Jack the Giant Slayer

Posted on February 28, 2013 at 6:00 pm

B+

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for intense scenes of fantasy action violence, some frightening images, and brief language
Profanity:	Brief strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	None
Violence/ Scariness:	Extended fantasy and action violence, characters in peril, injured, and killed, some graphic and disturbing images, monsters
Diversity Issues:	Class issues, strong female character
Date Released to Theaters:	March 1, 2013
Date Released to DVD:	June 17, 2013
Amazon.com ASIN:	B00CFA222M

More action, more romance, more spectacle, a brave princess who wears armor and does not wait to be rescued, and lots more giants — this is a grand bedtime story 21st century-style. As a boy, Jack (“Warm Bodies” Nicholas Hoult) loved to hear the stories about the time that giants ruled the earth and the magical crown that keeps them confined to their home above the clouds. It turns out they were more than stories.

As a young man, Jack lives with his uncle, who sends him to town to sell their horse. The movie Jack is a bit less credulous than the one in the story. He does end up with magic beans, but not because he believes a story about them. He is given them by a man desperate to keep them from being used to bring the giants back to earth.

Jack is warned not to let the beans anywhere near water, but you know what happens. Pretty soon a beanstalk grows five miles up into the sky, taking Jack’s house with it. And, since Princess Isabelle (Eleanor Tomlinson) happened to stop by Jack’s house to get out of the rain, she is up the beanstalk, too. The king sends a rescue squad after her led by Roderick, his highest-ranking courtier and — despite her objections — Isabelle’s fiancé. Also making the climb are a group of soldiers led by Elmont (a gallant but under-used Ewan McGregor), and a volunteer — Jack.

And they find a big community of giants — all male, which may explain some of their anger issues as well as a disturbing lack of attention to personal hygiene. Production designer Gavin Bocquet and costume designer Joanna Johnston have created an eye-filling world that feels fairy tale fantastic but not musty or old-fashioned. Aside from a few clunkers in the dialog (in no fairy tale is it ever appropriate for a character to say “okay” or “pissed off”), it remains inventive and entertaining. The giants are imaginatively designed, with the leader a motion capture performance by Bill Nighy (as at least one of the two heads). Tucci clearly enjoys himself as the ruthlessly ambitious courtier and it is a nice twist to have the real bad guy be someone more close to home than the giants. Jack and Isabelle have a sweet and almost immediate connection, wasting little time on the usual back-and-forth of learning to trust themselves and each other. And that makes the idea of a happily ever after ending even more satisfying.

Parents should know that this movie includes a great deal of fantasy/action violence, with characters injured and killed and some scary monsters and disturbing images like skeletons and skulls and an eye that pops out — plus some giant nose-picking. There is also some gross/crude humor and brief strong language.

Family discussion: What is Roderick’s plan? How does he show that he cannot be trusted? What does Jack to to earn the respect of Elmont and Isabelle? What does Roderick mean by saying that they all think of themselves as the hero of the story?

If you like this, try: Disney’s “Mickey and the Beanstalk” and “A Knight’s Tale”

20 Film Collection from Warner Brothers: Musicals

Posted on February 25, 2013 at 8:00 am

A+

Lowest Recommended Age:	All Ages
MPAA Rating:	Varied
Profanity:	Varied
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Varied
Violence/ Scariness:	Varied
Diversity Issues:	Varied
Date Released to DVD:	February 25, 2013
Amazon.com ASIN:	B009Z59782

Warner Brothers has issued a spectacular collection of musical films, from the ground-breaking “The Jazz Singer” to classics like “Cabaret,” “Signin’ in the Rain,” “Seven Brides for Seven Brothers,” and “The Music Man.” This is a treasure that should be in every family DVD library, and every school and community library as well. It includes:

The Jazz Singer ( 1927) Al Jolson plays the son of a cantor who wants to sing popular music in this groundbreaking film that was the first live-action film with a synchronized soundtrack. (Remade twice, with Danny Thomas and Neil Diamond)

Broadway Melody of 1929 Winner of the second Best Picture Oscar, this early talkie includes “Give My Regards to Broadway,” “You Were Meant for Me.”

42nd Street (1933) “You’re going out there a chorus girl, but you’re coming back a STAR!” This classic pre-code backstage musical features the title tune and “Shuffle Off to Buffalo.”

The Great Ziegfeld (1936) Another Best Picture winner (and Best Actress for Luise Rainer), this story of impressario Florenz Zeigfeld has rare filmed performances by Fanny Brice (the singer Barbra Streisand played in “Funny Girl”).

The Wizard Of Oz (1939) One of the most beloved films of all time, this enduring classic has Judy Garland singing “Over the Rainbow” and following the yellow brick road to see the wizard.

Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) James Cagney plays the bantam-like singer/dancer/performer George M. Cohan in this biopic of the superstar who wrote classics like “For it was Mary” and “Give My Regards to Broadway.”

An American in Paris ( 1951) Gene Kelly. George Gershwin. Vincente Minnelli. Glorious.

Show Boat (1951) This second version of the Jerome Kern musical based on the Edna Ferber story stars Ava Gardner, Marge and Gower Champion, Howard Keel, and Kathryn Grayson, with classic songs like “Old Man River” (sung by Wiliam Warfield in the part played by Paul Robeson in the original), “Life Upon the Wicked Stage,” and “Only Make Believe.”

Singin’ In The Rain (1952) This may just be the perfect movie as comedy, romance, satire, and musical. Gene Kelly is the silent movie star who has to adjust to the talkie era. In addition to the rapturous title number, the movie features Donald O’Connor’s classic “Make ‘Em Laugh.”

Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954) Seven rambunctious red-headed backwoods brothers named in alphabetical order (Adam, Benjamin, Caleb, Daniel, Ephram, Frank, and Gideon) are tamed by love in this rollicking musical with wildly athletic dance numbers choreographed by Michael Kidd.

A Star Is Born (1954) Judy Garland and James Mason star in the second (of three–so far) versions of the story of the fading star who marries a rising star. Garland sings “The Man That Got Away” and “Born in a Trunk” and introduces herself as “Mrs. Norman Maine!”

The Music Man (1962) Robert Preston re-creates his legendary stage performance as “Professor Harold Hill,” a con man who sells a small Iowa town on the idea of a boys’ band. He plans to skip town before they discover that he has no idea of how to teach kids to play instruments, but then he meets “Marian the Librarian” (an almost impossibly pretty Shirley Jones) and things get complicated. Songs include “Trouble,” “76 Trombones,” “Goodnight My Someone,” and “Til There Was You.” And a barbershop quartet singing “Lida Rose.”

Viva Las Vegas (1964) Elvis and Ann-Margret sing and dance. What else do you need to know?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFw5a5Bp_Pw

Camelot (1967) The grand Lerner and Lowe musical about King Arthur, Guinevere, and Sir Lancelot stars Richard Harris, Vanessa Redgrave, and Franco Nero. Songs include “The Lusty Month of May,” “If Ever I Should Leave You,” and the poignant title number.

Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory (1971) This is the first and best version of Roald Dahl’s classic children’s book about the poor boy who finds a golden ticket to visit the world’s most magnificently magical candy factory. Too bad for the naughty kids who are greedy and spoiled!

Cabaret (1972) The film, director Bob Fosse, and stars Joel Gray and Liza Minnelli won Oscars for this searing musical about pre-WWII Germany, brilliantly presented in an adult musical that deals with issues like the rise of the Nazi party, anti-Semitism, and “divine” decadence.

That’s Entertainment (1974) This delicious compilation includes highlights of dozens of classic and underrated musicals and led to two sequels.

Victor, Victoria (1983) James Garner, Robert Preston, and Julie Andrews star in a wildly funny musical about an impoverished singer whose career takes off when she pretends to be a man pretending to be a woman.

Little Shop Of Horrors (1986) Possibly the most improbable source for a musical was a cheap horror film about a carnivorous plant, shot over a weekend. But the cheeky score made it a theatrical hit and this movie version is a lot of fun.

Hairspray (1988) John Waters’ non-musical film about the controversy over integration on a teen dance show in 1960’s Baltimore inspired this musical remake with John Travolta as the mother of the adorable Tracy (Nikki Blonsky). Michelle Pfeiffer, Queen Latifah, and Zac Efron co-star in this tuneful treat that includes “Good Morning Baltimore,” “Run and Tell That,” and “You Can’t Stop the Beat.”

Beautiful Creatures

Posted on February 13, 2013 at 6:00 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for violence, scary images, and some sexual material
Profanity:	Some strong language, crude insult
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking
Violence/ Scariness:	Supernatural images, violence, peril, characters injured and killed, references to loss of parents
Diversity Issues:	Diverse characters
Date Released to Theaters:	February 14, 2013
Date Released to DVD:	May 20, 2013
Amazon.com ASIN:	B009AMAGXK

In a small Southern town that feels far from everything, where everyone is “too stupid to leave or too stuck to move,” a teenage boy named Ethan (Alden Ehrenreich) dreams every night of a girl he has never seen. Ethan has recently lost his mother. His father is never there. He is about to start his junior year in high school “so insanity’s inevitable.” But his mother’s best friend Amma (Viola Davis), the local librarian, looks out for him. There are books that he loves. And the dream feels very real and somehow comforting.

Suddenly it is real as Lena Duchannes (Alice Englart) comes to town to live with her uncle, Macon Ravenswood (Jeremy Irons) in a creepy old mansion. Ethan feels an immediate connection, but Lena seems reluctant to talk to him or to make any friends in her new school. Some of the other kids in the class feel the same way. There are rumors that the Ravenswoods have strange powers.

The rumors are true. “You know how some families are musical and some have money. We have powers,” Lena explains. She is a witch or, to use the term her people prefer, she is a “caster.” She is 15 and on her 16th birthday she will be chosen for the light side or the dark.

No one wants Ethan and Lena to be together. But the love they share is stronger than any caster powers from the dark or the light.

The storyline is fairly basic but touches of self-aware humor help to hold our interest. And it is fun to watch Irons swan around in ascots and smoking jackets, striding past the swooping banister-less staircase in his mansion. Thompson and Emmy Rossum clearly relish the chance to chew scenery with Spanish moss hanging all over it. They revel in the Southern gothic setting, tossing off Dixie-isms like “Slap my ass and call me Sally!” and “She looks like death eating a cracker.” Viola Davis does what she can stuck with an exposition role that includes a completely random Nancy Reagan reference. It is also buoyed by the lushy imaginative settings from production designer Richard Sherman and goth-glam costumes from Jeffrey Kurland and an entertaining assortment of literary and popular culture references, from Slaughterhouse Five and poet Charles Bukowski to the “Final Destination” series, Bob Dylan, To Kill a Mockingbird, and Jane Austen. Most important, writer/director Richard LaGravenes creates a world where strange things seem both wonderful and normal. The various transformations, expanding powers, and sense of alienation seem like a tangible reflection (and only mild exaggeration) of the experience of adolescence.

Parents should know that this film includes themes of good and bad magic, some disturbing images, characters in peril, and sad deaths.

Family discussion: Who makes the choice for the casters? What makes Lena different? What do you learn from the sacrifice in the movie?

If you like this, try: the series of books by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, the books read by Ethan and Lena in the movie, and the “Twilight” films

Warm Bodies

Posted on February 3, 2013 at 9:48 pm

B+

Lowest Recommended Age:	Mature High Schooler
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for zombie violence and some language
Profanity:	Brief strong language (b-word, s-word, f-word)
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Beer
Violence/ Scariness:	Zombie violence with some graphic and disturbing images
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to Theaters:	February 1, 2013
Date Released to DVD:	June 3, 2013
Amazon.com ASIN:	B008220BLG

You don’t often hear the word “adorable” used to describe a zombie movie, but that is probably because you don’t often have a story about a zombie in love.

Oh, it’s still a zombie movie. Brains get eaten. In fact, that’s how our undead anti-hero, known only as R (Nicholas Hoult) falls in love. We meet him as a zombie who has a semblance of an inner life, already an arresting notion. The whole deal about zombies is that they are undead, soulless creatures who have just one remaining motive or compulsion — they need to eat, preferably brains. This gives them an important advantage over the rest of us, with our ambivalences, consciences, and that pesky ability to reason that requires us to consider a range of competing considerations. They also have an even more important advantage — being undead, they cannot really be killed.

R introduces himself via an internal narration that provides a comic contrast with his very limited mode of oral expression and compromised memory. R is all he can recall of his name. As he explains when he introduces his “best friend,” M (Rob Corddry), “by best friend I mean we occasionally grunt and stare awkwardly at each other.” He spends his days trudging stiffly through the airport, now the home base for the zombies, until he gets the urge to feed. A part of him longs to be human and a bigger part of him fears turning into one of the “bonies,” a further devolution from zombie, skeletal figures who are much more aggressive, eating their own skin. “They’ll eat anything with a heartbeat. I will, too, but at least I’m conflicted about it.”

There is one thing he likes about eating brains, “the part that makes me feel human again, a little less dead.” R eats the brains of a young man named Perry (Dave Franco of “21 Jump Street”), which give him access to Perry’s memories and to his feelings, especially his feelings of love for his girlfriend, Julie (the warmly appealing Teresa Palmer of “Take Me Home Tonight”). R and Julie — yes, there is a balcony scene, too. Julie lives in a walled, post-apocalyptic city ruled by her father (John Malkovich). The surviving humans are at war with the zombies. But R rescues Julie and as they are hiding out, his love for her begins to make him more human.

Hoult easily makes us understand why Julie is drawn to R, and his small, gradual awakening to the pleasures and pains of being human are beautifully chosen. Based on the book by Isaac Marion and with able script and direction from Jonathan Levine, this works as a zombie movie and as a romance. The massive losses have caused the humans to jettison some of their humanity for survival. Julie’s friend Nora (Analeigh Tipton of “Crazy, Stupid, Love”) to abandon her dream of being a nurse to be an armed forager. She has held on to a small store of make-up in hopes of a return to a more civilized life and tells Julie ruefully, “I wish the internet was working so I could look up what is wrong with you.” The movie’s nicest moments are when Julie must pretend to be a zombie and R must pretend to be a human. We see how superficial the differences have become and M and some of the other zombies find their hearts re-animated through the power of longing for love and Julie’s father has to open his heart despite his grief at losing his wife. R’s concerns about how he appears to Julie (“Don’t be creepy! Don’t be creepy!”) are only a slightly amplified version of what we all go through when we meet someone who inspires us to enlarge our spirits and be on our best behavior. And a simple “hi” turns out to be a poignant reminder of what being human really means.

Parents should know that this movie has fantasy/sci-fi violence, some graphic, with disturbing images, guns, brain-eating, knife, and weed-wacker attacks, some strong language (b-word, one f-word), a beer, and some lingerie.

Family discussion: What is the significance of the names R and Julie? What makes R more human?

If you like this, try: “Shaun of the Dead” and “Zombieland”

Downton Abbey 3rd Season DVD!

Posted on January 27, 2013 at 8:00 am

Lowest Recommended Age:	Middle School
MPAA Rating:	NA
Profanity:	Mild language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking, smoking
Violence/ Scariness:	Illness and death
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie
Date Released to DVD:	January 28, 2013
Amazon.com ASIN:	B0099Y2MYK

The most popular television show in the world has a gorgeous new DVD/Blu-Ray release this week, Season 3 and some marvelous extras:

– Downton Abbey Behind the Drama
–    Shirley MacLaine at Downton
–    The Men of Downton
–    Downton in 1920
–    Season 3 Christmas Special bonus episode “A Journey to the Highlands”
–    and much more!

The returning cast includes Hugh Bonneville, Dame Maggie Smith, Elizabeth McGovern, Dan Stevens, Michelle Dockery, Jim Carter, Penelope Wilton, Joanne Froggatt, Brendan Coyle and a host of others, joined by Shirley MacLaine, who plays Martha Levinson, the very American mother of Cora, Countess of Grantham. Written and created by Julian Fellowes, Downton Abbey, Season 3 is a Carnival Films and Masterpiece co-production, in association with NBCUniversal. I have one Blu-Ray to give away! Send me an email at moviemom@moviemom.com with “Downton” in the subject line and tell me your favorite character in the series. Don’t forget your address! (US addresses only) I will pick a winner at random on February 2. Good luck!
Photo caption: The Great War is over and a long-awaited engagement is on, but all is not tranquil at Downton Abbey as wrenching social changes, romantic intrigues, and personal crises grip the majestic English country estate for a third thrilling season. With the return of its all-star cast plus guest star Academy Award®-winner Shirley MacLaine, Downton Abbey, Season 3 airs over seven Sundays on PBS beginning on January 6, 2013. Shown in the photo from left to right: Maggie Smith as Violet, Dowager Countess of Grantham and Shirley MacLaine as Martha Levinson