300
At the State Theater, Quality 16 and Showcase
Rating: 2 OR 4 out of 5 stars
- Christina Choi
According to our dueling critics, “300” is either an “aggressive and exuberantly stupid spectacle (that) purports to get the audience off, but there’s no fire here, no heat, and in the end the whole thing turns into a frigid parade of limbs and egos mutilated beyond repair,” or it “speaks to themes of loyalty, honor and duty, but no one bought a ticket to see ‘themes,’ they came to see a battle.
And the fighting itself is so beautiful and well-orchestrated it carries the movie.” Either way, it’s become the film event of the late winter.
Wild Hogs
At Quality 16 and Showcase
Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
Predictable, generic comedy whose only redeeming quality is its big-name stars (the dubious combination of Tim Allen, Martin Lawrence, William H. Macy and John Travolta).
Ghost Rider
At Quality 16 and Showcase
Rating: 0 out of 5 stars
If you’re a fan of over-the-hill, balding, mediocre actors playing superheroes, “Ghost Rider” is the movie for you. Of course, this isn’t just any superhero – Ghost Rider (Nicolas Cage) is a superhero with a motorcycle, flaming skeleton head and powers of a satanic minion, although for some reason he uses them for good. Actually, this whole package is a hard pill to swallow. But Eva Mendes is hot, right?
Zodiac
At Quality 16 and Showcase
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
“Zodiac” opens in 1968 and doesn’t stop jumping weeks from there, months and even years, following the various men – a drug-addled San Francisco Chronicle reporter (Robert Downey Jr.), a family-man detective (Mark Ruffalo) and, eventually, a cartoonist (Jake Gyllenhaal) – who take charge of and are slowly consumed by the investigation into California’s most notorious (and elusive) serial killer.
The Lives of Others
At the State Theater tomorrow
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
In pre-unification East Berlin, Gerd Wiesler dutifully begins an investigation of a German couple suspected of espionage. As they begins smuggling anti-party literature out to West Germany’s sympathetic press, the East Berlin government increases surveillance over the seemingly average couple. Percise and articulate.
Premonition
At Quality 16 and Showcase
Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
Linda is a bored housewife, minding after two boringly cute daughters and a boringly attractive husband. Day after day, she awakes to find herself in a bizarre series of events, leading her, in non-sequential order, to find that her husband has died. The problem with this lumbering Sandra Bullock vehicle is that by the end, we just don’t really care.