Films This Week
Check out the movies playing around town.
With: Reviews
Movie Times click here.
Santa Cruz area movie theaters >
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New This Week
THE DIVERGENT SERIES: INSURGENT Shailene Woodley and Theo James return as Tris and Four in this second installment of the dystopian future trilogy based on the popular book series by Veronica Roth. Hunted by the leader of the Erudite ruling class (Kate Winslet), they race to unlock the secret of their fiercely class-based society. Octavia Spencer, Zoë Kravitz, Miles Teller, and Ansel Elgort co-star for director Robert Schwentke. (PG-13) 119 minutes. Starts Friday.
GETT: THE TRIAL OF VIVIANE AMSALEM In this Oscar nominee for Foreign Language Film, an Israeli woman fights for her freedom and her reputation when she finds her morality effectively put on trial because she seeks to end her marriage to her manipulative husband. With no civil marriage or divorce in Israeli law, only a rabbi can dissolve the union, and only if the husband agrees, so the desperate wife takes her battle to the courtroom. Ronit Elkabetz stars in the film she also co-wrote and directed with brother Shlomi Elkabetz. (Not rated) 115 minutes. At the Nickelodeon, one week only.
THE GUNMAN Sean Penn goes the Liam Neeson/action route in this thriller he also co-wrote and co-produced, directed by Pierre Morel (Taken). Javier Bardem, Idris Elba, Ray Winstone and Mark Rylance co-star. 115 minutes. Starts Friday.)
IT FOLLOWS It’s back to ’50s-era morality in this indie horror thriller, in which a 19-year-old girl dares to have sex, which unleashes something nasty into her life. Maika Monroe stars for director David Robert Mitchell. (R) 100 minutes. Starts Friday.
QUEEN AND COUNTRY 30 years after Hope and Glory, the first installment of veteran director John Boorman’s cinematic memoir, comes this wry sequel. A decade after the events of the previous film, its English boy protagonist has grown into a youth conscripted into the Army during the Korean war, which he spends teaching typing on the base, chasing girls, and falling in love with film. Callum Turner and David Landry-Jones star. (Not rated) 115 minutes. Starts Friday.
Film Events
SPECIAL EVENT THIS WEEK: THE GLOBE ONSCREEN The reconstruction of Shakespeare’s famous playhouse in London is the setting for this series of performances, captured live in HD and broadcast to theatres worldwide. This week: THE DUCHESS OF MALFI Gemma Arterton (Tamara Drewe) stars in John Webster’s Elizabethan tragedy about a widowed noblewoman whose desire to marry her lover, who is also her steward, rouses the ire of her scheming brothers. (Not rated) 170 minutes. At the Del Mar, Sunday (March 22) 11 a.m. Admission: $15. Seniors and students: $13.
CONTINUING SERIES: MIDNIGHTS @ THE DEL MAR Eclectic movies for wild and crazy tastes plus great prizes and buckets of fun for only $6.50. This week: PORCO ROSSO This lesser-known, 1992 work from animator Hayao Miyazaki follows the adventures of a retired WWI flying ace (mysteriously transformed into a pig during the war) who enlists a crew of women mechanics to repair his plane in his battle against sky pirates. (PG) 93 minutes. In Japanese with English subtitles. At the Del Mar, Fri-Sat, midnight only.
CONTINUING EVENT: LET’S TALK ABOUT THE MOVIES Film buffs are invited to join us Wednesday nights at 7 p.m. in downtown Santa Cruz, where each week we discuss a different current release. For our location and discussion topic, please visit our Google Groups webpage: groups.google.com/group/LTATM
Movie Times click here.
Now Playing
CINDERELLA Reviewed this issue. (PG) 112 minutes. (***)—Lisa Jensen.
CHAPPIE Neill Blomkamp (District 9) has a savvy sense of the sci-fi genre. But this tale of an indestructible robotic police droid of the near future, imbued with consciousness and stolen by a gang of petty crooks, aspires to be little more than a twisted caper comedy about an innocent inducted into a life of crime. A thriller plot involves a lot of amped-up shootouts between criminals, robocops, and even bigger robots. Blomkamp and co-scripter Terri Tatchell make a valiant attempt to weld these random parts together into one big story, but a lot gets lost in all the mayhem. (R) 124 minutes. (**1/2)—Lisa Jensen.
RUN ALL NIGHT Liam Neeson decides to get mad, and even (as usual), as a retired hit-man who goes after his crime lord ex-boss (Ed Harris) to protect his estranged son (Joel Kinnaman). Common co-stars for director Jaume Collet-Serra (Non-Stop; Unknown). (R) 114 minutes.
’71 Jack O’Connell (Unbroken) stars as a young British soldier accidentally left behind by his unit for one harrowing night in the streets of riot-torn Belfast during “The Troubles,” in this intense drama from director Yann Demange. (R) 99 minutes.
WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi, co-creators of HBO cult hit Flight of the Conchords, take on vampire-obsessed pop culture in this comedy about bloodsucking roommates trying to keep up with the times—trends, technology, fashion, their zombie and werewolf rivals, and their daily dose of nourishment. (Not rated) 86 minutes.
WILD TALES Recently nominated for a Foreign Language Oscar, produced by Pedro Almodóvar, this dark satire from Argentina contains six related stories about the pressures, demands, and injustices of modern life and a cast of characters who gleefully give in to the temptation to lose control. (R) 115 minutes. In Spanish with English subtitles.
