filmland / By Charlie Myers

March Badness

The competent Bank Job shines like gold in a season of stinkers

(March 13, 2008) Previews

Rhona Mitra (The Practice; Boston Legal)leads a team of scientists to a quarantined Scotland in Doomsday in an attempt to find a cure for a lethal virus known as the Reaper, which is once again threatening the human race. The team failed to account for survivors of the original virus, who may turn out to be even more lethal. Sounds like a summer film, but I’d follow Mitra anywhere. Rated R for strong bloody violence, language and some sexual content/nudity. 115 m. At the Broadway.

The Bank Job

GALLERY >

From Blue Sky Studios, who released Ice Age: The Meltdown, comes the Dr. Seuss story Horton Hears a Who! The well-known story is about Horton the elephant (voiced by Jim Carrey) who protects a species known as the Whos despite the skepticism of his friends that anyone could live on a speck of dust, particularly Sour Kangaroo (Carol Burnett), who sets out to destroy the speck. Rated G. 98 m. At the Broadway, Fortuna and Mill Creek.

On the teen film front is Never Back Down, a film that deals with a teenage fight club. Sean Faris (TV series Reunion) plays new high school student Jake Tyler, who discovers an underground fight club involving mixed martial arts. Newly living with his mother in Florida and still angry from his father’s death at the hands of a drunk driver, Jake takes out his frustrations in the club. Rated PG-13 for mature thematic material involving intense sequences of fighting/violence, some sexuality, partying and language, all involving teens. 120 m. At the Broadway and Mill Creek.

The Brazilian film City of Men is set in a rough area of Rio de Janeiro where teenage hoodlums whose fathers are long absent from their lives try to cope with their own emerging destinies. The film features some of the same actors and locales of the 2002 film City of God, and is based on the Brazilian TV series with the same name. If it’s even half as good as the earlier film it will be well worth seeing. Rated R for strong language and scenes of violence. 120 m. At the Minor.

Written and directed by Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind; The Science of Sleep), Be Kind, Rewind takes place in a New Jersey video store that rents only tapes, no DVDs. When the owner goes off on a trip, he leaves Mike (Mos Def) in charge, and when Mike’s friend Jerry (Jack Black) accidentally erases the tapes due to his magnetized brain, he has a major problem. What to do? Well, the obvious solution is to reshoot the films with a camcorder using local talent. Mia Farrow plays one of the store’s regular customers. Looks like fun. Rated PG-13 for some sexual references. 111 m. At the Minor.

Reviews

10,000 B.C.: I know that at the beginning of every year the studios dump their dreck for distribution since, they figure, no one, and the voters who chose Oscar nominations in particular, will remember any film released in January or February. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. But come on, it’s March now and we’re still getting close to 100 percent crap. Shouldn’t there be the odd film by now that’s actually worth

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