Vicky Christina Barcelona
Relationships are very complicated, often traumatic and, if we are lucky, full of three-way, night-long, love-ins in Catalan with your ex-wife and a hot American. Sadly as most of us are not smooth-talking, tight-panted, soft-eyed artists named Juan, we will have to live out these dreams aided by the ever confused Woody Allen in his latest film. Allen seems never to tire of making films about the complexities of relationships and people don’t seem to tire of watching them, as he pulls together Rebecca Hall, Scarlet Johansson, Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem for this quirky, Catalonian caper. You get love, laughs and a crazy ex-wife who likes to shoot people.
Opens November 20
Subtitles in MOM Park Only
Twilight
What’s the worst characteristic a boyfriend/girlfriend has ever had? Insulting your parents? Leaving up the toilet seat? Being a vampire!?! Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) has always been a bit of an oddball but dating a vampire pushes the boat out even further in this interesting twist on the teen romance genre. If Woody Allen films don’t put you off relationships for life, then this will. Luckily Edward Cullen is a vampire “vegetarian” so when he wants to ‘neck’ with his new love, he means it in the traditional round the back of the bike sheds sort of way, not in the neck-piecing, life-draining style (although he does slaughter poor innocent animals). The film is as touchingly sweet as its underlying question is unanswerable: when you can live forever, what do you live for?
Opens November 27
Burn After Reading
In this film the poor soon-to-be retired CIA analyst Osbourne Cox (played by the ever-versatile John Malkovich) gets stuck between three ruthless, deadly, amoral, hate-filled killing machines: an ex-wife, the CIA and someone who likes going to the gym. Not only does his ex-wife want to use top-secret information she copied from his computer to blackmail him to pay for her cosmetic surgery, but she also dates George Clooney. The plot continues to push the limits of reasonability and the Coen Brothers show off to rest of the world about the fact they are allowed to make films about whatever they like, getting the studios money and make everyone laugh along with them.
Opens November 27
Body of Lies
The CIA are everywhere. Not only in the half of this week’s films but also, more illegally, in Jordon searching for terrorists. Leonardo DiCaprio proves that Blood Diamond wasn’t a fluke and he genuinely is a good actor, not the arrogant little muppet we thought, as covert CIA operative Roger Ferris. Ridley Scott’s latest film manages to keep the Middle East politics pretty even, in a rare piece of Hollywood phenomenological filmmaking. Ferris attempts to infiltrate a terrorist network, but he has to work with a man he’s not so sure he can really trust. The cultural clashes, moral clashes and ego clashes help the two-plus hours fly by in this engaging and thought-provoking film, which takes a modern, edgy subject and pulls it off with style.
Opens November 27