August 16, 2007

"The Invasion" (PG-13, 1 hr., 39 min.)

Chic and sleek in her designer suit, with nary a hair out of place and the camera fawning over her, Nicole Kidman plays Carol, a Washington, D.C., psychiatrist, determined to rescue her little son Oliver (Jackson Bond) from the boy's father (Jeremy Northam) after she realizes her ex-husband has been taken over by an alien organism. As an epidemiologist he is infected while investigating the slimy organism that enters our world on debris from a space shuttle that burns up on re-entry, scattering the bug across the country. People begin acting robotic after the alien cells take over their brains as they sleep. They awaken with slime on their faces, emotionless personalities and utter obedience to groupthink. This third cinematic take on Jack Finney's novel, "The Body Snatchers," filmed twice quite effectively as "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" (in 1956, Unrated, and 1978, PG) has breath-catching intervals, but is confusing in its narrative and all over the place thematically. Is it about the fear of biological terrorism? Is it about today's political reality? The film tries to have it all ways, but awfully vaguely, its messages emerging in bits of TV news stories. And fine actors such as Northam, Daniel Craig as Carol's colleague and Jeffrey Wright as a researcher seem wasted in bland supporting roles.

High-speed chases with infected people piled onto Carol's car, gunfire and tense moments as she flees stalkers in a subway tunnel may draw teen sci-fi/thriller fans in. They may also like the yuck-inducing aspects of how the alien bug is spread -- those already transformed regurgitate on new victims. The film also shows a vicious dog running after trick-or-treaters, the death of one character infected with the virus -- covered with slime and having a seizure -- and two people who jump off a building to their deaths. The rating also reflects mild sexual innuendo, including a lingering kiss and Kidman briefly shown in revealing sleepwear. There is an upsetting verbal description of how an alien-infested man kills a family pet. Characters drink and use occasional mild profanity.

P.S. FOR TEENS: If the central idea in "The Invasion" intrigues you, check out the first two films (also based on author Jack Finney's novel, "The Body Snatchers") and see how they reflect their particular eras. Science fiction/horror movies are often used by filmmakers as metaphors to comment on some wider reality. The 1956 "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" partly dealt with the Cold War, fear of communism and the old Soviet Union. The 1978 version (PG) took a dim view of government in the wake of Watergate and the Vietnam War. In this new "Invasion," the filmmakers seem to be examining human nature in general.

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"Superbad" (R, 1 hr., 44 min.)

In this riotous, very R-rated comedy, a pair of smart, sarcastic, potty-mouthed, sex-obsessed, totally uncool high-school senior guys try desperately to lose their virginity one drunken night. It is a kind of epic hero's journey, in its own profane way. While technically a "teen comedy," "Superbad" is not appropriate for anyone under 17 unless they have extremely open-minded parents, aware of all the avenues of information available to teens nowadays -- information that can make them worldly, even while they remain emotionally immature. It is the boys' naivete and desperation that keeps "Superbad" from sliding into mere raunchiness. The movie explores that theme and features stunningly explicit sexual language. It also includes scenes of drug use, drunkenness, a squirm-inducing riff on menstrual blood and a series of graphic comical drawings of male sex organs. There are a couple of semiexplicit sexual situations, too, but they are mild compared to the film's language. "Superbad" arrives via producer Judd Apatow, who pushed the taste envelope as co-writer and director of "The 40 Year Old Virgin" (R, 2005) and writer/director of "Knocked Up" (R, 2006). "Superbad" director Greg Mottola worked on cable TV cult faves "Arrested Development" and "Undeclared." The script comes from "Knocked Up" star Seth Rogan and his childhood pal Evan Goldberg, for whom the lead characters are named.

Pudgy, profane Seth (Jonah Hill) can't believe his lifelong pal, the quieter Evan (Michael Cera), got into the Ivy League while he must go to a state university. They'll be separated by hundreds of miles. Then there's the fact that neither boy -- both brainy and glib, but dorky -- has any luck with girls. They're determined to remedy that in one night of partying. They get an even dorkier kid, Fogell (Christopher Mintz-Plasse), to use his fake ID to buy booze so they can bring it to a popular girl's (Emma Stone) bash and win favor. Fogell is sidelined by two idiotic cops (Rogan and Bill Hader), so Evan and Seth try to steal booze.

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BEYOND THE RATINGS GAME

-- OK FOR 6 AND OLDER:

"Daddy Day Camp" PG (Kids throw up, relieve themselves, get skunked and paintballed in a corny sequel (no cliche unused, no joke untelegraphed) to "Daddy Day Care" (PG, 2003); "Day Care" hero Charlie (played by Cuba Gooding Jr. now, instead of Eddie Murphy) takes on a failing day camp and the bullying owner (Lochlyn Munro) of the camp next door, bringing in his estranged dad (Richard Gant), a retired Marine colonel, to help. Mild sexual innuendo; rare mild profanity; child briefly disappears, but is fine; jokes about parents who give their kids Xanax.)

"Bratz" PG (Girls 6 to 12 (and some younger) will delight in this live-action feature based on the Bratz "fashion dolls"; adults may cringe at the syrupy, everyone's-special sermons, but film's focus (like the dolls) on mixed-race, multiethnic friendship and its anti-clique stance are positive, if superficial; cheerleader Sasha (Logan Browning), science whiz/fashionista Jade (Janel Parrish), singer Yasmin (Nathalia Ramos) and soccer star Cloe (Skyler Shaye) enter high school as pals, but are pulled into rival cliques; they reconcile, then take on said cliques and their snootiest enforcer (Chelsea Staub). The girls' dress and dance moves, to older generations, will seem overly sensual.)

-- OK FOR 8 AND OLDER:

"Underdog" PG (Live-action update (with digital effects) of 1960s and '70s TV 'toon will entertain kids because human (and beagle) actors put real heart in their roles; a mad scientist (Peter Dinklage) transforms a stray K-9 unit dropout into a superpowered talking pooch; the dog escapes and is unwittingly adopted as a normal hound by Dan (Jim Belushi) for his son Jack (Alex Neuberger); the dog reveals his superpowers to the boy and they invent Underdog, the crime fighter. Mildly scary bits could upset under-8s -- a giant syringe (we don't see an injection); chases, fights, explosions, abductions, interrupted robberies; Jack's schoolmate (Taylor Momsen) and her dog get mugged, but are fine; canine sexual innuendo, toilet humor.)

-- MORE ACCESSIBLE TO KIDS 10 AND ODLER:

"Hairspray" PG (Exuberant adaptation of the Broadway musical based on John Waters' original 1988 film (PG), about fearless, plump Tracy Turnblad (Nikki Blonsky), a teen in 1960s Baltimore, who agitates to integrate the local TV teen dance show; Zac Efron (TV's "High School Musical") as the boy she loves; John Travolta -- a treat -- as Tracy's big but dainty mom, Edna (a role played by men since the first film) in a fat-suit and Baltimore-ese. Sexual innuendo -- subtle enough so many preteens won't get it; suggestive dancing; implied teen pregnancy; pregnant women smoke, drink. A tangy slice of cultural history for most kids 10 and up.)

-- PG-13s OF VARYING INTENSITY AND ONE ARTY PG FOR TEENS:

"The Invasion" (NEW) (Nicole Kidman remains, incongruously, a fashion plate throughout most of this disjointed, only intermittently breath-catching remake of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" films (1956, unrated; 1978, PG), which has little new to say; Carol (Kidman), a Washington, D.C., psychiatrist, learns her ex-husband (Jeremy Northam), an epidemiologist, has been infected by an alien microbe brought to earth on space shuttle debris; people become emotionless automatons, trying to infect others; Carol tries to get to her young son (Jackson Bond) away from his father; Daniel Craig (the new James Bond) as her colleague, Jeffrey Wright as a scientist are wasted in bland roles. High-speed chases, crashes, people run over; infected people swarm over Carol's car; gunplay; Carol stalked in subway tunnel; infected people regurgitate on new victims -- high yuck factor; vicious dog runs after kids; a man dies covered in slime, having a seizure; people jump off a building; understated kiss; Kidman briefly in revealing sleepwear; verbal account of how a man kills a dog; drinking; mild profanity. OK for most teen sci-fi/thriller fans.)

"Rush Hour 3" (Hong Kong police inspector Lee (Jackie Chan) and L.A. detective Carter (Chris Tucker) reunite (after "Rush Hour," 1998, and "Rush Hour 2," 2001, PG-13s) to fight Asian triad crime syndicates in Paris; the story makes no sense, but the formula still makes laughs. Martial-arts face-offs with fists, blades, sticks, including a neat Eiffel Tower fight; high-speed chases; gunplay; leering but nonthreatening sexual innuendo (and a bit of sexism); ethnic, racial stereotypes spoofed; racial slurs referred to by their first letters; implied toplessness among club dancers; briefly lewd but nonexplicit sexual situation; rare profanity.)

"Stardust" (Richly adorned, at times overcrowded fairy tale, based on Neil Gaiman's graphic novel -- old-looking but modern-sounding in a nice, breezy way; Tristran (Charlie Cox), a young man from an old English village, crosses into the forbidden magical kingdom of Stormhold to retrieve a fallen star for the shallow girl (Sienna Miller) he loves; the star turns out to be a young woman (Claire Danes) who needs protection from a witch (Michelle Pfeiffer) and princes who want to cut out her heart and eat it to gain eternal youth. Witches who gouge out entrails (barely off-camera) of animals, turn people into donkeys; violence is non-gory but intense -- stabbings, bone-snappings; mild sexual innuendo; subtly implied overnight trysts; implied nudity; rare profanity; themes deal gently with sexual orientation (a cross-dressing pirate), unwed pregnancy.)

"The Bourne Ultimatum" (Hyperkinetic thriller -- gloriously dizzying and paranoid -- is a stunning finale to the Bourne trilogy ("The Bourne Identity," 2002; "The Bourne Supremacy," 2004, PG-13s), updating Robert Ludlum's Cold War novels to the terror-tainted present; Matt Damon as amnesiac CIA assassin Jason Bourne, gets to the source of his identity, and why most (but not all) CIA higher-ups want him dead. Violence approaches bloody R levels in bone-crushing fights, lethal gunplay; foot chases, car chases are breathlessly shot and edited and could induce motion sickness in some; mild profanity. High-school thriller buffs.)

"Becoming Jane" PG (Lovely, atmospheric film won't please Jane Austen purists, but it winningly imagines Jane (Anne Hathaway in a glowing portrayal) as a character in an Austenesque tale -- tasting romance, seizing literary inspiration from people and events; a lawyer (James McAvoy, his role based on a man Austen at least met), combines traits of heroes and cads in Austen's novels, and nearly wins her heart. Frisky bedroom moment between Jane's parents (James Cromwell and Julie Walters); chaste sexual innuendo and a kiss between young adults; drinking; women at an inn seem to be prostitutes. For romance-loving, literary teens.)

"The Simpsons Movie" (Riotous feature-length episode of the iconic animated TV show loses momentum briefly midway, but recovers; it is tasteless and subversive, but never raunchy; boneheaded patriarch Homer (voice of Dan Castellaneta) dumps pig poo into Lake Springfield, causing such pollution that the EPA puts a dome over the town; the Simpsons barely escape lynching and flee to Alaska. Homer dares son Bart (voice of Nancy Cartwright) to skateboard naked, offering a glimpse of Bart's sketchily drawn "doodle"; characters drink and smoke -- including, at times, kids; evangelical Christians spoofed; mildly crude language; rare profanity; brief bedroom scene with Homer and Marge; two gay policemen kiss, go into a motel; robot suicide gag. Esoteric jokes may be lost on kids 10 to 13, but -- with parental OKs -- they'll still judge the film a riot.)

"Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" (Wizard-in-training Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) at 15 feels alienation and foreboding in this gripping, somber meditation on the trials faced by all truth-tellers, based on J.K. Rowling's fifth book; the Minister of Magic (Robert Hardy) makes Harry a pariah for allegedly lying about his battle with evil Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes); cruel Dolores Umbridge (Imelda Staunton) joins Hogwarts to impose the Ministry's Taliban-esque rules; Harry secretly readies his friends to fight Voldemort and their climactic battle, though largely bloodless, is chilling. Skeletal spirits could spook younger kids, but Voldemort's awful face is the creepiest sight; Umbridge etches words painfully on Harry's hand; younger kids may shrink from gamekeeper Hagrid's (Robbie Coltrane) giant half brother; gross humor about boils; adults drink. Parents of younger kids may want to pre-screen.)

-- R's AND AN UNRATED DOCUMENTARY:

"Superbad" (NEW) (Riotous, lewd teen comedy about lifelong best friends Seth (Jonah Hill) and Evan (Michael Cera), both smart but dorky, about to go to different colleges and desperate to lose their virginity before that; a kid (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) even dorkier than they uses his fake ID to get them booze to bring to a party given by a popular girl (Emma Stone) from their high school, but he's diverted by a pair of idiot cops (Bill Hader and Seth Rogan; Rogan co-wrote the script and stars in R-rated hit "Knocked Up"). Stunningly explicit sexual language; drugs, drunkenness; squirm-inducing riff on menstrual blood; graphic drawings of male sex organs; semiexplicit sexual situations, mild compared to the language; the boys' naivete and desperation keeps "Superbad" from sliding into raunchiness. Not for under-17s.)

"Rocket Science" (NEW; LIMITED RELEASE) (Brainy teen comedy by indie writer/director Jeffrey Blitz; film offers poignant, unsentimental view of life's disappointments and betrayals, always moving at a fast, "screwball comedy" clip; a kid (Reece Thompson) with a painful stutter suffers through his parents' (Lisbeth Bartlett and Denis O'Hare) separation, his older brother's (Vincent Piazza) bullying and humiliations in a New Jersey high school, until a fast-talking girl (Anna Kendrick) gets him to join the debate team with hints of curing his stutter and, perhaps, romance. Sexual themes refer comically to teen longing, masturbation, cross-dressing, homosexuality; sound of protagonist's mom and her new lover (Steve Park) having sex; teens make out -- just kissing -- drink, smoke; profanity. 16 and older.)