Film Reviews

Stuart Smalley, the Saturday Night Live character, comes to the big screen. Stuart, the disciple of the 12 step program, is challenged by lifes injustices.

A delinquent teenager's only link to society is the attachment he feels towards an older brother-figure. When the older boy starts spending time with a new girlfriend, the teenager begins to feel even more alienated, and gets involved with drugs and the police.

A documentary look at the changing interpretations of the first amendment of the U.S. Constitution - laws and court cases that have alternatively broadened and narrowed the amendment's protection of free speech and assembly. The film's thesis is that post-9/11 the government has seized unprecedented license to surveil, intimidate, arrest, and detain citizens and foreigners alike. The film also looks back to the Pentagon Papers' case and compares it to cases since 9/11 dealing with high school students' speech and protesters marching in New York City during the 2004 Republican convention. Comment comes from a range of scholars, pundits, and advocates.

A nature documentary centered on a family of chimps living in the Ivory Coast and Ugandan rain forests.

From a torturous cell in Africa, Abel Powell is released and given the chance to regroup his team of skilled mercenaries for one last job. A top scientist will guide them half a mile underground through an ex-Soviet bunker to extract the vital specimens and information being paid for by a mysterious backer, but what they seek should never have been found!

In the city of Santiago, four characters struggle to reach their goals: a psychologist who wants to help other women and save their lives, a hairdresser who wants to buy a car, a musician who wants to play in a philharmonic orchestra, and a young woman who simply survives in the city, but each of them obtains something unexpected and different from what they wanted.

In the menacing inferno of the old American West, Liz is a genuine survivor who is hunted by a vengeful preacher for a crime she didn’t commit.

When a police officer is murdered, Captain Street looks to Mr. Wong to catch the killer. Prime Suspect: Frank Belden Jr., whose father is a businessman well known for both his success and dishonesty. Mr. Wong faces increasing danger and is nearly executed himself as the investigation develops in treachery and complexity. As Mr. Wong follows the trail of dead bodies, he uncovers a jewel smuggling ring on the San Francisco waterfront and a case much larger than the death of a police officer.

Lady, a golden cocker spaniel, meets up with a mongrel dog who calls himself the Tramp. He is obviously from the wrong side of town, but happenings at Lady's home make her decide to travel with him for a while.

A demented handyman comes to the rescue of a young woman (Ashley Greene), then imprisons her in his basement.

Washington plays a school principal in a tough inner city Los Angeles high school out to rid it of drugs, gangs, low moral of teachers, and restore educational values.

Tells the tale of three buddies in their 20's whose love-lives are in shambles. They go to Aspen to pursue the booming trend of dating cougars: hot older women who prey on hot young guys.

After killing a prison guard, convict Robert Stroud faces life imprisonment in solitary confinement. Driven nearly mad by loneliness and despair, Stroud's life gains new meaning when he happens upon a helpless baby sparrow in the exercise yard and nurses it back to health. Despite having only a third grade education, Stroud goes on to become a renowned ornithologist and achieves a greater sense of freedom and purpose behind bars than most people find in the outside world.

Troubled divorcee Mary Kee is tormented by a series of sinister phone calls from a mysterious woman. When the stranger reveals she's calling from the past, Mary tries to break off contact. But the caller doesn't like being ignored, and looks for revenge in a unique and terrifying way...

Played out in real time, several complex family dramas intersect in the landscape of the Himalayan foothills, allowing the Bengali auteur to examine the class and generational differences of postcolonial India while celebrating the hopes of a society in transition.