Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix / ***1/2 (2007)

The realm of spectacle and sorcery at the heart of “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” is not the gentle and capricious place that moviegoers were enticed into admiring when this series first came to the cinema six years ago. Gone are the good-hearted and harmless touches of children’s fantasy, their light-weight and colorful textures replaced by shadows, dank exteriors, menace and threat, and an occasional blood splatter thrown in to emphasize the notion of evil being actively at work in the fabric of the story. We have always anticipated the world of Potter and his magical friends to get darker and more solemn, not just because the premise conflicts require it to, but also because it is of the nature of kids to look at their settings in more serious a light when childhood daydreaming is replaced by the reality of adolescence. The safety that comes with innocence – and the prospect of magic itself being a shield from all grave conflict – is but a self-delusion long left in the dust when the teenage heroes return to Hogwarts for what is to be their fifth school year. They are at the forefront of life-altering decisions and situations now, and every thought they have or move they make requires more specific consideration, lest they fall into traps designed to crush their aspirations as prospering professionals in a world of wizardry.

Children of Men / ***1/2 (2007)

Alfonso Cuarón’s “Children of Men” is an anti-thesis of the modern Hollywood movie dystopia, an endeavor in which the image of a condemned human civilization contains no gloss, depends on nothing proverbial, and insists on taking paths so seldom traveled that we often wonder if it knows just how dangerous or challenging the unpaved roads can be. The movie doesn’t even have safety nets to fall back on, other than the background notion that its director’s sly and unusual style perhaps makes him ideal for assuming control over this rather heavy and morally-intricate source material. Whereas most filmmakers might broach the P.D. James novel “The Children of Men” with a straightforward or assertive attitude, here is a guy who knows it takes not just an analytical slant for the material to work, but also confidence in the prospect of it being obscure on formula and drab in its emotional thrust. Needless to say, he finds the precise chords required of it and doesn’t even bat an eyelash in the process. The very soul of the film scoffs at the expectation of being conventional or formulaic.

The Fountain / **** (2006)

The director who undertakes ventures that are about more than conventional entertainment value is the director who goes on to make a movie like “The Fountain,” in which message and concept are bound by touches of experiment in a way that lends great potential to the way a story can move, excite and intrigue us on more than just a surface level. The very existence of the movie is a refreshing notion, a manner made all the more exhilarating by the sheer gustiness of its thrust, and its ability to turn its own nose up at the idea of attracting a crowd interested only in traditional thrills. But the Hollywood machine often forgets that it inherits its most faithful of followers not from the mainstream, but rather from the trenches in which many a unique cinematic endeavor reside. It is this prospect, alas, that encourages many of the most gifted and offbeat filmmakers to simply abandon the more challenging road and move onto the path more glamorous. What happened to the era of the movies where we went to think, to learn, and to experience? And for that matter, what happened to the times in which we embraced the eccentrics for what they were, and not for how much box office potential their movies had? There are those of course who find great success in making that leap, but for most the grass is seldom greener on the other side of the fence.

28 Weeks Later / ***1/2 (2007)

The zombie movie is a silly but stimulating beast, a popular sub-genre in horror that has survived, evolved and outlasted many of its counterparts for as long as movies of this nature have been popular on the big screen. Those who acknowledge it as such would also be more than happy to stress the fact that the cinematic undead developed a lot more potential after they were discovered by George A. Romero, the director who, in 1968, took a nearly childish premise and used it as a platform for things no one would have ever expected of the material: that is, thought-provoking (and relevant) social and political commentary. Many an avid filmmaker have made great efforts, have sought various avenues, in their attempts to capture the success – or better still, the resonance – or the director’s notorious and on-going series of “Dead” films, but almost none have ever quite tapped into the safely-guarded chutzpah that continues to tower over all his would-be successors. Many still fail to realize that the key rests not in zombies themselves, but rather in the well-executed atmospheres that envelop them. Isolated, the flesh-eating undead make notoriously uninteresting characters; but surround them in a premise and narrative that tap into human feeling and psychological unrest, and an audience will have no problem projecting genuine fears onto them. Before Romero, stories about the undead were the stuff of B-movies, and zombies were just their visual distractions.

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End / **1/2 (2007)

There is a scene early on in “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End” when Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) finds himself barking orders at a crew of insubordinate misfits that, for the lack of a better description, are also exact physical replicas of himself. The scene appears as such because Sparrow is the most recent arrival of that elusive but immense vacuum of space best known as Davy Jones’ Locker – the world that exists beyond the borders of our own – and its emptiness becomes a podium for his eccentric persona to absolve itself of lunacy and reasoning, the only two things that he was still proficient at on this side of the map. Because he is the isolated subject of this multi-faceted sequence in which one Sparrow argues with hundreds of others, we half-expect Depp to be liberated enough to be able to leap at the material with zeal and spirit. But the enthusiasm never emerges from his work; nor, for that matter, does anything resembling general interest or patience. It is a sad and potentially alarming warning sign for any movie when its most stimulating screen talent begins to show signs of being bored with the material, but it is even more startling when it happens to a franchise as elaborate as this, especially so late into the story arc and with such a distinctive and memorable character at the forefront.

Hannibal Rising / **1/2 (2007)

If not for the fact that “Hannibal Rising” acquires a performance of great intensity and determination from newcomer Gaspard Ulliel in the title role, its only relevance would be as a topic of discussion in college film classes where the day’s lesson is about being conceited and overzealous with a screenplay. The movie is a mess of monstrous proportions, labored  by all estimations from the narrative perspective, and driven by a certain smugness that demands the movie’s viewers to blindly accept any and all plot devices it throws at them, no matter how obvious and convenient they may be. To call the film obvious and manipulative in its conviction would not accurately sum up its most specific dilemmas, either; the screenplay displays such a lack of skill to its subject that it entirely skirts important issues, submitting to explanations that sidestep detail in favor of locating the most simplistic and expedient answers possible for the material. Hindsight, it turns out, is bad news when you’re a cannibal trapped in a Hollywood script.

Film criticism loses a timeless legend

The greats of the well-known movie critics are not simply the ones who know how to deliver thoughts and opinions in the garments of colorful analogies or biting hyperbole, but the ones who bring their life experience into their work, those that recognize themselves as nothing more than overzealous moviegoers, and those who maintain that they do it all for a love of the art over the size of a paycheck. Joel Siegel, who was all of the above rolled into one, was one of a handful of those guys who inspired my own venture into this professional realm, a man who embraced cinema with a sense of charisma and refused to get caught up in an ego-driven notion that he was a defining participant in a movement of insightful film analysis. He was slamming and praising all the latest releases long before most of us knew how to form coherent sentences, but he never held that over the heads of all the incoming new-bloods.

House of Mouse acknowledges members of press with overt display of suspicion

The fumes from the remnants of Jack Valenti remain a stirring force in the Hollywood of new, at least if the actions on part of Walt Disney Studios are anything to go by. Three weeks before their “Ratatouille” founds its way onto movie screens, members of the press here in the Pacific Northwest were treated to dangling carrots when the studio invited them to a super-early private screening of the CGI-animated project, perhaps because early reactions might be seen as useful at a time when so much uncertainty rests on the creative heels of their takeover of Pixar Animation (and because this is the first release under that new ownership, the stakes are particularly high as of the present). Would their direct input change the course of the medium’s future? Would the movie meet, or perhaps even exceed, the expectations of a group of people that is not exactly unfamiliar with the tug-of-war that has gone on between both the Mouse House and the CGI connoisseurs for the past several years?

A New Attitude

The universe often has a way of telling us that we exist for more reasons than just sucking air or walking upright. Sometimes the answers come in actions, other times internal realizations, almost all of them unexpectedly. In the instance of someone with great drive, the impact of such an epiphany can sometimes be so valuable that it’s not enough to just realize and act on the things we should, but also completely re-imagine the path we have taken along the way. If past plays an important part in the blueprints of our futures, then perhaps the original foundation is deserving of a new coat of gloss on occasion, too.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest / ***1/2 (2006)

Captain Jack Sparrow is an insatiable human being, cutthroat and ragged, with such a calculated and intricate magnetism that even those who openly detest his existence can’t help but be fascinated by him. By the standards of movie pirates, he is also like few of his kind: an elusive buccaneer who still manages to connect with a conscience on occasion. Most others are prepared to slit countless throats and betray any advisor possible in the pursuit of riches galore, but Sparrow knows when to be sympathetic, when to abandon fool-hearted ideas, and when to except defeat, even if only because he lacks the guts to be a dedicated example of his kind. There is, furthermore, little trouble in an audience routing for him; despite all the shady dealings he may or may not be a part of on the open seas, we know there is usually an ulterior motive cleverly hidden beneath. Example: an early scene in “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest,” in which Jack is confronted by Davy Jones, captain of the legendary Flying Dutchman, and told that he must collect 100 souls in order to save his own life. The audience knows he has no intention of carrying out such a plan, although that does not prevent him from initially agreeing to the bargain (or making the effort to come up with the cost). Never trust a pirate to keep a promise, they say, but also never assume that he won’t have a few cards hidden up his sleeve, either.

Superman Returns / **1/2 (2006)

If the great triumph of superheroes on the big screen owes its comprehensive success to any one specific person or thing, that distinction belongs solely to the moment in which Christopher Reeve tears open his shirt and exposes a giant red “S” in the middle of his chest. That split second of footage, a mere morsel it seems amongst a slew of great scenes and sequences in the original “Superman” film, characterizes the essence of the conflicted superhuman crime-fighter almost instinctively: the costume is not just some random impulse intended for casual dress-up, it comes attached with all kinds of responsibility. An entire city, and therefore an entire population, trusts him to keep peace, fight crime, uphold justice and look out for every individual’s best interest. He is a god amongst diverse believers, a public that stands in the shadow of a world so littered in turmoil that wildly fantastical heroes are the only hope they have. And yet no matter how many beasts or brutes he may tame, no matter how many sinister plots he may thwart, no one consciously seems to realize that the person wearing the costume is, too, a living and feeling human being at the core. To successfully adopt the identity that he does, his personal identity must remain secret to all around him, which thus restricts his ability to maintain a decent personal life. It is a hard job for a guy who seems to sociable and friendly to his peers, but it is unwavering nonetheless.

Poseidon / ** (2006)

“The ocean has been the cradle of rebirth.” So announces a character aboard the cruise ship Poseidon, mere minutes before the clock strikes midnight on New Year’s Eve. A guy who obviously never took into consideration the fact that Earth’s oceans have a nasty habit of claiming human lives as easily as an elephant goes through peanuts, you would think basic history knowledge (or even movie-going experience) would have given him the insight to rethink that proclamation – “The Perfect Storm,” about a crew of fishermen who are swallowed by the ocean during a tropical storm, and “Titanic,” telling of a catastrophic loss of life at the hands of human error on the open seas, are two prime recent examples of just how easily a simple thing like water can quickly become an object of chaos. No, his rhetoric is that of a man who is either too optimistic or too foolish to comprehend the oncoming contradiction of his statement. This is a man who never bothered to watch Ronald Neame’s “The Poseidon Adventure” before boarding.

Tristan and Isolde / ** (2006)

“Tristan & Isolde” is more a curious experiment than a full-fledged cinematic romance, a movie in which all necessities are captured in two hours of ambitious celluloid, except for one critical anchoring piece: a heart. The pain of characters like these is not that they sacrifice so much to be together, but the fact that they do so without ever being able to grasp the true feeling of the situation. Credible acting and a solid sense of style accommodate the final result only so far: slowly but surely, director Dean Georgaris’ medieval fable of love lost and found cripples our patience just as easily as he cripples the emotional walls around his hero and heroine. Foolish, ill-fated lovers they may be, but Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet they are not.

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe / ***1/2 (2005)

Stories about kids have been known to get away with just about anything, perhaps because, unlike real life, literature isn’t bogged down by grave world events like child kidnappings or mysterious disappearances. On the printed page, their lives unfold as well as they deserve, without unnecessary tragedy but full of the kind of curiosity that gives their adventures the suggestion of fearsome danger. Admittedly, some of us who go into stories like these with preconceived perceptions of the harshness of reality might find some things a bit too hard to swallow. The kids in the Narnia chronicles are a particularly worrisome bunch, not so much for their own naïve inquisitiveness but for their basic nature to jump the gun and trust things that for any normal kid would seem a little too colorful and unreal to believe in. Of course, all of this is never much of a forethought when we are kids ourselves, but as adults it would be foolish to deny that our eyebrows do not raise a little at the mere notion of something like a little girl being eager to go home “for tea” with a half-human stranger she meets by a lamppost.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory / **1/2 (2005)

Tim Burton's "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" plays like a road trip through the mind of a recovering psychiatry patient, zany and unsystematic, and so encased by its own bizarre reality that at times you wonder whether you will need a few prescription drugs to get through it. The visual look provides clues to the mindsets of the director and his special effects artists; here, on a canvas that has essentially been cleansed of all previous concepts of the famous children's novel by Roald Dahl, they unleash an environment that feels less like pure creative enterprise and more like a hallucination induced by illegal substances. That's not to say the movie lacks the enticing quality that make most of Burton's offbeat visual feasts so enjoyable, but to utilize it in a story which has, at its very basic core, been targeted towards children ever since its inception certainly blurs the focus. Is this movie for the kids, or is it for the Burton aficionados?