Film Clips: Extremely Haywire and Incredibly Tomboy

Fullmetal Red Tails go Haywire in the Underworld

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  • Sony Pictures
  • Kate Beckinsale plays a smoking hot vampire in Underworld Awakening



’’EXTREMELY LOUD AND INCREDIBLY CLOSE 2 stars (PG-13) An obsessive-compulsive boy (Thomas Horn) embarks on a complicated quest across the five boroughs of New York to solve the final game left by his father (Tom Hanks), who died in the fall of the World Trade Center. Max Von Sydow gives a terrific performance as a mute man who becomes the boy’s companion, but overall the film proves too contrived, too sentimental and much too quirky for its own good. — Holman
’’FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST: THE SACRED STAR OF MILOS (NR) The latest film in the anime franchise takes place in a steampunk-type universe in which alchemy is real. The protagonists, the Elric brothers, join a rebellion of oppressed peoples against their corporate overlords.
HAYWIRE 2 stars (R ) Mixed martial arts star and American Gladiator Gina Carano makes her film acting debut as Mallory Kane, a covert ops contractor marked for death by her own employers. Director Steven Soderbergh clearly enjoys dabbling in Bourne’‘-style chases and action scenes, and Carano makes an impact as a muscular action heroine, particularly in hand-to-hand fight scenes with Channing Tatum and Michael Fassbender. But Soderbergh and scripter Lem Dobbs seem utterly indifferent to the film’s plot and motivations and leave Carano emotionally stranded. — Holman
’’RED TAILS 3 stars (PG-13) Stationed in Italy in 1944, the Tuskegee Airman fight to prove their value to the U.S. Air Force in battling evil German aviators. Self-consciously corny, repetitive and overloaded with subplots, this old-fashioned war movie benefits from spectacular air battles and some interesting details about the strategies of airborne combat. Terence Howard stands out as a tough colonel. — Holman
’’TOMBOY (NR) This French film depicts a 10 year-old girl (Zoé Héran) who passes as a boy when she moves to a new neighborhood.
’’UNDERWORLD AWAKENING (R ) Kate Beckinsale returns as Selene, the vampire warrior, in the fourth installment in the ‘Underworld’ series. After being captured and cryogenically frozen for 12 years, Selene wakes up to a world where the tables have turned on her kind, and humans are hunting the vampires. —Henry Samuels
DULY NOTED
ACE THE ZOMBIE (NR) A pushover finds confidence after being bitten by a zombie, but also must take on the nasty head of the Zombie Control Force. Sun., Jan. 22, 9:30 p.m. Plaza Theatre, 1049 Ponce de Leon Ave. 404-873-1939.’’
BOOGIE NIGHTS (1997) 3 stars (R ) (1980) Style trumps substance in Paul Thomas Anderson’s likeably sprawling tale of the rise and fall of porn star Dirk Diggler (Mark Wahlberg) in the fun 1970s and cruel 1980s. The terrific cast includes Burt Reynolds, Julianne Moore, John C. Reilly, Don Cheadle and William H. Macy, but the film’s breezy tone gives way to violent sensationalism and cheap moralizing. This screening includes a live burlesque show. Taboo La La. Sat., Jan. 21, 10 p.m. Plaza Theatre, 1049 Ponce de Leon Ave. 404-873-1939. www.plazaatlanta.com.’’

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