Opening Films

by Inlander Staff


The Amityville Horror -- "Gosh... beautiful house, nice neighbor-hood, original woodwork... and you only want $80K for it? We'll take it!" A seeming real estate steal turns into a living nightmare for a young couple (Ryan Reynolds and Melissa George) and their kids as the charming old Cape Cod they've just moved in to starts behaving downright inhospitably. Flies on window screens, growling voices, invisible presences and clocks that snap people awake at 3:15 am all point to the disturbing real life events that took place in the house in 1973. Remake of the 1979 original, from the producers of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003 version). Rated: R





Dear Frankie -- A supremely understated Emily Mortimer (Notting Hill) plays a single mother whose young, deaf son Frankie (Jake McElhone) believes his dad is a crewman on a cargo ship sailing around the world. Lizzie ghostwrites letters from Frankie's ideal father until the ship that he evidently sails on docks in Glasgow harbor, forcing Lizzie to hire a stranger to meet Frankie posing as the boy's parent. Although the story is objectively fraught with sentimental pitfalls, Dear Frankie is a sophisticated movie (by first time director Shona Auerbach) that carefully exposes the universal onion layers of familial bond without ever leaving fingerprints on the layers. (Cole Smithey) Rated: PG-13





Publication date: 04/14/05