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JANE HORWITZ - FAMILY FILMGOER |
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``Happy Feet'' (PG, 1 hr., 38 min.) ``Casino Royale'' (PG-13, 2 hrs., 20 min.) Actor Daniel Craig's new James Bond is rough-edged and unapologetically violent. ``Casino Royale'' Bond, based on Ian Fleming's earliest novel (1953), posits what the agent might be like just as he earns his double-O status (licensed to kill) and before he has decided his martinis should be shaken, not stirred; he makes mistakes. The signature music isn't heard fully until the end credits and the gadget guru, Q (John Cleese in recent films) appears not at all, though Bond's boss, M (Judi Dench), still gives orders. The changes won't matter to high-schoolers. Taken on its own, ``Casino Royale'' is a half-hour too long, but still a crackerjack international thriller laced with realpolitik. (We see African guerrilla fighters, including child soldiers, financed by Westerners.) Bond faces down a financier to the world's terrorists (Mads Mikkelsen) in a high-stakes poker game, aiming to bankrupt him. A gorgeous (of course), chilly woman (Eva Green) from M's financial office tags along. Iffy for middle-schoolers, the movie shows bone-snapping fights, gunplay, a drowning, a poisoning, and a cobra-mongoose fight. One sour note is a prolonged torture scene in which it is strongly implied that a naked, captive Bond (shown seated, from the side) has his privates battered. There are also steamy, nongraphic love scenes, scantily clad women, and a bit of drinking. ``For Your Consideration'' (PG-13, 1 hr., 26 min.) (LIMITED RELEASE) This deliriously droll spoof of Hollywood silliness and self-delusion may be too inside-baseball for most teens and even a tad too lewd for middle-schoolers. Yet it could coax chuckles from high-schoolers drawn to stories of the inner workings of the film business. Director Christopher Guest likes to improvise parts of his films with his actor pals, such as Eugene Levy, who co-writes the scripted bits with him. They most recently gave us ``A Mighty Wind'' (PG-13, 2003), mocking pseudo-folk singers and ``Best in Show'' (PG-13, 2000), nipping at dog shows. In ``For Your Consideration'' we visit the set of a sentimental and seemingly awful little film-in-progress, about a Southern Jewish family in the 1940s. Suddenly a rumor floats that the actress playing the mom (Catherine O'Hara) may get an Oscar nod. The ``buzz'' spreads and she and her co-stars (chiefly Harry Shearer and Parker Posey) hit the talk shows. These characters are absurdly self-involved, yet so eager they're poignant. The movie contains sexual innuendo, crude sexual slang, profanity and drinking. ``Fast Food Nation'' (R, 1 hr., 46 min.) (LIMITED RELEASE) Budding environmental and social activists 17 and older will find plenty of ammo in this passionate, rambling, well-acted but grim screed about what goes into the fast-food burgers we scarf by the billions. According to director Richard Linklater's fictionalized adaptation of Eric Schlosser's nonfiction book, that includes cattle feces, due to speeded-up assembly lines in meat packing plants, the labor of workers -- many of them undocumented -- who risk severe bodily harm on the lines, and a culture that could care less. The film rather clumsily cuts between Greg Kinnear as a naive executive with a fast-food chain, illegal workers (chiefly Wilmer Valderrama and Catalina Sandino Moreno as young lovers) at a meat packing plant and a teen (Ashley Johnson) who works at a fast-food outlet. Aptly rated, ``Fast Food Nation'' shows a bloody montage of cattle being slaughtered and depicts an awful plant accident, graphic sexual situations, strong sexual innuendo, nudity, drug use, smoking and drinking. The dialogue, some in Spanish with subtitles, includes strong profanity. BEYOND THE RATINGS GAME -- 6 AND OLDER: ``The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause'' G (Bright colors and slapstick may divert kids from tacky sets, poorly attached elf ears, and a charmless, pseudo-sentimental script in this tired, shamelessly derivative sequel (to ``The Santa Clause,'' PG, 1994, which wasn't bad, and ``The Santa Clause 2,'' G, 2002, which was); now Scott (Tim Allen), the man who took up the Santa mantle 1994, is in his peak toy-making season, his new wife (Elizabeth Mitchell) very pregnant; he brings her parents (Alan Arkin and Ann-Margret) up to visit, but feels it necessary to hide the fact that he is Santa and they are at the North Pole; meanwhile Jack Frost (Martin Short -- droll, but unable to save the film) connives to make the visit so bad that Scott/Santa will quit. Under-6s may be scared when Jack Frost freezes people, or Mrs. Santa goes (gently) into labor; a flatulent reindeer.) -- 7 AND OLDER: ``Happy Feet'' PG (NEW) (Computer-animated fable starts out as a glorious, funny, penguin musical about diversity, then morphs into a scarier screed about human encroachment on their Antarctic habitat; despite a happy ending, it feels like two films; Mumble (voice of Elijah Wood), a fledgling Emperor penguin, doesn't have the singing voice, or ``heartsong,'' necessary to keep a mate; he tap dances instead (to ``motion-captured'' moves by dancer Savion Glover) and his colony rejects him; he makes Latino friends from an Adelie colony (led by Robin Williams as Ramon) who think he's cool; sad about losing the lovely Gloria (Brittany Murphy) at his home colony, he goes off to learn why the fish are dwindling and encounters humans. Scary bits include looming ships, fishing nets and debris, extra-scary scenes of leopard seals, killer whales, birds of prey bursting out of water or swooping down to get Mumble; also, a penguin nearly asphyxiates as a plastic 6-pack holder left by humans tightens on his neck. Too much for many kids under 7, some under 8.) ``Flushed Away'' PG (Enormously witty (many jokes only adults and/or Anglophiles will get) computer-animated fable mimics clay-mation style of ``Wallace & Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit'' (G, 2005) to tell of Roddy (voice of Hugh Jackman), a pampered pet mouse who gets flushed down the loo by a conniving London sewer rat (Shane Richie); Roddy finds a mini-London in the sewers, built by rodents and bugs from debris; he and a feisty mouse girl (Kate Winslet) take on a cabal of amphibians and rats (Ian McKellen as Toad, their leader), who plan to flood the sewer city. Mild toilet humor (a chocolate bar, partly in its wrapper, floats by; oozy brown slugs that shriek and sing); under-7s could be unnerved by chase scenes on sewer rapids and a tsunami-like flood; insults such as ``dipstick'' and ``get stuffed''; Roddy eats maggots that look like rice.) -- PG-13s: ``Casino Royale'' (NEW) (Daniel Craig is an arresting, rough-edged James Bond, newly licensed to kill, in crackerjack spy thriller (based on Ian Fleming's first Bond novel) that departs from some Bond traditions -- gadgetry, sly repartee -- which is OK, has interesting bits of realpolitik (guerrilla fighters in Africa), but is also long, violent; Bond's target is a banker (Mads Mikkelsen) to terrorists, whom he plans to bankrupt in a high-stakes poker game; a gorgeous money minder (Eva Green) from Bond's boss, M (Judi Dench), tags along. Bone-snapping fights, gunplay, a drowning, a poisoning, a cobra-mongoose pit fight; major sour note is a prolonged torture scene in which it is strongly implied that a naked, captive Bond (shown seated, from the side) has his privates battered -- topical, but tasteless in a Bond film; Bond has steamy, but nongraphic love scenes with scantily clad women; drinking. Iffy for middle-schoolers.) ``For Your Consideration'' (NEW; LIMITED RELEASE) (Hilarious, but very inside-baseball spoof of Hollywood from director Christopher Guest (``A Mighty Wind'' PG-13, 2003, ``Best in Show'' PG-13, 2000), with his usual band of comic actors; they are the cast, crew, director, writers, producers and agents (Catherine O'Hara, Harry Shearer, Parker Posey, Guest, Eugene Levy, many more) involved with the making of a corny film about a Southern Jewish family in the 1940s; a rumor that one of the obscure actors (O'Hara) may be up for an Oscar sets them all on funny, sad, delusional tangents. Sexual innuendo; crude sexual slang; profanity; drinking. High-school film buffs.) ``The Return'' (NEW) (A wan Sarah Michelle Gellar in visually arresting but narratively murky thriller (incoherence posing as arty impressionism) about unsettled young woman haunted by memory fragments, hallucinations hinting at a violent occurrence in her childhood she can't quite recall; she goes to a small Texas town, seeking answers; a local man (Peter O'Brien) sparks more memories. Shattering car crash with hurt child; two violent attacks against women, with strongly implied, if nonexplicit, attempted rapes; stalking; fist fights; a stabbing; heroine cuts herself when upset; muted love scene; drinking; rare profanity. Not for middle-schoolers.) ``Stranger Than Fiction'' (Utterly engaging, visually rich comic-romantic fantasy about wonkish IRS agent Howard Crick (Will Ferrell, ever a better actor) who starts hearing a narrator in his head and realizes he has become the protagonist in a novel-in-progress and that the writer intends to kill him off; adding delight are Dustin Hoffman delights as a quirky literary scholar, Emma Thompson as the chain-smoking, death-obsessed writer unaware her hero is ``real,'' and Maggie Gyllenhaal as the free-spirited cookie baker Howard loves. Passionate kissing, tossing off of outer garments, implied sexual tryst; middling profanity, crude humor; drinking; smoking; nonsexual rear nudity; two lethal car accidents; documentary footage of animals downed by predators. Literary teens 15 and up.) ``A Good Year'' (Cliched but pleasurable, postcard-pretty tale (directed by Ridley Scott from Peter Mayle's novel) about an arrogant London stock trader (Russell Crowe, fine as a romantic comedian, but also lending needed ballast to a slight story), who inherits a chateau and vineyard in France; inspecting the property, he flashes back to boyhood visits with his beloved uncle (wonderful Albert Finney; Freddy Highmore as the boy version of Crowe's hero); his arrogance softens, he falls in love (with Marion Cotillard). Much sophisticated, rarely crude sexual innuendo; passionate kissing, implied overnight tryst, subtle hints of undress; mild-to-midrange profanity; a child sips wine; adults drink, smoke cigars; cheap-shot portrayal of boorish American tourists. May interest high-schoolers.) -- R's: ``Fast Food Nation'' (NEW; LIMITED RELEASE) (Fictionalized adaptation of Eric Schlosser's nonfiction book proves a passionate, disturbing, well-acted, yet also grim and rambling, screed about what goes into the fast-food burgers we eat; Greg Kinnear as a fast-food executive looks into reports that his burgers are contaminated with cattle feces; we learn disturbing facts about the way meat packing plants are run; story follows undocumented Mexican workers (chiefly Wilmer Valderrama and Catalina Sandino Moreno) at a Colorado plant, a teen (Ashley Johnson) who works at a nearby fast-food restaurant and well-meaning but naive student activists. Bloody montage of cattle being slaughtered; workers badly hurt in plant accident; graphic sexual situations; strong sexual innuendo; nudity; drug use; smoking, drinking; profanity. Some dialogue in Spanish with subtitles. Socially conscious film buffs 17 and up.) ``Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan'' (Brilliant, subversive British comic Sacha Baron Cohen (famed as pseudo hip-hopper, Ali G) as another of his characters, supposed Kazakh TV personality Borat, on a tour of America; shot as cinema verite, with ordinary people largely caught unaware that the crude, sex-obsessed, viciously anti-Semitic, but puppyish Borat is not real. Tone is lewd, sexually explicit, misogynistic, bigoted, scatological, profane, often uncomfortable. Near-frontal nudity; jokes about rape; graphic sexual language in NC-17 range; likely to offend actual Kazakhs with its portrayal. No under-17s -- more for college kids into rude, whacked-out humor.) ``Babel'' (Deeply involving drama (though too long, with some plot threads less compelling than others) peels away degrees of separation between nationalities, world's richest and poorest in tale of linked crises sparked when a well-off California woman (Cate Blanchett) traveling in Morocco with her husband (Brad Pitt) is unintentionally shot by two boys playing with a rifle; ripple effect touches their housekeeper (Adriana Barraza) and little children in California, a Japanese father (Koji Ykusho) and daughter (Rinko Kikuchi) in Tokyo. Frontal nudity; explicit sexuality; explicit scene of a young boy masturbating (he is clothed, his actions implied); in a separate scene, he spies on his sister as she undresses -- nothing seen; shootings; beatings; drug use; profanity. Buffs 17 and up.)
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