May 8, 2008

"Speed Racer" (PG, 2 hrs., 9 min.)

"Speed Racer" is an eye-filling, neon-colored saga with high-velocity cars zooming at impossible speeds in a virtual-reality world peopled with live actors. The movie looks like a melding of comic book, cartoon, live-action and 3-D computer-animation, but amounts to far less than the sum of its parts. Superior to its aesthetic cousins, the "Spy Kids" films (all PGs), "Speed Racer" is still weak on story, far too long, and with action sequences that wow you once, then grow repetitive. Thank goodness for the first-rate cast, whose solid characterizations lend a sense of meaning to this convoluted tale. Based on a 1967 Japanese "manga" comic book and an animated series that ran in various incarnations on American TV for years, the wide-screen adaptation is by the Wachowski Brothers who gave us the R-rated, far more convincing "Matrix" trilogy. It bears their technical sheen and, despite its flaws, it will probably glue kids 8 and older to their seats.

The young hero of the title, Speed Racer (Emile Hirsch), is the middle son in a closeknit, race-car-obsessed family. Pops (John Goodman) builds "Mach 5" cars. Mom (Susan Sarandon) is proud and supportive. Kid brother Spritle (Paulie Litt) and his annoying pet chimp are into mischief. And Speed's girlfriend Trixie (Christina Ricci) is true blue. His older brother Rex (Scott Porter) was a champion, but died in a racing accident (shown in nongraphic flashbacks) that haunts Speed. When Speed is recruited by Royalton (Roger Allam), the smarmy owner of a race-car conglomerate, to drive for his company, he says no thanks. Furious, Royalton sics his thugs on Speed. The young hero then competes in two dangerous races in order to expose Royalton's corruption.

Aside from the harrowing race sequences, the movie contains gunplay and a couple of surprisingly intense fight scenes for a PG film, in which people are beaten. A bone covered with red meat is fed to a tankful of piranhas and then a man is forced to put his finger in the tank and screams (nothing shown). The script contains occasional crude and scatological language, mild sexual innuendo, toilet humor, beer drinking and a reference to hard liquor most kids won't catch ("rye").

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BEYOND THE RATINGS GAME

-- OK FOR KIDS 8 AND ODLER:

"Speed Racer" PG (NEW) -- Live actors toil inside a digital world in "Speed Racer." The movie looks like a neon-colored blend of comic book, cartoon and 3-D computer-animation, but the result is less than the sum of its parts. "Speed Racer" is long on technique, weak on story, way too long, and with high-velocity action sequences that thrill at first, then grow tedious. Thank goodness the first-rate cast is able to lend this convoluted tale a sense of meaning. Flaws noted, lots of kids 8 and older will probably be riveted to their seats anyway. Based on a 1967 Japanese comic book and animated TV series that ran on America TV, this adaptation is by the Wachowski Brothers, creators of the R-rated, far more convincing,"Matrix" trilogy. The young hero of the title, Speed Racer (Emile Hirsch), is the middle son in a close family. Pops (John Goodman) builds race cars. Mom (Susan Sarandon) lends support, as does his girlfriend Trixie (Christina Ricci). Speed's older brother Rex (Scott Porter) was a champion driver who died in an accident, shown in nongraphic flashbacks. When Speed turns down an offer to drive for a corrupt race-car conglomerate, the company's furious owner (Roger Allam) targets Speed for destruction and sends thugs after him. Speed then competes in two dangerous races in order to expose the industry's corruption. Aside from racing scenes, the film contains a few surprisingly intense fights for a PG, in which people are beaten. A meaty bone is fed to a tank of piranhas, then a man is forced to put his finger in the tank and screams. There is some crude language, mild sexual innuendo, beer, and a reference to hard liquor.

-- PG-13s OF VARYING INTENSITY:

"What Happens in Vegas" (NEW) -- Cameron Diaz and Ashton Kutcher smirk their way through this crass, irredeemable farce about polar opposites who find themselves accidentally sharing the same Las Vegas hotel suite. They get drunk, win a $3 million jackpot and wake up married. Back in New York, they try for an immediate divorce, but there's the question of who gets the money. The eccentric judge (Dennis Miller) requires them to live together for six months to try to make the marriage work. Jack (Kutcher) is a slovenly slacker and Joy (Diaz) is a chic, ambitious trader at the Stock Exchange. They share Jack's filthy flat and drive each other nuts, each trying to trick the other into violating the agreement. Can true love be far behind? The film includes midrange profanity, toilet and other crude humor, much sexual innuendo, a drug reference and drinking. Iffy for middle-schoolers.

"Made of Honor" (NEW) -- The repartee in this mildly amusing romantic-comedy-by-committee sparkles now and then, but not enough. And the crass humor inserted to gin up the laughs doesn't help. It is the tale of a rich, promiscuous cad named Tom (Patrick Dempsey) who realizes he's in love with his longtime platonic best friend Hannah (Michelle Monaghan) after she leaves New York on business and returns engaged to a Scotsman (Kevin McKidd). In hopes of winning her heart before she gives it away, Tom agrees to be the "maid of honor" at her Scottish wedding. Monaghan is hugely likable and Dempsey makes the swinish Tom seem almost sympathetic. The PG-13 reflects jokes about sex toys, verbal sexual innuendo, implied locker room nudity and penis-size jokes, some profanity, crude language and drinking. Not for middle-schoolers.

"Son of Rambow" (NEW; LIMITED RELEASE) -- Two preteen boys in 1980s England escape the unhappiness of their home lives by creating their own video sequel to "First Blood" (R, 1982) in this funny, unsentimental, visually inventive childhood fable. Fatherless Will Proudfoot (Bill Milner) lives with his mom (Jessica Stevenson) in a repressive religious community that allows no TV, movies or music. At his public school, Will must even leave class when they show a film. Lee Carter (Will Poulter), being raised by his brother, is the school troublemaker. He pulls naive Will into his sphere and lets him watch a bootleg copy of "First Blood." It changes Will's life. Already an artistic kid (his drawings add a rich touch of whimsy), Will becomes obsessed with making a sequel, "Son of Rambow." They work happily on the project, shooting hilarious stunts, until a French exchange student (Jules Sitruk) horns in. "Son of Rambow" contains some profanity, mild sexual innuendo, teens smoking and kissing, a bad accident, and an unsettling scene when kids throw stones at Lee. OK for teens.

"Iron Man" -- This superhero flick is smartly written, crisply acted and elegantly designed, with gasp-inducing action and dashes of intellectual and moral heft. True, the final face-off between robotic warriors is overlong and the villains -- jihadists -- seem a cheesy, if topical, choice. Yet the movie avoids outright jingoism. Robert Downey Jr. is super cool as weapons magnate Tony Stark, who is injured and held captive by jihadist insurgents in Afghanistan. A fellow captive (Shaun Toub) saves him by inserting a glowing electromagnetic device in his chest to keep shrapnel from entering his heart. The two men build a weaponized suit of robotic armor when their captors aren't looking and Tony dons it and escapes. Back in Malibu, he announces he will no longer sell weapons and will protect the innocent. This meets with resistance. He builds a new fighting suit capable of supersonic flight. The mayhem is thunderous, but nearly bloodless, though with point-blank shootings, images of surgery and implied torture. The film depicts Afghan families threatened at gunpoint and includes rare profanity, a nongraphic sexual situation, mild sexual innuendo and drinking. For teens who can handle war scenes.

"Baby Mama" -- Slightly bawdy, refreshingly off-center and often flawed, this uneven comedy will still delight many high-schoolers. Tina Fey plays Kate, an executive who is 37, single, and determined to have a baby. Told she can't, she purchases frozen sperm and hires a surrogate mother, Angie (Amy Poehler), an undereducated junk-food-aholic. They clash when Kate tries to clean up Angie's diet. With "Saturday Night Live" in their DNAs, Fey and Poehler play off each other expertly, and the supporting cast is great. But while "Baby Mama" shines when it spoofs class snobbery and gooey ideas about parenthood, it droops later on when sentimentality and cliches take over. There is midrange profanity, some R-ish sexual slang, toilet humor and drinking. A tad raunchy for middle-schoolers.

"The Forbidden Kingdom" -- Filled with gravity-defying martial arts, silly jokes, colorful sets and bad wigs, "The Forbidden Kingdom" showcases kung-fu action heroes Jackie Chan and Jet Li in a ripping yarn designed to bridge Eastern and Western tastes. The plot is often incomprehensible, but the movie is still a fun fantasy that teens and preteens will enjoy. The mayhem is stylized, and the blood minimal. Jason (Michael A. Angarano), a South Boston teen and martial arts film buff, is transfixed by a carved fighting staff in an old man's (Chan) shop. Local thugs rob and shoot the man and chase Jason. He falls off a building clutching the staff and lands magically in ancient China, where he meets a drunken fighter, Lu Yan (Chan again) and a Silent Monk (Jet Li), who engage in a great fight, then tutor him. The film has mild sexual innuendo, ethnic slurs, toilet humor and drinking.

"Prom Night" -- While we can celebrate the substitution of suspense for gore in this remake (the 1980 film, rated R, starred Jamie Lee Curtis), the new "Prom Night" feels just plain dumb. The way teen victims wander off so the psychopath can get them is ludicrously obvious, even for a slasher flick. High-school senior Donna (Brittany Snow) still has nightmares about the home invasion and murder of her family, which she barely escaped. As she and her pals go with their dates to the prom, the cop (Idris Elba) who caught the killer (Johnathon Schaech) learns he has escaped. Uh-oh. The film features stylized, nearly gore-free stabbings, sexual innuendo about spending prom night in a hotel, semi-crude sexual slang, the start of an understated sexual situation, teen drinking and rare profanity. Not for nightmare-prone teens.

-- R's:

"Redbelt" (NEW) -- High-schoolers who like martial arts sagas that hinge on questions of honor may find "Redbelt" unusual and gripping. But thanks to writer/director David Mamet, it is also tough to follow, and full of his unreal sounding dialogue. Chiwetel Ejiofor plays idealistic martial arts master Mike Terry, who runs a Los Angeles academy. An accidental gunshot (no injuries) fired by a distraught woman (Emily Mortimer) in his school starts a chain of events that becomes a Faustian test for Mike. He rescues a movie star (Tim Allen) in a bar fight, and the grateful actor offers Mike and his wife (Alice Braga) a chance to earn big money. But things turn sour and Mike may be forced to betray his ideals and fight on TV. The movie includes intense fight sequences, a suicide victim with a gunshot wound, strong profanity, drug references, drinking and smoking. OK for high-schoolers.

"Then She Found Me" (NEW; LIMITED RELEASE) -- Helen Hunt stars in and directs this bittersweet comedy, based on a novel by Elinor Lipman. April (Hunt), a 39-year-old school teacher, longs to be a mother, but her immature husband (Matthew Broderick) wants out of the marriage. Then her adoptive mother (Lynn Cohen) dies. As April's life seems to collapse, a popular TV personality Bernice (Bette Midler) contacts her to say that she is her birth mother and wants to reconnect. Utterly conflicted, April also finds herself falling for Frank (Colin Firth), the newly single father of one of her students. The narrative unfolds clumsily, but Hunt shows a sure hand with the actors, coaxing subtle performances that draw you in. There is strong language, steamy sexual situations and implied nudity, nothing especially graphic for the rating. OK for high-schoolers, but may bore them.

"Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay" -- The political satire in this semi-obscene frat-house romp has a very clever edge, so it's too bad the film limits its audience with such fatiguing lewdness. A sequel to "Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle" (R, 2004; one DVD version is unrated), this installment again spoofs and celebrates recreational drug use, and includes explicit sexual situations and language, frontal nudity, homophobic humor, strong profanity, ethnic slurs, and jokes about terrorism and incest. Success-motivated Harold (John Cho) and stoned-slacker Kumar (Kal Penn), the former of Korean and the latter of Indian descent, get arrested and racially profiled on a flight to Amsterdam after Kumar lights up a bong that looks like a bomb. A stupid Homeland Security agent (Rob Corddry) has them sent to Guantanamo Bay. They escape and party their way back. SO not for under 17s.