Tuesday 8 March 2011

Critical Week(s): A blustery day

No, I haven't gone all retro: there's actually an all-new Winnie the Pooh movie coming to cinemas, and critics were, erm, treated to the now-requisite Sunday morning child-friendly press screening. There were an unusual number of under-5s at this one, the perfect audience for it. At the other end of the spectrum, we all rather enjoyed the raucous energy of Battle Los Angeles, a virtually script-free movie that has a lot of style.

The past two weeks were filled out with: Julie Taymor's uneven but watchable all-star gender-bending take on Shakespeare's The Tempest; Liam Neeson's return to Euro-action for the preposterous but enjoyable thriller Unknown; the Farrelly Brothers' clever and endearing gross-out comedy Hall Pass; Ed Helms as an effective fish-out-of-water in the enjoyable comedy Cedar Rapids; Felicity Jones taking on the Pretty Woman role opposite hunk-du-jour Ed Westwick in the silly but charming Chalet Girl; the rightfully acclaimed, emotionally powerful Canadian-Middle Eastern drama Incendies; Wim Wenders' gorgeously artful 3D Pina Bausch doc Pina; and the riveting, moving education doc Waiting for "Superman".

I also took the opportunity to rewatch The Social Network on the flight to New York, to see if I'd missed something the first time. But I had the same reaction: it's excellent filmmaking and acting, plus a staggeringly relevant subject, but the film never grabs hold on any other level. Anyway, this coming week features the child-friendly morning screening of the Disney romp Mars Needs Moms, Ben Affleck in The Company Men, the Korean horror I Saw the Devil,  the 3D racing doc Closer to the Edge, the editor's cut of the notorious Taxi Zum Klo, and something called Tomorrow When the War Began.

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