UPDATE 12:05 p.m.: New capsules for films opening today.
Capsule reviews of films playing in area movie theaters (Click links for full reviews):
Opening today
Alice has grown — not by “drink me” potion or “eat me” cake — into a 19-year-old girl in Tim Burton’s adaptation of Lewis Carroll’s classic tale. Working from Linda Woolverton’s very Hollywood adaptation, Burton shifts the story from a child Alice to a near-adult Alice (the startlingly promising Mia Wasikowska). This is Alice’s second journey down the rabbit hole, though she doesn’t recall the first. This time is less “Who-o-o are you-o-o?” self-discovery, but a formulaic (if madcap) tale of proving oneself. One misses the light wit and the “simple and loving heart of her childhood” from Carroll’s book. Burton’s film is whimsical and several moments glimmer — the big slobbering tongue of a Bandersnatch, the tweaky March Hare — but it’s heavy with the dread of Danny Elfman’s score and the impersonal rebooting of Alice as dragon-slayer. Helena Bonham Carter is brilliant as the thin-skinned and bigheaded Red Queen. Johnny Depp’s Mad Hatter is rootless but entertaining. The Cheshire Cat, voiced by Stephen Fry, feels like a bow made out of courtesy. No, this is a dog’s movie: Baynard the Bloodhound is one of the finer movie mutts in some time.
PG for fantasy action-violence involving scary images and situations, and for a smoking caterpillar. 109 minutes.
Two stars out of four.
— Jake Coyle, AP Entertainment Writer
“Brooklyn’s Finest” — Director Antoine Fuqua uses a sledgehammer to pound home the irony in the title of this drama about cops who are anything but fine at their jobs. Fuqua rounded up a fine cast — Richard Gere, Don Cheadle, Wesley Snipes and the director’s “Training Day” co-star Ethan Hawke. Yet for all its fine performances and solid production values, the film is a bloody mess, largely because of the body count. Fuqua kills off lots of people in nasty ways with the remorseless glee of a cruel boy torturing insects. The movie centers on three Brooklyn cops — a burned-out patrolman (Gere), a murderously corrupt narcotics detective (Hawke) and a stressed-out undercover man (Cheadle) playing drug dealer under the nose of a crime kingpin (Snipes). The decent supporting cast features Lili Taylor, Ellen Barkin and Will Patton. But the movie is relentlessly bleak and barbarous, Fuqua grinding viewers down through his cavemen-with-badges depiction of police work.
R for bloody violence throughout, strong sexuality, nudity, drug content and pervasive language. 133 minutes.
Two stars out of four.
— David Germain, AP Movie Writer
Also Playing
Avatar
James Cameron's 3-D epic has all the smack of a Film Not To Miss — a movie whose effects are clearly revolutionary, a spectacle that millions will find adventure in. But it nevertheless feels unsatisfying and somehow lacks the pulse of a truly alive film. The plot is a little like the American frontier circa the 1800s, only transposed to the year 2154 on the faraway moon Pandora, the home of Native American-like, aqua blue, 10-foot tall creatures called the Na'vi. Arriving are imperialistic humans to plunder, and scientists to study. Dr. Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver) leads a team that explores in Na'vi bodies, avatars, controlled remotely. A sense of discovery — of Cameron's digital world of Pandora, of the impressive techno-filmmaking — makes "Avatar" often thrilling. The environmentalist and anti-war messages resonate with contemporary troubles, but they also seem odd coming from such a swaggering behemoth of a movie. One senses Cameron's zest lies in the battle, not in peace. With Sam Worthington and Zoe Saldana.
PG-13 for intense epic battle sequences and warfare, sensuality, language and some smoking. 161 minutes.
Two and half stars out of four.
— Jake Coyle, AP Entertainment Writer
A CLIP FROM AVATAR:
This redemption-minded sports flick serves its inspiration straight-up with no twist. Writer-director John Lee Hancock wisely lets the true story of Michael Oher — the African-American teen who found a home and, eventually, football stardom, after being adopted by a wealthy Memphis family — speak for itself. That direct focus delivers a feel-good crowd-pleaser, but it also drains the film of the kind of subtle nuances that might have separated it from other Hollywood Hallmark-like efforts, including Hancock's own "The Rookie." The movie dutifully chronicles the transformation of Oher (newcomer Quinton Aaron) from blank slate to a fully formed young man, emphasizing the involvement of Leigh Ann Tuohy (Sandra Bullock). Bullock brings her trademark spunkiness to the mother hen role, delivering an iron-willed woman who looks past appearances to do the right thing.
PG-13 for one scene involving brief violence, drug and sexual references. 128 minutes.
Two and a half stars out of four.
— Glenn Whipp, For The Associated Press
This clumsy postmodern buddy cop flick stuffs as many genre references as it can into the ceaseless patter between Tracy Morgan and Bruce Willis. They play our paired police — detectives Paul Hodges and Jimmy Monroe, respectively — and they might as well be in different movies. Willis, a veteran of cop films, is our unmistakable straight man. Almost charmingly, he's actually trying to solve crimes. Hodges, however, is a parody. One can't help wondering how his partner — let alone his wife (Rashida Jones) — can treat a cartoon so much like a human. Kevin Smith, for the first time directing from a script not his own, never comes close to raising the movie to the level of its buddy cop inspirations. Harold Faltermeyer's synthesizer-heavy score recalls his soundtrack from "Beverly Hills Cop," which "Cop Out" falls well short of.
R for pervasive language including sexual references, violence and brief sexuality. 110 minutes.
One and half stars out of four.
— Jake Coyle, AP Entertainment Writer
Breck Eisner's remake of George A. Romero's 1973 cult horror film presents the perfect nightmare for a flu-fearing times. It's an offshoot of Romero's zombie movies, deriving its horror from the fear that the enemy lurks both within and without you and that there's a very real chance you might turn into a monster. Here, folks in a small Iowa farming town beginning acting strangely, leading to a government-ordered military crackdown. Four plucky survivors (including Timothy Olyphant and Radha Mitchell) try to get out of Dodge, avoiding hazmat-wearing soldiers and their formerly friendly neighbors. There's some unease over Big Brother, but what "The Crazies" really taps into is our pervasive unease over disease, that moment when the person sitting next to you on the subway or airplane or, yes, the movie theater breaks into a coughing fit and you realize you're unarmed. Never mind the pitchfork. Just don't leave the hand sanitizer at home.
R for bloody violence and language. 101 minutes.
Three stars out of four.
— Glenn Whipp, For The Associated Press
In some not too far-fetched parallel universe, Jeff Bridges really might be living the life of a boozy country singer. Bridges seems like the real thing in this musical portrait, rasping out songs in the comfortable remnants of a whiskey-and-tobacco-seared voice that you might swear you've heard on a hundred jukeboxes in a hundred anonymous roadhouses. Bridges plays the aptly named Bad Blake, a country-music veteran performing in dive bars and bowling alleys as he continues to drink and smoke himself toward an early grave. Accustomed to one-night stands, Bad falls for a single mom and small-town journalist (Maggie Gyllenhaal) who interviews him. Robert Duvall co-stars as Bad's buddy and Colin Farrell plays his old protege, now a superstar hankering for Bad to write him some new songs. Bridges may not have a great singing voice, but it's a soulful one, and he matches it with one of the finest performances of his career, just playing the hell out of this guy whose self-abuse has carried him to a precipice where he either leaps into the pit or turns back and cleans up.
R for language and brief sexuality. 111 minutes.
Three stars out of four.
— David Germain, AP Movie Writer
RYAN'S REVIEW: Ryan McPherson offers a second opinion on "Crazy Heart."
Yes, there’s a character named John and, yes, he’s a soldier who, sure enough, receives dozens of letters from his sweetheart back home, including one emotionally wrought missive that begins with “Dear John” and ends with him vowing to permanently switch to e-mail. And because this earnest romance comes from a Nicholas Sparks novel, death and disappointment hover over the events, ready to strike — and strike often. For Sparks, grief is good. Maybe greed, too, given the number of times he has recycled the same themes. Here John (Channing Tatum) and Savannah (Amanda Seyfried) fall in love in the spring of 2001 and promise their lives to each other. But then 9/11 happens and John, a Special Forces soldier, has to decide between love and country. The leads click effortlessly during the movie’s romance section, but then comes the inevitable loss and disappointment, events that seem overwrought even by Sparks’ operatic standards.
PG-13 for some sensuality and violence. 102 minutes.
Two stars out of four.
— Glenn Whipp, For The Associated Press.
Writer-director Nancy Meyers’ latest relationship comedy isn’t what the name promises at all. It’s simple, almost as simple about grown-up romance and heartache as the average Hollywood teen comedy is about youthful love and sex. That said, a simple-minded story can benefit enormously with Meryl Streep on screen for almost an entire movie. Streep is charming as a divorced woman in an affair with her remarried ex-husband (Alec Baldwin) and a flirtation with a new man (Steve Martin). Too bad Streep puts on this nice show for such a superficial story, and for that matter, too bad for Baldwin, Martin and the rest of an earnest supporting cast led by John Krasinski. Meyers serves up fluff as light as the pastries Streep’s character bakes for a living, a story to make divorced people wish their broken marriages and the ugly aftermath could be as fun and frolicsome as this.
R for some drug content and sexuality. 118 minutes.
Two stars out of four.
— David Germain, AP Movie Writer
In Michael Hoffman's historically based film about Tolstoy's last days, the great Russian writer's legacy is seemingly up for grabs. On one side are the Tolstoyans (Paul Giamatti plays their leader), ardent followers of Tolstoy's late philosophies of poverty and renunciation. On the other is Tolstoy's wife, the Countess Sofya Tolstoy (Helen Mirren), who curses their "revolutionary nonsense" and is desperately trying to prevent Tolstoy (Christopher Plummer) from giving away his estate. James McAvoy plays a visiting Tolstoyan, who — like Tolstoy, himself — begins to doubt its rigidity, especially after he meets the carefree Marsha (Kerry Condon). In this richly acted film, love and human flaws have a way of making a mockery of dogma and the deification of genius artists. In celebrating nature in all of its messy, vulgar glory, Hoffman's camera floats through the tall birch trees. R for a scene of sexuality and nudity. 110 minutes. Three stars out of four.
— Jake Coyle, AP Entertainment Writer
Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief
Uma Thurman with snakes for hair and a killer stare is almost enough on her own to make this Greek-myth-inspired adventure worth seeing. Throw in the absurdity of former James Bond smoothie Pierce Brosnan, now put out to stud as a mythical centaur with a horse's rump, and this latest supplicant for the Harry Potter fantasy crowd has two decent elements in its favor. The trouble with this return to youth fantasy by director Chris Columbus, who made the first two "Harry Potter" flicks, is that for every worthwhile moment, there's a clunker merely filling up time, or worse, wasting it. Based on the first book in Rick Riordan's fantasy series, the movie stars Logan Lerman as Percy, a teen who learns he's the demigod son of Poseidon, lord of the sea. Falsely accused of stealing boss god Zeus' lightning bolt, Percy travels America with two fellow young heroes (Brandon T. Jackson and Alexandra Daddario) to save his mom (Catherine Keener) from the underworld and recover Zeus' bolt. The fitful movie has OK action and effects, but it lacks spark. With Steve Coogan, Rosario Dawson, Sean Bean, Kevin McKidd.
PG for action violence and peril, some scary images and suggestive material, and mild language. 119 minutes.
Two stars out of four.
— David Germain, AP Movie Writer
A SCENE FROM PERCY JACKSON & THE OLYMPIANS: THE LIGHTNING THIEF:
Robert Downey Jr. is so NOT Sherlock Holmes. That’s not a hindrance — in fact, it’s a big help — as he and Guy Ritchie bring Arthur Conan Doyle’s Victorian-age detective into the modern world. Enough of the trappings are left in their brawn-over-brain action romp to make Downey a reasonably faithful embodiment of Holmes. And of course, this is Downey, whose career resurgence rests on his ability to make the most unlikely role his own. The movie’s big failing is the drab story, a bit of nonsense revolving around a secret society and potentially supernatural doings. But Ritchie compensates with exhilarating action, and the movie offers engaging interplay among Downey and Jude Law as Holmes sidekick Watson, Rachel McAdams as the woman in the detective’s life, Eddie Marsan as Scotland Yard Inspector Lestrade and Mark Strong as the bad guy.
PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action, some startling images and a scene of suggestive material. Running time: 129 minutes.
Three stars out of four.
— David Germain, AP Movie Writer
Martin Scorsese clearly had a ball making this one, which seemingly hurls everything the director knows about filmmaking up on screen in a blazing, masterful technical triumph. But even with Leonardo DiCaprio leading the superb cast, this crime-and-paranoia thriller is long and wearying — brilliantly constructed, obsessively detailed, yet dramatically a piece of pulp schlock that's been overdressed and overstuffed to disguise a ponderous and absurd story. Much of the trouble starts at the source, Dennis Lehane's novel, whose jolts and surprises range from clever to cheap and far-fetched. DiCaprio plays a U.S. marshal assigned with his new partner (Mark Ruffalo) to investigate the disappearance of a murderous mom who escaped from her cell at an asylum for the criminally insane in the 1950s. As gorgeously as Scorsese captures this nightmare world, the inherent gloom of the setting and characters overwhelm the story. With Ben Kingsley, Michelle Williams, Max von Sydow, Patricia Clarkson, Emily Mortimer.
R for disturbing violent content, language and some nudity. Running time: 138 minutes. Two stars out of four.
— David Germain, AP Movie Writer
MARTIN'S MUSE: A look at the films of Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio.
SLIDE SHOW: Click link to view a selection of photos from the four films of Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio.
A montage from "Shutter Island":
Following the big-screen exploits of elves and bedroom monsters, tooth fairies were inevitably ready for their close-up. "Tooth Fairy" steals liberally from "Monsters Inc." and "Elf," among many others. It's very much what you'd expect: a tale of optimism overcoming disbelief; family fare with comical casting (Julie Andrews as a Fairy Godmother); The Rock in a tutu. But despite its predictability and pat Hollywood cliche, "Tooth Fairy" is mostly charming, thanks largely to the toothy grins of Dwayne Johnson (aka The Rock) and Stephen Merchant, the British comedian and Ricky Gervais sidekick. Johnson plays a minor league hockey player who's summoned to Tooth Fairy duty (Merchant plays his guide) to penalize his dream-dashing ways. Obvious puns (some from Billy Crystal in a cameo as a veteran fairy) and fully expected redemption follow. Johnson, a human Buzz Lightyear, and the spindly Merchant make the obvious material surprisingly winning.
PG for mild language, some rude humor and sports action. 101 minutes.
Two stars out of four.
— Jake Coyle, AP Entertainment Writer
A CLIP FROM TOOTH FAIRY:
Gauzily wrapped in stars and roses, Garry Marshall's "Valentine's Day" is exactly what it professes to be: an overdose of sentimentality. A Hallmark card of a film, it's a calculated ploy of comfortable predictability and general cheerfulness. The stars spill out as if from a clown car. They're too numerous to name, but Ashton Kutcher, as a florist, is at the center. Julia Roberts, Anne Hathaway, Jamie Foxx, Taylor Swift (in her feature film debut) and many others find various forms of love on one eventful Valentine's Day in Los Angeles. Like real Hollywood, there's plenty of musical chairs. Marshall ("Pretty Woman," "Runaway Bride") juggles the many overlapping story lines successfully, but the film is remarkably, sometimes nauseatingly overstuffed. It also might boast the most shirtless dudes in a movie since "300."
PG-13 for some sexual material and brief partial nudity. 121 minutes.
One and a half stars out of four.
— Jake Coyle, AP Entertainment Writer
Michael Haneke's masterpiece immerses viewers, making squeamish voyeurs of them as they watch a small German town come unhinged amid unexplained violence and tragedy as World War I approaches. The Austrian writer-director has crafted a gorgeously gloomy parable exploring the origins of hatred, malice and communal barbarity, the sort of madness of the masses that would explode in Germany a generation later. The film is grim even by Haneke's normal dour and disturbing standards, with exquisite black-and-white images by cinematographer Christian Berger that help create the illusion of a window in time looking back to the early 20th century. The film hints that the town's young ones might be responsible for the dark deeds, children reared in tyrannical devotion to a puritanism their lustful, abusive parents fail to follow, children who will emerge from this incubator of malevolence as the generation unleashing the atrocities of Nazi Germany. But Haneke's not the sort of storyteller to make things easy on the audience by spelling out anything for sure.
R for some disturbing content involving violence and sexuality. 144 minutes.
Four stars out of four.
— David Germain, AP Movie Writer
With vampires of every kind running around around Hollywood, the big-screen is ripe for a new take on werewolves. Yet despite a first-rate cast led by Benicio Del Toro, Anthony Hopkins and Emily Blunt, a classy re-creation of late-Victorian England and commendable respect for Lon Chaney's 1941 original movie, this one's more a yawn than a scream. The tone adopted by director Joe Johnston is oppressive to the point of suffocating. Sure, the players here are swept up in the story of a man bearing a horrible curse, so you don't expect them to be having fun. But they don't have to be so funereal about it. The remake casts Del Toro as a wayward aristocrat who transforms into a hairy beast after he returns to his ancestral home. Except for Hopkins, who wrings some deviltry out of a pretty silly patriarch's role, the performers are just deadly dull. Del Toro's wolfie may be a doomed and tortured soul. But that's no reason to doom and torture the audience.
R for bloody horror violence and gore. 102 minutes.
One and a half stars out of four.
— David Germain, AP Movie Writer
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