September 2008 Movie Releases

SEPTEMBER 5th:
Bangkok Dangerous****
Everybody Wants to Be Italian [limited]

SEPTEMBER 12th:
The Women
Burn After Reading**
The Family That Preys
Towelhead
Righteous Kill

SEPTEMBER 19th:
Lakeview Terrace
The Duchess
Blindness
Appaloosa
My Best Friend's Girl

SEPTEMBER 26th:
Miracle at St. Anna
Choke
Eagle Eye****
Nights in Rodanthe
The Lucky Ones

SEPTEMBER 5th
Bangkok Dangerous
Director: Oxide Pang Chun Danny Pang
Stars: Nicolas Cage, Charlie Yeung, Shahkrit Yamnarm (Full Cast)
Studio: Lionsgate
The Plot: A hitman (Cage) in Bangkok to pull off a series of jobs falls for a local woman and bonds with his errand boy.
THE BUZZ: In real life, Thailand's in a state of emergency; meanwhile, in Hollywood, Nic Cage sports hockey-player hair in the Pang Brothers's remake of their own 1999 film, which might have been more interesting if Cage could have been convinced to play his character as a deaf-mute hitman as the original story goes. Though they certainly have a cult following, the Pangs's brand of horror hasn't taken off with mainstream audiences here, what with their meddling English-language debut and that barely there remake with J'Alba achieving back-to-back strikeouts. Our suggestion: Scrap this version, redevelop the remake with a bankable Asian star (Chow-Yun Fat, Jet Li), set the story in the U.S., and watch the receipts roll in.

Everybody Wants to Be Italian [limited]
Director: Jason Todd Ipson
Stars: Jay Jablonski, Cerina Vincent, John Kapelos (Full Cast)
Studio: Roadside Attractions
The Plot: Jake (Jablonski) is a romantic guy who's still pining for his ex some eight years after their separation. But when he sparks with Marisa (Vincent), a beautiful Italian woman from Boston's North End, he learns how far he'll go for love when he opts to disguise the fact that he's not Italian -- a potential deal breaker for Marisa.
THE BUZZ: Loosely based on writer-director James Todd Ipson's own romantic experiences in Beantown, in which he landed an Italian bride, we can only imagine how this story will end. Penny Marshall has a small role among a cast of recognizable character actors in another ethnic romantic comedy that could catch on with older audiences.

SEPTEMBER 12th
The Women
Director: Diane English
Stars: Meg Ryan, Eva Mendes, Annette Bening (Full Cast)
Studio: Picturehouse Entertainment
The Plot: Happily married Mary (Ryan) finds her world shaken when she discovers that her husband is cheating on her with shopgirl Crystal (Mendes) -- and she was pretty much the last to know. Crying, divorce, recriminations, and revenge follow. Based on the star-studded 1939 classic starring Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford and Rosalind Russell and updated to the present day.
THE BUZZ: Like the original, no men were harmed -- er, employed! -- in front of the camera for this film. Hard core fans will want to know how the movie has been updated: Mary is now a clothing designer, frenemy Sylvia (Annette Bening -- perfect casting!) is a magazine editor, and Crystal is... still a perfume salesgirl. Writer-director Diane English (of "Murphy Brown" fame) has been working on this script for over ten years, and Ryan's availability finally got it made, albeit on an indie-shoestring budget (which is why you saw Ryan at the recent Independent Spirit Awards). The original, after almost 70 years, is still juicy as ever, and we'd call this superfluous if it weren't for English's much-ballyhooed script, which many thought would never get made. And now that Sex and the City made the movies and fun place for the Carrie Bradshaws and Stanford Blatches of the world, look for that crowd to swoon over the first trailer, which funny in a great sitcom way.

Burn After Reading
Director: Ethan Coen Joel Coen
Stars: Brad Pitt, Frances McDormand, George Clooney (Full Cast)
Studio: Focus Features
The Plot: A disk containing the memoirs of a CIA agent ends up in the hands of two unscrupulous gym employees who attempt to benefit from the discovery.
THE BUZZ: The Coens want to make you laugh again, less than a year after bringing Anton Chigurh to life and saddling away with 4 Oscars for their efforts. While I don't think BAR will reach the same level of pop culture-saturation as NCfOM, I guess there's something to be said for a movie in which most everyone in the theater will understand the ending? Sigh ... More on this one after its premiere at the Venice Film Festival at the end of August ...

The Family That Preys
Director: Tyler Perry
Stars: Kathy Bates, Alfre Woodard, Sanaa Lathan (Full Cast)
Studio: Lionsgate
The Plot: Faced with a series of secrets and scandals that are threatening to tear their respective families apart, old friends Charlotte Cartwright (Bates) and Alice Pratt (Woodard) embark on a cross-country road trip in hopes of finding a way to end the drama and rebuild their familial connections.
THE BUZZ: Wait, there's no Madea aboard this trip? Hmm, well, Tyler Perry better hope for a Why Did I Get Married?-sized hit, and not another Daddy's Little Girls experience with his sixth theatrical release, which has yet to generate much buzz on the summer-movie circuit. (I think it's the quiet before the storm over at Lionsgate, however, as the studio ramps up to release 11 films between August and December -- a schedule that include guaranteed hits such as Saw IV and Transporter 3, awards-bait in the form of W. and Religulous, and clunkers such as My Best Friend's Girl and Punisher: War Zone.) My suggestion for marketing Preys: Promote it like a Bucket List for women, and make sure press outlets act dumbfounded if another Perry film debuts at #1. (P.S. The playwright plays a construction worker this time around, which really makes us giggle.)

Towelhead [NY/LA]
Director: Alan Ball
Stars: Summer Bishil, Aaron Eckhart, Peter Macdissi (Full Cast)
Studio: Red Envelope Entertainment
The Plot: An Arab-American teenager is sent to live with her strict father and struggles to find love and acceptance in a her new surroundings.
THE BUZZ: The creative mind behind American Beauty and Six Feet Under wasn't likely to avoid controversy for his feature directorial debut with a title like that. So, it's no surprise that controversy, like a creepy, nosy neighbor, quickly came-a-knocking. First up was Fox News, who dubbed it the "feel-awful film of the year". No need to dignify their claim here, but the novel is touted for exploring themes of racism, misogyny and pedophilia. Not exactly perky, feel-good, date-movie topics. And, what to make of the report that people supposedly walked out during advance screenings? Hmmm, sometimes that only makes us want to see a movie more.

Righteous Kill
Director: Jon Avnet
Stars: Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Carla Gugino (Full Cast)
Studio: Overture Films
The Plot: Two veteran New York City detectives (De Niro and Pacino) work to identify the possible connection between a recent murder and a case they believe they solved years ago; is there a serial killer on the loose, and did they perhaps put the wrong person behind bars?
THE BUZZ: I've watched the trailer a few times, and I have to say that I wish RK's premise excited me as much as the long-awaited pairing of these two acting legends. That said, I have to keep in mind that the script was written by Russell Gewirtz, the pen behind Spike Lee's excellent Inside Man, so I imagine there are more twists in store than the one I already know. (And it's a good one, even if you have seen it before.)

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas [NY/LA]
Director: Mark Herman
Stars: Asa Butterfield, David Thewlis, Rupert Friend (Full Cast)
Studio: Miramax Films
The Plot: A WWII-set story as seen through the eyes of Bruno (Butterfield), whose Nazi-Officer father (Thewlis) has just been made the commandant of a concentration camp outside Berlin. Bruno's eventual friendship with Shmuel, a boy his age who is detained at the camp, will usher in a troublesome reality for Bruno, and lead to a fateful attempt to alter Shmuel's fate.
THE BUZZ: Typically cheery British director Mark Herman (Little Voice) looks back to the dark days of WWII in his adaptation of John Boyne's acclaimed, super-depressing novel. Prepare to be horrified by David Thewlis and Rupert Friend in what could be the saddest film released this year.

Flow: For Love of Water [NY/LA]
Director: Irena Salina
Stars: (Full Cast)
Studio: Oscilloscope Pictures
The Plot: A documentary that addresses how dwindling resources, pollution, privatization and other factors are affecting the world water supply.
THE BUZZ: Irena Salina's documentary has finished up the film-festival circuit (it won a Best Doc award at Vail and was shortlisted for Sundance'S Grand Jury Prize), where it received what industry types call "kind notices" for showing us things we already know (that bottled water you're drinking at your desk probably came from a dirty tap) and things we can only imagine (corporations are buying up the global water supply, drought is just one of many foreboding environmental factors, and even the Ganges is being siphoned). More than one reviewer has suggested the film could use more rhythm, but that hasn't prevented a raft of foreign sales as well as a likely future home on DVD and (perhaps) in classrooms and lecture halls.

SEPTEMBER 19th
Lakeview Terrace
Director: Neil LaBute
Stars: Samuel L. Jackson, Patrick Wilson, Kerry Washington (Full Cast)
Studio: Screen Gems
The Plot: An LAPD officer (Jackson) will stop at nothing to force out the interracial couple (Washington and Wilson) who just moved in next door ...
THE BUZZ: It'll be fun to see Patrick Wilson in thriller mode (one of two genre flicks this season for the former phantom and soon-to-be owl -- look for him in Passengers next month), and I'm pro Kerry Washington (Ray) getting more notice, but if Neil LaBute isn't careful, he's going to find himself, like, rebooting a franchise or remaking his own early film for his next project. And if he tries to pass this off as anything but a cheap-and-easy mainstream release, we're going to laugh at him just like we laughed at Roland Joffe when he tried to promote Captivity as a film with a message.

The Duchess [limited]
Director: Saul Dibb
Stars: Keira Knightley, Ralph Fiennes, Dominic Cooper (Full Cast)
Studio: Paramount Vantage
The Plot: A chronicle of the life of Georgiana Cavendish (Knightley), the 18th century aristocrat who endured a difficult marriage to the Duke of Devonshire (Fiennes), and was known for her beauty, political manuvers, and gambling indulgences.
THE BUZZ: Keira K. gives the period drama another workout, this time with an able-bodied cast, a studio that knows how to market a genre film, and a story that mirrors the experiences of Georgiana's descendant, Princess Diana. Our eye isn't on Ms. Knightley, however, it's focused on Hayley Atwell, who is set to captivate audiences in Bridehead Revisited this year ...

Blindness [limited]
Director: Fernando Meirelles
Stars: Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo, Gael García Bernal (Full Cast)
Studio: Miramax Films
The Plot: A thriller set in a city that is suffering from an epidemic of sudden blindness, where only one woman (Moore) remains able to see as the rest of her society is pushed to its limits.
THE BUZZ: Fans of writer José Saramago have given their blessing to Fernando Meirelles as the director selected to handle the adaptation of Saramago's seemingly unfilmable novel. City of God proved that Meirelles can handle violence artfully and The Constant Gardener showed us his mysterious angles -- two elements crucial to successfully bring this story to life. Helping in front of the camera will be the alluring match up of Ms. Moore and Mr. Ruffalo, who play wife and husband (pretty on paper, but we SO don't buy it) and two of the only people who might be able to put an end to the epidemic. What we're most interested in seeing is how much of the first half of the novel, which is set in an asylum where those who have been stricken blind encounter even worse scenarios, is depicted in the film; if Miramax learned anything from marketing No Country for Old Men, it's that literary violence can equal critical and popular success and plenty of awards.

But now that the film's Cannes premiere has come and gone, and the un certain regard was unfavorable, we wonder if Miramax will take after former boss Harvey Weinstein and re-edit the picture for its general release?

Appaloosa [9/17 -- limited]
Director: Ed Harris
Stars: Ed Harris, Viggo Mortensen, Renée Zellweger (Full Cast)
Studio: New Line Cinema
The Plot: A pair of lawmen (Harris and Mortensen) out to save a Western town from a rancher's tyrannical reign find their bond, and their mission, tested by the arrival of a double-dealing widow (Zellweger).
THE BUZZ: Ed Harris returns to the director's seat some 8 years after his award-winning Pollock, but I'm more excited for his reunion with his A History of Violence co-star, Viggo Mortensen. Both men are fit for the material, an adaptation of the novel by Robert B. Parker (whose Jesse Stone TV movies have been a boon for Tom Selleck's career), but I'm not so sure about the Zellweger's ability to be anything but comical as she makes her return Cold Mountain-ish territory. Does this photo earn your confidence?

My Best Friend's Girl
Director: Howard Deutch
Stars: Kate Hudson, Dane Cook, Jason Biggs (Full Cast)
Studio: Lionsgate
The Plot: Tank (Cook) makes a living as an uncouth womanizer hired by guys who want their girlfriends or wives to reconsider leaving them. But what happens when his behavior has the opposite effect on Alexis (Hudson), the love of his best friend's (Biggs) life?
THE BUZZ: Is Kate Hudson being punished for taking time off to have kids or something? If not, why does she have to star alongside these two bozos? Seriously! As for Jason Biggs, isn't there some American Pie DVD sequel requesting your presence? And Dane Cook, can't you take a parkour class or something -- you know, mix it up a little.

Igor
Director: Anthony Leondis
Stars: John Cusack, Molly Shannon, Steve Buscemi (Full Cast)
Studio: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)
The Plot: Tired of playing second fiddle to his "Master," a talented laboratory assistant (Cusack) looks to win the annual Evil Science Fair with his own creation.
THE BUZZ: I sense that Igor's storyline mirrors the experiences of director Anthony Leondis, who has spent his career thus far laboring over direct-to-video sequels at Disney. Given his own animated creation, the first project from Exodus Film Group (who should have Bunyan and Babe in theaters sometime next year), Igor looks like it'll appeal to kids and Tim Burton fans alike; check the teaser trailer for a peep at the dark fun to be had this fall.

Ghost Town
Director: David Koepp
Stars: Ricky Gervais, Greg Kinnear, Téa Leoni (Full Cast)
Studio: Paramount Pictures
The Plot: Bertram Pincus (Gervais) dies for a seven-minute period during his routine colonoscopy, then awakens to realize he has gained the ability to see and communicate with ghosts. Problem #1: He never had people skills, in life or in death. Problem #2: His ghostly patron, Frank Herlihy (Kinnear), pesters him into meddling with the impending marriage of his widow, Gwen (Leoni), who lives in Bertram's building and isn't necessarily his number-one fan.
THE BUZZ: What did Ricky Gervais do to deserve such a schlocky foray into leading manhood? Look here for evidence that this rather-dated premise has zero signs of life or longevity. Greg Kinnear also deserves better roles than the aw-shucks types he tends to inhabit these days; the one time Bob Crane is this close to having a see-through career (and his upcoming Flash of Genius looks like a rainy day). Can we expect Téa and Ricky to form a clay bowl together?

SEPTEMBER 26th
Miracle at St. Anna
Director: Spike Lee
Stars: Derek Luke, Michael Ealy, Laz Alonso (Full Cast)
Studio: Touchstone Pictures
The Plot: A murder committed by post-office worker Hector Negron in 1984 sets in motion an investigation that ties back to the experiences of a battalion of black American soldiers who became trapped in a Tuscan village during WWII.
THE BUZZ: The Emmy-winning "When the Levees Broke" and the box-office topping Inside Man have made Spike Lee one of the busiest independent director/producers on either coast (Lee has sequels to both projects in mind, too), and now he's bringing a different WWII perspective to the big screen with Miracle at St. Anna. And he's not stopping for air while taking swipes at Clint and the Coens and angering Italians for revising bits of their WWII history. So will some other sort of miracle earn Lee his first-ever Oscar? Well, I imagine he has a better chance than, say, Oliver Stone this year, but a lot is riding on how Disney will market the film and how much of a push it will receive. We hear Disney had to put the kibosh on Lee's Eastwood comments, however, if he wants to make a good impression on the Academy -- a move which might cause the director to abandon studio filmmaking for a spell?

Choke [limited]
Director: Clark Gregg
Stars: Sam Rockwell, Anjelica Huston, Kelly Macdonald (Full Cast)
Studio: Fox Searchlight Pictures
The Plot: An adaptation of the Chuck Palahniuk novel, in which sex-addicted con-man Victor Mancini (Rockwell) pays for his mother's (Huston) hospital bills by playing on the sympathies of those who rescue him from choking to death. Victor's mother's attending physician, Dr. Paige Marshall (Macdonald), initially sinks into his morass, only to become his best chance for redemption.
THE BUZZ: I'm still waiting to see if the planned film version of Invisible Monsters, Palahniuk's most-out-there novel, actually happens, it's exciting to ponder the effect of his prose on the movie-going public almost ten years after Fight Club's notorious, end-of-the-century reign. Palahniuk fans probably have heard already how well actor-turned-director Clark Gregg (who's always reminded me of a younger Richard Jenkins) molded the author's mania into something that's been described by many as slimy, weird, and oddly lighthearted to boot. And yes, the characters played by Rockwell, Macdonald, and supporting player Brad William Henke are as sexually obsessed as they are in the novel. Take a couple minutes to watch one of the best trailers of the year.

Eagle Eye
Director: D.J. Caruso
Stars: Shia LaBeouf, Michelle Monaghan, Rosario Dawson (Full Cast)
Studio: DreamWorks SKG
The Plot: Two strangers (LaBeouf and Monaghan) become the pawns of a mysterious woman they have never met, but who seems to know their every move. Realizing they are being used to further her plot for a political assassination, they must work together to outwit the woman before she has them killed.
THE BUZZ: How awesome is this teaser trailer?
When Disturbia surpassed everyone's expectations last spring, DreamWorks execs quickly reunited Shia LaBeouf and director D.J. Caruso for a second project, and it'll be interesting to see if all the kids who swooned for Shia in a retooled Hitchcock thriller will be as engaged by our hero (who lost his real life, real-world innocence this year) trying to prevent political terrorism. By the way, there are a lot of screenwriters present here -- perhaps an indication of how quickly this was rushed into production, which is confirmed by the release-date slippage from August (summer vacation) to late in the back-to-school season.

Nights in Rodanthe
Director: George C. Wolfe
Stars: Diane Lane, Richard Gere, James Franco (Full Cast)
Studio:
The Plot: A doctor (Gere) who is traveling to see his estranged son sparks with an unhappily married woman (Lane) at a North Carolina inn
THE BUZZ: After The Notebook became one the best recent examples of a sleeper hit, producers fought for the rights to the unoptioned novels of Nicholas Sparks. Superproducers Denise Di Novi and Bruce Berman secured Rodanthe and assembled an ace cast as well as an interesting director pick in George C. Wolfe (Lackawanna Blues). Though we love Richard Gere and Diane Lane so much, the question remains whether they can help reignite the romantic drama by pulling in a big audience on opening weekend or, a la The Notebook turning favorable word-of-mouth into staying power at the box office. Watch the trailer and if you listen closely, after the part where Diane says, "We saved each other," Richard whispers, "from career oblivion."

The Lucky Ones
Director: Neil Burger
Stars: Rachel McAdams, Tim Robbins, Michael Peña (Full Cast)
Studio: Roadside Attractions
The Plot: Three soldiers (McAdams, Robbins, and Peña) meet one another as they have all returned from Iraq, and circumstance unites them for a road trip across the country, in which they hope to fulfill different personal missions. As they travel, however, they soon realize the ways in which life has progressed without them in mind.
THE BUZZ: Though it has a comedic tone and it doesn't graphically depict the war, the latest project from director Neil Burger (The Illusionist) is still suffering from post-Rendition stress syndrome, the new condition that makes movie execs nerves about making Iraq-related pictures -- never mind marketing them. At least Lionsgate sounds sincere in their effort to find the right release strategy for these Lucky Ones, though I feel like, despite the appealing cast and apparent good vibes, audiences might take this as the Grace Is Gone of 2008.