POP CULTURE FILM REVIEWS BY AMY DIAZ
Kung Fu Panda 3 (PG)
The fighting panda of previous films finds his panda kin in Kung Fu Panda 3, a slight but entertaining continuation of Po’s adventures.
Dragon Warrior Po (voice of Jack Black) is still hanging out with his buddies the Furious Five — Tigress (Angelina Jolie), Monkey (Jackie Chan), Mantis (Seth Rogen), Viper (Lucy Liu) and Crane (David Cross) — and still eating dumplings and other goodies made by his father, Ping (James Hong). Though the Furious Five might want to contact their agents about how few onscreen lines they have, life is basically good in the Valley of Peace. But in the spirit realm, where Master Oogway (Randall Duk Kim) now resides, an old enemy is amassing power. Kai (J.K. Simmons), an old friend of Oogway, is collecting the chi (as symbolized by jade amulets) from kung fu masters, seeking a way to return to the mortal world and become all-powerful. He takes Oogway’s chi but Oogway, as he is turning into jade, warns that he has already picked a warrior capable of stopping Kai. Thus, when Kai gets back to this mortal coil, he starts searching for Oogway’s students. It’s at this exact time that Shifu (Dustin
AT THE MULTIPLEX
Coming soon Feb. 4: Hail, Caesar! (PG-13) Yay, a Coen brothers movie! George Clooney, Channing Tatum, Scarlett Johansson, Josh Brolin, Ralph Fiennes, Tilda Swinton and Jonah Hill star!; The Choice (PG-13) Here are the key words “based on a Nicholas Sparks novel,”; Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (PG-13) It is a truth universally acknowledged that zombies are still the hot movie monster. Reviewlets * Indicates movies worth seeing. *The Big Short (R) Christian Bale, Steve Carell. Directed and co-written by Adam McKay, this funny, angry movie about the housing bubble and financial crisis of 2008 is well constructed and packs a lot of actual information into its finance-bro tales. B+ *Bridge of Spies (PG-13) Tom Hanks, Mark Rylance. Steven Spielberg directs this traditional but solid Cold War legal and spy thriller.
Kung Fu Panda 3
Hoffman), the Five and Po’s current master, decides to pass the teaching baton to someone else so that he can spend more time learning the secrets of chi. His pick? Po, who does not quite feel ready to teach or to lead his fellows. In this state of selfquestioning, Po heads to the noodle stand to find that someone is about to beat his dumpling-eating record — and shockingly, that someone is another panda. Li (Bryan
Hanks performance is good; Rylance’s performance is great. ACarol (PG-13) Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara. This romance about two women, a divorcee and a young artist, in 1950s Manhattan is lovely to look at (wardrobe in particular) but occasionally sleepy. B Concussion(PG-13) Will Smith, Albert Brooks. This solid little movie about the doctor who discovered the link between football head injuries a brain degeneration doesn’t wow but it does offer a nice bit of process story-telling and quite a few very nice supporting actor performances. B
Dirty Grandpa (R) Robert De Niro, Zac Efron. Remember that Jackass movie called Bad Grandpa? That is Citizen Kane compared to this embarrassment about a swearing, offending grandpa trying to stop his grandson from making bad life choices. F The 5th Wave (PG-13) Chloë Grace Moretz, Ron Livingston. As unnecessary YA dystopian stories go, this one’s alright. A girl tries to look after her younger brother after an alien invasion starts to seriously cull the human population. C+
The Good Dinosaur (PG) Voices of Jeffrey Wright, Frances McDormand. Even Pixar doesn’t hit it out of the park every time, as *Creed (PG-13) evidence by this lukewarm Michael B. Jordan, Sylvester tale of a dinosaur and his Stallone. human friend. It hits way too The Rocky franchise gets many familiar cartoon beats reinvented with the arrival of and does nothing new or Adonis, son of Apollo Creed. interesting with them. BThe movie manages to hit The Forest (PG-13) a lot of the best bets of the Natalie Dormer, Natalie Rocky saga and offers winning, realistic characters. B+ Dormer.
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Cranston) says he is searching for the son he lost years ago; Po mentions that, coincidentally, he lost his dad years ago. The two wish each other luck but do eventually clue in to the fact that they might be the son/dad each other was looking for. Po’s sudden promotion to kung fu teacher, his reunion with his father and the reappearance of the villainous Kai in the mortal plane all come together with the dis-
A woman tries to find her twin sister, who has hiked into Japan’s “suicide forest” in this less-than-middling horror film. C*The Hunger Games: Mockingjay — Part 2 (PG-13) Jennifer Lawrence, Philip Seymour Hoffman. Also, Julianne Moore, Donald Sutherland, Elizabeth Banks, Natalie Dormer and Stanley Tucci, plus Josh Hutcherson and Liam Hemsworth doing their duty in the least-essential, love triangle part of the story. No matter your actual interest in Panem and the world of this dystopian YA novel, the cast is too great to ignore. B *Joy (PG-13) Jennifer Lawrence, Robert De Niro. This highly stylized David O. Russell movie tells the story of single mom Joy, her cruddy family and her dream of finding success with one of her inventions. The movie is mostly Jennifer Lawrence being fun to watch but that, really, is good enough to car-
covery that Kai can only be defeated by a chi expert and pandas apparently have the ability to master chi. Li offers to take Po back to the valley of pandas where he lives to teach him the secrets of chi. Because Ping doesn’t entirely trust this rando who is taking his son away, he stows away for the journey. As mentioned, the Furious Five have become the Furious Five Contractually Obligated Lines with only Tigress playing a significant plot role and Viper’s role so slight I was sort of surprised when she actually talked. But the movie is called Kung Fu Panda, not Kung Fu Tertiary Characters, so even when most of the action follows Po to the panda village it doesn’t necessarily feel like we’re missing out. Even with the new characters and setting and all the stuff about spirit realms, 3 feels even more streamlined that I remember the other movies feeling. It boils down to some core ideas — believe in yourself, teamwork is good, everybody has useful skills even if that skill is just hugging something really hard. These messages are delivered in a basically fun and gentle way with plenty of panda slapstick to keep kids happy and entertained. This isn’t some masterpiece of innovative storytelling, but it does a solid
ry the occasionally too-much *Spotlight (R) rest of the movie. B+ Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo. *The Peanuts Movie (G) Based on the true story of the Noah Schnapp, Hadley Belle Boston Globe’s investigation Miller. into the Catholic Church’s The characters you know priest sex abuse scandal, this and love get a surprisingly ode to expensive, exhaustive sweet update (visually; theinvestigative reporting is not matically they are the same) just an argument for highin this animated movie that quality journalism but also has Charlie Brown attempta solid bit of story-telling ing to win over the Little Red chalk full of great perforHaired Girl. B+ mances. A The Revenant (R) Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy. DiCaprio’s wilderness guide character gets the stuffing knocked out of him by a bear and then wonders around the pre-Civil-War northern midwest in this pretty but slow movie. BSisters (R) Tina Fey, Amy Pohler. The comedy dream team produces a less than perfect movie about two sisters saying goodbye to their childhood home. The entire movie is kind of made worth it by the final scene. B-
*Star Wars: The Force Awakens (PG-13) Daisy Ridley, John Boyega. If you haven’t thrown your money into the $1.5 billion pile of worldwide box office earnings yet, do. This movie is fun, real actual fun, not fun for nostalgic reasons and in spite of annoying CGI like some Star Wars movies I could mention. This revisiting of the galaxy far, far away that does in fact feature Luke, Leia, Han and other old favorites is actually at its best with the next generation: pilot Rey (Ridley), ex-Stormtrooper Finn (Boyega), bad-ass Poe and even whiny villain Adam Driver. B+