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click
here for the previous week's New Movies
click
here for 2009 OVERVIEW!
NEW
MOVIES! APRIL 7 - APRIL 13, 2009
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BEDTIME STORIES (dir: Adam
Shankman, PG) – Adam Sandler tries to recruit a slightly younger audience with this mostly useless effects-laden
comedy - redeemed slightly by the presence of Russell Brand, the funniest dude on Earth. |
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THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL (dir: Scott
Derrickson, PG-13) – If they gave Academy Awards for casting directors, I’d say the person who envisioned Keanu Reeves playing a monosyllabic alien ought to have a little something to show for their efforts. |
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DONKEY PUNCH (dir: Oliver Blackburn,
Unrated) – Take a boatload of the most despicable British youths imaginable, spice it up with some yucky sexual violence and you get this “refreshingly nasty” thriller. |
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DON'T LOOK DOWN (dir: Eliseo
Subiela, Unrated) – A young man in Buenos Aires suffers both the death of his father and a miserable existence earning money wearing a humiliating sandwich-board costume for a restaurant. Things turn around when his sexy older neighbor, Elvira, decides to experiment on him with the Kama Sutra. |
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DOUBT (dir: John Patrick
Shanley, PG-13) – Someone’s been fiddling with the alter boys and my money is on Meryl
Streep. |
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FAITH LIKE POTATOES (dir: Regardt van den
Bergh, PG) – A white Zambian farmer moves his family to a racially and politically tense part of South Africa in search of a better life. Based on some guy's autobiography, this is bound to be rather inspiring. |
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THE KITE (dir: Randa Chahal
Sabag, Not Rated) – When a girl turns fifteen, it means one thing. It's time for you to leave your beloved Lebanese village and get married to a stranger in Israel that your family picked out for you. |
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THE MOON AND THE STARS (dir: John Irvin, Not Rated) – In this whimsical romance, a British actor and his temperamental German co-star fall for one another while on location in Rome. |
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NOT EASILY BROKEN (dir: Bill Duke, PG-13) – I was about to make fun of this movie for being silly Christian propaganda but then I went on IMDB and it seems all the Christians on there don't think this movie is Christian enough. Apparently prayer is only talked about for roughly ten minutes. So, I guess if you're in search of some moderately Christian entertainment you could do worse. |
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OPERA JAWA (dir: Garin
Nugroho, Not Rated) – This is sort of the equivalent of DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES, if it
were set in a remote village on the island of Java in Indonesia. |
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PRAYING WITH LIOR (dir: Ilana
Trachtman, Not Rated) – I admit it, when I was a little kid I would get really mad when Corky on LIFE GOES ON would talk about being able to drive a car. Obviously because of his down syndrome, that was an impossibility. At least legally. Anyway, that doesn't really have anything to do with this nice documentary about a young disabled boy gearing up for his bar mitzvah. |
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[REC] (dir: Jaume Balaguero / Paco Plaza, Not Rated) – It's hard to admit, but I actually think this is inferior to its American remake, QUARANTINE. But maybe it's just because I love Jennifer Carpenter so much as the foul-mouthed sister on DEXTER. |
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THE SECRETS (dir: Avi
Nesher, Not Rated) – It obviously sucks to be a woman in the Orthodox Jewish community. You're not even allowed to sing. So these two chicks take to singing in secret. I think there might be some lesbian stuff to this as well. |
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SHUTTLE (dir: Edward Anderson, R) –
As proof that just about every scenario possible has been used in a horror movie, two young women board an airport shuttle
and soon find out they've actually been kidnapped by a madman. |
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1612 (dir: Vladimir
Khotinenko, Not Rated) – One time I was drinking this Austrian schnapps and I thought to myself about how far that schnapps had traveled to end up in my stomach and stuff got really heavy for a while. I guess you could have the same reaction to this Russian 300 rip-off. |
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SPECTACULAR! (dir: Robert
Iscove, Not Rated) –
It must be really lame to be young right now. In the 80s we had THE DARK CRYSTAL, THE NEVERENDING STORY,
E.T., STAR WARS and GHOSTBUSTERS. All
kids get now is whatever dreck Disney Channel or Nickelodeon Studios
wants to fill with Hannah Montana / Jonas Brothers robot clones. |
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THE TALE OF DESPEREAUX (dir: Sam Fell / Robert
Stevenhagen, G) – Matthew Broderick, perhaps drawing inspiration from his marriage to Sarah Jessica Parker, is a timid mouse who must learn to stand up for himself and slay the horrific beast that rules over his kingdom. |
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*TIMECRIMES (dir: Nacho
Vigalondo, R) – If you're like me, your top interests are time travel, serial killers and sharks. This Spanish thriller about a time-traveling serial killer hits 2 out of 3 marks quite nicely. |
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TOKYO ZOMBIE (dir: Sakichi Sato, Not Rated) – One positive way to look at the recession is that when the looming zombie apocalypse hits, it won't matter that that AIG jerk-face made off with your 401k to the Cayman Islands or where-ever. |
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VINYAN (dir: Fabrice Du
Welz, R) – The ageless Emmanuelle Beart and the increasingly creepy Rufus Sewall play a couple whose kid was swept away by that tsunami. Rather than deal with reality, they head off into the jungle to search
for their son and are attacked by a band of feral children. |
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YES MAN (dir: Peyton Reed, PG-13)
– Oh, Jim Carrey. You can't be very proud of this one. In fact, if you can list me 5 differences between this movie and LIAR LIAR, all will be forgiven. |
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= GREG's
pick of the week! ^ = Bart's
OUT OF LUCK THIS week! |