http://www.catholicmoviereviews.orgCatholic Movie Reviews60
In a galaxy far, far away little green aliens are living in a "Happy Days"-style suburbia, complete with white picket fences, backyard barbecues, tea parties, dogs chasing mailmen, teen angst, comic books and muscle cars with chrome fins. Adding spice to this innocent world is the local drive-in, showing the latest horror movie where one-eyed monsters called "Humaniacs" launch an invasion and turn everyone into zombies.

It's good clean fun—until a real "alien" drops from the sky in a NASA capsule, and all heck breaks loose.

Enter one unsuspecting and overconfident astronaut, Captain Charles "Chuck" Baker (voice of "The Rock," Dwayne Johnson), and you have a classic fish-out-of-water tale. Chuck befriends Lem (voice of Justin Long), a shy nerdy kid who dreams of other worlds in his job at the planetarium, while pining for the comely Neera (voice of Jessica Biel).

The story shifts to chase-movie mode as Lem and his friends scramble to help this E.T. return home by escaping the clutches of evil Gen. Grawl (voice of Gary Oldman) and his mad-scientist ally, Professor Kipple (voice of John Cleese). Together they run Base 9, the top-secret "Area 51"-type facility where alien ephemera is housed.

Viewers will enjoy the many clever references to sci-fi classics like "Star Wars" and "War of the Worlds."

Practically stealing the movie (and owing a lot to "Wall-E") is Rover, Chuck's robot companion, who lives up to his name, bouncing about like man's best friend. True to his programming, Rover ignores all alien life in search of rock samples. On Planet 51, it rains "rocks and dogs," and amid a shower of pebbles Rover has a hilarious "Singing in the Rain" moment worthy of Gene Kelly.

The first feature of Ilion Animation Studios, based in Spain, and directed by Jorge Blanco, Javier Abad, and Marcos Martinez, "Planet 51" is a funny, fast-paced, and colorfully rendered movie worthy of Pixar status. The screenplay by Joe Stillman ("Shrek" and "Shrek 2") is laden with sight gags and witty one-liners.

"Planet 51" features positive life lessons about friendship, loyalty, and acceptance of others. Chuck comes to realize that having the "right stuff" means risking everything to help a stranger in need. And he tells Lem, "Don't be afraid of the unknown. It's not something to be afraid of. It can be your best friend."

Apart from one unfortunate sexual joke ("That's a funny place for an antenna") and some mildly suggestive humor, this is a wholesome and fun film that can be enjoyed by the entire family.

The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-I—general patronage. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG—parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.

*****
McAleer is a guest reviewer for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Office for Film & Broadcasting. ]]>Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:00:00 ESTThe Blind Side: Evolution of a Game, and here adapted for the screen.

The Christian academy in question is the meeting place of homeless, solitary and emotionally shell-shocked black teen Michael Oher (appealing newcomer Quinton Aaron) and two fellow students—white children of privilege Collins (Lily Collins) and S.J. (Jae Head) Tuohy— whose family is destined to transform his life and to be, in turn, transformed by him.

This seemingly unlikely scenario comes about thanks to the impulsive compassion of the Tuohy children's feisty mother, Leigh Anne (Sandra Bullock). Spotting Michael wandering the streets on a winter night dressed only in shorts and a T-shirt, no-nonsense Leigh Anne— whose motivations throughout are shown to be explicitly religious—bundles him into the family car and, with the quiet support of admiring hubby Sean (Tim McGraw), offers him the living room couch for the night.

As this arrangement becomes more permanent—and Michael becomes an increasingly integral part of the Tuohy clan—socialite Leigh Anne, a successful interior decorator, discovers both the latent prejudices of the ladies with whom she lunches and the grim realities of life in Michael's home neighborhood, an area appropriately known as Hurt Village that, although just across town, has previously been terra incognita to her.

Michael's original admission to his otherwise all-white private school was based on a coach's (Ray McKinnon) perception of his football potential. (As Bullock's opening narration makes clear, Michael has the perfect build to play left tackle, a key position charged with defending a right-handed quarterback from being sacked from his blind side.).

But Michael's education has been so woefully neglected that his grades are far below the requisite average that would allow him to join the team. So his adoptive kin set to work, helping Michael to hone his on-field skills while also hiring determined tutor Miss Sue (Kathy Bates) to raise his academic standing.

Driven by Bullock's field-sweeping performance, writer-director John Lee Hancock's unapologetically Christian tale of human solidarity across racial and class divides—though restricted to adult and, perhaps, mature teen audiences by the elements listed below—is funny, shrewd and ultimately uplifting.

The film contains brief nongraphic marital lovemaking, at least one profanity, a few sexual and drug references, and a half-dozen crass terms. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-III—adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13—parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

*****
 Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. ]]>Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:00:00 EST
After being expelled from school, rebellious teen Carl (Tom Sturridge) is sent by his glamorous mother, Elenore (January Jones), to live with Quentin (Bill Nighy), a friend from her past who has converted an oil tanker anchored in the North Sea into an offshore radio station broadcasting the rock 'n' roll music that the government-sponsored BBC will not.
(While Quentin's operation is fictional, several such facilities did exist at the time.)

As Quentin's staff of eccentric disc jockeys—including, most prominently, a shaggy-haired American expatriate known as the Count (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and his celebrated native rival Gavin (Rhys Ifans)—battles uptight bureaucrat Dormandy's (Kenneth Branagh) efforts to shut them down, Carl wins the record spinners' acceptance and pursues romance with fetching shipboard visitor Marianne (Talulah Riley).

With characters slipping into and out of each other's cabins, and boatloads of groupies being brought from shore on a regular basis for casual sex, physical combinations range from the premarital—Carl's determination to lose his virginity is aided and applauded by his new friends -- to the multiple, as we see one DJ happily slipping off with two enthusiastic female fans.

Even the ship's lesbian cook, Felicity (Katherine Parkinson), eventually finds a partner, much to her fellow characters' delight.

The film contains a benign view of casual, group and gay sex and of drug and condom use, brief rear nudity, a pornographic image, some irreverent and sexual humor, a couple of profanities and at least 20 uses of the F-word. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is O—morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R—restricted; under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

*****
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Fri, 13 Nov 2009 08:00:00 EST
Emmerich has built his career on ravaging the globe in popular films like "Independence Day," "Godzilla" and "The Day After Tomorrow." Here, mankind is not at fault; instead, doomsday stems from an act of nature -- increased solar activity and the alignment of the planets -- that results in the overheating of the earth's core and displacement of its crust. As the Mayans supposedly anticipated, these events reach critical mass on the winter solstice: 12/21/2012.

The audience is asked to take heart since the end-of-days scenario brings out the best in two particular individuals. White House geologist Adrian Helmsley (Chiwetel Ejiofor) has been working with the scientific community and governments to predict the crisis and shape a response that includes an international plan to evacuate 400,000 fortunate souls. Exactly how they'll be spared has definite biblical overtones.

Divorced science-fiction writer Jackson Curtis (John Cusack), who has pondered this eventuality in a largely ignored book, happens to be camping with his two children in Yosemite, an epicenter of the catastrophe. He and his family are perfectly positioned to witness California falling into the sea and Las Vegas being torn asunder.

Back in the nation's capital, President Thomas Wilson (Danny Glover) chooses to act selflessly before the White House is flattened by an aircraft carrier and the Washington Monument topples onto innocent citizens. The Himalayas then become the plot's focal point as floodwaters reach the top of the earth.

Along with false solemnity, the script is sprinkled with intermittently successful gallows humor. More often, though, hokey lines and corny cliches trigger unintended laughter, and the acting is predictably bad. Only Woody Harrelson, playing a pickle-eating radio prophet named Charlie Frost, and Oliver Platt, portraying cynical presidential aide Carl Anheuser, embrace the apocalyptic absurdity and have fun with their roles.

Despite a plethora of religious imagery and references to faith and prayer, "2012" has no theological substance. It posits an ecumenical disaster in that no denomination or belief system is given favored status. Yet its general theological glibness may rankle a minority of viewers of every creed.

Catholics should be forewarned that Emmerich dispatches the faithful in the Vatican with particular relish, collapsing the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel onto praying prelates and dropping the dome of St. Peter's Basilica onto the reverent masses assembled in St. Peter's Square. He also goes out of his way to show Rio de Janeiro's statue of Christ the Redeemer falling down. After all that, it's difficult to feel hopeful—let alone ennobled—at the conclusion of "2012."

The film contains considerable crude and crass language, much profanity, a rough gesture and a few instances of sexual innuendo. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-III—adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13— parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

*****
 McCarthy is a guest reviewer for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Office for Film & Broadcasting.]]>Fri, 13 Nov 2009 08:00:00 EST
The result—a touch of menace and a single questionable joke aside—is a parable rich in sophisticated family entertainment, with abundant fun for youngsters and a few insights into the tensions and paradoxes of human nature for adults.

Director and co-writer (with Noah Baumbach) Wes Anderson's clever, lovingly crafted adaptation of Roald Dahl's 1970 children's book finds its titular vulpine character (voice of George Clooney) torn between his respectable life as newspaper columnist and family man— with caring but pragmatic Mrs. Fox (voice of Meryl Streep) and slightly quirky son Ash (voice of Jason Schwartzman) depending on him—and the memories of his wild past as a chicken thief poaching on local farms.

Abetted by his daring nephew Kristofferson (voice of Eric Anderson, the director's brother) and possum pal Kylie (voice of Wally Wolodarsky), Mr. Fox resumes his raids. But the infuriated response of a trio of mean-spirited farmers (voices of Michael Gambon, Robin Hurlstone and Hugo Guinness)—who resort to ever escalating countermeasures— eventually threatens not only the Fox clan, but their whole burrowing community.

Underlying the gentle domestic comedy generated by Mr. Fox's inept attempts to deceive his spouse about his backsliding—Ma Fox, like Alice Kramden of "The Honeymooners" before her, knows her husband's foibles far too well to be misled for long—lies a positive and touching portrayal of marriage.

And, though somewhat more melancholy, the father-son relationship between Mr. Fox and Ash, which involves the eccentric, cape-wearing boy in a seemingly hopeless rivalry with his dashing cousin, movingly reflects the universal yearning for parental acceptance.

As Mr. Fox wavers between the rewards of stability and the lure of danger, scenes in which his otherwise placid behavior suddenly gives way to a frenzy of mindless eating, from which he emerges slightly dazed, hint at the capacity of human passions and appetites to overwhelm the necessary restraints of civilized life.

While the violence on view here is strictly of the cartoon variety, situations of peril— including the fate of Mr. Fox's tail—may be too much for the littlest.

As for a fleeting, supposedly humorous reference to Mrs. Fox's youthful indiscretions by which, we learn, she became known as the "town tart," the moment is entirely out of keeping with the otherwise unobjectionable proceedings, and might have warranted a more restrictive classification but for the value of the fable as a whole.

The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-I—general patronage. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG—parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.

*****
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. ]]>Fri, 13 Nov 2009 08:00:00 EST
The latest, a lavish and well-crafted 3-D animated version from Disney, though free of objectionable content, does feature images and special effects likely to disturb sensitive youngsters.

As faithfully retold by writer-director Robert Zemeckis, this is the familiar story of miserly misanthrope Ebenezer Scrooge (voice of Jim Carrey), who notoriously regards Christmas as a "humbug."

After spending the eve of the holiday making his much-put-upon clerk Bob Cratchit (voice of Gary Oldman) miserable, and rebuffing the cheerful invitation of his nephew, Fred (voice of Colin Firth), to a celebratory family dinner, Scrooge retires to his dreary mansion for a supper of cheap gruel. But his routine is interrupted by the tortured specter of his late business partner, Jacob Marley (also voiced by Oldman).

Chained to heavy money chests symbolic of the greediness that marked his life, and condemned to wander in eternal restlessness, Marley—a grimly decaying animated corpse— warns Scrooge that he is headed for a similar doom, and that he will soon be visited by three spirits who will try to persuade him to change his ways.

These, of course, are the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come, all three voiced by Carrey.

The first, who appears as a flickering candle, returns Scrooge to the scene of his lonely childhood and his apprenticeship under fun-loving Mr. Fezziwig (voice of Bob Hoskins), during which he fell in love with gentle Belle (voice of Robin Wright Penn). As the sprite also forces Scrooge to recall, however, their romance was eventually ruined by his idolatrous love of money.

The Ghost of Christmas Present, a jolly, thriving figure, gives Scrooge a "heavenly perspective" on current events, revealing the straitened circumstances in which Cratchit's meager salary leaves his family, especially his sickly, crippled, but ever-chipper son Tiny Tim (Oldman's voice as well), and the pitying mockery with which Scrooge is discussed by Fred and his guests.

With the approach of midnight, the Ghost of Christmas Present suddenly turns corpselike and is replaced by the last apparition, a black-robed, silent skeleton. The vision he conjures sees Scrooge chased for his life by a runaway horse-drawn hearse and forced to experience his own unmourned death.

Such eerie elements, though present in the original, make this unsuitable viewing for the most impressionable. But heartier family members of almost any age will be delighted by a sweeping survey of Victorian London, from its coziest firesides to its gloomiest graveyards.

As for the central conversion story, its Christian context is unabashedly detailed in the lyrics of carolers, in the lingering view of the ornamental cross above a city church and in the upbeat piety of Tiny Tim, whose jaunty prayer, "God bless us, every one," serves as the final line of novella and script alike.

"A Christmas Carol" will be shown on both Imax and conventional screens.

The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-I—general patronage. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG—parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.

*****
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. ]]>Fri, 06 Nov 2009 08:00:00 EST
The occasional jolt aside, the results in this slow-moving, largely ineffective thriller are not especially convincing.

In keeping with his overall conceit, writer-director Olatunde Osunsanmi introduces us to two versions of his main character, psychologist Abigail Tyler: the wheelchair-bound and deeply spooked "original"—whom he gravely interviews—and, for purposes of supposed dramatization, actress Milla Jovovich. Back in 2000, we learn, the recently widowed Tyler was treating several Nome residents for a sleep disorder when she discovered that their symptoms were startlingly similar.

All, for instance, reported being stared at, to nerve-jangling effect, by a mysterious white owl. Once hypnotized to clarify their dim memories, however, at least two of Tyler's subjects came to the agonizing realization—amid, as we're shown, much screaming and thrashing about—that the gimlet-eyed bird was merely a psychological substitute for malevolent visitors of an extraterrestrial variety.

In addition to smelling like putrefied cinnamon, according to one victim's description, and speaking Sumerian—a language extinct among humans for millennia—these interplanetary baddies make a habit of whisking folk off to their spacecraft and experimenting on them in all manner of unspeakable ways, then returning them to their beds with their consciousness of the experience all but wiped clean.

Convinced that the intruders were to blame for her husband's death, and anxious to pursue her history-altering discovery, Tyler turns for support to friendly colleague Dr. Abel Campos (Elias Koteas). But Campos, like local lawman Sheriff August (Will Patton)—who comes into conflict with Tyler after one of her patients goes on a murderous post-hypnotic rampage—proves stubbornly skeptical.

Amid the hokey proceedings, the script makes a fleeting, potentially troublesome foray into theology, with an expert on Sumerian civilization asserting that the biblical accounts of the creation and the flood are derived from pagan myths, and the seemingly demonic aliens making garbled claims to divinity.

But Tyler—who is earlier shown extemporizing an explicitly Christian grace before a family dinner—sets things right, at least on the second topic, in one of the generally weak script's more worthwhile exchanges.

The film contains some violence, including a short scene of gory murder, brief nongraphic marital lovemaking, a half-dozen uses of profanity and a few crude terms. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-III—adults. Motion Picture Association of America rating, PG-13—parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

******
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. ]]>Fri, 06 Nov 2009 08:00:00 EST
Director Grant Heslov's adaptation of British journalist Jon Ronson's 2004 best-seller of the same title registers as a mildly diverting, though disorganized comedy. But this satiric tale of soldierly excess also showcases pantheistic New Age spirituality and implicitly condones its two main characters' indulgence in some questionable high jinks.

Ronson's fictional stand-in is Ann Arbor, Mich., reporter Bob Wilton (Ewan McGregor). After his wife dumps him for a colleague, Wilton determines to prove his manly mettle by signing on to cover the Iraq War, then in its early "Mission Accomplished" stage.

Stranded in Kuwait, and shunned by his successfully embedded peers, Wilton is scrambling to find a way into the war zone when he encounters eccentric military veteran Lyn Cassady (George Clooney). Though Cassady is posing as a civilian businessman, Wilton recognizes his name as that of a legendary figure in the Reagan-epoch New Earth Army, a secret unit dedicated to cultivating "warrior monks" endowed with such occult powers as remote viewing (the ability to see far-distant objects or events) and invisibility.

Cassady is headed in country and agrees to take Wilton along. As their problem-plagued journey—which involves them, successively, in a kidnapping incident, various car accidents, a spell stranded in the desert, and an urban shootout—progresses, Cassady regales Wilton with the history of the New Earth Army's rise and fall.

Founded by Vietnam vet-turned-hippie Bill Django (Jeff Bridges), the corps—its real-life prototype was known as the First Earth Battalion—flourished until the selfish machinations of a newcomer, Cassady's resentful rival Larry Hooper (Kevin Spacey, playing wonderfully easy-to-hate), jeopardized its future.

As we see in flashbacks, Django's training program included the group recitation of a prayer to the earth, one of the pagan devotions that his favored parotege Cassady continues to practice. We're also shown that among the transformative therapies Django sampled during his spiritual metamorphosis was nude co-ed hot-tubbing, though the scene is a short and relatively restrained one.

Peter Straughan's script effectively parodies various aspects of military psychology and behavior. But at times the outlook is woefully simplistic, as in a late-reel scene implying that all Iraqi prisoners of war are abused innocents who should be liberated forthwith. And the moral implications of a practical joke involving narcotics are ignored in favor of portraying it as an amusing lark.

The film contains rear and brief upper female nudity, neo-pagan religious practices, drug use, a dozen instances of profanity, and frequent rough and crude language. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-III—adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R—restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

******
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. ]]>Fri, 06 Nov 2009 08:00:00 EST
But writer-director Richard Kelly's intelligently challenging, if over-elaborate, reflection on ethical choices and consequences is suitable only for spiritually well-grounded adult viewers, since the latter stages of this evolving parable include actions that would be blatantly unacceptable in a more realistic context.

Slightly updated to Christmastime of the U.S. bicentennial year, this is the tale of Norma (Cameron Diaz) and Arthur (James Marsden) Lewis, happily married suburbanites in Richmond, Va., and their preteen son Walter (Sam Oz Stone).

With teacher Norma facing budget cuts at her school, and NASA engineer Arthur uncertain of his future, cash is short, and the planned surgery to repair Norma's foot, deformed by a doctor's malpractice years before, may have to be postponed.

Suddenly, though, the arrival of a mysterious package on their doorstep, and the subsequent visit of one Arlington Steward (a haunting Frank Langella)—the equally mysterious, and horrifically disfigured stranger who left it there—present the couple with a stark temptation.
The package contains a simple-looking device, a wooden box with a glass dome enclosing a red button. If either Norma or Arthur pushes the button, Steward explains, two things will happen: Someone unknown to them will die, and they will receive a tax-free payment of $1 million. They have 24 hours to decide what to do.

As the sometimes improbable plot unfolds, we learn that Steward's unsettling appearance (most of the left side of his face has been reduced to raw tissue) is the result of burns sustained in a lightning strike, an event that also put him in touch with those he calls his "employers," unspecified beings—perhaps extraterrestrial, perhaps heavenly in a different sense—who use him as their agent in testing human morality.

Amid an increasingly eerie atmosphere, meanwhile, Norma and Arthur are caught up in a surreal conspiracy reminiscent of the one surrounding Mia Farrow's character in "Rosemary's Baby." Against this background, the shifting forces of fundamental decency, momentary impetuosity, human interdependence and the inexorable demands of justice are pitted in a mostly intriguing drama, though one that requires careful discernment.

The film contains mature themes, complex moral issues, a few uses of profanity and a couple of sexual references. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is L— limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13—parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

*****
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Fri, 06 Nov 2009 08:00:00 EST
Director Kenny Ortega's energetic, largely unobjectionable tribute to the controversial "king of pop" is narrowly focused and entirely worshipful, casting little light on the eccentric, if not inscrutable, personality of one of the late 20th century's most iconic entertainers. But the filmmaker does succeed in providing insight into the talent, vision and discipline that lay behind Jackson's global—and long-lasting—professional success.

Using footage originally intended for other purposes, Ortega captures the planning and rehearsals for the titular series of comeback concerts, scheduled to begin in London in July, but forestalled by Jackson's untimely death at age 50 the previous month.

Jackson is explicit about holding back on both his singing and dancing, saving his energy for the audiences who—as it turned out—were never to see him perform. Yet the appeal of his wide-ranging material, which easily embraced rhythm and blues, rock, disco and even the occasional heavy-metal guitar riff, remains unmistakable.

Fragments of a video cleverly incorporating Jackson into a series of scenes from old movies is particularly entertaining, while a montage of his career played out as he sings one of his childhood hits, "I'll Be There"—first recorded in his Motown days as the diminutive frontman for the Jackson 5—proves poignant. And it's intriguing to witness both Jackson's intuitive skill in guiding his backup musicians and the understated, quirky wit he sometimes reveals.

With his breathless voice and shy manner, Jackson displays an apparently sincere, though nonspecific, faith as he frequently invokes God's blessing on his collaborators and on the work he shares with them. He also seems somewhat taken aback when—in the closest anyone on-screen comes to verbal vulgarity—one of his fellow performers uses the term "booty" in a way that doesn't refer to footwear.

The only other factor likely to be of concern to parents of young fans is the mildly risque nature of some of the dancing, especially a characteristic move that mimics the self-adjustment sometimes indulged in by baseball players.

The film contains some skimpy costuming and suggestive dancing and at least one vaguely crass term. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-II— adults and adolescents. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG— parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.

****

Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Thu, 29 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
Writer-director Oren Peli's feature debut, made for a tiny fraction of the normal Hollywood budget, is mostly gore-free, playing instead—subtly and quite effectively— on viewers' primal fears of the unseen. But his script fails to show the same restraint with regard to language and sexual topics.

Our amateur cameraman is ordinary San Diego yuppie Micah (Micah Sloat), who has purchased the gadget to document some disturbing phenomena that have been taking place recently in the house he shares with girlfriend Katie (Katie Featherston). (As Micah later puts it, to Katie's visible annoyance, the couple is "engaged to be engaged.")

Katie, who tells of being pursued by an evil spirit off and on since childhood, is wary of the supernatural and enlists the aid of a psychic (Mark Fredrichs), though he eventually proves ineffectual. Micah, by contrast, begins by treating the situation as a lark, but becomes increasingly confrontational with the invisible presence, bullheadedly regarding its unidentified designs on Katie as a challenge to his machismo.

The fact that most of the taping is done in their bedroom, since the entity is particularly active while they're asleep, offers Micah the opportunity for several off-color suggestions, and we witness the immediate aftermath of a coupling about which he boasts. Additionally, as he and Katie become more and more panicked, their fear leads to a stream of obscenity, including at least 35 uses of the F-word.

The film contains some sexual content, including a premarital situation, an off-screen encounter and a few jokes and references, a half-dozen uses of profanity, pervasive rough and crude terms, and at least two obscene gestures. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is L—limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R—restricted; under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

******
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Tue, 27 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
Along the way, director and co-writer (with Brian Helgeland) Paul Weitz's adaptation of three novels in Darren Shan's "Cirque du Freak" series of children's books offers a bleak outlook on conventional family life.

Thus, strait-laced, small-town high school student Darren (newcomer Chris Massoglia)— whose rather macabre coming-of-age story provides the basic arc of the narrative—is saddled with overbearing parents (Don McManus and Colleen Camp) who demand that he keep his grades up in preparation for the rat-race future they have mapped out for him.

Darren's longtime best friend Steve (Josh Hutcherson), by contrast, is neglected by his widowed, alcoholic mother. As a result, he's a rebellious teen who constantly derides Darren for his timid conformity and challenges him to break the rules.

Spider-loving Darren and vampire-obsessed Steve share a taste for the outlandish, and both are bored with life in their bland burg. So when an unseen rider in a passing car— a black-and-violet Rolls Royce, no less—drops a flier at their feet advertising the one-night-only performance of the titular circus, they're thrilled.

One of the featured acts in this sideshow, along with beard-sprouting Madame Truska (Salma Hayek) and Japanese giant Mr. Tall (Ken Watanabe) is skilled spider trainer Larten Crepsley (a commanding John C. Reilly), whom Steve recognizes as a 200-year-old bloodsucker he's seen in an occult book.

Through a series of complications not worth unpacking, Crepsley—who turns out to belong to a race of human-friendly, plasma quaffers who anesthetize their victims and drink only a smidgen of blood at a time—becomes Darren's mentor after transforming the lad into a so-called "half vampire." (Unlike the full-blown variety, Darren can survive in daylight.)

Steve, though, ends up in the thrall of a group of homicidal vein-drainers known as the Vampaneze, which is unfortunate since they're locked in a centuries-old conflict with Crepsley and his softhearted ilk, making the two young pals, perforce, implacable enemies.

As the undead and their proteges throw each other around with Herculean force and inflict the occasional dagger wound, the tolerant circus folk—including Darren's new sidekick, Evra the Snake Boy (Patrick Fugit), and his love interest, Rebecca (Jessica Carlson)—provide the young demi-Dracula with an alternate family to match the alternative dad he's found in Crepsley, making, so the script would seem to imply, his journey to the dark side worthwhile.

After all, to paraphrase some heavy-handed moralizing Rebecca dispenses, "It's not what you are, it's who you are" that counts, Count.

The film contains considerable hand-to-hand and knife violence, some crude and crass language and a pornography reference. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-III—adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13—parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

****
 Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Fri, 23 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
With its exemplary titular hero (voice of Freddie Highmore) embodying both innocence and altruism, as he struggles to discover his place in the world, director and co-writer (with Timothy Hyde Harris) David Bowers' adaptation of Osamu Tezuka's internationally popular comic book series—first published in 1951 and previously the inspiration for three television cartoon series—is by turns amusing, exciting and poignant.

As explained in the opening scenes, narrated by Charlize Theron, this chronicle of Astro Boy's origins is set in futuristic Metro City, a pristine section of the earth that was launched into the atmosphere as the rest of the planet became overrun with debris, and that now hovers in splendor over the grim global junkyard below. Metro City's economy is based on the toil of an underclass of mechanical servants who are treated with disdain by their human masters.

Though a key player in developing robotic technology, government scientist Dr. Tenma (voice of Nicolas Cage) shares the widespread prejudice against these mechanized drudges. But his gentle son, Toby (also voiced by Highmore), shows greater sensitivity.
Brilliant and inquisitive, but neglected by his work-obsessed dad, Toby sneaks into Tenma's lab to witness the demonstration of his latest project, an armaments advance of particular interest to Metro City's militaristic leader, President Stone (voice of Donald Sutherland). In a tragic mishap, the boy is killed.

Heartbroken, Tenma uses Toby's DNA to create an identical-looking robot replica programmed with the lad's memories and personality traits, but also equipped with super powers. Finding the new Toby a painful reminder of the original rather than a replacement, Tenma swiftly rejects him, however, crushing the hybrid boy's inherited feelings of love and filial devotion.

Abandoned to his fate, the misfit youth sets off on a series of adventures that see him adopted by a band of good-hearted ragamuffins, who give him his heroic Space Age moniker, manipulated by the waifs' Fagin-like adult mentor, Hamegg (voice of Nathan Lane), and relentlessly pursued by Stone, who's intent on using Astro Boy's life-giving energy source for weaponry.

Besides the confrontations and perilous situations cited above, parents may also be concerned by one scene that plays with punning humor on the custom of saying grace and by another where an endangered robot displays a warning to the effect that he has just had an emergency disposal of fluid.

But likely to have a far greater impact on their young companions are the sustained themes of overcoming discrimination and indifference to the feelings of others, of resisting violence except when necessitated by self-defense and of triumph through loyal, self-sacrificing love.

The film contains considerable stylized violence, some menace and brief instances of vaguely irreverent and mildly scatological humor. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-II—adults and adolescents. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG—parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.

***
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. ]]>Fri, 23 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
Those expecting a stirring portrait of a feminist pioneer—Earhart was born in 1897 and disappeared over the Pacific in 1937—will be disappointed by the ethereal ambiguity offered here. Aviation buffs will also feel dissatisfied, as her achievements aren't put into historical context or rendered as especially thrilling. The long and short of it: She yearned to fly and be free. But that much we knew going in.

As a love story, "Amelia" offers a positive message about matrimony, even while failing to add dimension to Earhart's relationship with her promoter/husband George Putnam (Richard Gere). Their unconventional union was tested and ultimately strengthened by her intimate rapport with aeronautics executive Gene Vidal (Ewan McGregor).

We're never clear why she and Putnam fell in love. Yet after warning she wasn't interested in a conventional marriage and then straying with Vidal, she feels guilty and atones. For his part, publisher and PR innovator Putnam realizes he has exploited his wife for commercial gain.

No one could expect director Mira Nair, working from a script based on two literary biographies—East to the Dawn by Susan Butler and The Sound of Wings by Mary Lovell—to present the definitive take on Earhart's personality, let alone to solve the mystery of her fate. But there's a degree of ambivalence and sketchiness to Nair's film that proves frustrating.

The allure of flying is only apparent at a poetic level, which helps fuel doubts about Earhart's piloting skills as well as intimations that "Lady Lindy" was most accomplished at being a celebrity. We rarely see her behind the controls of an airplane, and when we do she's usually gazing out the cockpit window with an amateurishly dreamy look in her eyes or fretting as danger looms.

Covering the period of 1928 through July 1937—with two brief flashbacks to Earhart as a gap-toothed tomboy in Kansas—the film takes off courtesy of a lush score and well-photographed scenery, yet never climbs high enough or travels as far as it might.
The scenario cuts back and forth between Earhart's fateful attempt to circumnavigate the globe with navigator Fred Noonan (Christopher Eccleston) and her exploits from the time Putnam selected her to be the first woman to fly across the Atlantic—as a passenger. Depicting her demise was always going to be the film's major challenge and the modestly nail-biting climax refrains from any radical conjecture while using available evidence to identify likely causes.

Nair and company succeed neither in portraying her charisma and sense of derring-do nor in baring her faults. The viewer comes away feeling Earhart was a dilettante and thus unable to control her destiny—a suspicion that undercuts the romance, tragedy and adventure in one fell swoop.

The film contains discreetly handled adulterous and premarital sexual situations, one use of crass language, and one of profanity. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-II—adults and adolescents. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG—parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.
****
McCarthy is a guest reviewer for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Office for Film & Broadcasting. ]]>Fri, 23 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
This attempt at social relevance would be laughable if the results were not so grisly.

The latest victims in the sadistic life-or-death games initiated by the deceased psychopath Jigsaw (Tobin Bell), and now being secretly carried on by police detective Hoffman (Costas Mandylor)—even as he pretends to investigate the crimes—include two predatory real estate lenders and William (Peter Outerbridge), a coldhearted health insurance executive.

For the bulk of the 90-minute running time, we witness William enduring a gauntlet of torturous tests by which his bones are crushed, his hands mangled and his body scalded. In between, Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan's script resurrects Jigsaw via a series of flashbacks and at least one hallucination so he can engage in ponderous moral mutterings about teaching people to value life by forcing them to confront death.

But such philosophical window dressing can hardly disguise the true nature of this callous descent into gratuitous cruelty.

The film contains pervasive gory violence, including graphic torture and mutilation, a half-dozen profanities, at least 40 uses of the F-word, and some crude and crass language. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is O— morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R—restricted; under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

****
 Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. ]]>Fri, 23 Oct 2009 08:00:00 ESTWhere the Wild Things Are (Warner Bros.), which combines live action, puppetry and computer-generated animation, is hardly a film for kids.

Instead, director and co-writer (with Dave Eggers) Spike Jonze's subtle adaptation of Maurice Sendak's classic tale—winner of the prestigious Caldecott Medal in 1964, the year after its first publication—is a wistful adult meditation on the interior struggles of youth.

Those battles are fought out within the mind and heart of Max (newcomer Max Records in a compelling performance), a rambunctious but lonely suburban 9-year-old whose excess energy is devoted to scaring his dog, pelting his older sister's friends with snowballs and generally driving his divorced mother (Catherine Keener) up the wall.
Yet Max is also vulnerable, as he shows when Mom seemingly neglects him in favor of some quiet time with her boyfriend (Mark Ruffalo). Volatile Max's gentle pleas for attention quickly give way to a tantrum, and the resulting confrontation ends with him running away from home.

At this point, mundane reality is overtaken by the logic of dreams as Max—dressed in his favorite outfit, a fuzzy wolf costume, and seemingly undaunted by the fact that it's nighttime—enters a nearby wood, discovers an empty sailboat and promptly sets off across a vast body of water. After an arduous journey, he arrives at a mysterious island where bright bonfires mark the abode of the titular Wild Things.

This close-knit but emotionally unstable community of giants features a variety of personalities, each of whom reflects either some aspect of Max's real circumstances or of his unsettled psychological state.

Affectionate but easily offended Carol (voice of James Gandolfini), for instance, mirrors Max's yearning for love and security, while loner K.W. (voice of Lauren Ambrose)—who wavers between belonging to the group and spending time outside it, much to Carol's sorrow, since he secretly pines for her—represents both Max's adolescent sister, who seems to be abandoning their once-close relationship as she matures, and his own aspirations for independence.

There's a melancholy tone to the proceedings as we witness Max symbolically working through his Freudian conflicts via the constant squabbling and alternatively creative and destructive behavior of the Wild Things. Early on, Max is crowned their king on the strength of some fibs about his prowess. But his ready assurance that his rule will make everyone happy looks increasingly rash, since his every action manages to alienate one or another of his new subjects.

Though youngsters addicted to gadgets and demanding distraction will likely be bored, this delicate portrait of the fears and joys of growing up is calculated to charm viewers willing to invest the necessary concentration.

"Where the Wild Things Are" will be shown on both Imax and conventional screens.
The film contains occasional menace and a few mild oaths. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-II—adults and adolescents. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG—parental guidance suggested. Some material may not be suitable for children.

****
 Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Fri, 16 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
Returning home from the military school to which he has been consigned for past unruliness, Michael (Penn Badgley) finds his divorced mother, Susan (Sela Ward), living with, and engaged to, David (Dylan Walsh), a seemingly affable but strangely resume-free fellow she met in a grocery store.

As the audience knows from the opening scenes, and as Michael gradually begins to suspect, David's smiles and pro-family sentiments disguise a murderous agenda, though no coherent motive is ever suggested for his pursuit of it. With viewers thus deliberately tipped off to the mystery man's true identity from the start, the only potential for suspense lies in waiting for the other characters—a remarkably dense lot—to catch up with the audience.

In the interval, we're introduced to Michael's girlfriend, Kelly (Amber Heard), whose wardrobe seems to consist almost entirely of bikinis and underwear, and to Susan's sister, who is involved in a lesbian relationship that J.S. Cardone's script implicitly and matter-of-factly endorses.

Though scenes of Michael and Kelly clinching on his bed or in the backyard pool are not overly explicit, the fact that both are still in high school suggests that such activity is not only maritally but developmentally premature.

The film contains a benign view of homosexual acts, cohabitation, brief nongraphic nonmarital (possibly underage) sexual activity, moderate criminal violence, a half-dozen uses of profanity, and a few crude and crass terms. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is O—morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13—parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

*****
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Fri, 16 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
So in "Law Abiding Citizen" (Overture), when Gerard Butler's Clyde Shelton announces, while on a murderous rampage, "It's gonna be biblical," it's just one of many nonsensical bleats in this brutish fantasy about one man's search for "justice." Director F. Gary Gray and screenwriter Kurt Wimmer begin with an homage to the old hyper-violent "Death Wish" films and, after 90 minutes of gushing body parts, concoct an implausible ending that looks like it was borrowed from an old "Scooby-Doo" cartoon.

Shelton's rage begins when his wife and young daughter are murdered by two thugs in a home invasion. Justice in a Philadelphia court means a deal with the prosecution—one thug gets the death penalty but the other gets just five years in prison.

That's not good enough for Shelton, of course, but he's no ordinary revenge-seeker with a gun. He's a specialist in the dark art of killing terrorists, and takes out his anger not only on the criminals, but also on everyone in the court system, using all manner of devious technology—even from a prison cell.

Shelton makes a series of implausible "deals" with prosecutor Nick Rice (Jamie Foxx) to prevent more killings, but the strangely impassive Rice never gets there in time as Shelton gets ever more inventive.

The film contains a rape, explicit torture, gun and knife violence, explosions, rear male nudity, and pervasive crass and rough language. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is O—morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R—restricted; under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

*****
Jensen is a guest reviewer for the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Fri, 16 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
The result is a hard-hitting but at times overly simplistic documentary.

Moore is at his best in chronicling the effects of economic dysfunction on vulnerable individuals and families, as a large group of Chicago factory workers are summarily thrown into unemployment or a farming couple faces foreclosure. And he manages to uncover more unusual—and more outrageous—examples of corporate greed gone haywire.

It's disturbing to learn, for instance, that a number of airline pilots supplement their meager paychecks with food stamps or by selling their blood plasma, and that large corporations secretly take out life insurance policies on low-level employees, calculating that a certain percentage of them will end up as—to quote the callous and insulting phrase used in the companies' internal documents—"dead peasants."

But by far the most unsettling story Moore tells involves two corrupt Wilkes-Barre, Pa., judges who accepted bribes from a local for-profit juvenile detention facility in exchange for sentencing scores of young people to imprisonment there, often for the most trivial offenses.

Moore is on shakier ground, though, when he examines economic history. He idealizes the days when top U.S. earners paid 90 percent income tax, claiming that this made possible not only the maintenance of the national infrastructure but the generous contracts under which unionized employees enjoyed numerous benefits, including free health and dental care.

He also blames the disappearance of American heavy industry entirely on the policies of President Ronald Reagan and his first treasury secretary, Donald Regan.

Ultimately, Moore calls for an economic revolution that would uproot capitalism completely. In its stead, he seems to favor not the extreme socialism of the old Soviet system, but a cooperative model of democracy in the workplace, with each employee and manager an equal shareholder. Where the initial investment to establish new workplaces is to be found he fails to mention.

For a spiritual perspective, Moore—who speaks with great warmth of his Catholic childhood, of the kindly nuns who educated him and of his admiration for the clergy— interviews two Catholic priests who are family friends and retired Auxiliary Bishop Thomas J. Gumbleton of Detroit. The three are unanimous in condemning capitalism as inherently sinful.

Yet this is not the teaching of the full magisterium, which instead takes a more moderate stance, recognizing both the efficiencies of the free market system and its need to be prudently regulated, while upholding the human dignity of workers, particularly their right to unionize.

The film contains at least three uses of the F-word and a couple of crude terms. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-III—adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R—restricted; under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

***
 Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. ]]>Mon, 12 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
Before reaching the safe shore of its morally acceptable, fidelity-affirming wrap-up, viewers have to endure waves of constantly suggestive, occasionally smutty humor and a tide of New Age psychobabble.

Presiding over the resort—where the usual recreational activities are interspersed with sessions of hippy-dippy marriage therapy—is French-born free spirit Marcel (Jean Reno). Impressed by Marcel's reputation as a renowned "couples whisperer," suburbanites Jason (Jason Bateman) and Cynthia (Kristen Bell), whose bond has been strained by their infertility and by the round of treatments they've been pursuing to remedy it, are certain that he alone can salvage their union.

But the pair can only afford Marcel's luxurious retreat at a group rate, so they cajole a few of their friends to join them on the journey with the promise—false as it turns out— that the others can skip the relationship repair work and spend all their time chasing fun in the sun.

Since Dave (Vince Vaughn) and Ronnie (Malin Akerman) believe themselves to have a perfectly happy marriage, and since Joey (Jon Favreau) and Lucy (Kristin Davis) want to conceal the fact that they're about to split, they're chagrined to be told, shortly after arrival, that everyone must participate in analysis or they will all—Jason and Cynthia included—be sent packing.

As for Shane (Faizon Love), he's equally put out, since he's already separated from his wife and has his recently acquired, much younger girlfriend Trudy (Kali Hawk) in tow.

Predictably, first-time director Peter Billingsley's debut sees its ensemble of characters rediscovering their love for each other or learning to work harder at being good spouses. But Marcel's method, which rests on concepts like connecting with your inner animal spirit, and features sessions of yoga and massage played for blue humor, is obviously not a credible substitute for faith as a basis for lifelong commitment.


The film contains strong sexual content, including brief but aberrant adulterous activity, fleeting nongraphic sexual activity within marriage, a flash of rear nudity, many sexually themed jokes, and some crude and much crass language. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is L—limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13—parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

***
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Mon, 12 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
Filmmakers Laura Gabbert and Justin Schein chart a bold yearlong experiment by the New York City resident and his journalist wife, Michelle Conlin, during which they gradually give up every aspect of their lifestyle that might cause a negative environmental effect.

This formidable list of sacrifices eventually includes all motorized transport, even the elevator to their ninth floor apartment, all food not grown within 250 miles, disposable diapers for their toddler daughter, air conditioning, heating and electric lights.

These deprivations prove especially challenging for Conlin, who acknowledges in an early scene her addiction both to shopping and to reality television. With the purchase of new clothes or shoes "verboten" and the family's large-screen TV carted off to storage, Conlin -- who also has had to give up the coffee-guzzling that gets her through her hectic days at the offices of Business Week magazine -- begins to show the strain.

Beavan, by contrast, cheerily embarks on visits to an upstate dairy farm and a Gotham community garden tended by an aging hippie whose radical ideas have not mellowed with time. He also plans a back-to-the-land family vacation at another farm, despite the reservations of the nature-shunning Conlin.

While the couple's undertaking obviously carries conscientiousness to an extreme unlikely to be imitated by many, the pioneering experience does have its potentially inspiring rewards. Thanks to increased exercise and a better diet, Conlin's health improves and her prediabetic condition is cured. The absence of electronic entertainment leads to intensified social interaction with friends and more time to concentrate on family life.

For Conlin, that includes trying to convince Beavan that they should have another child, a discussion that reveals that, although they display a sound sense of mutual commitment, both share widespread but misguided reproductive values, as witness their explicitly referenced use of artificial birth control.

Catholic viewers committed to the moral teaching of the magisterium will hardly miss the irony involved here, since the millions of condoms sold worldwide every year—not to mention the packaging used with other contraceptive products—have environmental consequences far different from those which would result from an increased reliance on responsibly practiced natural, and nature-friendly, family planning.

The film contains some rough and crude language, a half-dozen crass terms and birth control references. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-III— adults. Not rated by the Motion Picture Association of America.

****
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Mon, 05 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
Throwing herself into this ostensibly liberating underground sport is restless small-town Texas high school student Bliss Cavendar (Ellen Page). Since her strong-willed, socially ambitious mother Brooke's (Marcia Gay Harden) fondest wish for Bliss is that she become the queen of the local beauty pageant circuit, Bliss carefully conceals her new enthusiasm both from Mom and from her amiable but henpecked father Earl (Daniel Stern).

With the support of her best friend Pash (Alia Shawkat), and despite not having skated since she was a little girl, Bliss gains a spot on an Austin-based team known as the Hurl Scouts, becoming the protege of their captain, Maggie Mayhem (Kristen Wiig). As her skills improve and her star rises, Bliss—who now goes by the moniker Babe Ruthless— discovers romance, falling for derby fan and local rock singer Oliver (Landon Pigg) whom she meets at one of the Scouts' matches.

Barrymore's genre-blending debut—partly a sports drama and a romantic comedy as well as a chronicle of teen maturation—in which she plays Smashley Simpson, another of Bliss' colorfully nicknamed teammates, is buoyed by heartfelt performances from its principals.

But, though Shauna Cross' script, adapted from her own novel of the same title, has Bliss grapple with the negative consequences of premature freedom—and come to a better appreciation of her parents—it also, at least partially, glamorizes her irresponsible sexual experimentation.

The film contains nongraphic nonmarital underage sexual activity, brief partial nudity, underage drinking, occasional irreverence, a few uses of profanity, some sexual humor and references, about a dozen crude terms and much crass language. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is L—limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13—parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

______________________________
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Fri, 02 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
Though its trailer gives no clue as to its true agenda, this venomous supposed comedy is set in a world where lying is unknown and every word spoken is accepted as truth and where—not accidentally, the screenplay implies—God does not exist. Until, that is, failed documentary screenwriter and all-around loser Mark Bellison (Ricky Gervais) spontaneously discovers the ability to deceive.

After playing on the absolute trust of everyone around him to inflate his bank account and in an abortive attempt to compel an attractive stranger to have sex with him on the grounds that, should she refuse, the world will come to an end, Mark graduates to white lies, encouraging his suicidal neighbor Frank (Jonah Hill), for instance, to remain alive by promising that he has a bright future ahead.

In a similar vein, Mark tries to comfort his dying mother, Martha (Fionnula Flanagan), who is tormented by the prospect of eternal nothingness, by inventing the fable of an afterlife in which she will be reunited with everyone she has ever loved and live in a mansion, experiencing perpetual joy.

The hospital attendants who overhear Mark's reassuring fabrication are thrilled, and word soon spreads that he has some kind of secret knowledge. As crowds besiege his house, Mark works out a ludicrously simple-minded creed which he proclaims at his doorstep, a latter-day suburban Moses with a pair of pizza boxes taking the place of the tablets of the Law.

The main tenets of Mark's freshly minted religion concern a "man in the sky" who controls and directly causes everything that happens—including both disease in individuals and large-scale natural disasters—and who rewards good deeds and punishes evil, though three serious sins per lifetime are forgivable. His credulous listeners accept his teachings with pathetic eagerness, but obsess about the smallest details.

Though he goes on to worldwide fame and great wealth, Mark pines in vain for his elusive friend Anna (Jennifer Garner), who rejects him as a spouse on the grounds that his genes are far inferior to hers.

In a particularly disgraceful scene, Mark, who has become a reclusive heavy drinker, answers the doorbell one day to find Anna on his threshold. She stares at him, and tells him he looks terrible. The next shot reveals that—with long hair and a new beard and wrapped in white bed sheets—Mark in fact looks like a seedy version of Jesus.

Gervais, who co-wrote and co-directed with Matthew Robinson, launches an all-out, sneering assault on the foundations of religious faith such as has seldom if ever been seen in a mainstream film, despicably belittling core Judeo-Christian beliefs. Not only Catholics but believers of every stripe and, indeed, people of good will generally will be well-advised to shun this calculated cinematic insult.

The film contains pervasive blasphemy, some sexual humor and references, and a few rough and crude terms. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is O—morally offensive. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13— parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

***
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. ]]>Fri, 02 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
Set in a ruined world where hordes of cannibal zombies prey on the few remaining humans, screenwriters Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick's post-apocalyptic tale tracks the odd-couple adventures of a phobia-plagued slacker known as Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg) and a fearless gunslinger called Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson).

As these unlikely monikers suggest, one of the script's conceits is that, in an environment where everyone is on the move in search of safety and where too much trust is dangerous, people identify themselves by place names rather than personal ones.

Despite their conflicting personalities and divergent survival techniques—Columbus has an elaborate set of rules for evading the predators, while Tallahassee actively seeks them out and mows them down with abandon—the pair forms an uneasy alliance. But their partnership is repeatedly strained after they cross paths with sisters Wichita (Emma Stone) and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin), whose own success at withstanding zombie attacks is not based on being the innocents they initially seem.

Though this is anything but family-friendly cinema, adults with a high tolerance for graphic nastiness and casually dispensed foul language may discern some honorable values behind the uproarious, corpse-ridden proceedings of director Ruben Fleischer's feature debut.

Thus, inspired by a touching nostalgia for more innocent times, Columbus longs to return to his parents, though he also regrets the shallowness of his past relationship with them. Moved by a similar impulse, Wichita and Little Rock dream of revisiting a California amusement park where they often enjoyed themselves in happier days.

The characters also display a beleaguered yearning for solidarity, whether expressed through the friendship that eventually bonds all four or through the gently caring romance that develops between Columbus and Wichita.

The film contains much gory violence, including cannibalism, partial upper female nudity, drug use, a few profanities, frequent crude and crass language, and an obscene gesture. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is L—limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is R—restricted; Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.

***
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
]]>Fri, 02 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EST
This generally intriguing cautionary tale begins with a series of flashbacks showing us the profound, and seemingly positive, social changes brought about by the use of these mechanical avatars. As more and more people opt to remain in the safety of their homes and live their lives vicariously through their surrogates, for example, the crime rate dwindles to nothing.

So law enforcement authorities are shocked when the college-aged son of the man who invented surrogacy—the wheelchair-bound scientist is played, at different ages, by James Francis Ginty and James Cromwell—is murdered. Adding to their bewilderment is the fact that the young man died because his surrogate was destroyed, something that was thought to be impossible.

Assigned to investigate the high-profile case, Boston-based FBI agents Greer (Bruce Willis) and Peters (Radha Mitchell) gradually uncover a conspiracy that appears to involve the above-mentioned corporation, the Army, and even a group of anti-surrogate activists whose dreadlocked leader calls himself the Prophet (Ving Rhames).

Off the job, Greer mourns for his little son, who was killed in an auto accident, and longs to reconnect with his wife Maggie (Rosamund Pike). But Maggie—whose grief has caused her to become addicted to prescription pills—refuses to interact with him except via her surrogate, fearing that Greer will reject her if he sees the graying, ravaged figure she has become.

Director Jonathan Mostow's adaptation of Robert Venditti's graphic novel The Surrogates dramatizes the perils of contemporary technology, especially its potential to cut us off from human contact and from the world of nature. Through Greer and Maggie's troubles, John Brancato and Michael Ferris' script also explores the spiritual values undergirding a successful marriage.

The film contains considerable action violence, drug use, brief sexual situations, a couple of uses of profanity and a few crude and crass terms. The USCCB Office for Film & Broadcasting classification is A-III—adults. The Motion Picture Association of America rating is PG-13—parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.
____________________________
Mulderig is on the staff of the Office for Film & Broadcasting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.]]>Fri, 25 Sep 2009 08:00:00 EST