News

Selected mini-reviews, rated on a system of 0 to 4 stars, by Liam Lacey and Stephen Cole. Full reviews appeared on the dates indicated.

Antichrist

**

Lars von Trier's ambitious new provocation follows the story of a couple (Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg) attempting to recover from the death of their young son, and then spinning into madness in a cabin in the woods. Biblical references to the Fall and evocations of late medieval apocalyptic painting abound, and the wife's psychotic breakdown is triggered by her academic investigations into the tradition of Christian misogyny. After a disciplined, Bergmanesque, first hour, the film ratchets up the allegory and absurdity, with demonically possessed woodland animals, graphic violence (including genital mutilations) and an apocalyptic ending. The problem is that the hallucinations seem clumsy and the shock effects more numbing than disturbing; the film as a whole is an embarrassment of overreaching. R (Nov. 13) L.L.

The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day **

The inevitable sequel to the 1999, straight-to-video hit, The Boondock Saints. The McManus boys (Sean Patrick Flanery and Norman Reedus) are back in town (Boston), wreaking havoc with I-talians. Lots of Irish-Catholic malarkey and slow-mo death scenes. Think Tarantino with his brow lowered. Cast includes Billy Connolly, Dexter's Julie Benz and Peter Fonda speaking baby-I'm-a-want-you Italian. 14A (Nov. 13) S.C.

The Collector

**

Director Marcus Dunstan and co-writer Patrick Melton wrote the scripts for the last three Saw movies, and The Collector is very much in the same ruptured vein. A construction worker (Josh Stewart) turns cat burglar, but when he arrives at the rich folks' house, he discovers he has been beaten to the punch by a sadistic killer, who has booby-trapped the house and is busy doing nasty things to mom and dad. Fish hooks, sewed lips, acid on the floors and bear traps abound. Plotless and illogical as anything else in the so-called torture-porn genre, The Collector features decent execution(s), in a relatively accomplished life-of-slice thriller. 18A (Oct. 30) L.L.

An Education

****

Deceptive charm is both the subject and the method of An Education, a film directed by Denmark's Lone Scherfig and adapted by Nick Hornby (High Fidelity, About a Boy) from a memoir by British journalist Lynn Barber. In 1961 London, 16-year-old Jenny (radiant newcomer Carey Mulligan) is obsessed with all things French and bored with her school, hoping that a scholarship to Oxford will liberate her from her stultifying existence. Along comes a handsome, smooth, older man (Peter Sarsgaard) who gives her and her cello a ride home in the rain, and is soon squiring her to concerts and art auctions with his fashionable, dubious friends. Hornby's dialogue sparkles and the supporting performances by Alfred Molina and Cara Seymour as Jenny's status-obsessed parents and Olivia Williams and Emma Thompson as her teachers, are note perfect. Best of all though, is the way the film deals with Jenny's choices without falling into facile moral traps: Some lessons can't be learned from a text book. PG (Oct. 23) L.L.

Gentlemen Broncos

*

Jared Hess's new film harks back to the geeky absurdity of his 2005 success with Napoleon Dynamite in every way except the important one: Napoleon Dynamite was funny; the new movie is just odd and gross. A mopey Michael Angarano stars as Benjamin, a 17-year-old science-fiction writer whose sci-fi epic is plagiarized by a pompous author (Flight of the Conchords' Jemaine Clement). The movie includes competing film adaptations of Benjamin's ridiculous story, which feature Sam Rockwell, in different costumes, amidst cheesy home-made special effects. PG (Nov. 6) L.L.

I Hope They Serve Beer

in Hell

0

One part The Hangover, one part American Psycho, this is the movie of the book of one-time law student Tucker Max's account of his sex and alcohol adventures. The story sees the rascally Tucker (Matt Czuchry) persuading his friends to go on a dirty weekend in Texas. The humour consists largely of the boys insulting strippers, prostitutes and pretty much any women they meet who suggest they're a bunch of idiots. The comic climax is the part where the Mexican maid is left to clean up after Tucker's epic bout of diarrhea. 18A (Nov. 13) L.L.

The Men Who Stare at Goats

**

Grant Heslov directs this absurd military comedy about a secret psychic commando force in the U.S. military. George Clooney, Jeff Bridges and Kevin Spacey play former agents of a program in which soldiers trained to "remote view" the enemy, walk through walls and stare goats to death. Ewan McGregor plays a hapless journalist who discovers their secret world. Too often, the film feels self-congratulatory as Clooney, Bridges and Spacey work to out-do each other in deadpan lunacy and slapstick silliness, and the most chilling aspect lies outside the realm of the film: The script is based on real programs, chronicled in a book by journalist Jon Ronson. 14A (Nov. 6) L.L.

Pirate Radio

**

Writer-director Richard Curtis (Love Actually, Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill) misfires with this comedy about an off-shore pirate radio station broadcasting into Britain in the mid-sixties, a time when the U.K. government was still trying to keep the airwaves respectable. A good cast (Bill Nighy, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Kenneth Branagh) can't raise the humour above sub-Carry On-gang slapstick and pranks left over from Revenge of the Nerds. The soundtrack (the Stones, the Who, Hendrix etc.) is enjoyable if not exactly fresh: Once these musicians couldn't get on the radio; now we can't get them off. 14A (Nov. 13) L.L.

This Is It

**

A memorial/opportunistic cash-in, the documentary This Is It was compiled from footage of the late Michael Jackson rehearsing for his planned series of 50 concerts in London. Jackson looks very thin but is as exciting a singer and dancer as ever and it's poignant and often moving to see him work. That's not to say this salvage job qualifies as a revealing or insightful film. Director Kenny Ortega splices together multiple takes of Jackson performing his hit songs to construct a sort of simulation of the concerts he never gave (we also see original film footage that was to be used in the show), but this is less a concert than a dis-concert, overshadowed by Jackson's death and the absence of a real audience. The best scenes show the star's perfectionism as he works with dancers and musicians, which leads to a tricky question: Would such a perfectionist have wanted his rehearsals released to the public? PG (Oct. 29) L.L.