Boondock Saints 2:  All Saints Day is a typical sequel in that it’s not as good as the original (2000), which has become a cult film and which we watched on dvd.  It was really impressive, violent (but original about it), funny, and not a little ambivalent about how we’re supposed to feel about its vigilante “heroes.”  (Willem Dafoe is really, really fine, and nobody quite replaces him as the principal cop in 2—Julie Benz is OK, but she ain’t Willem.)  Anyhow, the sequel is not as blow-them-away fresh or funny, and the above-mentioned uncertainty about good-vs.-bad guys is missing.  The villains are pretty stock gangland types, for one thing.  There is some nice, malapropish dialogue, and the new third guy, played by Clifton Collins Jr. is good.  (Randy wrote this, but Joanne, ill , contributed over his shoulder and ordered him to rate it because she wasn’t up to snuff when we saw it.  **1/2  (11/24/09)     

(The) Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans is not exactly a remake of the 1992 Abel Ferrara film, which took place in New York and starred Harvey Keitel, and there seems to be some inconsistency about the title.  Whatever else this is, it’s a tremendous vehicle for Nicolas Cage, who plays a cop who hurt his back while rescuing the inmate of a prison in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.  (At least the film suggests this is how he hurt his back.)  This begins a long slide into drug dependency which he shares with his girlfriend, a high-priced call girl.  (Whether he is also her pimp is not entirely clear.)  Before you begin to feel too sorry for the guy, he wasn’t terribly nice before he hurt his back and started taking every drug in sight.  In fact, the movie is largely an exercise in how far the lieutenant can push the audience before they start walking out.  It’s got the same appeal as a bad wreck that way.  It also seems to end a few times before it actually does.  One female member of the audience kept laughing, but it was a nervous reaction.  Don’t worry about the dog, the iguanas are hallucinations, and an alligator dies in a car wreck and is mourned by its mate; the fate of the little boy’s fish is uncertain.  **  (11/22/09)

Planet 51 is a lot like the U.S. in the 50s except for the presence of a marooned astronaut, an initially cowardly, not very bright astronaut.  The inhabitants are green and the males don’t wear pants, but they firmly believe they know everything there is to know about their universe until a blond, blue-eyed well-built guy lands there and challenges a few willing-to-be-challenged residents.  This is Mexico’s first animated feature and it really tries, but doesn’t always succeed.  The conception of the astronaut (voiced by Wayne Johnson, formerly The Rock) is original and there are some inspired touches—the beginnings of the protest movement who chant “We are really upset” among them.  The film is intermittently witty and Randy liked the way it looked, although he eventually found that monotonous.  Joanne thought it looked good and was balanced on the 50s; she especially liked the probe Rover who makes friends with a native dog and dances to Gene Kelly’s famous number in Singin’ in the Rain (it rains rocks on Planet 51).  It also reminded her of Pleasantville.  **1/2  (11/21/09)

William Kuntsler: Disturbing the Universe is a documentary by the famous attorney’s daughters from his late second marriage.  Emily and Sarah were not born until after Kuntsler’s most famous work:  involvement with the Civil Rights Movement, defending the Catonsville Seven and the Chicago Seven, negotiating (and failing) at Attica, negotiating (and succeeding) at Wounded Knee, and are seeking to reconcile that man with the one who defended bombers, assassins, and the mob in his later life.  One thing that seemed to be apparent to Joanne from watching the film was that Kunstler was always seeking acceptance (fame, which his daughters do acknowledge as a motive, was important, but was not everything:  just watch him joining as the Indians sing), but that’s apparently something his daughters do not see.  Randy found it engaging moment to moment, appreciated being reminded of the history involved, and thought they found some interesting talking heads.  ****  (11/20/09)

The Messenger is wounded decorated Iraq War veteran Will Montgomery who has been assigned to work as part of a Casualty Notice Team as his enlistment winds down.  His boss in this detail is the by-his-version-of-the-book career soldier Woody Harrelson (who had to fight for this role as he is deemed “too hippie” to play a member of the military).  Randy thought the movie suffered from perhaps too much plot, but agreed with Joanne that the performances are certainly fine (and that New Jersey, where it was filmed in and around Fort Dix, looked good).  It’s a tough film and it will be interesting to see how it does with audiences.  The one Joanne and Randy saw it with seemed mesmerized by the end.  ****1/2  (11/15/09)

Pirate Radio is a fictionalized story of the rock and roll stations that provided Great Britain with its otherwise ignored music during the late 60s.  A first rate cast plays the group of men who wouldn’t have been able to stand each other under any other circumstances and includes Philip Seymour Hoffman as the one American.  Richard Curtis, who writes and directs, is highly manipulative, moving his audience (Joanne and Randy among them) from smiles to tears within minutes.  He is blessed with what has got to be one of the best ever soundtracks (and it doesn’t include the Beatles) but he also uses the songs carefully.  If there was nothing else to recommend this film (and there are lots of things that do), it would be worth seeing for Bill Nighy and his neckware, especially his embodiment of the word “languor.”   *****  (11/14/09)

Visual Acoustics: The Modernism of Julius Shulman  You may say you are not interested in this documentary about the work of photographer Julius Shulman and his influence on modernism in architecture, but Joanne and Randy dare you to see it and not be bored.  You will also learn a lot in a highly entertaining way.  The film is excellently researched, has good talking heads and uses them well, makes good use of moving pictures, and had the benefit of Shulman still being alive and working during its making (he died this past summer).  Joanne also notes that it was nice to see a largely positive (although the film does address the need for buildings to use the land carefully) documentary for a change.  *****  (11/10/09)

An Education  It’s 1961 and Jenny, who lives in suburban London, is spending all her time getting ready for the exams she (and her parents, particularly her father) hope will get her into Oxford.  She isn’t allowed to do anything that isn’t considered of use in reaching that goal, and, despite her own desire to go to university, she is beginning to wonder what kinds of life it will bring her as the examples of educated women in her life are not very inspiring.  Then she and her cello get caught in the rain and she meets David, a much older man leading a seemingly glamorous and free life which he’s willing to take her into.  Jenny, even though David has largely won over her parents, begins leading a kind of double life, one which raises the stakes of what she will do next even higher and confuses the issues even more.  Jenny, remember, turns 17 during the movie.  Much like the way we often assume that people we like share our political and social opinions, Jenny assumes that the people she meets through David (and David himself) are more interested in the kind of life she’s been aspiring to than they really are.  This is an unusual movie, drilling in as it does on the narrow story of Jenny, a truly complex character, as she tries to figure out what she wants and what it may be worth.  The things that could but don’t happen in this film are noteworthy and there’s little that’s predictable in the plot.  The performances are uniformly first rate, and Carey Mulligan, the dimpled beauty who plays Jenny, is a real discovery.  Emma Thompson seems right on track for playing Margaret Thatcher in the near future.  *****  (11/9/09)

The Men Who Stare at Goats is a movie that is worthy of its title.  It’s funny, witty, spot on about the Iraq War, and captures the “peace and love” 70s as well as they’ve ever been portrayed.  Ewan MacGregor and Jeff Bridges are excellent, Kevin Spacey is at his “detest him on sight” best, and small roles are well filled, especially by Stephen Lang and Robert Patrick.  Joanne and Randy differed on George Clooney:
Randy thought he was wasted, Joanne thought he was the perfect combination of off-the-wall and sad.  It is not a romantic role, Clooney-lovers be warned.  The movie will probably not be well served by the fact that it opened the day after the shootings at Fort Hood (large portions take place on an Army base), but the movie is never disrespectful toward enlisted men or even officers, just the people who make their decisions for them.  ***1/2  (11/7/09)

Law Abiding Citizen  If, like Joanne, you are having a hard time believing that good things still go on in the world, that somewhere people are falling in love, that phones ring with good news, and that there are things to look forward to, this movie may be for you.  Randy, who remains less cynical, had a harder time with it.  Jamie Foxx is a Philadelphia prosecutor more interested in protecting his high conviction rate than in pursuing justice; Gerard Butler is the man whose wife and daughter have been murdered.  Foxx decides to make a plea deal with the more guilty of the two men who committed the crime:  his partner will be executed, but he will be free in a few years.  Not surprisingly, this does not sit well with Butler’s character, a man with many hidden talents.  Fortunately, he is up again Foxx’s character, a man so arrogant that he cannot, even while the city explodes around him, accept any responsibility for his decision or admit that it might have been the wrong one.  He never does and Joanne found it very satisfying to detest him.  Still, while you can understand Butler’s character’s motives, you can’t applaud his actions, so you can’t actually root for him.  So there’s a real flaw in the plot.  Randy didn’t find enough surprises to hold his interests while enduring the grimness and he didn’t find it very believable.  Most of the violence is not seen, but that doesn’t help much.  It’s always nice to see Philadelphia, although it troubles Joanne that so little of it now seems familiar to her.  There are several nice supporting performances.  **  (11/2/09)