NOTHING TO CHEER ABOUT: Gerard Butler and Jennifer Aniston in The Bounty Hunter.
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A PROPHET An Academy Award nominee this year for Best Foreign Language Film, the French import A Prophet brings some necessary new life to that favored offshoot of the crime genre, the prison flick. Tahar Rahim delivers a quietly compelling performance as Malik El Djebena, a young French Arab who's sentenced to six years in prison for a run-in with cops. The opposite of an amoral opportunist like Scarface's Tony Montana, Malik is a quiet kid who only wants to serve his six years with his head down and his hands kept clean. Good luck with that. Instead, he's immediately approached by Cesar Luciani (Niels Arestrup) and his Corsican gang; they inform him that either he murders a fellow inmate who's about to squeal in court, or they murder him. In order to survive, Malik has no choice but to carry out the hit, yet although he's then under the protection of the Corsicans, they dislike him because of his Arab blood and treat him poorly. For their part, the Muslims view him with equal disdain. Malik eventually proves to be more resourceful than anyone realizes, and yet, despite his ascendancy, he's still under the thumb of Cesar. Even taking into account his advanced age and short stature, Cesar is a towering figure, and Arestrup plays him with a scary steeliness that makes it easy to believe he could rule a prison yard. And as long as the film centers on the power plays between the various jailhouse factions, or the manner in which Malik struggles with his own morality before realizing what needs to happen for him to survive the entire six-year stretch, A Prophet is a gripping drama that neither condemns nor coronates its leading character. It's only when the action moves outside the prison walls (during Malik's furloughs) that the movie loses much of its propulsive power, with the various criminal activities (drug wars, double-crosses and the like) appearing all too rote and routine. Fortunately, director Jacques Audiard and his co-writers always have one more surprise up their sleeves. This audience courtesy extends through the end credits, as this gritty, violent picture wraps up with perhaps the dreamiest, most peaceful rendition of "Mack the Knife" (Jimmie Dale Gilmore's version) ever recorded. ***
REMEMBER ME I'm not saying it's impossible for the surprise ending of Remember Me to work (not to worry; no spoilers here); however, it needs to be attached to a project a lot more distinguished than the one on display here. But because the bulk of Remember Me is clumsy, mawkish and marked by some truly heinous dialogue, the conclusion proves to be staggering in its tastelessness, and one gets the impression that scripter Will Fetters came up with this "gotcha!" moment first and then banged out enough drivel leading up to it in order to have a completed screenplay to shop around. Twilight's Robert Pattinson maintains his gloomy 'tude here as well: He's cast as Tyler Hawkins, who loves his precocious little sister (bright Ruby Jerins), runs afoul of his distant dad (Pierce Brosnan), and still misses the older brother who committed suicide six years earlier. Through labored screenwriting, Tyler meets and falls for Ally Craig (Emilie de Ravin), who's also been touched by a death in her immediate family. Most of Remember Me is banal and insipid, conditions brought on as much by director Allen Coulter's inability to stage a scene as by Fetters' cringe-worthy lines. Pattinson and de Ravin are earnest but never quite connect as screen lovers, while Tate Ellington's character of Aidan Hall, Tyler's roomie and best bud, is the most obnoxious sidekick/comic relief seen in many a new moon: The character's description of his penchant for bedding women of all nationalities -- "I've planted my flag in every country!" -- is particularly gag-inducing. Nothing, however, is more retch-worthy than that ill-conceived climax, which will strike the easily manipulated as deep but will cause most discerning viewers to recognize it for a cheap trick that should come with some sort of trigger warning before it unfolds. *
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