Thursday, July 29, 2010

New This Week:

Clash of the Titans
When Hades, the god of the underworld, takes his family, Perseus embarks on a mission to defeat him before he can seize ultimate power and unleash hell on earth.

Ghost Writer
When a gifted ghostwriter is hired to write the memoirs of former British Prime Minister Adam Lang, he quickly finds himself trapped in a web of political and sexual intrigue. Lang is implicated in a scandal over his administration's harsh tactics, and as the ghostwriter digs into the politician's past, he discovers secrets that threaten to jeopardize international relations forever.

Kick-Ass
Ordinary teenager and rabid comic-book geek Dave Lizewski captures the imagination of the public when he becomes the no-nonsense vigilante, Kick-Ass. After he teams up with the fearless father-daughter crime-fighting duo, Big Daddy and Hit-Girl, the three work together to take down the criminal empire of local Mafioso Frank D'Amico. But when D'Amico's son Chris is reborn as Red Mist, the showdown between the forces of good and evil will force Kick-Ass to live up to his name, or die trying.

North Face (German)
Based on a true story, a gripping adventure about a competition to climb the most dangerous rock face in the Alps, the north face of the Eiger. Set in 1936, Nazi propaganda urges German alpinists to conquer the mountain, and two reluctant young climbers, Toni and Andi, attempt a daring ascent, closely followed by two Austrian climbers. All goes well at first, but then the climbers lose their advantage over the mountain and the race against time and forces of nature begins.

Prophet (French)
Malik el Djebena, who is condemned to six years in prison, cannot read or write, but soon figures out the politics of the prison. Though Malik is only 19-years-old, the leader of the Corsican gang who rules the prison corners him and gives him certain 'missions' to carry out. He quickly gains the confidence of the gang leader, as these assignments begin to toughen him up. But Malik soon develops some plans of his own.

Tudors
King Henry VIII: young, sexy and the most powerful man in the world. The throne and the entire world became his at age 19. This television series reveals the early years of the passionate, vibrant and scandalous man who forever changed the course of history.

Unthinkable
An FBI agent and a Special Operations interrogator must force a terrorist suspect to divulge the locations of three nuclear weapons that are set to detonate somewhere in the United States.

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

What I've been watching: The Road

Cormac McCarthy’s The Road is an amazing piece of fiction. How he was able to make a story of a man and a boy walking across a post-apocalyptic, desolate earth and make it interesting says a lot about his skill as a writer. In the film, the director has succeeded in creating the same fascination, the same empathy as the book. This one is definitely a winner, but keep your handkerchief handy.

New This Week:

Chloe
Catherine is suspicious that her husband David is having an affair, and hires Chloe, an alluring young escort to test his fidelity. Their arranged weekly meeting allows Catherine to hear the explicit details of the encounters Chloe has with David. As Catherine becomes caught up in a web of sexual desire herself, she begins a journey that will put her family in grave danger. Is it too late to stop Chloe? The Toronto Globe and Mail says: “Chloe is director Atom Egoyan’s foray into the realm of what might be called artful trash. This is a high-toned erotic thriller, handled with style and some emotionally raw scenes, aiming for an effect that’s pleasingly unnerving, if not outright arousing.”

Cop Out
Two longtime NYPD partners on the trail of a stolen, rare, mint-condition baseball card find themselves up against a merciless, memorabilia-obsessed gangster. Jimmy is the veteran detective whose missing collectible is his only hope to pay for his daughter's upcoming wedding, and Paul is his 'partner-against-crime' whose preoccupation with his wife's alleged infidelity makes it hard for him to keep his eye on the ball. The Arizona Republic says: “A movie that makes little sense, is dumb when it's not being stupid and yet is still at times laugh-out-loud funny.”

The Runaways
With the success of their all-girl teenage rock band The Runaways, Joan Jett and Cherie Currie's friendship begins to unwind after Currie decides to leave the group. “The Runaways isn't just about rock 'n' roll; it IS rock 'n' roll, as loud, sexy, sometimes sloppy and ultimately exhilarating as the music can be.”—St. Petersburg Times

Thursday, July 15, 2010

New this week:

Bounty Hunter
Milo, a down-on-his-luck bounty hunter, gets his dream job when he is assigned to track down his bail-jumping ex-wife, reporter Nicole. He thinks it's an easy payday, until she gives him the slip to chase a lead on a murder cover-up. Milo soon realizes that nothing is ever simple with him and Nicole. As the two continue to one-up each other, they find themselves on the run for their lives. If they thought their promise to love, honor, and obey was tough, staying alive will be a lot tougher!

Brooklyn’s Finest
After having endured extremely different career paths, the lives of three disheartened Brooklyn police officers will collide with destiny when they all wind up at the same fatal crime scene.

Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Forty years ago, Harriet Vanger disappeared from a family gathering on the island owned and inhabited by the powerful Vanger clan. Her body was never found and her beloved uncle is convinced she was murdered and that the killer is a member of his own tightly knit but dysfunctional family. He employs disgraced investigative journalist Mickael Blomkvist and the tattooed and troubled yet resourceful computer hacker Lisbeth Salander to investigate.

Greenberg
Roger Greenberg is single, fortyish and deliberately doing nothing. In search of a place to restart his life, he agrees to housesit for his brother in LA and tries to reconnect with his former bandmate and successful ex-girlfriend. But old friends aren't necessarily still best friends, and Greenberg soon finds himself forging a connection with his brother's personal assistant, Florence. Greenberg has come to realize that he may at last have found a reason to be happy.

Jennie: Lady Randolph Churchill
Lee Remick stars as Jennie Jerome, born in the United States in 1845, who eventually became Lady Randolph Churchill, and gave birth to Sir Winston Churchill in this seven-part, seven-hour biographical mini-series.

A Single Man
After the death of his longtime partner, a British college professor in Los Angeles struggles to find meaning in his life. As he dwells in the past, he begins to contemplate suicide. A series of events and encounters will lead him to question if there really is a meaning to his life after all.