Opening Films

by Inlander Staff & r & & r & ARCTIC TALE


From the peeps that brought us March of the Penguins and the studio that brought us An Inconvenient Truth comes Arctic Tale. Shot like the penguin flick, narrated by Queen Latifah and following a polar bear cub and its mum, this is sure to be the cutest doc of all time ... until the diminishing food stocks caused by ice shelves cause the mama bear to turn on her observers, biting a poor cameraman named Jean-Michel clean in two. Wait, that last part was what I hope happens.... (LB) Rated G





BECOMING JANE


Back in the 1790s in England, before Jane Austen was a published author, she was a 20-year-old woman who dallied romantically with dashing Irishman Tom Lefroy. Many have suggested that their relationship became the model for the romances depicted in her fiction. Here, American actress Anne Hathaway (last seen as Meryl Streep's hapless assistant in The Devil Wears Prada) plays Jane to James McAvoy's Lefroy in a Pride and Prejudice-style treatment of the author's own life. (AC) Rated PG





DEATH AT A FUNERAL


Perhaps best known as the voice of Yoda in all those Star Wars movies, Frank Oz is also an accomplished director (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels). Now he's back for the first time in years with Death at a Funeral, a British black comedy about all the mayhem that ensues after a rich patriarch passes away ... and his young, gay lover arrives to join in the grieving. Of course the kids visualize their trust funds going up in smoke, Anna Nicole Smith-style, so they hatch a hilarious plot, if Oz still has the touch. (TSM) Rated R





THE INVASION


Do we really need another remake of Invasion of the Bodysnatchers? My head says no and my heart says ... my heart also says no. Especially when the project, written by David Kajganich and directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel, was wrested from the original filmmakers by Warner Brothers, given to the Wachowski brothers (The Matrix trilogy) to partially rewrite and handed to James McTeigue (V for Vendetta) to partially reshoot, then spliced back together. Uh, more like Invasion of the Moviesnatchers. (LB) Rated R





THE LAST LEGION


Rome doesn't want a Caesar ruling any longer - no surprise there. The young ruler, Romulus Augustus (Thomas Sangster from Love, Actually), is forced out in a social coup turned violent and is sent on an adventurous quest with Colin Firth and Ben Kingsley. As legend has it, he is predicted to find the sword Excalibur (pre-King Arthur) and wield it against his enemies. Shot on location in the countryside and with camera work that looks beautifully done (CGI to the minimum, it seems -- cross your fingers). (KM) Rated PG-13





SUPERBAD


Three high school seniors -- two pals (Jonah Hill and Michael Cera) and a dorky hanger-on (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) -- try to find booze for a big party while trying not to think about the fact that college will soon separate them. Equal parts raucous, funny, and sweet, this is far from your usual teen comedy, mainly due to the touch of producer Judd Apatow (The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up). It's a goofy class act, with sharp dialogue amid outrageous situations. (ES) Rated R





VITUS


Switzerland's entry at the 2006 Oscars. A piano prodigy and all-around genius excels at everything, struggles to find himself, stumbles into love and finally becomes the person he seems to want to be ... a pianist, all before middle school. Standard smart-kid film fare. As they say, though, it isn't the story so much as the telling. (LB) Rated PG