Reviews

The Sunday Age

Sunday November 15, 2009

By Tom Ryan

Rating: 2.5/5 AMELIA(PG, 110 minutes). On general releaseOriginally a Phillip Noyce project, India-born, New York-based Mira Nair's solid but uninspired biopic about famed pilot Amelia Earhart has a distinct feminist thrust as the adventurous young aviatrix becomes a champion for women's rights. Hilary Swank stars alongside Richard Gere and Ewan McGregor, with Anna Hamilton Phelan's reworking of Ronald Bass' original screenplay afflicted by some awfully creaky dialogue.Rating: 2.5/5 CAPITALISM: A LOVE STORY(M, 128 minutes). On general releaseIn his film about capitalism and corporate America, Michael Moore charts a series of injustices and misdeeds and arrives at the conclusion that we're witnessing the fall of the American Empire. Shambling from one outrage to the next, the crumpled Columbo of documentary cinema raises important issues and asks good questions but his tut-tut tone is becoming insufferable.Rating: 1/5CASE 39(MA15+, 109 minutes). On general releaseShot in 2007, the US debut for German director Christian Alvart is a clunky bad-seed horror movie with Renee Zellweger as a social worker for whom case 39 turns into a bit of a nightmare. Jodelle Ferland does OK as the child with the devil in her, but Alvart's parade of cheap scare tricks quickly palls and some of the dialogue is risible. Also starring Ian McShane and Bradley Cooper.Rating: 2/5 A CHRISTMAS CAROL(PG, 95 minutes). On general release and at IMAXWith meticulous care, Robert Zemeckis brings the same "motion capture" animation to this new adaptation of Charles Dickens' 1843 novella that he did to The Polar Express (2004) and Beowulf (2007). The method is suitably Dickensian �� a story mixing grittiness and sentimentality, comic-book caricatures cast in a Gothic style �� but the effect is surprisingly dull. Jim Carrey, Colin Firth, Gary Oldman and Bob Hoskins are all vaguely recognisable. In 3-D at selected cinemas and at IMAX.Rating: 4/5GENOVA(M, 93 minutes). On general releaseThe superb new film from prolific British director Michael Winterbottom deals with the ramifications of the death of a parent for those left behind to pick up the pieces. As a Chicago-based academic takes his two daughters to Genoa, Winterbottom depicts the family circle as both a source of comfort and a place filled with dangers. Starring Colin Firth and Catherine Keener.Rating: 2.5/5 THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS(PG, 122 minutes). On general releaseThrough Doctor Parnassus' looking glass lies a wonderland where the unconscious is unleashed and anything can happen. Moving back and forth between present-day London and the surrealist realm of this Imaginarium, Terry Gilliam's wild fairytale ponders the state of its characters' souls. Starring Heath Ledger, Christopher Plummer, Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell.Rating: 1.5/5INTO THE SHADOWS(M, 92 minutes). On limited releaseBroken into five chapters, Andrew Scarano's documentary about the Australian film industry begins well enough, examining how deals forged between foreign ownership of distribution companies and their exhibition dependencies inhibited local production until the 1970s. But it eventually proves to be much more insightful about the way we were than the way we are now.Rating: 4/5JULIA(18+, 144 minutes). At ACMI from Tuesday to SundayThere are distinct echoes of John Cassavetes' Gloria (1980) in French director Erick Zonca's first major film since 1998's The Dreamlife of Angels. Screening in ACMI's invaluable First Look series, it's a canny mix of kidnap thriller and character drama, in which Tilda Swinton gives her all as "an out-of-control, suicidal, blind alcoholic" who appears to be making up her life as she goes along, adopting new roles to fit whatever circumstances require of her.Rating: 3.5/5PRIME MOVER(M, 98 minutes). On general releaseReminiscent in its way of a country-and-western ballad about innocent young lovers and the cruel world that threatens to tear them apart, Sydney-based writer-director David Caesar's fairytale brings a distinctively Australian flavour to an age-old story. With Michael Dorman, Emily Barclay, William McInnes and Ben Mendelsohn.Rating: 3/5SISTER SMILE(PG, 124 minutes). On limited releaseBelgian filmmaker Stijn Coninx's biopic of Jeanine Deckers, aka the Singing Nun, who achieved international stardom in 1963 with the song Dominique, depicts her as a woman of her times, a headstrong rebel with a cause and a fatal flaw. It refuses to sentimentalise her, and only in dealing with her sexuality does it seem evasive. Cecile de France gives a terrific performance (and does her own singing).Rating: 1/5THE TIME TRAVELLER'S WIFE(M, 108 minutes). On general releaseA romantic drama about a time traveller who visits the love of his life at various stages of hers. The premise is interesting enough �� that everyone carries their past and future with them wherever they go �� but ideas that have worked elsewhere (Ghost, Somewhere in Time, Carousel)fall flat. With Eric Bana and Rachel McAdams.