THE HOURS Like The English Patient and The Unbearable Lightness of Being, The Hours is one of those reputedly "unfilmable" novels that has bucked the odds to emerge as an exquisite motion picture in its own right. Adapting Michael Cunningham's Pulitzer Prize winner, director Stephen Daldry and scripter David Hare have crafted a richly textured film that spans decades to concentrate on three troubled women who are all connected in one way or another to British author Virginia Woolf's novel Mrs. Dalloway. First, there's Woolf herself (played by an unrecognizable Nicole Kidman), battling the mental illness that is starting to overtake her as she begins to write Mrs. Dalloway in the 1920s. Then there's Laura Brown (Julianne Moore), a suburban housewife in 1950s Los Angeles who, while reading the book, begins to focus on her own misery and how she might best change her lot in life. And finally, there's Clarissa Vaughan (Meryl Streep), a New York literary agent -- and modern-day Clarissa Dalloway -- who's busy preparing a party for a former lover (Ed Harris) now dying of AIDS. It's deeply rewarding to witness how the movie jumps between time periods, using an event in one storyline to beautifully segue into one of the others -- the result is a film of great cumulative power, sparked in no small part by a superlative cast. Added bonus: A rich score by Philip Glass that might be the year's best. 
1/2
CURRENT RELEASES
ABOUT SCHMIDT It's not exactly a product placement, but this unique, seriocomic film offers perhaps the most ingenious example of company promotion ever put on screen. Writer-director Alexander Payne and co-scripter Jim Taylor, adapting Louis Begley's novel, have tackled the sad-sack saga of Warren Schmidt (Jack Nicholson), a just-retired insurance actuary whose remaining days look like nothing more than one long slumber, endless hours of doing nothing, seeing nothing, feeling nothing. Bored with his lot in life, Schmidt perks up when he sees an infomercial for Childreach. Perhaps responding because he's deeply touched, or, more likely, because it gives him something to do, Schmidt ends up sponsoring a 6-year-old African boy named Ndugu. The movie's use of Schmidt's sponsorship is brilliant, allowing the character's voice-over narration to be deployed both as a floating, ethereal entity on the soundtrack and as the content of the letters that he writes to Ndugu. And it's all wrapped around a deeply felt story about one man's overwhelming desire to find meaning in his life and to ultimately make a difference. Nicholson's astute performance is one of his finest in recent times, and the film culminates in a scene of quiet devastation, centered on a picture that isn't just worth a thousand words but also a hundred emotions, all of them finely etched on Warren Schmidt's wrinkled, weary and wiser visage. 1/2
CATCH ME IF YOU CAN Steven Spielberg had already fulfilled his quota of quality entertainment for 2002 when he released Minority Report last summer, but as an added treat he's now offering this pleasing little picture that finds the director in a playful mood. From its snazzy opening credits -- the type normally found in frothy romantic comedies of the early 60s -- to John Williams' bouncy, infectious score, Catch Me feels like nothing so much as pure old-fashioned escapism -- it's the retro-movie that the fall flop The Truth About Charlie desperately wanted to be. Inspired by a true story, this stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Frank Abagnale, who, while still a teenager, manages to successfully impersonate a pilot, a doctor, a lawyer and a teacher, all the while cashing false checks to the tune of more than $2 million. Frank stays ahead of the law for years, but never too far ahead, as his every move is dogged by a persistent FBI agent (Tom Hanks, very good). Because this is a Spielberg project, you can bet some poignant subtext involving splintered family units will come into play (Christopher Walken does a nice job as Frank's perpetually weary dad), but for the most part, this is engaging, stress-free entertainment -- just kick back and enjoy.
CHICAGO Not only for theater aficionados, this adaptation of the stage hit is a musical for people who don't even like musicals, weaving its deliriously dark tale with enough cyanide-laced cynicism to win over moviegoers who wouldn't know Oklahoma! from Oh! Calcutta! Director-choreographer Rob Marshall and Oscar-winning scripter Bill Condon (Gods & Monsters) keep the proceedings both lively and lacerating, and if, after years of overexposure, the story's themes relating to the cult of celebrity have all the bite of a toothless gerbil, at least they're presented in an engaging fashion. Among other things, this knockout of a musical finds Catherine Zeta-Jones in her best screen work to date, Richard Gere putting forth his finest effort since An Officer and a Gentleman, and Renee Zellweger adding to her string of unassailable performances. Zellweger, that most Kewpie Doll of actresses, turns into Lethal Barbie as she handles the role of Roxie Hart, a starlet wanna-be in Prohibition-era Chicago who, like fellow singer-dancer Velma Kelly (Zeta-Jones), is behind bars for murder. Both women's public images are carefully handled by slick lawyer Billy Flynn (Gere), and all three work the angles to ensure they each land on top. The actors' exuberance and Marshall's imaginative staging just might be enough to raise this once-revered genre from the dead. 1/2
GANGS OF NEW YORK There's no hemming and hawing on projects like Gangs of New York, those epic undertakings that result in inflated budgets, overlong shoots, studio bickering, and reams of newspaper copy predicting failure (see Apocalypse Now and Titanic). A quick answer is all but required by curious moviegoers: yes or no? In the case of Martin Scorsese's 170-minute achievement -- hell, yeah. The bad news for Miramax is that it's unlikely such a grim picture will make back its $100 million cost. Instead, the studio will have to console itself with the fact that it's produced one of the year's most notable films, a historical drama that presents a compelling revenge yarn set against the backdrop of New York in the mid-19th century, with an explosive climax that brings the draft riots of 1863 to chilling life. Leonardo DiCaprio stars as Amsterdam Vallon, a strong-willed kid who seeks to avenge the death of his father (Liam Neeson), the leader of a borough's immigrant crop, at the hands of "Bill the Butcher" (Daniel Day-Lewis), the brutal yet clever ruler of the "natives." It'd be a mistake to dismiss this as a period Death Wish -- there's genuine tension in Amsterdam's mission, and Scorsese and his crackerjack team spare no expense in immersing us in what amounts to a grungy hell on earth. DiCaprio and Cameron Diaz are both solid, yet it's Day-Lewis' riveting work in an unexpectedly complex role that puts New York over the top. 1/2
THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE TWO TOWERS Last year's The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring proved to be one of those rare films that improves with each viewing; that may turn out to be the case with The Two Towers as well. After an initial watch, however, this second chapter doesn't quite match the majesty of its predecessor, though that's hardly meant as a knock -- a rousing, far-reaching spectacle of unlimited ambition, TTT scores on many fronts. But whereas Fellowship did a nice job of balancing quieter moments with the bombast, this installment is largely all action all the time, with the few expository scenes practically presented as asides (too many good actors -- Ian McKellen, Cate Blanchett, Miranda Otto -- are given short shrift in this outing); what's more, the movie doesn't deepen or expand the tale's themes as masterfully as The Empire Strikes Back added to Star Wars's mystique. But as a stirring story of unsullied heroism, it's a winner, and as an action epic, it features some of the best battle sequences ever created on film. And while the planned campaign to win a Supporting Actor Oscar for the CGI-created Gollum (voiced by Andy Serkis) seems far-reaching, he turns out to be the best special effect in a movie crammed with them.
NARC The story goes that Tom Cruise caught this film at Sundance and was so impressed, he requested that Paramount Pictures (where he's made many a hit) purchase it for distribution. Given that the movie probably won't cause any ripples at the box office, the question looms: Will Paramount subtract any losses from Cruise's next paycheck? Narc isn't bad, but it's also nothing too far removed from the usual cops'n'robbers fare that passes through the multiplexes on a regular basis. Its primary strength is the intense performance by Ray Liotta; he's cast as a detective whose best friend, a fellow cop, was murdered while investigating drug-running on the streets of Detroit. Taken off the case for personal reasons, he's brought back on board to partner with the new man on the job, an undercover officer (Jason Patric) working through his own demons. Writer-director Joe Carnahan has made an involving crime flick in the gritty French Connection tradition, but it's undermined by a protracted finale and a ludicrous last-minute twist. 1/2
PINOCCHIO Aside from Disney's 1940 masterpiece, Carlos Collodi's Pinocchio has been the source of many dubious film versions, from 1964's animated Pinocchio In Outer Space to the X-rated Erotic Adventures of Pinocchio (advertised with the tagline "It's Not His Nose That Grows") to the dismal 1996 adaptation with Martin Landau and Jonathan Taylor Thomas. In the annals of bad cinema, though, no version will ever approach Roberto Benigni's take on the tale, which, released at the end of December, just beat the buzzer to emerge as the worst film of 2002. This is a monumental achievement in practically every facet of inept filmmaking: joyless, idiotic, annoying, heavy-handed, visually atrocious, and often downright creepy. The 50-year-old Benigni has cast himself as the wooden puppet who longs to become a real boy, and his performance is both tiresome and terrifying; ditto for the Cricket who looks like Otto Preminger, and the Fox and the Cat whose mere presence might disturb impressionable young minds for years to come. Had this been released stateside with its original Italian soundtrack, it might have escaped as being merely awful on a mortal level; instead, the poor dubbing by English-speaking actors like Breckin Meyer (as Pinocchio), Glenn Close and Regis Philbin (their words match the lip movements about as well as in imported kung fu flicks from the 70s), renders it completely unwatchable.
TWO WEEKS NOTICE The best thing that can be said about Two Weeks Notice is that at least it isn't Maid In Manhattan. Still, during a holiday season that could have benefited from a choice romantic comedy, it's depressing to note that Hollywood went 0-for-2 this Christmas -- even a soggy Nora Ephron-Tom Hanks-Meg Ryan confection would have been preferable to this dismal duo. Sandra Bullock again plays a rumpled, neurotic lonelyheart, while Hugh Grant serves up his umpteenth variation on his patented role as a superficial, self-centered bachelor. Between them, they manage to wring out a couple of nice moments, but not nearly enough to matter. Bullock plays an environmental attorney who boasts that she's like a "bobcat" and a "pretzel" in the sack (this is in opposition to the movie itself, which is more like a defanged kitten and a soggy cracker); Grant co-stars as the cad millionaire for whom she works, and with whom she eventually becomes infatuated. This is the third time writer-director Marc Lawrence has teamed with Bullock, having also written her previous mediocrities Miss Congeniality and Forces of Nature. For God's sake, someone stop them before they shoot again.
OPENS FRIDAY:
A Guy Thing (Jason Lee, Julia Stiles).
The Hours (Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman).
Kangaroo Jack (Jerry O'Connell, Anthony Anderson).
National Security (Martin Lawrence, Steve Zahn).
Rabbit-Proof Fence (Everlyn Sampi, Kenneth Branagh).
