The new movies for July 17 are reviewed here by Volkmar Richter who writes: "You can’t avoid Harry Potter this week, nor should you. But if you must, there are two hits of war, a dose of pollution and some comical sex play from France. Read his reviews here."
HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE: Ever since it opened on Wednesday, this 6th movie about the boy wizard-in-training has had a huge response from the fans. Both at the box office and in comments online, where it looks like the nit-pickers outnumber the outright enthusiasts. Sure there are faults to be found, but overall this an elegant piece of film storytelling, beautifully visualized and adorned with seamless special effects. It’s a transition in the series. There’s a great deal of content to get across and less spectacle than we’re used to. Plus a thick ominous mood of foreboding. Harry’s final showdown with Lord Voldemort is coming. Headmaster Dumbledore and a teacher brought back out of retirement arm him with information. That bully Draco Malfoy is skulking around apparently on a mission while that unctuous Snape is poised to help him and the Death Eaters are on a wrecking spree. All the while, there’s a sweet puppy love sideshow. Harry, Hermione and Ron are now older teenagers after all. If you don’t know the book, you might lose your way now and then. Some story lines are underplayed (who the half-blood prince was, for instance) or brought in late (like the all-important Horcruxes). Some scenes in the middle drag but the film recovers to deliver an emotional ending. Jim Broadbent is the latest addition to the who’s who of fine British actors playing the teachers, Tom Felton brings new depth to his role as the conflicted Draco and two young actors are eerie in some flashbacks to Voldemort’s early years. (At theatres all over)
THE HURT LOCKER: There have been many films now about the Iraq war but audiences have mostly stayed away. Even from the Oscar winning documentary, Taxi to the Darkside. There’s too much to think and argue about. This film tries a different approach. It doesn’t deal with the right and wrong issues, except maybe in a line or two of dialogue. It delivers breathless suspense watching a company of U.S. soldiers assigned to bomb-disposal. It’s fiction that feels absolutely authentic. The writer spent time with and reported on squads like this. There are a series of scenes as they uncover a device and one man goes out to disarm it. He doesn’t know if there’s a timer ticking down or a guy with a remote nearby ready to set it off. People watching from rooftops and mosques look suspicious. There’s no music on the soundtrack as he works. These scenes are very effective building tension and ultimately setting up a character study. One soldier, well-played by Jeremy Renner, takes to the work like a daredevil and, as one guy labels him, an adrenaline junkie. His company leader (Anthony Mackie) calls him “a redneck piece of trailer trash” for disregarding standard procedure. This is a very good film because it goes far beyond the usual maverick versus authority battle to touch on deep fears and the lure of war itself. Kathryn Bigelow directed and Ralph Fiennes, David Morse and Guy Pearce show up in small roles. Filmed in Jordan, and (a few later scenes) in Vancouver. (Playing at Tinseltown).
THE GIRL FROM MONACO: The Ridge Theatre’s French Film Festival just keeps coming up with winners this year. This is a very funny and droll farce about a straight-laced lawyer with an eye for the ladies. Or maybe he’s just an unlikely magnet, even at age 60. He travels from Paris to the tiny principality on the Mediterranean to defend a society matron on a murder charge. One night he watches a blonde and sexy weather girl on TV and before you know it runs into her several times, is invited into her bed and goes out clubbing and partying with her. As he lets loose in these nighttime sprees, his daytime work suffers. Luckily there’s a bodyguard who’s always nearby to offer advice and keep him out of serious trouble. A later assignment takes a darker ironic turn. The film sparkles in the interplay between these characters. Fabrice Luchini is a solid everyman as the lawyer while real life TV weather personality, Louise Bourgoin, plays the ambitious free-spirit who loves to quote her idol, Princess Diana. The film is clever light entertainment, and very French.
KATYN: For years, Stalin blamed it on Hitler. This film opens up the real story of a wartime atrocity that the Soviet dictator personally ordered and that has only recently been confirmed by historians. People in Poland knew the truth but couldn’t talk about it. The country’s most honored director, Andrzej Wajda, waited until he was 82 to tell it, even though his own father was a victim. The event is the 1940 massacre by the Red Army of thousands of Polish military officers. They were also professors and community leaders. Stalin was trying to bust a nation as he took it over.
The film, based on a popular novel, shows the effect on four families as the men go off to war and are never heard from again. It has many well-staged moments but the story turns melodramatic and becomes scattered and fragmented as it shifts among too many characters. Still, the patriotic sentiments to preserve a free Poland come through clearly. So does the sense of outrage as the sudden discovery of one man’s diary allows the film to recreate some of the murders in a chilling final 10 minutes. (At the VanCity Theatre).
WATERLIFE: We’re hardly strangers on the west coast to concerns about pollution and clean water. So, this documentary from the east exploring those issues in the Great Lakes should find some takers. Starting with a grim result (cancerous whales) and a pleasurable ideal (people frolicking in the sun and water), the film tracks the damage being done to each of the five lakes. Toxic chemicals, agricultural and industrial run off, invasive species, residential development. The list gets scary as it goes on. One ironic image shows how much people like to be near the water. They’ve built a swimming pool right at the shore of one lake. The film is lively, has strong photography and an interesting innovation: no talking heads. It doesn’t show the people interviewed, but uses their voices like a narrator as we watch the pictures. Gordon Downie is the official narrator and not surprisingly some music from his band, The Tragically Hip, is on the soundtrack, along with many others especially Sigur Ros, Philip Glass and Brian Eno. The structure is a problem though. The film starts with Lake Superior and works its way down detailing the problems on all the other lakes as it goes. Eventually that gets to sound repetitive, and oddly Toronto gets off relatively easily. (Playing at Tinseltown)