“Becoming Jane” centers on a love affair British novelist Jane Austen (Anne Hathaway) began as a 20-year-old — with brilliant, roguish Irishman Tom Lefroy — that inspired her career as one of the world’s great romantic writers. The movie also looks at how the writer’s relationship with Lefroy helped create the male characters in “Pride & Prejudice.”
STARRING: Anne Hathaway, James McAvoy, Maggie Smith, Julie Walters
DIRECTOR: Julian Jarrold
STUDIO: Miramax
RATING: PG-13 (For brief nudity and mild language)
The first film of its kind to chronicle the reasons behind Iraq’s descent into guerilla war, warlord rule, criminality and anarchy, NO END IN SIGHT is a jaw-dropping, insider’s tale of wholesale incompetence, recklessness and venality. Based on over 200 hours of footage, the film provides a candid retelling of the events following the fall of Baghdad in 2003 by high ranking officials such as former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, Ambassador Barbara Bodine (in charge of Baghdad during the Spring of 2003), Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, former Chief of Staff to Colin Powell, and General Jay Garner (in charge of the occupation of Iraq through May 2003), as well as Iraqi civilians, American soldiers and prominent analysts. NO END IN SIGHT examines the manner in which the principal errors of U.S. policy - the use of insufficient troop levels, allowing the looting of Baghdad, the purging of professionals from the Iraqi government and the disbanding of the Iraqi military - largely created the insurgency and chaos that engulf Iraq today.
No End In Sight - Movie Trailer - Bush Admin and Iraq
“I Know Who Killed Me” - Lindsay Lohan, who if she doesn’t watch out, in real life, with her unacceptable partying, will know who kills her (herself), plays Aubrey, the young daughter of affluent parents who is abducted and mutilated by a sadistic serial killer. She manages to escape, sans a hand and a leg and lots of blood. The girl who regains consciousness in the hospital claims to be not Aubrey but Dakota - identical to Aubrey, but with a much different demeanor. Dakota struggles to convince anyone that she is not Aubrey and finds herself in a desperate race to save Aubrey’s life and her own against overwhelming odds.
STARRING: Lindsay Lohan, Julia Ormond, Neal McDonough, Brian Geraghty, Garcelle Beauvais-Nilon, Spencer Garrett, Gregory Itzin
DIRECTOR: Chris Sivertson
STUDIO: Columbia Pictures
RATING: PG-13 (For language, violence and teen situations involving drugs and alcohol)
“No Reservations” - Master chef Kate Armstrong (Catherine Zeta-Jones) lives her life like she runs her kitchen at a trendy Manhattan eatery-with a no-nonsense intensity that both captivates and intimidates everyone around her. Kate’s perfectionist nature is put to the test when she “inherits” her nine-year-old niece Zoe (Abigail Breslin), while contending with a brash new sous-chef who joins her staff. High-spirited and freewheeling, Nick Palmer (Aaron Eckhart) couldn’t be more different from Kate, yet the chemistry between them is undeniable. Rivalry becomes romance, but Kate will have to learn to express herself beyond the realm of her kitchen if she wants to connect with Zoe and find true happiness with Nick.
STARRING: Catherine Zeta-Jones, Aaron Eckhart, Abigail Breslin, Patricia Clarkson, Jenny Wade, Lily Rabe
DIRECTOR: Scott Hicks
STUDIO: Warner Bros.
RATING: PG (For some sensuality and language)
When a rap mogul from Atlanta tries to join a conservative country club in the Carolinas he runs into fierce opposition from the board President - but it’s nothing that he and his entourage can’t handle. Did we mention that we love Sherri Shepherd? Remember her as Robert’s partner on “Everybody Loves Raymond?” And as a recurring guest host on The View? She’s fat, black, sasssy and beautiful!
STARRING: Big Boi, Jeffrey Jones, Susan Ward, Sherri Shepherd
DIRECTOR: Don Michael Paul
STUDIO: MGM
RATING: PG-13 (For crude and sexual content, some nudity, language and drug material)
22-year-old Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, also known as Molière, is not yet the writer that history recognizes as the father & true master of comic satire, author of “the Misanthrope and Tartuffe, and a dramatist to rank alongside Shakespeare & Sophocles. Far from it. He is in fact, a failed actor.
His Illustrious Theatre Troupe, founded the previous year, is bankrupt. Hounded by creditors, Molière is thrown into jail, released, then swiftly imprisoned again. When the jailors finally let him go, he disappears. The combined efforts of historians have unearthed no trace of him before his reappearance, several months later, when his troupe begins touring the provinces - a tour that will last for thirteen years, and culminate in Molière’s triumphant return to Paris in 1658. But what happened to Molière during these mysterious lost months?
Molière, we discover, has been released from prison by a wealthy bourgeois, Monsieur Jourdain, who settled the young actor’s debts on the understanding that he will teach him the craft of the stage. Hungry for recognition, Jourdain is infatuated with the lovely but poisonous Célimene, whose salon gathers together suitors & great wits.
But the affair must remain secret, kept at all costs from Jourdain’s wife, Elmire, a wonderful woman with whom Molière himself will fall headlong in love. Unfortunately for him, Jourdain has presented Molière as Monsieur Tartuffe, an austere private tutor, to justify his presence. Elmire has nothing but the harshest words for this holier-than-thou figure who has invaded her home. Trapped in this untenable situation, Molière will experience all manner of events that will open his eyes and his mind, both to life itself and to his work as an artist. It is from the heart of this tale, and from his passion for Elmire, that Molière the great dramatist is born.
Boasting an extraordinary cast (Romain Duris The Beat My Heart Skipped; Ludivine Sagnier Swimming Pool, 8 Women; Laura Morante The Son’s Room; Edouard Baer L’Appartement) sumptuous production values and a witty and sophisticated script in the tradition of Shakespeare In Love, director Laurent Tirard’s romantic period drama reveals the tantalizing mystery behind the birth of France’s greatest dramatist.
STARRING: Romain Duris, Fabrice Luchini, Laura Morante, Edouard Baer, Ludivine Sagnier, Fanny Valette
DIRECTOR: Laurent Tirard
STUDIO: Sony Classics
RATING: PG-13 (For some sexual content)
It’s 1983 and school is out. Twelve-year-old Shaun is a lonely boy growing up in a grim coastal town in northern England, whose father died fighting in the Falklands War. Over the course of the summer holiday he befriends a group of local skinheads. With his pent-up rage and frustration, Shaun finds exactly what he needs in the gang — mischief, mayhem and brotherhood. He also meets the volatile and boorish Combo, an older skinhead who sees himself in Shaun. Adopting Shaun as his protégé, Combo leads the gang down a hate spewing path that culminates in an explosion never seen before.
“This Is England” is set in early eighties England; a world of popular TV character Roland Rat, aerobics, the TV show Blockbusters, Margaret Thatcher, the Falklands crisis, racial unease, and skinheads. Drawing heavily from his own experiences growing up, Shane Meadows has created a portrait of an often-overlooked moment in cultural history. Against the backdrop of the skinhead scene in a deadbeat coastal town, we witness this traumatic rite of passage, both on a cultural and personal level, through the eyes of a twelve-year-old boy.
STARRING: Joseph Gilgun, Stephen Graham, Kieran Hardcastle, Frank Harper, Jo Hartley, Vicky McClure, George Newton, Jack O’Connell, Andrew Shim, Thomas Turgoose
DIRECTOR: Shane Meadows
STUDIO: IFC Films
RATING: Unrated
“Goya’s Ghosts” - Spain 1792 - the Catholic Church is at the height of its powers. The revolution has sent neighbouring France into turmoil and the Spanish church decides to restore order by bringing back the dreaded Inquisition. Spearheading this movement is the enigmatic and cunning priest Lorenzo, a man who seeks power above all.
Lorenzo’s friend is Francisco Goya, Spain’s most famous artist and portraitist to kings and queens. When his beautiful model Ines is unjustly imprisoned and tortured by the Inquisition their friendship is put to a test as Goya begs Lorenzo to spare the poor girl’s life.
With the torture-ravaged Ines’ life in his hands, he rapes her and leaves her to rot in hidden dungeons.
Almost two decades later, just before the French armies invade Spain, Goya is a different man. Having lost his hearing entirely, he has become a dark, disturbed man, almost a ghost of himself. But it is now that he has entered his most famous creative period.
Lorenzo, having been banished by the Spanish church, fled to France, only to return in a new guise as chief prosecutor for Napoleon’s regime. Now he can take revenge on the very men that threw him out of Spain - he relishes the opportunity to persecute his old allies of the Spanish Inquisition.
When the French abolish the Inquisition, all its prisoners are set free. Ines, the once beautiful figure of Goya’s paintings and dreams, emerges from prison not only having lost her youth but also to find her once powerful family slaughtered in their own home.
The only person she has left in this world now is the mad, old Goya.
He becomes her protector and she reveals that she gave birth to a girl during her imprisonment.
When Goya discovers Alicia, Ines’ daughter, working as a prostitute, he confronts Lorenzo who finally admits having raped Ines and being the father of her child. But mother and daughter are still far from being reunited.
The power map of Europe continues its seismic changes as Spain is once again thrown into chaos when Wellington’s powerful army invades to restore Spanish rule. Lorenzo finds himself in desperate need of a new ally of faces a gruesome death sentence.
It is mayhem on the streets of Madrid and Goya continues his desperate struggle to reunite mother and daughter. Lorenzo will stop at nothing to save himself and keep secret the child that haunts him…”
STARRING: Javier Bardem, Natalie Portman, Stellan Skarsgård
DIRECTOR: Milos Forman
STUDIO: Samuel Goldwyn Films
RATING: R (For violence, disturbing images, some sexual content and nudity)
“Sunshine” - Fifty years from now, the sun is dying, and mankind is dying with it. Our last hope: a spaceship and a crew of eight men and women. They carry a device which will breathe new life into the star. But deep into their voyage, out of radio contact with Earth, their mission is starting to unravel. There is an accident, a fatal mistake, and a distress beacon from a spaceship that disappeared seven years earlier. Soon the crew is fighting not only for their lives, but their sanity. For trivia fans, director Danny Boyle made a splash across the universe over a decade ago with the film “Trainspotting.”
STARRING: Rose Byrne, Cliff Curtis, Chris Evans, Troy Garity, Cillian Murphy, Hiroyuki Sanada, Benedict Wong, Michelle Yeoh
DIRECTOR: Danny Boyle
STUDIO: Fox Searchlight
RATING: R (For violence, language, drug use and sexual situations)
Adam Sandler and Kevin James (TV’s “The King of Queens”) team as two straight guys who stumble down the aisle with the best of intentions in “I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry.” Chuck Ford (Sandler) and Larry Allensworth (James) are the pride of their fire station: two guy’s guys always side-by-side and willing to do anything for each other. Salt-of-the-earth widower Larry wants just one thing: to protect his family. His buddy Chuck also wants one thing: to enjoy the single life. Grateful Chuck owes Larry for saving his life in a fire, and Larry calls in that favor big time when civic red tape prevents him from naming his own two kids as his life insurance beneficiaries. All that Chuck has to do is claim to be Larry’s domestic partner on some city forms. Easy. Nobody will ever know. But when an overzealous, spot-checking bureaucrat becomes suspicious, the new couple’s arrangement becomes a citywide issue and goes from confidential to front-page news. Forced to improvise as love-struck newlyweds, Chuck and Larry must now fumble through a hilarious charade of domestic bliss under one roof. After surviving their mandatory honeymoon and dodging the threat of exposure, the well-intentioned con men discover that sticking together in your time of need is what truly makes a family - “I Now Pronounce You Chuck And Larry.”
STARRING: Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Jessica Biel, Ving Rhames, Steve Buscemi, Dan Aykroyd
DIRECTOR: Dennis Dugan
STUDIO: Universal Pictures
RATING: PG-13 (For adult situations, language)
