Film Reviews

Disparate individuals rationalize their infidelities.

This erotically charged drama from Japanese director Ryuichi Hiroki (Vibrator) traces the intersecting stories of a group of employees and visitors at a notorious "love hotel" in Tokyo's red-light district.

From the onset of the AIDS epidemic, author Larry Kramer emerged as a fiery activist, an Old Testament-style prophet full of righteous fury who denounced both the willful inaction of the government and the refusal of the gay community to curb potentially risky behaviors. Co-founder of both the service organization Gay Men's Health Crisis and the direct action protest group ACT UP, Kramer was vilified by some who saw his criticism to be an expression of self-hatred, while lionized by others who credit him with waking up the gay community — and, eventually, the government and medical establishment — to the devastation of the disease.

A woman (Catherine Deneuve) becomes obsessed with her son's best friend after her child dies in a car accident. Camille voit sa vie brisée par la disparition de son fils dans un accident de la route. Incapable de faire le deuil, elle s'attache à Franck, le meilleur ami de celui-ci, qui est aussi le responsable du drame. Les proches de Camille ne comprennent pas son attitude. Le vide se fait autour d'elle. Qu'importe le scandale, Franck devient l'objet consentant de son affection. Mais il va prendre peu à peu conscience que l'obsession de Camille le met en danger.

Eight strangers go into a locked room for clinical trials on a new drug that gives them superpowers.

As the front man of the Clash from 1977 onwards, Joe Strummer changed people's lives forever. Four years after his death, his influence reaches out around the world, more strongly now than ever before. In "The Future Is Unwritten", from British film director Julien Temple, Joe Strummer is revealed not just as a legend or musician, but as a true communicator of our times. Drawing on both a shared punk history and the close personal friendship which developed over the last years of Joe's life, Julien Temple's film is a celebration of Joe Strummer - before, during and after the Clash.

A priest and his wife adopt a brother and sister, but the girl has terrible outbursts of rage.

The conflict between duty and conscience is explored in the WWII drama The Deep Six. Alan Ladd stars as Naval gunnery officer Alec Austin, a Quaker whose sincere pacifist sentiments do not sit well with his crew members. When he refuses to fire upon an unidentified plane, the word spreads that Austin cannot be relied upon in battle (never mind that the plane turns out to be one of ours). To prove that he's worthy of command, Austin volunteers for a dangerous mission: the rescue of a group of US pilots on a Japanese-held island. The ubiquitous William Bendix costars as Frenchy Shapiro (!), Austin's Jewish petty officer and severest critic. If the film has a villain, it is Keenan Wynn as ambitious Lt. Commander Edge, who seems to despise anyone who isn't a mainline WASP.

High school hotshot Zach Siler is the envy of his peers. But his popularity declines sharply when his cheerleader girlfriend, Taylor, leaves him for sleazy reality-television star Brock Hudson. Desperate to revive his fading reputation, Siler agrees to a seemingly impossible challenge. He has six weeks to gain the trust of nerdy outcast Laney Boggs -- and help her to become the school's next prom queen.

Frederick Abberline is an opium-huffing inspector from Scotland Yard who falls for one of Jack the Ripper's prostitute targets in this Hughes brothers adaption of a graphic novel that posits the Ripper's true identity.

When Confederate soldier Matt Weaver returns to town after the Civil War, he finds that his home has been sold by town boss Sam Brewster. Brewster hires gunfighter Jules Gaspard d'Estaing to deal with Weaver, but d'Estaing's independent approach settles the town's problems in a very unorthodox manner.

Sentimental sequel film finds the Bears, somehow, the little league champions of California. As a result, the team is invited to play a between-games exhibition at the Houston Astrodome with the local champs, the Toros. Kelly Leak, the Bears' star player, decides to rejoin the team and go with them to Houston to make amends with his estranged father, Mike

Possibly the first use of the camera technique of "focus pulling, in which an image (the man shown kissing a beautiful woman) blurs and dissolves into a clear image (the man shown kissing his less-attractive wife), which is meant to show someone experiencing a dream or fantasy, then being brought about to reality.

Those supersucking desert creatures are back --- and this time they're south of the border. As the creatures worm their way through the oil fields of Mexico, the only people who can wrangle them are veteran Earl Bassett and survivalist Burt Gummer. Add to that team a young punk out for cash and a fearless scientist, and the critters don't stand a chance.

American soldiers lost behind enemy lines during the WWII make a horrific discovery: Hitler has a super bomb in development. Against all odds, they set out to find the scientist in charge of the program who is looking to defect.