Past the Popcorn film roundup—Expelled, The Forbidden Kingdom, and more
Each week, Past the Popcorn offers a thorough look at the latest round of films opening on big screens.
The film that everybody is waiting for this week is Expelled: No Intelligence allowed. Like the movie itself, even a review barely does the topic justice. But Greg Wright gives it stab: the movie, he says, “certainly provides proof of bias, in both intentional and unintentional ways. And the vituperative response from detractors who haven’t even seen the film proves that, yes, there is a much larger war going on out there. On the entertainment level, the film comes in at about a B. When it comes to its subject matter, though, Expelled fumbles the ball quite a bit. At the end of the day, I don’t find that the film makes a compelling case. Yes, I am inclined to believe that the opposition fights pretty dirty; I simply don’t think those folks are really the same cabal that Expelled.” If the filmmakers are really right, Wright says, they simply playing too nice to catch the culprits “red-handed.”
The most enjoyable film of the week, though, and maybe of the month, is The Forbidden Kingdom, which Mike Brunk calls “an outstanding adventure film,” a martial arts film that feels like early Indiana Jones.
Greg Wright also recommends Young @ Heart, “filled with “many, many moving highlights and pleasures,” and The Visitor, a “a quietly worthy film” that develops into a “subtle and mature romance.” Jeff Walls also enjoyed the R-rated raunch comedy Forgetting Sarah Marshall, and Kathy Bledsoe fairly raves about the R-rated Gen-X indie Backseat.
Greg Wright, meanwhile finds Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden to be the proverbial bait-and-switch, with Morgan Spurlock barely interested in actually finding the terrorist. Kathy Bledsoe also pans 88 Minutes, and Jennie Sphor wanted a little bit more out of My Blueberry Nights than what it delivered.
Also new this week: Body of War.
