The Lovely Bones

From the official site: Based on the critically acclaimed best-selling novel by Alice Sebold, and directed by Academy Award winner Peter Jackson from a screenplay by Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens and Peter Jackson The Lovely Bones centers on a young girl who has been murdered and watches over her family and her killer from Heaven. She must weigh her desire for vengeance against her desire for her family to heal. Oscar nominee Mark Wahlberg and Oscar winners Rachel Weitz and Susan Sarandon star along with Stanley Tucci, Michael Imperioli and Oscar nominee Saoirse Ronan.

Opens North America December 11th.

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Review – Surrogates

Imagine living inside your mind and taking that a step further by having a robot live out that pseudo reality on a daily basis. That’s what Surrogates plays out, taking the concept of incubated human beings and harvesting their minds (The Matrix) and combining it with living robots (I, Robot). These robots, through mind control by individuals, go to work, have a social life, live out fantasies (which begs the question, “Is it considered cheating on your spouse if your surrogate is doing it?”). These surrogate robots are tailored fit to whatever the user wants them to look like; for many it’s a younger, model version of them, and for others it’s a completely opposite persona and gender altogether. The environment is filled with mannequin-perfect models walking and talking the lives of their users.

Life goes on smoothly in this pseudo reality for FBI agent Tom Greer (Bruce Willis, whose surrogate is an eerily photoshopped version of himself) and his wife Maggie (Rosamund Pike), who drops further into the illusionary abyss, until a series of murders threatens the existence of their way of life. Agent Greer finds himself without his surrogate and is forced to live out the investigation on his own two feet with the help of agent Peter (Radha Mitchell). All the players, including head agent Stone (Boris Kodjoe, whose surrogate looks more of his real self than its user) are all surrogates, easily manipulated and potential portals of death for their controllers.

Amidst the glamorous utopia, there are obvious omissions to daily life. Where are all the children and senior citizens? Can you imagine the world filled with the manifestation of undeveloped minds of children? What happens to the mentally disabled who don’t have the capacity to control their minds much less their surrogates? What of the psychotic criminals? Sure, the crime rate has dropped dramatically in this utopia under the assumption that everyone is fulfilled and life is copacetic. Yet there is the community of “unwanted people” known as the Dreads, headed by the Prophet (Ving Rhames) who becomes an unexpected revelation in the storyline.

This film is visually stunning, with its blockbuster sci-fi backdrop and what looks to be detailed photo-editing for those mannequin-like features of the surrogates. Action packed – the surrogates can fly and do inhumanly stunts – it keeps you in suspense, trying to unravel the mystery behind the surrogate killings. The buildup reaches to the ultimate climax which mandates the decision of “to push the button or not.” It’s a great film if you don’t think too much about it; otherwise there’s too much incongruity for that surrogate utopia to happen in your mind. If anything, it’s worth seeing in action Bruce Willis in a blond wig and mannequinesque Boris Kodjoe (Madea’s Family Reunion and Resident Evil: Afterlife in 2010).

Official Site

Whiteout

From the official site: Antarctica. The coldest and most isolated place on earth. Temperatures drop to 120 below. Winds whip across the ice at over 100 miles an hour.  Home to one of the deadliest forces in the world: the whiteout.

It’s a place US Marshall Carrie Stetko (KATE BECKINSALE) won’t miss. As the lone law-enforcement agent at the Amundsen-Scott Research Center, her tenure here has not only been harsh but uneventful. In three days, when the station powers down and the sun sets for the long winter, she’ll be getting out; leaving Antarctica for good and turning in her badge for a new life.

But when a body is discovered in the no-man’s land on open ice, Stetko is plunged into a shocking mystery. Bizarrely battered and miles from camp, the dead man is Antarctica’s first homicide victim and Stetko’s first real challenge in a long time.

Her investigation soon involves U.N. Special Agent Robert Pryce (GABRIEL MACHT), sent to monitor her progress in this ungoverned territory.  As the case takes a deadly twist and a 60-year-old secret is unearthed, Stetko herself becomes a target. Pryce could prove to be a powerful ally but only if solving the murder is what he’s really after.

With only days before the last plane out, Stetko must race to unravel the mystery or risk being stranded on the ice as darkness and the killer closes in.

Warner Bros. Pictures presents, in association with Dark Castle Entertainment, a Dominic Sena film: the action thriller Whiteout starring Kate Beckinsale (Underworld), Gabriel Macht (The Spirit), Columbus Short (Stomp the Yard), and Tom Skerritt (Contact). The film is directed by Dominic Sena (Swordfish) from a screenplay by Jon Hoeber & Eric Hoeber and Chad Hayes & Casey W. Hayes, based on a graphic novel by Greg Rucka and Steve Lieber and published by Oni Press.

Opens September 11th.

Official Site

Snow Angels (2008)

David Gordon Green has adapted the 1994 first novel by Stewart O’Nan and is bringing it to the screen this week as its director. The story of love, relationships and violence in a Pennsylvania suburban town brings some weighty drama to a weekend of prehistoric heroes and family comedy.

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