‘12 Years a Slave’ Honored by Hoosier Film Critics

THE INDIANAPOLIS STAR
By Bob Bloom

HOLLYWOOD---“12 Years a Slave” was the big winner today as the Indiana Film Journalists Association announced its awards for 2013. “12 Years a Slave” was honored as best picture, with Steve McQueen named best director and star Chiwetel Ejiofor named best actor. Composer Hans Zimmer was recognized was his musical score. “Her,” a feature about a man who falls in love with the voice on his computer took three honors: original screenplay by director Spike Jonze, the association’s Original Vision Award and runner-up for best film. Adele Exarchopoulos was named best actress for her performance in “Blue Is the Warmest Color,” which also was selected as best foreign film. [link]

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An Unbeliever in Disney World: "Saving Mr. Banks" Opens Dec. 20th

THE NEW YORK TIMES
By A.O. Scott

Emma Thompson and Tom Hanks in "Saving Mr. Banks," directed by John Lee Hancock.

HOLLYWOOD---“Saving Mr. Banks,” released by Disney, is a movie about the making of a Disney movie (“Mary Poppins”), in which Walt Disney himself (played by Tom Hanks) is a major character. It includes a visit to Disneyland and, if you look closely, a teaser for its companion theme park in Florida (as yet unbuilt, when the story takes place). More precisely, “Saving Mr. Banks” recounts the consummation, in business and creative terms, of Walt Disney’s long courtship of P. L. Travers, the creator of Mary Poppins, played with spirited fussiness by Emma Thompson. [link]

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"The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" Opens Friday, December 13, 2013

FANDANGO

HOLLYWOOD---Frightening images and fantasy action violence: "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug". Having survived the first part of their unsettling journey, Bilbo Baggins and his companions  continue east. More dangers await them, including the skin-changer Beorn and the giant spiders of Milkwood. After escaping capture by the dangerous Wood Elves, Bilbo and the dwarves journey to Lake-town and, finally, to the Lonely Mountain, where they face the greatest danger of all: the fearsome dragon Smaug. [Tickets]

Cast: Ian McKellen, Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, Benedict Cumberbatch, Evangeline Lilly, Lee Pace, Luke Evans, Ken Stott, James Nesbitt, Orlando Bloom
Director: Peter Jackson
Genres: Action/Adventure, Sci-Fi/Fantasy

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Movie Review: "The Hunger Games: Striking Fire"

THE NEW YORK TIMES
By Manohla Dargis

HOLLYWOOD---“Catching Fire” is the follow-up to “The Hunger Games” and the second in what will be four movie adaptations of Suzanne Collins’s fantastically successful book trilogy. (The studio behind the series, Lionsgate, is splitting the final book into two flicks.) It’s largely satisfying as far as screen adventures go, and comes fully loaded with special effects and action scenes, and embellished with the usual brand-name character actors, including the new arrivals Philip Seymour Hoffman, Jeffrey Wright and Amanda Plummer. It also has a different director, Francis Lawrence (replacing Gary Ross), who showed he knows his way around the post-apocalypse with the Will Smith vehicle “I Am Legend.”[link]

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A Black Director's Own Christmas Miracle" "Black Nativity" Opens Today

THE NEW YORK TIMES
By Felicia R. Lee

Kasi Lemmons, pictured at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Harlem,
wrote some of the lyrics for the movie “Black Nativity.”

HOLLYWOOD---“Black Nativity,” an unapologetically feel-good musical about a family’s Christmas miracle, is a stark stylistic departure from Kasi Lemmons’s signature film as a director, the brooding 1997 indie hit “Eve’s Bayou.” But Ms. Lemmons said that “in a weird way” the two films are not dissimilar: Both examine complicated families and belief in things unseen through a child’s perspective. Black Nativity,” which opens Wednesday. [link]

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Movie Review: "Philomena," Starring Judi Dench and Steve Coogan

THE NEW YORK TIMES
By Stephen Holden

HOLLYWOOD---In “Philomena,” Judi Dench’s portrayal of a stubborn, kindhearted Irish Catholic trying to discover what became of the toddler she was forced to give up as a teenager is so quietly moving that it feels lit from within. A major theme of this film from Stephen Frears is forgiveness. Ms. Dench’s Philomena Lee glows with the radiance of someone serene in her faith despite inhumane treatment by the church. That she makes you believe her character has the capacity to forgive provides the movie with a solid moral center. “Philomena” has many facets. It is a comedic road movie, a detective story, an infuriated anticlerical screed, and an inquiry into faith and the limitations of reason, all rolled together. Fairly sophisticated about spiritual matters, it takes pains to distinguish faith from institutionalized piety. [link]

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Gay Muslim Movie 'Naz + Maalik' Explodes Stereotypes

THE HUFFINGTON POST
By Yasmine Hafiz

HOLLYWOOD---An upcoming independent feature film borne out of director Jay Dockendorf's reaction to hearing about the FBI's program of secret spying in mosques in Brooklyn, "Naz + Maalik" explores the world of two closeted Muslim teens who have their Friday afternoon ruined by FBI surveillance. Though the American Muslim community is becoming increasingly diverse, the problem of ignorance and bigotry towards Islam is still an issue. In that sense, American Muslims share a history of prejudice with the black and gay communities, which all intersect in this film. [link]

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Does 'Ender's Game' Tell the Bible Story of Joseph?

THE CHRISTIAN POST
By Tyler O'Neil

HOLLYWOOD---The new film "Ender's Game," based off the book by Mormon writer Orson Scott Card, may carry some Christian themes, and one reviewer claims it mimics the biblical story of Joseph. The film "parallels directly Joseph's dealing with this brothers," Robert Hamel, assistant professor of Theatre Arts at Westmont College and a Lutheran pastor for 29 years, told The Christian Post in an interview on Thursday. Hamel compared the character Ender's crisis of conscience to Joseph's decision to feed the very same brothers who once sold him into slavery. "In a creative way, the movie uses Ender's family dynamic to show how the character of a leader is shaped," Hoose writes. In a society where families are only allowed to have two kids, Ender is the third – but his parents still value him deeply. [link]

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Movie Review: ‘12 Years a Slave’ Holds Nothing Back in Show of Suffering

THE NEW YORK TIMES
By Manohla Dargis

HOLLYWOOD---“12 Years a Slave” isn’t the first movie about slavery in the United States — but it may be the one that finally makes it impossible for American cinema to continue to sell the ugly lies it’s been hawking for more than a century. Written by John Ridley and directed by Steve McQueen, it tells the true story of Solomon Northup, an African-American freeman who, in 1841, was snatched off the streets of Washington, and sold. It’s at once a familiar, utterly strange and deeply American story in which the period trappings long beloved by Hollywood — the paternalistic gentry with their pretty plantations, their genteel manners and all the fiddle-dee-dee rest — are the backdrop for an outrage. [link]

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Movie: ‘Gravity’ Stars George Clooney and Sandra Bullock

THE NEW YORK TIMES
By A.O. Scott

HOLLYWOOD---The defiance of impossibility is this movie’s theme and its reason for being. But the main challenge facing the director, Alfonso Cuarón (who wrote the script with his son Jonás), is not visualizing the unimaginable so much as overcoming the audience’s assumption that we’ve seen it all before. Mr. Cuarón succeeds by tethering almost unfathomably complex techniques — both digital and analog — to a simple narrative. “Gravity” is less a science-fiction spectacle than a Jack London tale in orbit. Cosmic questions about our place in the universe are not so much avoided as subordinated to more pressing practical concerns. [link]

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Movie: "Grace Unplugged" Opens in Theaters This Friday!

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS

HOLLYWOOD---Having just turned 18, Grace Trey aspires to more than just singing at her church, where the worship leader is her father—former pop star Johnny Trey. So with the help of Mossy, her dad's former manager, Grace records a cover version of Johnny's old Top-10 hit, runs off to Los Angeles, and begins to taste the kind of stardom she's always dreamed about. Yet with each rung of the ladder she climbs, Grace feels more and more pressure to compromise her values, further straining her relationship with her parents. Will everything she experiences lead her to reject her faith … or rediscover it? See "Grace Unplugged" in theaters beginning October 4. [Trailer]

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Movie Review: "Prisoners" is More Than an Angry-Dad Revenge Drama

THE NEW YORK TIMES 
By A.O. Scott

HOLLYWOOD---“Prisoners” is the kind of movie that can quiet a room full of casual thrill-seekers. It absorbs and controls your attention with such assurance that you hold your breath for fear of distracting the people on screen, exhaling in relief or amazement at each new revelation. If “Prisoners,” written by Aaron Guzikowski, upholds some of the conventions of the angry-dad revenge drama, it also subverts them in surprising, at times devastating ways. The easy catharsis of righteous payback is complicated at every turn, and pain and uncertainty spread like spilled oil on an asphalt road. It’s all very creepy and mysterious, and “Prisoners” is, among other things, a satisfying whodunit, with artfully deposited clues and twists that are surprising without entirely undermining the film’s naturalistic credibility. [link]

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Movie Preview: "Grace Unplugged" -- When Art & Faith Collide

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS
By Ernest Disney-Britton

HOLLYWOOD---"Grace Unplugged" opens in theaters October 4. Having just turned 18, Grace Trey aspires to more than just singing at her church, where the worship leader is her father-a former rock star. So, with the help of Mossy, her dad's former manager, Grace records a cover version of her dad's old Top-10 hit, runs off to Los Angeles, and begins to taste the kind of stardom she's always dreamed about. Yet with each rung of the ladder she climbs, Grace feels more and more pressure to compromise her values, further straining her relationship with her parents. Will everything she experiences lead her to reject her faith; or rediscover it?  [Watch: Trailer]

Opens in theaters: October 4, 2013
Cast: AJ Michalka, James Denton, Kevin Pollack

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Hollywood's Next Big Thing: Religion

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR
By Gloria Goodale

This publicity image shows Diogo Morcaldo
as Jesus (r.) in a scene from 'The Bible.' (Joe Alblas/History/AP)

HOLLYWOOD---As summer winds down, the hottest trend on Hollywood’s fall schedule appears to be religion. Faith-based entertainment is in the midst of a comeback, what with NBC announcing its sequel to “The Bible,” the highly rated cable mini-series; multiple upcoming movies about Moses; a new film about Noah (starring Russell Crowe); and a Ridley Scott production of Exodus. While faith and mass entertainment are not mutually exclusive, they coexist in a delicate balance that risks cheapening religion in order to give it mass appeal, says Bryan Stone, academic dean at Boston School of Theology. “Consumer culture may render a religious tradition more accessible, but our relationship to that tradition remains one of ‘shoppers’ and ‘consumers’ who engage that tradition as a disposable commodity,” he says. [link]

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