It has been a hairy start to the new year with such masterworks as “Valentine’s Day,” “Legion,” and “Dear John” not even among the worst offenders. Of course everything has paled next to “Avatar” in the money-making department, most of the film-going public preferring to visit Pandora multiple times instead of sitting through “From Paris With Love,” “The Wolfman” or “When In Rome.” Things are finally starting to change though, as this week sees the release of Martin Scorsese’s “Shutter Island.” Instead of several terrible films being dumped on screens nationwide today, the much anticipated Leo DiCaprio starrer is the only film opening wide and should dominate the box office this weekend. We would say that though this validates the public’s appetite for meatier fare, it probably won’t open as big as last weekend’s “Valentine’s Day.”
In Wide Release: Not since “Cape Fear” has Martin Scorsese had the chance to flex his genre muscles so strongly than with this week’s “Shutter Island.” Leonardo DiCaprio stars as a U.S. Marshall investigating the disappearance of a patient from a fortress-like hospital for the criminally insane off the coast of Massachusetts. We reviewed the movie this week, and with a cast that also includes Mark Ruffalo, Emily Mortimer, Ben Kingsley, Max Von Sydow, and Michelle Williams it ostensibly shouldn’t disappoint, but we ran two reviews on both sides of the fence — one a pretty big rave and one with a much colder take. You’ll have to decide for yourself.
With an increasingly full schedule of non-Leo projects, this may be the Scorsese’s last collaboration with the star for a while, which after ‘Island’ and “The Departed” will be going out on a very high note indeed. But critics are split and the film doesn’t have high marks overall. Rotten Tomatoes tracks the film with a rating of 65%, while Metacritic gives it a score of 63.
In Limited Release: Nothing beats a little free publicity. While Roman Polanski’s name has been high in the headlines these pasts few months or so, the man himself has been busy completing his latest film “The Ghost Writer.” Summit Entertainment is taking full advantage of the opportunity to get the flick in theaters while it’s director is still in the news, debuting it in NY and LA this week. Ewan Macgregor stars as a hack ghostwriter chosen to write the autobiography of a shady former British PM played by Pierce Brosnan. We checked the movie out earlier this week and found it to be deeply flawed, full of questionable performances and brought under by a tepid script. The film showed us one other thing we never thought we’d see in a Polanksi flick: Jim Belushi. Critics at-large are certainly more impressed than we were, as it has a rating of 82% from RT, with a 79 score from Metacritic.
Writer-director Julio DiPietro makes his debut this week with “The Good Guy.” Alexis Bledel plays an ambitious young Manhattanite looking for love in the generic-looking Wall Street-set romantic comedy. If you’re looking for something light and romance-themed, this is probably a better bet than “Valentine’s Day,” at least we think. Scott Porter, Bryan Greenberg, and Anna Chumsky co-star. Rotten Tomatoes has it at 30%, with a Metacritic score of 51.
Also released on a few screens today, an adaptation of the excellent book by Timothy Tyson, “Blood Done Sign My Name.” The film explores the racial outcry and subsequent call for social justice in Oxford, NC after a white man and his son are acquitted of a murder of a black man committed in full public view. The buzz isn’t too strong on this one unfortunately, as it looks more like a TV movie than an art-house classic. Nate Parker, Rick Schroder, Afemo Omilami, and Lela Rochon star in the Jeb Stuart directed film. RT is at 50%, while Metacritic gives it a score of 52. [header image by of M. Morrison]