Film clips

— At area theaters 89 THE AVENGERS, PG-13 The title superheroes of all those preceding Marvel-based, big-screen comic book adventures, including Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Captain America: The First Avenger (Chris Evans), The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) and Thor (Chris Hemsworth) in a majormovie mash-up. Nick Fury, director of the international peacekeeping agency SHIELD, pulls together a team to battle the unexpected enemy threatening global safety and security. (142 minutes) 65 BATTLESHIP, PG-13 Based, believe it or not, on Hasbro’s classic naval combat game, our heroes sail aboard the USS John Paul Jones as the planet fights for survival against a superior force of what the trailers suggest are big, nasty aliens and/or robots. With Taylor Kitsch, Brooklyn Decker, Alexander Skarsgard, Rihanna, Tadanobu Asano, Liam Neeson; directed by Peter Berg. (131 minutes) 87 BEING FLYNN, R Paul Franklin Dano plays a struggling writer working at an inner-city homeless shelter where he encounters his estranged father (Robert De Niro). With Dale Dickey, Lili Taylor, Olivia Thirlby, Julianne Moore; directed by Paul Weitz. (102 minutes) 83 CHIMPANZEE, G In the long tradition of Disney nature documentaries, directors Alastair Fothergill and Mark Linfield take us deep into the African forests and introduce an adorable baby chimp named Oscar and hisentertaining approach to life. (78 minutes) 74 DARK SHADOWS, PG-13 Director Tim Burton brings to the big screen TV’s campy bloodsucker Barnabas Collins (via favorite actor/collaborator Johnny Depp), turned by a witch’s curse into a vampire in the late 18th century and discovering, after being freed from a tomb in 1972, that the world has become a very different place. (113 minutes) 78 THE DICTATOR, R Sacha Baron Cohen plays the title role, a dictator who risks his life to ensure that democracy will never come to the country he has so lovingly oppressed. With Anna Faris, Ben Kingsley, Megan Fox, John C. Reilly, J.B. Smoove; directed by Larry Charles. (83 minutes) 85 DR. SEUSS’ THE LORAX, PG Danny DeVito provides the voice ofDr. Seuss’ ultimate environmentalist, a grumpy forest creature whose story provides the platform for a 12-year-old boy searching for the one thing that will enable him to win the affection of the girl of his dreams. Animated. (94 minutes) 83 GOOD DEEDS, PG-13 Director Tyler Perry plays a successful, wealthy businessman named, naturally, Deeds, jolted out of his always-dowhat’s-expected-of-him routine when he meets a down-on-her-luck single mother (Thandie Newton). (129 minutes) 84 THE HUNGER GAMES, PG-13 Jennifer Lawrence plays a teenager in a post-apocalyptic United States picked by the evil capital city to represent her district in the annual Hunger Games, a nationally televised event of fights to the death until there’s only one survivor. (142 minutes) 70 JOHN CARTER, PG-13 Based on the novels by Tarzan creator Edgar Rice Burroughs, with Taylor Kitsch as the titular war-weary former military captain whisked away to Barsoom (aka Mars), where he becomes reluctantly embroiled in a conflict of planetary proportions. (132 minutes) 80 JOURNEY 2: THE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND, PG In this follow-up to 2008’s remake of Journey to the Center of the Earth, Dwayne Johnson (playing the new stepfather of a 17-year-old portrayed by Josh Hutcherson) and a helicopter pilot (Luis Guzman) and his “beautiful, strong-willed daughter” (Vanessa Hudgens) set out tofind the title island, rescue its lone inhabitant and escape before it sinks into the sea. (94 minutes) 90 THE KID WITH A BIKE, PG-13 An 11-year-old boy (Thomas Doret) who longs to be reunited with his family refuses to accept the reality of his circumstances: His dad (Jeremie Renier) is a bum who doesn’t care about him and has abandoned him at an orphanage. Subtitled. (87 minutes) 70 THE LUCKY ONE, PG-13 Zac Efron plays a Marine sergeant who searches for the unknown woman in the photograph he credits for keeping him alive during three tours of duty in Iraq. (101 minutes) 82 MIRROR MIRROR, PG A “fresh and funny” retelling of the Snow White story, with Julia Roberts as the evil queen and Lily Collins as a princess in exile whom seven “courageous rebel” dwarfs help fight to reclaim her birthright and win her prince (Armie Hammer). (106 minutes) 88 THE PIRATES! BAND OF MISFITS, PG From the folks who brought you Wallace & Grommit and Chicken Run, a boundlessly enthusiastic, if somewhat less-than-successful, terror on the High Seas (voice of Hugh Grant) leads a ragtag crew on a probably fruitless quest to beat out bitter rivals Black Bellamy (voice of Jeremy Piven) and Cutlass Liz (voice of Salma Hayek) for the much coveted Pirate of the Year Award. Animated. (88 minutes) 83 SAFE HOUSE, R Denzel Washington plays the CIA’s most dangerousrenegade, on the run with his rookie-operative “housekeeper” (Ryan Reynolds) after mercenaries tear apart his South African safe house. (115 minutes) 87 THINK LIKE A MAN, PG-13 Four guys, whose love lives are shaken up after the women they are pursuing buy comedian Steve Harvey’s bestselling book. (122 minutes) 67 A THOUSAND WORDS, PG-13 Eddie Murphy plays a fast-talking literary agent hoisted with his own petard when his target, a New Age guru, fixes it so he must find some other way of communicating besides speech to save his life. (91 minutes)86 21 JUMP STREET, R Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum play ex-adolescents who return to high school as youthful-looking undercover cops. (109 minutes) 70 WHAT TO EXPECT WHEN YOU’RE EXPECTING, PG-13 Five couples’ intertwined lives are turned upside down by the challenges of impending parenthood, including the question of what to do when your first child precedes your first date. With Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Lopez, Elizabeth Banks; directed by Kirk Jones. (110 minutes) 83 WOMAN THOU ART LOOSED: ON THE 7TH DAY, PG-13 Blair Underwood and Sharon Leal play a couple who begin to uncover secrets about their past. (101 minutes) 86 WRATH OF THE TITANS, PG-13 In this Clash of the Titans sequel, Sam Worthington returns as Greek demigod Perseus. (99 minutes)Movie-rating point system Movies are rated on a scale from 50 to 100. Guidelines for moviegoers:

96-100 Transcendent

90-95

Exceptional

80-89

Better than most to remarkable

70-79

Average

60-69

Awful to mediocre

50-59

Irredeemable

MovieStyle, Pages 35 on 05/25/2012

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