Archive for September, 2011

Margaret

Friday, September 30th, 2011

Genre: Drama

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 138

Language:

Director: Kenneth Lonergan

Plot: Margaret centers on a 17-year-old New York City high-school student who feels certain that she inadvertently played a role in a traffic accident that has claimed a woman’s life. In her attempts to set things right she meets with opposition at every step. Torn apart with frustration, she begins emotionally brutalizing her family, her friends, her teachers, and most of all, herself. She has been confronted quite unexpectedly with a basic truth: that her youthful ideals are on a collision course against the realities and compromises of the adult world.

 

Bunraku

Friday, September 30th, 2011

Genre: Action-Adventure

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 146

Language: English

Director: Guy Moshe

Plot: A mysterious drifter (Josh Hartnett) and an ardent young Japanese warrior Yoshi (Gackt) both arrive in a town that has been terrorized by outrageous and virulent criminals. Each is obsessed with his separate mission, and guided by the wisdom of The Bartender (Woody Harrelson) at the Horseless Horseman Saloon, the two eventually join forces to bring down the corrupt and contemptuous reign of Nicola (Ron Perlman), the awesomely evil “woodcutter” and his lady Alexandra (Demi Moore), a femme fatale with a secret past. This classic tale is re-vitalized and re-imagined in an entirely fresh visual context, set in a unique world that mixes skewed reality with shadow-play fantasy, a place where even the landscape can betray you. Heroes triumph here only because the force of their will transforms and transcends both space and time. The world of BUNRAKU is past and present, fantasy and reality, Samurai and Western all combined. Like SIN CITY and 300, it gives classic conflict a whole new graphically supercharged dynamic. Resonating through a wide range of cultures and showcasing a mind-blowing array of martial arts disciplines, BUNRAKU is a fresh arena for breathtaking fight action.

 

50/50

Friday, September 30th, 2011

Genre: Comedy

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 77

Language:

Director: Will Reiser

Plot: Inspired by personal experiences, 50/50 is an original story about friendship, love, survival and finding humor in unlikely places. Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Seth Rogen star as best friends whose lives are changed by a cancer diagnosis in this new comedy directed by Jonathan Levine from a script by Will Reiser.

50/50 is the story of a guy’s transformative and, yes, sometimes funny journey to health – drawing its emotional core from Will Reiser’s own experience with cancer and reminding us that friendship and love, no matter what bizarre turns they take, are the greatest healers.

 

Sahib Biwi aur Gangster

Friday, September 30th, 2011

Genre: Drama

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 140

Language: Hindi

Director: Tigmanshu Dhulia

Plot: Based in a small town in the Northern part of India, Sahib Biwi aur Gangster is a story packed with intrigue betrayal and ambition between a beautiful Begum, her Nawab husband and an ambitious young boy. The Nawab and his Begum, live in their ancestral royal house trying to maintain the status and structure their ancestors had left behind. But due to the changing time, some extreme financial conditions and the long gone habit of a royal having a mistress, the Nawab tries real hard to maintain his status and financial conditions.

 

Tucker and Dale vs. Evil

Friday, September 30th, 2011

Genre: Comedy

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 152

Language: English

Director: Eli Craig

Plot: Tucker (Firefly’s Alan Tudyk) and Dale (Tyler Labine of TV’s Reaper and the upcoming Rise of the Planet of the Apes) are two best friends on vacation at their dilapidated mountain house, who are mistaken for murderous backwoods hillbillies by a group of obnoxious, preppy college kids. When one of the students gets separated from her friends, the boys try to lend a hand, but as the misunderstanding grows, so does the body count.

 

Dream House

Friday, September 30th, 2011

Genre: Thriller

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 154

Language: English

Director: Jim Sheridan

Plot: Some say that all houses have memories. For one man, his home is the place he would kill to forget. Daniel Craig, Naomi Watts and Rachel Weisz star in Dream House, a suspense thriller about a family that unknowingly moves into a home where grisly murders were committed-only to find themselves the killer’s next target.

Successful publisher Will Atenton (Craig) quit a job in New York City to relocate his wife, Libby (Weisz) and two girls to a quaint New England town. But as they settle into their new life, they discover their perfect home was the murder scene of a mother and her children. And the entire city believes it was at the hands of the husband who survived.

When Will investigates the tragedy, his only lead comes from Ann Paterson (Watts), a neighbor who was close to the family that died.

 

Courageous

Friday, September 30th, 2011

Genre: Drama

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 140

Language: English

Director: Alex Kendrick

Plot: Four men, one calling: To serve and protect.

As law enforcement officers, Adam Mitchell, Nathan Hayes, and their partners aree confident and focused. They willingly stand up to the worst the streets have to offer. Yet at the end of the day, they face a challenge that none of them are truly prepared to tackle: fatherhood.

While they consistently give their best on the job, good enough seems to be all they can muster as dads. But they’re quickly discovering that their standard is missing the mark.

They know that God desires to turn the hearts of fathers to their children, but their children are beginning to drift further and further away from them. Will they be able to find a way to serve and protect those that are most dear to them?

When tragedy hits home, these men are left wrestling with their hopes, their fears, their faith, and their fathering. Can a newfound urgency help these dads draw closer to God – and to their children?

 

WHAT’S YOUR NUMBER?

Friday, September 30th, 2011

Genre: Comedy

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 152

Language: English

Director: Mark Mylod

Plot: Anna Faris is Ally Darling, who after reading a magazine article that leads her to believe she’s going to be forever alone, begins a wild search for the best “ex” of her life.

 

Anonymous

Friday, September 30th, 2011

Genre: Thriller

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 119

Language: English

Director: Roland Emmerich

Plot: Set in the political snake-pit of Elizabethan England, Anonymous speculates on an issue that has for centuries intrigued academics and brilliant minds ranging from Mark Twain and Charles Dickens to Henry James and Sigmund Freud, namely: who was the author of the plays credited to William Shakespeare? Experts have debated, books have been written, and scholars have devoted their lives to protecting or debunking theories surrounding the authorship of the most renowned works in English literature. Anonymous poses one possible answer, focusing on a time when cloak-and-dagger political intrigue, illicit romances in the Royal Court, and schemes of greedy nobles hungry for the power of the throne were exposed in the most unlikely of places: the London stage.

 

CONNECTED: AN AUTOBLOGOGRAPHY ABOUT LOVE, DEATH & TECHNOLOGY

Saturday, September 24th, 2011

Genre: Documentary

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 150

Language:

Director: Tiffany Shlain

Plot: Between texts and tweets, memes and microchips, we’ve become great at breaking the world down into byte-sized bits. In the process we’ve stopped seeing the forest for the trees, never mind the root system that connects them all. In Connected, Tiffany Shlain—award-winning filmmaker and founder of The Webby Awards–sets out to explore these bonds with the help of her father, acclaimed author and thinker Dr. Leonard Shlain. When the unexpected happens during the making of the film, Tiffany is forced to reexamine everything she thought she knew about life, relationships, and connectedness. Tracing interdependence through history, she discovers the surprising links between right brain and left; alphabets and power; honey bees and stress; hormones and happiness; technology and nature; progress and consequences; and parents and children. The result is a personal film with universal resonance that encourages viewers to make connections of their own. Offering an exhilarating stream-of-consciousness ride, Connected is a journey through the interconnectedness of humankind, nature, progress and morality at the dawn of the 21st century. For centuries we’ve been declaring independence. With insight, curiosity, and humor, this film asks if it’s time to declare our interdependence instead.

 

Moneyball

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Genre: Drama

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 153

Language: English

Director: Bennett Miller

Plot: The story of Oakland A’s manager Billy Beane and his successful attempt to put the club on a budget by using a computer to draft players.

 

Aturfrenz

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Genre: Drama

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 75

Language:

Director: Jeff Phillips

Plot: When depressed and withdrawn Catharine meets a secretive boy online, she begins to come out of her shell. But is he a suitor or a stalker, a friend or foe? The mystery of his existence fuels obsession, denial and deceit, sending her to the point of no return. In the midst of cliques, boyfriends, and digital drama, Catharine is trying to make sense of a world of uncertain identities. The film was inspired by the writer-director’s own experience parenting his teenage daughter in the world of cyberspace. “@urFRENZ” was made to serve as a talking point for the subject matter of bullying and cyberbullying, the number one hot button issue between parents and teens today.

 

Limelight

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Genre: Documentary

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 124

Language:

Director: Billy Corben

Plot: As the owner of legendary hotspots like Limelight, Tunnel, Palladium, and Club USA, Peter Gatien was the undisputed king of the 1980s New York City club scene. The eye-patch-sporting Ontario native built and oversaw a Manhattan empire that counted tens of thousands of patrons per night in its peak years, acting as a conduit for a culture that, for many, defined the image of an era in New York. Then years of legal battles and police pressure spearheaded by Mayor Giuliani’s determined crackdown on nightlife in the mid-’90s led to Gatien’s eventual deportation to Canada, and the shuttering of his glitzy kingdom.

Featuring insider interviews with famous players in the club scene as well as key informants in Gatien’s high-profile trial, Billy Corben’s (Cocaine Cowboys) exuberant documentary aims to set the record straight about Gatien’s life as it charts his rise and fall against the transformation of New York, offering a wild ride through a now-closed chapter in the history of the city’s nightlife.

 

The Man Nobody Knew: In Search of My Father, Cia Spymaster William Colby

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Genre: Documentary

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 142

Language:

Director: Carl Colby

Plot: THE MAN NOBODY KNEW: IN SEARCH OF MY FATHER, CIA SPYMASTER WILLIAM COLBY is a son’s riveting look at a father whose life seemed straight out of a spy thriller. Told by William Colby’s son Carl, the story is at once a probing history of the CIA, a personal memoir of a family living in clandestine shadows, and a most timely inquiry into the hard costs of a nation’s most cloaked actions. From the beginning of his career as an OSS officer parachuting into Nazi-occupied Europe, William Colby rose through the ranks of “The Company,” and soon was involved in covert operations in hot spots around the globe. He swayed elections against the Communists in Italy, oversaw the coup against President Diem in Saigon, and ran the controversial Phoenix Program in Vietnam, which influenced today’s legacy of counter-insurgency. But after decades of obediently taking on the White House’s toughest and dirtiest assignments, and rising to become Director of the CIA, Colby defied the President. Braving intense pressure, he revealed to Congress and the nation some of the agency’s darkest, most tightly held secrets and extra-legal operations. Now, his son asks a series of powerful and relevant questions about the father who was a ghost-like presence in the family home – and the intelligence officer who became a major force in American history, paving the way for today’s provocative questions about security and secrecy vs. liberty and morality. The film forges a fascinating mix of rare archival footage, never-before-seen photos, and interviews with the “who’s who” of American intelligence, including former National Security Advisers Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, former Secretary of Defense and Director of CIA James Schlesinger, as well as Pulitzer Prize journalists Bob Woodward, Seymour Hersh and Tim Weiner. Through it all, Carl Colby searches for an authentic portrait of the man who remained masked even to those who loved him most.

 

A Bird of the Air

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Genre: Comedy

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 130

Language:

Director: Margaret Whitton

Plot: A sassy parrot and a free-spirited librarian upend the well-ordered life of a solitary man.

Lyman (Jackson Hurst) is a loner, working the graveyard shift for the Courtesy Patrol. When a green parrot flies in to his trailer he becomes obsessed with finding its owner, which leads him to Fiona(Rachel Nichols). She has been eyeing Lyman from a distance and decides to help with his parrot search, whether he wants her to or not. Along with her basset hound, they set out on a quest to find the bird’s previous owners and Fiona begins to unravel the mysteries of Lyman’s past. But when Fiona joins Lyman on his nightly rounds, she witnesses a reality more intense than the romantic version she had envisioned.

 

Weekend

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Genre: Drama

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 138

Language:

Director: Andrew Haigh

Plot: One of the most significant discoveries of this year’s film festival circuit-WEEKEND is a delicate, revelatory drama that won the SXSW Emerging Visions Audience Award and Nashville Film Festival’s Grand Jury Prize.

Weekend follows Russell (newcomer Tom Cullen, Best Actor winner at Nashville), who, after randomly picking up artist Glen (Chris New) at a nightclub on a Friday night, unexpectedly spends most of the next 48 hours with him in bedrooms and bars, telling stories and having sex, while developing a connection that will resonate throughout their lives. This affecting and naturalistic romance is beautifully realized, earning comparisons to Richard Linklater’s Before Sunrise in its exploration of how two people can come together only briefly, yet impact each other in a profound way.

 

Saving Grace B. Jones

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Genre: Drama

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 135

Language: English

Director: Connie Stevens

Plot: In 1950’s era Missouri town the life of a couple is thrown into chaos when the husband’s sister is released from the local asylum and comes to live with the family.

 

Puncture

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Genre: Drama

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 108

Language: English

Director: Adam Kassen

Plot: Mike Weiss (Chris Evans) is a talented young Houston lawyer and a functioning drug addict. Paul Danziger (co-director Mark Kassen), his longtime friend and partner, is the straightlaced and responsible yin to Mike’s yang. Their mom-and-pop personal-injury law firm is getting by, but things really get interesting when they decide to take on a case involving Vicky (Vinessa Shaw), a local ER nurse, who is pricked by a contaminated needle on the job. As Weiss and Danziger dig deeper into the case, a health care and pharmaceutical conspiracy teeters on exposure and heavyweight attorneys move in on the defense. Out of their league but invested in their own principles, the mounting pressure of the case pushes the two underdog lawyers and their business to the breaking point.

Brothers and directors Mark and Adam Kassen bring this real-life story to the screen with all the urgency and passion of the subjects themselves. The result is an effective issue-driven drama that finds its footing in a contemporary David and Goliath story.

 

Mardi Gras

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Genre: Comedy

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 68

Language: English

Director: Phil Dornfeld

Plot: For three college guys, it’s senior year and the co-ed experience has left them high and dry. Their solution: A road trip to Mardi Gras, where beautiful babes are happy to lift their shirts and open containers are always welcome. But after dressing in drag, breaking into Carmen Electra’s hotel room, starring in a scandalous sex show and accidentally exploding a feces bomb in a swank hotel lobby, will the Mardi Gras magic kick in and their wildest fantasies come true?

 

The Double

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Genre: Drama

Release Year: 2011

Runtime: 144

Language: English

Director: Michael Brandt

Plot: In THE DOUBLE, the mysterious murder of a US senator bearing the distinctive trademark of the legendary Soviet assassin “Cassius,” forces Paul Shepherdson (Richard Gere), a retired CIA operative, to team with rookie FBI agent, Ben Geary (Topher Grace), to solve the crime.

Having spent his career chasing Cassius, Shepherdson is convinced his nemesis is long dead, but is pushed to take on the case by his former supervisor, Tom Highland (Martin Sheen). Meanwhile, Agent Geary, who wrote his Master’s thesis on Shepherdson’s pursuit of the Soviet killer, is certain that Cassius has resurfaced. As Shepherdson and Geary work their way through crimes both past and present, they discover that Cassius may not be the person they always thought him to be, forcing both to re-examine everything and everyone around them.