Friday, November 28, 2014

"Sabotage" (2014)

Starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Olivia Williams and Sam Worthington
Written by Skip Woods and David Ayer
Directed by David Ayer
Rated R - Strong violence, language, nudity
Running Time: 109 Minutes
Trailer

John "Breacher" Wharton leads an elite squad of DEA tactical agents. On his team are James "Monster" Murray (Sam Worthington) and his wife Lizzy Murray (Mirielle Enos), Julius "Sugar" Edmonds (Terrence Howard), Joe "Grinder" Phillips (Joe Manganiello), Tom "Pyro" Roberts (Max Martini), Eddie "Neck" Jordan (Josh Holloway), Bryce "Tripod" McNeely (Kevin Vance) and "Smoke" Jennings (Mark Shlegel). And together they have just stolen $10 million from a vicious drug cartel during a DEA raid. But later that evening when they go to retrieve their stolen payout from its hiding place, they find that someone's taken the money.

Worse, the DEA figures out that $10 million is missing from the raid and puts the team under intense scrutiny. Six months later, the team is splintered. They've lost their trust in each other. And things are about to get worse: Someone starts picking them off. One by one, the bodies are found mutilated in ways that implicate the cartel, and Breacher partners with Atlanta PD homicide detective Caroline Brentwood (Olivia Williams) to find out who's offing his friends.

The closer Brentwood gets to the case, however, the less it seems to make sense. Who is playing whom? Who are the real killers? And what happened to all that dirty money?

Sunday, November 23, 2014

"The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1" (2014)

Starring Jennifer Lawrence, Liam Hemsworth and Phillip Seymour Hoffman
Written by Peter Craig and Danny Strong
Directed by Francis Lawrence
Rated PG-13: Violence, peril
Running Time: 123 Minutes
Trailer

After being rescued from the latest round of vicious Hunger Games, young rebel Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) finds herself in District 13, a city long-thought destroyed. Instead, the residents of 13 live in a massive, militarized underground bunker and are led by President Coin (Julianne Moore). Together with marketing whiz Plutarch Heavensbee (Phillip Seymour Hoffman), Coin plans to use Katniss as a rallying cry to get the other Districts to rise up against the villainous President Snow (Donald Sutherland) and the Capitol.

But Katniss is far from in shape enough to accomplish this task, suffering from post-traumatic stress after her ordeal in the Games. But when she discovers what Snow and the Capitol have done to her home District 12, and what he's currently doing to any district that dares show any sign of rebellion, she realizes she can't sit on the sidelines.

The opening shots of a dangerous civil war have been fired. On one side, the down-trodden people of the districts, rallying behind a young girl who increasingly finds herself out of her depth. On the other, the near-endless resources of President Snow, who will stop at nothing to put down this rebellion once and for all.

Saturday, November 15, 2014

"Hours" (2013)

Starring Paul Walker and Genesis Rodriguez
Written and directed by Eric Heisserer
Rated PG-13: Peril, language
Running Time: 97 Minutes
Trailer

Nolan Hayes (Paul Walker) brings his pregnant wife Abigail (Genesis Rodriguez) to the hospital one night. The doctors inform him that Abigail has given birth to a young girl, five weeks premature, and has died in the process. Meanwhile, Hurricane Katrina is bearing down on New Orleans and the hospital staff are in the process of evacuating the hospital as the storm grows worse.

Nolan's daughter needs to be kept in an incubator that can't be moved. Worse, with the power out, the incubator is operating on a backup battery - which only has three minutes of charge. Nolan soon discovers that the rest of the hospital has been evacuated without him, leaving him alone with his daughter, forced to crank and recharge the battery every two or three minutes in order to keep her alive until they can be rescued.

Thursday, November 13, 2014

"Interstellar" (2014)

Starring Matthew McConaughey, Ann Hathaway and Michael Caine
Written by Jonathan Nolan
Directed by Christopher Nolan
Rated PG-13 - Peril, language
Running Time: 149 Minutes
Trailer

In the future, the human race is dying. Earth is now barely capable of supporting human life as a mysterious blight destroys food crops worldwide. Humanity has retreated within itself, broken and despondent and waiting to die. One day, former NASA pilot turned farmer Cooper (Matthew McConaughey) discovers a strange gravitational anomaly in his daughter's bedroom and his investigation leads him to the remnants of NASA working secretly out of the old NORAD facility.

There, he finds his old mentor, Professor Brand (Michael Caine) has devised a bold plan to save humanity: A wormhole has been discovered near Saturn that leads to another galaxy, and there are possibly habitable planets nearby. Brand convinces Cooper to pilot the mission, which will also include Brand's daughter Amelia (Ann Hathaway), astronauts Romilly (David Gyasi) and Doyle (Wes Bentley), and two robots TARS (Bill Irwin) and CASE (Josh Stewart).

But in order to explore what lies on the other side of the universe, Cooper must leave behind his two children, Tom (Timothee Chalamet) and Murph (Mackenzie Foy), who may never forgive him for doing so.

Monday, November 10, 2014

"Dead Man Down" (2013)

Starring Colin Farrell, Noomi Rapace and Terrence Howard
Written by JH Wyman
Directed by Niels Arden Oplev
Rated R - Violence, strong language, sex
Running Time: 117 Minutes
Trailer

Victor (Colin Farrell) is an enforcer for Alphonse (Terrence Howard), a midlevel crime lord. For the past three months, someone has been offing other members of Alphonse's crew and mailing him cryptic notes. Victor's friend Darcy (Dominic Cooper) tries to discover the identity of this killer by following a trail left behind by the latest victim, who was also on the case.

Meanwhile, Victor befriends his next door neighbor, a woman named Beatrice (Noomi Rapace) who recently had her face reconstructed after an automobile accident. The two recognize something in each other, each damaged in different ways, and when Beatrice learns what it is that Victor does, she asks him a favor: to murder the man who drunkenly smashed into her with her car, scarring her face and ruining her life.

But the pressure is on: What Alphonse doesn't know is that Victor is the man who has been killing his crew. But he's getting closer and closer to figuring that out.

Monday, November 3, 2014

"Gone Girl" (2014)

Starring Ben Affleck, Rosamund Pike and Carrie Coon
Written by Gillian Flynn
Directed by David Fincher
Rated R: Violence, strong language, nudity, sex
Running Time: 149 Minutes
Trailer

On the morning of her fifth wedding anniversary, Amy Dunne (Rosamund Pike) disappears. Her husband, Nick (Ben Affleck), comes home to find their living room in disarray and calls the police. Detectives Rhonda Boney (Kim Dickens) and James Gilpin (Patrick Fugit) arrive and are immediately suspicious of Nick.

In the following days, as the evidence mounts against Nick, the public begins to turn against him. Even his loyal twin sister, Margot (Carrie Coon), always at his side, begins to wonder if he's not being entirely honest. Slowly, Nick's life begins to unravel. His year-long affair with one of his students is exposed, and the police come ever closer to pressing charges against him even without having found Amy's body.

What is Nick lying about? Where is Amy? And what was she so afraid of?