Right Cinema

Everyone ready for movie day? I think it’s time to ditch out of work a bit early and catch a matinee. The new movies coming out this week are “21″, “Run, Fatboy, Run”, “Stop-Loss”, and “Superhero Movie”.

21

In this week’s batch of new releases, we have an intense movie about some MIT card-counters, a British comedy about breaking up, a drama about soldiers returning to Iraq after one tour of duty has already been completed, and yet another spoof movie, this one playing off of the comic book superhero genre.

21

When I read “Bringing Down the House”, I loved it. The idea of this group of MIT students getting together and taking on Vegas seemed fantastic, and I wished that I could count cards. I even tried once, but the riverboat casinos of the midwest and the fact that I in fact cannot count cards kind of killed that dream. In “21″, which is best on “Bringing Down the House”, we find Ben Campbell, an MIT student looking for a way to pay his tuition. When he finds Kevin Spacey, his doubts about paying for school are put to rest. Spacey, as Micky Rosa, creates a finely-tuned team of students who work their magic at casinos nationwide. But it’s not all fun and games - it turns out casinos don’t really like to lose millions. “21″ stars Jim Sturgess, Kate Bosworth, Kevin Spacey, and Laurence Fishburne.

Run, Fatboy, Run

In this comedy, which is directed by David Schwimmer and stars one of my favorite British actors, Simon Pegg, we meet Dennis, a man with nothing he can’t run away from. According to the tagline, that includes love, commitment, and responsibility. After leaving his pregnant fiancee five years earlier, Dennis decides that he must finish something in life, so he opts for a marathon in London. Considering he’s kind of overweight and out of shape, the training gets a bit difficult. But his ex-fiancee’s new man is also running, so there’s a lot more to this prize than just a blue ribbon. But it sounds like Schwimmer’s directing debut gets off to a rocky start, so you might have to be patient with this one. “Run, Fatboy, Run” stars Simon Pegg, Thandie Newton, and Hank Azaria.

Stop-Loss

“Stop-Loss”, an MTV drama starring Ryan Phillippe and Channing Tatum, strikes a cord with me because I know someone getting stop-lossed in a couple months and I think it’s bogus. But I won’t bore you with my political rants and try to stick to the movie.

For those of you unfamiliar with the term, a stop-loss occurs when you have less than a year left on your military contract, maybe even only a day left, but they send you overseas, say to Iraq, for 12- or 15-month tour of duty. Even though your time is up, you have to serve more months than you originally bargained for because the army shipped you out. Under the stop-loss law, the army can do this to a soldier for up to 10 years.

In the movie, just after returning from a tour of duty in Iraq, Ryan Phillippe is starting to get back to normal when he finds out he’ll be going back for round 2, even though he’s only got a day left on his contract. Stop-lossed. Releasing just days after the count of Americans who’ve died in Iraq has reached 4,000, the film is sure to get a reaction. Directed by “Boys Don’t Cry”’s Kimberly Peirce, one review says the movie,

“covers some of the same territory as those other features. The difference here is a quality of propulsive emotional intensity that pushes us over rough spots as it drives us insistently forward. … Peirce not only manages to powerfully hook us into the fate of men we barely know, she also shows how disturbed they are by the nature of combat in Iraq, by the way the enemy intertwines itself with innocent civilians and all but dares Americans to shoot.”

Of the movies releasing tomorrow, this is the one I’ll see first.

Superhero Movie

And this is the one I won’t see at all. How many spoofs like this are they going to make? It’s just not funny any more. There was “Scary Movie” 1 through 18, “Epic Movie”, “Date Movie”, and “Not Another Teen Movie”. When will it end? Please, make it stop.

Unfortunately, there’s at least one more coming are way: “Superhero Movie”. You get the idea - take every comic book superhero movie you’ve ever seen, roll them into one long spoof, and you might laugh twice. Leslie Nielsen stars in “Superhero Movie”.

See the trailers for the movies below.