looking piece of cinema that stirs memories of everything from Alice In Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz to Where the Wild Things Are and Yellow Submarine. Featuring visions more suited to a hallucinatory dream than a movie screen, this picture, about a young girl who's forced to work in a bathhouse that caters to spirits, takes particular delight in confounding our expectations every step of the way -- not since Being John Malkovich has a movie proven to be so gloriously unpredictable. And perhaps only the Cantina in Star Wars can match this film's bathhouse as a sight for soaring eyes unable to believe the sheer number of unusual creatures sauntering through the place. Yet while Spirited Away would be worthwhile simply as an ocular treat, the story's also solid, concerning itself with timeless issues like honor, sacrifice, responsibility and respect.
TUCK EVERLASTING A movie that the less charitable might describe as a castrated cross between Highlander and Lolita, this is actually based on the beloved 1975 children's book by Natalie Babbitt. In the hands of the Disney studio and director Jay Russell (who helmed the sweet family flick My Dog Skip), this sounds like it couldn't miss -- and yet it does, thanks largely to an overly reverential tone that, ironically, ends up sucking the life out of a movie that's about living forever. Set in 1914, the story centers on the encounter between 15-year-old Winnie Foster (Alexis Bledel), daughter of the richest man in town, and the Tucks, a poor family living deep in the woods on her father's property. Winnie eventually discovers that all the members of the clan -- dad Angus (William Hurt, whose peculiar accent sounds more Swedish than Scottish), mom Mae (Sissy Spacek) and sons Jesse (Jonathan Jackson) and Miles (Scott Bairstow) -- once drank from a mountain spring whose water has given them immortality. Winnie falls for Jesse, a 104-year-old man stuck in a 17-year-old body, but their May-December romance gets interrupted by the aptly credited Man in the Yellow Suit (Ben Kingsley), whose banana of an outfit makes him seem less a malevolent figure and more like an adornment on one of Carmen Miranda's old outfits. A movie as tightly drawn as the corset that Winnie must endure, Tuck Everlasting is simply too plodding and ponderous to evoke the sense of magic and wonder that this story demands.
WHITE OLEANDER If the screen version of Janet Fitch's bestselling novel was an Olympic event, it's hard to tell which of the movie's four actresses would end up winning the gold. A powerfully performed drama that steadily works its way toward a satisfying wrap-up, this manages to offer complex roles to its quartet of leading ladies. And nobody's part is more complicated than that of Michelle Pfeiffer, who rewards the role with one of the finest performances of her career. She's cast as Ingrid, a talented artist and mother to 15-year-old Astrid (Alison Lohman). Ingrid clearly loves her daughter, but before long it becomes clear that she loves herself more -- hurt to the core by a philandering boyfriend, she kills him in a carefully plotted manner and soon finds herself behind bars, irresponsibly leaving Astrid at the mercy of a foster care system that places her in the home of a slutty born-again Christian (Robin Wright-Penn) and, later, in the care of a loving but overly sensitive actress (Renee Zellweger). Pfeiffer's physical beauty somehow seems to adapt to every role she plays, and here we see the frightening side of that allure: Ingrid is a woman who doesn't suffer fools lightly, and Pfeiffer's face, seemingly more angular and hard than in any past picture, reflects that steely detachment. It's a great performance in service of a towering character of great contradictions, yet she's nearly matched by the turns from Wright-Penn, Zellweger and especially Lohman, who handles the picture's largest role with the discipline it requires.
OPENS FRIDAY:
Ghost Ship (Gabriel Byrne, Julianna Margulies).
Jackass: The Movie (Johnny Knoxville, Steve-O).
Paid In Full (Wood Harris, Mekhi Phifer).
Punch-Drunk Love (Adam Sandler, Emily Watson).
Time Changer (Gavin MacLeod, Hal Linden).
The Truth About Charlie (Mark Wahlberg, Thandie Newton).