OPENING
Amateur Night (NR) Jason Biggs stars in this comedy as an unemployed architecture student who takes a job driving sex workers to their meeting places. Also with Janet Montgomery, Ashley Tisdale, Bria L. Murphy, Jenny Mollen, and Steven Weber. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
Don’t Think Twice (R) Mike Birbiglia writes, directs, and co-stars in this comedy about an improv comedy troupe whose dynamic changes when one of their members (Keegan-Michael Key) lands a coveted spot on a national comedy TV show. Also with Gillian Jacobs, Kate Micucci, Chris Gethard, Tami Sager, Emily Skeggs, and Richard Kline. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
Gleason (R) This documentary by J. Clay Tweel (Finders Keepers) is about Steve Gleason, the former NFL player diagnosed with ALS who devotes his time to philanthropy. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
How to Be Yours (NR) Bea Alonzo and Gerald Anderson star in this Filipino comedy as a young couple trying to balance their careers with their burgeoning relationship. Also with Bernard Palanca, Janus del Prado, Alex Medina, Anna Luna, Nicco Manalo, Jerome Tan, Divine Aucina, and Bryan Sy. (Opens Friday at AMC Grapevine Mills)
Indignation (R) This adaptation of Philip Roth’s novel stars Logan Lerman as an East Coast Jew who attends college in Ohio in 1951 to get away from his upbringing. Also with Sarah Gadon, Tracy Letts, Ben Rosenfield, Linda Emond, and Bryan Burton. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
The Mind’s Eye (NR) Graham Skipper and Lauren Ashley Carter star in this thriller as young people persecuted by a scientist (John Speredakos) who covets their supernatural abilities. Also with Larry Fessenden, Noah Segan, Michael LoCicero, and Jeremy Gardner. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
Nine Lives (PG) Kevin Spacey stars in this comedy as an uptight businessman who becomes trapped in the body of his family’s cat. Also with Jennifer Garner, Robbie Amell, Cheryl Hines, Mark Consuelos, and Christopher Walken. (Opens Friday)
Our Little Sister (PG) The latest film by Hirokazu Kore-eda (I Wish, Still Walking) stars Suzu Kurose as a 13-year-old Japanese girl whose arrival at her grandmother’s house upsets her three older half-sisters. Also with Haruka Ayase, Masami Nagasawa, Kaho, Shin’ichi Tsutsumi, Ryôhei Suzuki, and Ryô Ishibashi. (Opens Friday in Dallas)
Suicide Squad (PG-13) Margot Robbie and Will Smith star in this comic-book adaptation about imprisoned supervillains enlisted by the government to do good deeds in exchange for clemency. Also with Jared Leto, Viola Davis, Jai Courtney, Jay Hernandez, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Joel Kinnaman, Cara Delevingne, Common, David Harbour, Ezra Miller, Scott Eastwood, and an uncredited Ben Affleck. (Opens Friday)
NOW PLAYING
Absolutely Fabulous: The Movie (R) Patsy and Edina are starting to look long in the tooth in this movie version of the 1990s British sitcom. Jennifer Saunders and Joanna Lumley reprise their roles as fashion mavens who become fugitives from justice after Edina accidentally kills Kate Moss (who plays herself) while trying to land the supermodel as a client. At only 90 minutes, the thing is padded out with international celebrities and celebs whose fame doesn’t extend beyond the U.K., and the set pieces like Patsy dressing up as a man to wed a superwealthy baroness (Marcia Warren) mostly land with a thud. Fans of the show may adore this., but non-fans may feel like they’re being ignored by everybody at a great party. Also with Julia Sawalha, Indeyarna Donaldson-Holness, Jane Horrocks, June Whitfield, Mark Gatiss, Celia Imrie, Chris Colfer, Emma Bunton, Lulu, and Barry Humphries.
Bad Moms (R) A profane blast of fresh air compared with the pap that Hollywood usually serves up to older women. Mila Kunis stars as a 32-year-old Chicagoan who snaps under modern parenting culture’s impossible demands of mothers and stages her own rebellion with two other mothers (Kristen Bell and Kathryn Hahn) against a PTA president (Christina Applegate) who represents everything they hate. Writer-directors Jon Lucas and Scott Moore previously wrote The Hangover, and while I wish they’d let their moms cut loose like the guys in that series, they’ve got three brilliant and personable comic actresses on their side, with Hahn giving every scene of hers an electric charge. Also with Jada Pinkett Smith, Annie Mumolo, Emjay Anthony, Oona Laurence, David Walton, Jay Hernandez, Clark Duke, Wendell Pierce, J.J. Watt, and Wanda Sykes.
The BFG (PG) A Hook-level disaster from Steven Spielberg. This fantasy film based on Roald Dahl’s children’s book stars Ruby Barnhill as a London orphan who’s whisked away by a big friendly giant (Mark Rylance) and helps him keep his fellow giants from eating children. Like too many other cinematic Dahl adaptations, this one becomes bloated and lumbering, missing the small-scale, homespun charm of the original. The giant’s home is rendered without any sense of wonder, as is Dream Country where he goes to catch dreams to give to children, and the proceedings really go downhill when the giant comes out of hiding and visits the Queen of England (Penelope Wilton). You expect better from Spielberg. Also with Rebecca Hall, Rafe Spall, Jemaine Clement, Ólafur Darri Ólafsson, and Bill Hader.
Café Society (PG-13) Kristen Stewart’s dazzling performance is the best thing about Woody Allen’s latest. She plays a secretary and secret lover to a high-powered 1930s Hollywood agent (Steve Carell), only to be torn between him and his nephew (Jesse Eisenberg) who’s visiting California from the Bronx. Cast well against type as a bright, snappy, worldly wise operator, Stewart brings notes of softness and vulnerability to the role that other actresses might not thnk to bring. She’s cast opposite Eisenberg for a third time, and they seem delighted in each other as ever, but Allen loads down his movie with too many extraneous subplots and dead ends. What’s supposed to be a tender little romance of missed connections gets lost, and Stewart’s marvelous performance is wasted. Also with Blake Lively, Corey Stoll, Anna Camp, Ken Stott, Jeannie Berlin, Sheryl Lee, and Parker Posey.
Captain Fantastic (R) Viggo Mortensen stars in this comedy as a hippie father of six in the rural Pacific Northwest whose unorthodox parenting style is forced to confront the outside world. Also with George MacKay, Samantha Isler, Annalise Basso, Nicholas Hamilton, Steve Zahn, Kathryn Hahn, Missi Pyle, and Frank Langella.
Central Intelligence (PG-13) They had all the right ingredients in this comedy except a script. A high school loser-turned-CIA agent (Dwayne Johnson) has to team up with his school’s BMOC-turned-accountant (Kevin Hart) to foil an espionage plot. The casting works well and Johnson creates a funny character as an ass-kicker who’s into unicorn T-shirts and Twilight movies and is completely oblivious to the accountant’s objections to being dragged into danger. If only there had been some actual material instead of director Rawson Marshall Thurber (Dodgeball) staging action sequences while winking at the audience. Also with Amy Ryan, Aaron Paul, Ryan Hansen, Danielle Nicolet, Thomas Kretschmann, and an uncredited Melissa McCarthy.
Finding Dory (PG) The advance hype has been adulatory for Pixar’s latest, and I just can’t join in, much as I’d like. In this sequel to Finding Nemo, sweetly forgetful blue tang Dory (voiced by Ellen DeGeneres) remembers something about her family and dashes across the Pacific with Marlin and Nemo (voiced by Albert Brooks and Hayden Rolence) in tow to make sure she doesn’t get lost. There’s a nicely ambivalent depiction of the California aquarium that they all become trapped in, but the plot machinery creaks audibly as it strives to separate Dory from everyone else who wants to help her. The story is supposed to be about Dory learning to survive on her own, and this isn’t accomplished in any convincing way. There’s much that’s genuinely entertaining here, but the slippage from Finding Nemo and other Pixar greats is noticeable. Additional voices by Ed O’Neill, Kaitlin Olson, Ty Burrell, Diane Keaton, Eugene Levy, Idris Elba, Dominic West, Bill Hader, Kate McKinnon, John Ratzenberger, and Sigourney Weaver.
Ghostbusters (PG-13) Paul Feig’s reboot of the 1985 comedyisn’t as funny as Bridesmaids or Spy, but it’s still quite a bit of fun.Kristen Wiig and Melissa McCarthy play the leaders of this group of paranormal investigators who go into business just as a bullied bellhop (Neil Casey) tries to take over New York City at the head of a ghost army. Wiig and McCarthy seem hamstrung by their straitlaced characters and the PG-13 rating, so the hijinks fall to the other two Ghostbusters: Leslie Jones gets some good lines as an MTA worker who joins up, but Kate McKinnon walks away with the movie as a tech genius who takes a psychopath’s joy in causing spirit-world havoc and is scarier than some of the evil spirits that the group faces. Chris Hemsworth scores, too, as the Ghostbusters’ dim-bulb receptionist. The main actors from the original Ghostbusters all show up here in different roles from the ones they played. Also with Andy Garcia, Ed Begley Jr., Cecily Strong, Charles Dance, Matt Walsh, Michael Kenneth Williams, Nate Corddry, Annie Potts, Ernie Hudson, Dan Aykroyd, Sigourney Weaver, and Bill Murray.
Hillary’s America: The Secret History of the Democratic Party (PG-13) A federal judge recently ordered Dinesh D’Souza to undergo psychiatric counseling. Maybe the judge saw this film, or really, any of D’Souza’s others. The right-wing filmmaker and convicted felon’s documentary traces the history of slavery and genocide against Native Americans to Democratic presidents and lawmakers, while hailing the Republicans’ foundation as an anti-slavery party. The idea that the parties and voters might have shifted in the last 150 years doesn’t seem to occur to him. Some funhouse-style reenactments paint Hillary Clinton’s career as backed by murder and evil. If the Republican Convention didn’t give you your fill of conservative derangement, here’s more.
Hunt for the Wilderpeople (PG-13) This would look more special if Moonrise Kingdom hadn’t come out four years ago, but this New Zealand comedy is still pretty funny. Julian Dennison stars as an overweight 13-year-old foster kid of Maori descent who avoids being sent back into the system by fleeing into the wilderness with his crotchety foster dad (Sam Neill), touching off a nationwide manhunt. The boy is a terrific comic creation, an urban kid obsessed with guns and gangsta rap who composes violent haikus and finds a direction to grow up in while he’s surviving in the same lush New Zealand scenery where Lord of the Rings was filmed. This is by Taika Waititi (What We Do in the Shadows), Oceania’s funniest filmmaker. Also with Rima te Wiata, Rachel House, Tioreore Ngatai-Melbourne, Oscar Kightley, and Rhys Darby.
Ice Age: Collision Course (PG) The prehistorical animals go into space! Well, one of them, anyway. You may be surprised by that, but you won’t be surprised by the desperation that drives the makers of this fifth installment in the series to such a plot twist. Manny, Sid, and Diego (voiced by Ray Romano, John Leguizamo, and Denis Leary) have to save the entire world this time by locating a meteor crash site while Manny also deals with his daughter (voiced by Keke Palmer) getting married. The movie ventures into musical numbers, a cameo by Neil deGrasse Tyson, and a utopian society with eternal youth. Nothing works. Additional voices by Queen Latifah, Simon Pegg, Adam Devine, Nick Offerman, Max Greenfield, Josh Peck, Seann WIlliam Scott, Wanda Sykes, Jennifer Lopez, Jessie J, and Jesse Tyler Ferguson.
The Infiltrator (R) Underneath all the seriousness, this is just like a hundred other better movies about undercover agents who get in too deep. Bryan Cranston stars as Bob Mazur, the real-life U.S. Customs agent who managed to get inside Pablo Escobar’s drug operations out of Colombia during the 1980s.. All the familiar signposts are here: the partner who breaks all the rules (John Leguizamo), the neglected wife at home (Juliet Aubrey), the pretty fellow agent whom the hero is attracted to (Diane Kruger), and the higher-up whom he gets close to (Benjamin Bratt). Yet director Brad Furman (Runner Runner) never seems to settle on how we should applaud the hero’s work or judge it. Also with Amy Ryan, Elena Anaya, Yul Vazquez, Rubén Ochandiano, Simón Andreu, Art Malik, Saïd Taghmaoui, Michael Paré, and Olympia Dukakis.
Jason Bourne (PG-13) The superspy has recovered all his memories now, and yet it’s the movie he’s in that’s forgettable. Matt Damon and Paul Greengrass return to the spy series, as Bourne tries to avenge the long-ago murder of his father (Gregg Henry) and the more recent murder of CIA analyst-turned-hacker Nicky Parsons (Julia Stiles). Greengrass brings his familiar proficiency to a riot in Athens and a high-collateral-damage car chase in Las Vegas, but Bourne’s search for the killer and his encounters with the changing face of spycraft don’t lead anywhere rewarding. Also with Alicia Vikander, Vincent Cassel, Riz Ahmed, Ato Essandoh, Bill Camp, and Tommy Lee Jones.
The Legend of Tarzan (PG-13) So boring that it’s infuriating. Instead of an origin story, this new adaptation of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ stories picks up as Tarzan (Alexander Skarsgård) has resumed his title as Lord Greystoke and married Jane (Margot Robbie) before he’s summoned back to the jungle to protect it from a Belgian slaver and diamond hunter (Christoph Waltz). Skarsgår’s performance is as flat as his abs, Waltz is stuck in a ridiculous role, the special effects are subpar, and the whole thing is dour and joyless. Also with Djimon Hounsou, Rory J. Saper, Sidney Ralitsoele, Osy Ikhile, Antony Acheampong, Ben Chaplin, Jim Broadbent, and Samuel L. Jackson. — Cole Williams
Lights Out (PG-13) This above-average horror film stars Teresa Palmer as a directionless young woman who acts to save her young half-brother (Gabriel Bateman) and her mother (Maria Bello) from the monster that haunts them all but disappears whenever lights come on, only able to hurt people where there’s darkness. Swedish director David Sandberg adapts this from his own short film, and the best thing here is how the monster works as a metaphor for the mother’s mental illness and the damage it wreaks on her family. If Palmer didn’t give such a flat performance, this would be excellent. Also with Alexander diPersia, Alicia Vela-Bailey, Andi Osho, Emily Alyn Lind, and Billy Burke.
Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates (R) Four terribly attractive actors who are also excellent comic ad-libbers make this hilarious. Zac Efron and Adam Devine play hellraising brothers who advertise for respectable wedding dates on Craigslist, drawing two party-girl best friends (Anna Kendrick and Aubrey Plaza) who pretend to be sensible professional women so they can get the free trip to Hawaii that comes with the date. Devine is a bit too cartoonish, but he and everyone else fire off terrific lines and riffs while writers Andrew Jay Cohen and Brendan O’Brien (Neighbors) give their characters enough emotional underpinnings for this to stick. As the bride and the sister of the brothers, Sugar Lyn Beard steals a number of scenes, including a tantric massage you won’t soon forget. Also with Stephen Root, Sam Richardson, Alice Wetterlund, Kumail Nanjiani, Marc Maron, and Jake Johnson.
Nerve (PG-13) Emma Roberts stars in this watchable thriller as a straightedge Staten Island teen who gets roped into playing an online game in which she performs initially harmless but increasingly dangerous stunts for increasing amounts of money. Directors Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman previously made the documentary Catfish, so they’re pretty savvy about depicting the interaction of the online world and the real world. The film motors along reasonably well until the end, when its condemnation of the internet lynch mob falls flat. Roberts’ acting remains like well-chosen house paint: just sort of there. Also with Dave Franco, Emily Meade, Miles Heizer, Kimiko Glenn, Marc John Jeffries, Colson Baker, Samira Wiley, and Juliette Lewis.
Now You See Me 2 (PG-13) A vast improvement on the first movie. The magicians from the first movie (Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, and Dave Franco) plus one newcomer (Lizzy Caplan, subbing in for Isla Fisher) get into trouble as they try to take on the system, personified by a tech magnate (Daniel Radcliffe) peddling user info. Having the heroes expose corporate mischief is a far better plot than the original’s confusing one, the movie is much funnier, and Eisenberg’s character is made quite a bit less douchier. Don’t miss the slide show that introduces the villain. Also with Mark Ruffalo, Michael Caine, Jay Chou, Sanaa Lathan, David Warshofsky, Tsai Chin, and Morgan Freeman. — Cole Williams
The Secret Life of Pets (PG) Not as deep as Zootopia, but better than Finding Dory.Louis C.K. voices a neat-freak terrier in Manhattan whose jealousy over his owner bringing home a sloppy mutt (voiced by Eric Stonestreet) leads both of them to become stranded in Brooklyn and forced to cooperate to get back home. The lead characters are boring; Louis C.K. doesn’t adjust well to the kiddie environment. Still, there’s a funny subplot where the dogs fall into the hands of an underground movement of stray animals whose bunny rabbit leader (voiced in manic, scene-stealing manner by Kevin Hart) dreams of overthrowing the human race. He and the other supporting characters are funnier than the leads. Additional voices by Jenny Slate, Ellie Kemper, Lake Bell, Dana Carvey, Hannibal Buress, Bobby Moynihan, Steve Coogan, and Albert Brooks.
Star Trek Beyond (PG-13) The U.S.S. Enterprise gets broken into pieces in this latest episode, which sees the crew stranded on an alien planet while trying to stop an enemy (Idris Elba) who has hacked all the Federation’s records and knows all their tricks. Even though Simon Pegg is now a co-writer in addition to portraying Scotty, the movie could badly use some humorous touches, and its layers on the familiar characters are mildly interesting rather than compelling. Still, Justin Lin (from the Fast & Furious franchise) is a steadying hand on the tiller. Oh, and Mr. Sulu (John Cho) is gay. Also with Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, Sofia Boutella, Joe Taslim, and the late Anton Yelchin.
Train to Busan (NR) A superb technical breakthrough for Korean cinema, though underneath the effects you can detect the same sappy melodramatic impulses that plague other Korean thrillers. Gong Yu plays a 1%-type Seoul fund manager who grudgingly takes his daughter (Kim Soo-ahn) on a train trip to Busan when a zombie virus breaks out on the train and in many parts of the country. Director Yeon Sang-ho’s treatment of the zombie waves is as good as anything you’ll see from Hollywood, but we’re saddled with a hissable villain (Kim I-seong) who sacrifices multiple people to save himself, and the girl is basically there to cry whenever her dad gets in trouble. Let’s hope this blockbuster paves the way for better films in South Korea. Also with Jeong Yoo-mi, Choi Woo-sik, Ahn Soo-hee, and Ma Dong-seok.
