May 8
Based on the novel of the same name by Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games is essentially dystopic science fiction for the YA set. It is a hodgepodge of several other (and better) pictures and it is, in all honesty, rather weak sauce on its own merits. The film lacks impact and emotional scope, despite some rather compelling scenes, and remains a well-polished but relatively stale exercise.
Airing originally on German television as a two-part miniseries, Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s World on a Wire is a prescient, intelligent, complex piece of work that serves as a precursor of sorts for films like The Matrix and Inception. Fassbinder’s film has now been released on Criterion Collection in its full three-and-a-half-hour glory and really should be experienced as a whole work.
Source Code is a ridiculous film in a lot of ways and it doesn’t make much sense. Directed by Duncan Jones, it’s a movie that’ll make you think and ask a lot of questions. It just doesn’t seem to have the answers, which can potentially be part of the fun. The cast works exuberantly to cover up the holes and the Ben Ripley script is amusingly urgent in its unveiling of plot mechanics (and subsequent plot holes).
The so-called Marvel Cinematic Universe expands with Captain America: The First Avenger, yet another motion picture to build to the eventual May 2012 release of The Avengers. Directed by Joe Johnston, Captain America is a fun picture filled with good performances and some truly awesome fight and action sequences.
The more Rupert Wyatt’s Rise of the Planet of the Apes pushes the line into absurdity, the more fun it becomes as a popcorn blockbuster. The 2011 picture is a reboot of the Planet of the Apes series, sort of a Batman Begins for the Apes mythology complete with an origin story and an open-ended conclusion that leaves the door wide open for a number of sequels and other possibilities.
