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The International
The International is an action flick with smarts, but that’s not to say the brain and the brawn always coexist easily. Clive Owen stars as an Interpol agent who, with the help of a New York assistant D.A. (Naomi Watts), tries to bring down a banking institution that’s long been involved in illegal activities on a global scale (backing coups, purchasing weapons, that sort of thing). Although loosely based on a real-life scandal, The International adheres more
Psychotronic Film Society: The Babysitter (1969)
What: A straight-laced DA has a steamy,
secret affair with his newborn child’s free spirit of a babysitter – and finds himself blackmailed by a the girlfriend of a vicious biker in this drive-in exploitation gem directed by Tom Loughlin (who played ‘70s vigilante icon Billy Jack!). When: Wed. March 25, 8 p.m.-10 p.m. Where: Sentient Bean, 13 E. Park Ave. Cost: $5
Savannah Music Festival: Silent Film Classic 1
What: Charlie Chaplin in “The Immi-
grant” and “The Kid.”
When: Fri. March 27, 1 p.m., Sat. March
28
Where: Morris Center, 10 E. Broad St., Cost: $10.
Savannah Music Festival: Silent Film Classic 2
What: “Sunrise,” directed by F.W. Mur-
nau.
When: Fri. March 27, 7 p.m.-9 p.m. Where: Charles H. Morris Center, 10 E.
Broad St., Cost: $10.
to cinematic conspiracy-theory conventions, thus emerging as a pale shadow of such great works in the same mold as The Parallax View and The Manchurian Candidate. Still, director Tom Tykwer (Run Lola Run) keeps the film moving (Run Clive Run would have been an acceptance title, given how much mileage Tykwer gets out of his star), and there’s one spectacular (if overlong) shootout at the Guggenheim Museum that’s alone worth the admission price.
Coraline Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas was actually Henry Selick’s The Nightmare Before Christmas, given that it was the latter who actually directed the film. Here, he displays his mastery again, helming an eye-popping animated extravaganza he adapted from Neil Gaiman’s best-selling book. Dakota Fanning provides the voice of Coraline, a lonely little girl who discovers an alternate world hidden behind a small door in her family’s new house. Initially, life does seem more pleasant on the other side -- her alternate parents are hipper, the food is tastier, the entertainment is more dazzling -- but it’s not long before things take a dark
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movies
Clunky football metaphors are never out of season, so think of director Zack Snyder as the cinematic equivalent of the quarterback who’s clearly no MVP but is just good enough to get his team to the Super Bowl. In bringing (along with co–scripters David Hayter and Alex Tse) the sacred graphic novel by writer Alan Moore and illustrator Dave Gibbons to the big screen, Snyder makes almost all the right plays –– the movie is visually resplendent and remarkably faithful to the source material –– but too often fails to find the heart buried deep within the darkness. Worshipped by comic fans and tagged by TIME magazine as one of the 100 best novels of the past several decades, Watchmen debuted in 1986 as a 12–part series for DC Comics before being compressed into graphic novel form. Remarkable in its storytelling prowess –– both narratively and visually –– the comic has been lifted almost wholesale from the printed page, with many screen shots serving as mirror reflections of illustrated panels. The story begins in 1985 with the murder of a fascistic superhero named The Comedian (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) and from there moves back and forth in time to track the exploits of the other members of the band known as the Watchmen: Nite Owl (Patrick Wilson), Silk Spectre (Malin Akerman), Rorschach (terrific Jackie Earle Haley), Ozymandias (Matthew Goode) and the godlike Dr. Manhattan (Billy Crudup). With its overlapping storylines of a world on the brink of annihilation, the deleterious effects of life as a superhero celebrity, and the vagarious manner in which time itself might operate, the graphic novel possessed no small measure of gravitas yet also found room in the margins for wit and warmth. The movie retains the seriousness but too often loses the sympathy.
special screenings
29 MAR 25 - MAR 31, 2009 | WWW.CONNECTSAVANNAH.COM
Watchmen
