Capsule reviews of films playing the week of Jan. 28 

Current Releases

BEDTIME STORIES A winning formula for a successful family film gets reconfigured employing the lowest common denominator, and the result is a dismal effort that will fail with all but the most undemanding of children. As for their parents, it's hard to imagine any of them warming up to a picture in which Adam Sandler, as lowly handyman Skeeter Bronson, bonds with his niece and nephew by telling them that he'll always be around "like the stink on feet." Certainly, there's an unpleasant odor emanating from just about every scene in this slapdash comedy, in which the aforementioned Skeeter learns that portions of the bedtime stories he spins to his sister's (Courteney Cox) kids have a magical way of coming true. He hopes that these fantasy yarns will somehow allow him to ascend to the position of hotel manager, but for now, the tall tales result in him getting bombarded by a shower of gumballs and kicked in the shins by an angry dwarf. The tragedy of Bedtime Stories is that several noteworthy performers find themselves whoring their talents simply to play second banana to a somnambular Sandler – among the wasted are Guy Pearce, Keri Russell and Lucy Lawless. The most memorable supporting characters turn out to be Bugsy, a CGI-assisted guinea pig with saucer-sized eyes, and a Native American chief (Rob Schneider) who waves his hand behind his butt as he discusses "fire and wind" (get it?). Unfortunately, they're memorable in the worst way – as symbols of a potentially interesting movie that comes crashing down as hard as that proverbial beanstalk. *1/2

BOLT In recent years, Disney plus Pixar has led to some terrific animated features, but Disney minus Pixar has led to yearnings to locate the nearest auditorium exit. Bolt is straight-up Disney, which would be worrisome if it wasn't for the fact that Pixar guru John Lasseter has been handed the keys to the studio's entire animation department. So while Bolt isn't a Pixar production, it falls under the auspices of Lasseter (billed here as executive producer), and that might possibly be the reason this fast-paced confection is far better than such studio sourballs as Chicken Little and Treasure Planet. But make no mistake: This is still a long way from the giddy heights of the Pixar pack. It mixes the speed of an ADD Nickelodeon toon project with narrative elements from The Incredible Journey, as Bolt (voiced by John Travolta), a canine who believes he really possesses the superpowers he employs on his hit TV series, gets separated from his owner/co-star Penny (Miley Cyrus) and ends up crossing the country in search of her. It's entertaining while it lasts but dissipates from memory the moment it's over, a condition predicated on the fact that neither the noble, stiff Bolt nor the typical toon preteen Penny are especially dynamic characters. There are some clever inside-Hollywood touches, but the lack of any real tension means that the scripters are ultimately forced to turn to a burning building to serve as the "villain" of the piece. Still, the visual design is inventive, and kids and adults alike are sure to love Rhino (Mark Walton), a portly hamster always on the go in his plastic ball. Whenever he's on screen, you can be sure he keeps the movie rolling. **1/2

THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON David Fincher's groveling Oscar bait is a desperate lunge by a normally exciting genre filmmaker to earn some year-end accolades by helming An Important Movie With Life-Affirming Values. But when faced with results such as this, I'll take the comparative cheap thrills of Fincher's Seven or Zodiac any day of the week. Except for one bravura sequence near the end of the picture – a beautifully staged scene of a life winding down – Button is curiously listless, with all of its passion apparently expended on its technical feats. Loosely based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald, this deals with Benjamin Button (Brad Pitt), who's born as an 80-year-old man but becomes gradually younger as time passes. Like his cinematic soulmate Forrest Gump, Benjamin leads a rich and varied life, although his heart always belongs to Daisy (Cate Blanchett), who, like Forrest's Jenny, is a callow free spirit who doesn't realize the depths of her fondness for Benjamin until it's almost too late. Benjamin Button is primarily a passive character, and he's in turn played by Pitt in a passive manner. It's not the actor's finest work, as he's upstaged by his own makeup as well as the CGI trickery that (in old-age mode) turns him into a diminutive figure. Even Pitt is finally freed from the movie magic and allowed to look like himself, it's to no avail, largely because he and Blanchett have no chemistry together. As for the movie's themes, they're basically a series of homilies about the beauty of life and how we shouldn't waste a single precious moment of it. Point taken: I won't spend another second reflecting on this motionless motion picture. **

DEFIANCE The 1970s TV miniseries Holocaust and the 2002 theatrical release The Grey Zone touched upon the topic, but Defiance might be the first celluloid outing to focus exclusively on the efforts of Jews to violently oppose their Nazi oppressors during World War II. Certainly, it's an overdue entry in the long history of Hollywood Holocaust flicks, but it's a shame that such an intriguing story didn't receive a more distinguished rendering. Adapted by director Edward Zwick and co-scripter Clayton Frohman from Nechama Tec's nonfiction book Defiance: The Bielski Partisans, this centers on three siblings who battle the German threat from within the Belarus Forest. The eldest, Tuvia Bielski (Daniel Craig), is the tentative leader; middle son Zus (Liev Schreiber) is far more tempestuous; and youngest lad Asael (Jamie Bell) is a greenhorn who soon gets his initiation under fire. The Bielskis soon earn a reputation for their guerilla tactics that keep the Nazis off balance, and before long, scores of other Jews join them in their forest sanctuary. Zwick's epics (Glory, Legends of the Fall, The Last Samurai) have never lacked for propulsive power, but Defiance is the first to constantly stumble over itself even as it tries to get its tale in gear. Episodic in nature, it places stock characters (fresh-faced intellectual, gently questioning rabbi, vicious troublemaker, foxy lady to frolic in the forest with Tuvia) in stock situations that require characters to spout off inspirational clichés every few scenes. Still, Craig and Schreiber make for interesting contrasts in masculinity, and it's commendable that somebody finally got around to paying tribute to these woodland warriors. **1/2

DOUBT While Ron Howard transforms Frost/Nixon into a living, breathing motion picture, writer-director John Patrick Shanley never quite makes it past the curtain call with Doubt. Adapting his own Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Shanley doesn't possess Howard's cinematic instincts, resulting in a movie that remains resolutely stage-bound. But that's not necessarily a sign of defeat: No one could ever really argue that Mike Nichols' superb Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? managed to shuck the playhouse chains, either. Doubt is no Woolf, of course, but blessed with a quartet of strong performances, it's weighty enough to earn its bookings. Set in 1964, the film examines a battle of wills taking place at St. Nicholas in the Bronx. Sister Aloysius (Meryl Streep), the strict principal of the school, isn't crazy about Father Flynn (Philip Seymour Hoffman), whose desire for a more progressive direction within the Catholic church flies in the face of her old-school ideology. So when timid Sister James (Amy Adams) airs her suspicions that Father Flynn is being a bit too chummy with an altar boy, Sister Aloysius works on getting him ousted. But is she truly convinced of his guilt, or is she merely using the issue as a way to force out the theological thorn in her side? Pulitzer notwithstanding, Shanley's play was disappointing in the manner in which it took the obvious way out. The movie can't overcome that hurdle, though it can be argued that Shanley adds an extra layer of ambiguity to the proceedings. Still, what really matters is the cast, and there's no doubt that Streep, Hoffman, Adams and Viola Davis (as the mother of the allegedly molested student) all do heavenly work. ***

FROST/NIXON If all high school history classes were as grandly entertaining as the historical flicks penned by Peter Morgan, no student would ever again be caught slumbering in his seat. Morgan, who previously wrote The Queen, here adapts his own play, and together he and director Ron Howard open it up so that the end result feels much more vibrant than merely a constricted stage piece plunked down in front of a camera. Blessed by an exquisite cast, the two men keep the wheels turning, offering a propulsive look at the most widely loathed U.S. president until George W. Bush stumbled into sight. Set after the Watergate scandal and Richard Nixon's resignation, the picture concerns itself with the attempts of Nixon (Frank Langella) to rise Phoenix-like from the ashes of political irrelevance by holding a series of one-on-one interviews with British TV host David Frost (Michael Sheen). Nixon believes that he can easily exert control over this show biz personality, and he may be right, as Frost initially has trouble keeping up with his mentally agile interviewee. Several actors have played Tricky Dick on celluloid (Anthony Hopkins among them), but Langella bests them all with an riveting portrayal that goes beyond mimicry. He depicts the former president as a haunted man struggling to salvage his legacy, a scrappy fighter who refuses to yield even a square inch to his challengers. If many audience members don't feel the slightest bit of pity for the Nixon that Langella brings to life, that certainly isn't the fault of the actor – it's simply that too many Americans will always view Richard Milhous as monster rather than man. ***1/2

GRAN TORINO It's not necessary to be familiar with Clint Eastwood's career arc to enjoy Gran Torino, but it does amplify the appreciation for the manner in which the topic of violence is approached. From the glorified gun battles in the Dirty Harry franchise to the ruminations about the impact of taking a man's life in Unforgiven, Eastwood has clearly given much thought to the subject. To describe how he has continued to modify his beliefs would spoil the film's ending, but suffice to say that his character, Walt Kowalski, is no stranger to killing. A Korean War vet, Walt lives in a Detroit neighborhood in which he's clearly in the minority. Surrounded by Asians, African-Americans and Latinos, he's an unrepentant racist, although he doesn't have much use for his own kind, either: Caring little for his two grown sons and their families, he prefers the company of his faithful dog and his prized 1972 Gran Torino. But his shell of indifference begins to crack once he comes into reluctant contact with the two Hmong teens (appealing newcomers Bee Vang and Ahney Her) who live next door. Dismissed in some camps as merely a simplistic rift on racism, this is far more complicated than that, not only in its aforementioned exploration of violence but also in its affecting look at a rigid individual who comes to realize that the world has moved on without him. The picture does have its weak spots (for starters, Walt's family members are cartoonish in the extreme), but there's no quibbling over Eastwood's performance, which ranks as one of the finest of his career. If this marks his final acting turn (as he's hinted), he's managed to go out, appropriately enough, with a bang. ***

LAST CHANCE HARVEY Last Chance Harvey is the sort of insipid romantic comedy that, had it starred a pair of 20-somethings or 30-somethings, would be instantly dismissed by one and all. But because it stars two seasoned performers, it will be championed in some quarters as a sweet look at how older folks can actually – are you ready? – enjoy many of the same things as the young'uns. See them flirt! See them dance! See them fall in love! Truth be told, it's all a bit insulting – a patronizing sop to an underserved movie demographic that doubtless was largely responsible for turning the equally torturous The Bucket List into a box office hit at this time last year. The 71-year-old Dustin Hoffman stars as Harvey Shine, while 49-year-old Emma Thompson plays Kate Walker. He's an American arriving in London for the marriage of his estranged daughter (Liane Balaban); cut from the same cloth as the salesmen from Glengarry Glen Ross, he's a self-absorbed loser who rubs practically everyone the wrong way. She's a Brit whose single status worries her busybody mom (Eileen Atkins) and lands her on blind dates with insensitive doofuses. Rather than "meet cute," the film has them "meet ugly" in an airport bar, and their testy banter easily marks this scene as the movie's best. Unfortunately, the rest is both forced and tired, complete with a music video-style montage, the missed date that threatens to derail the whole relationship, and even the added strain of a nonsensical subplot in which Kate's mum suspects her Polish neighbor of burying bodies in his backyard. While he's at it, maybe he can shovel a few scoops of dirt onto this film's prints as well. *1/2

MARLEY & ME Even given my status as a big dog lover (and whether you take that to mean a big lover of dogs or a lover of big dogs, either interpretation works), the notion of spending two hours watching puppies frolic during the course of Marley & Me seemed like a pretty one-note way to spend a matinee. Welcome, then, to one of the season's most pleasant surprises, as this family film proves to be far more thematically rich than its simplistic trailer reveals. Major-league screenwriter Scott Frank (Minority Report, Get Shorty) and middle-league screenwriter Don Roos (The Opposite of Sex) adapt John Grogan's fact-based novel about his family's pet, a Labrador retriever named Marley. Both journalists, John (Owen Wilson) and wife Jennifer (Jennifer Aniston) agree that Marley is "the world's worst dog," given his penchant for always getting into trouble. But thankfully, the movie doesn't devolve into a series of comic scenes revolving around leg humpings and yard droppings. Instead, as John and Jennifer add some children to the equation, it becomes a clear-eyed look at the difficulties in raising a family, all the more so when there's a lumbering beast driving everyone mad. Ultimately, though, the film makes a point that every dog owner – indeed, every pet owner – long ago took as gospel: A family doesn't begin and end with merely its two-legged members. Alternately sweet, sad and sentimental, Marley & Me represents cinema as dog's best friend. ***

MILK The China Syndrome, Wall Street and even Casablanca are examples of movies that happened to be in the right place at the right time – that is to say, life imitated art (or vice versa) as each picture's release neatly dovetailed with real-life incidents that in one way or another mirrored what was happening on-screen. Milk follows suit: Although it's set in the 1970s, it couldn't possibly be more relevant; for that, we have to blame those hideous anti-gay measures that recently passed in California, Florida, Arkansas and Arizona. Back in the '70s, Harvey Milk (played by Sean Penn) fought against similar hysteria: Tired of homosexuals such as himself being treated as second-class citizens, he found himself drawn to political office as a way in which to fight for equality. Eventually elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, he continued to grow in stature and influence, a career ascendancy which did not sit well with Dan White (Josh Brolin), the board's most conservative member – and, as it turned out, its most trigger-happy. The Oscar-winning 1984 documentary The Times of Harvey Milk offered a flawless look at the career of this passionate progressive, so it's a testament to the richness of Gus Van Sant's direction and Dustin Lance Black's screenplay that this fictionalized version feels authentic in its every movement. As Milk, Penn delivers the performance of his career, and he's backed by a superlative cast containing only one weak link: Diego Luna as Milk's insecure lover, Jack Lira (James Franco fares much better as Harvey's previous lover, Scott Smith). But this is a small misstep in an otherwise excellent production full of passion and purpose. ****

RACHEL GETTING MARRIED Rarely has patience been such a virtue than when faced with Rachel Getting Married, which gets off to an extremely rough start before eventually finding its stride. Movies about dysfunctional families are trotted out by indie-minded filmmakers with alarming regularity, but better to spend some time with Rachel at the wedding than with Margot at the Wedding. Anne Hathaway, unfairly overlooked in such efforts as Brokeback Mountain and The Devil Wears Prada, commands most of the attention – from both audience members and the other actors – as Kym, a recovering drug addict who returns home to attend the wedding of her sister Rachel (Rosemarie DeWitt). Kym, who still feels guilty for a past tragedy, is a complete mess and thus is usually at the center of attention. Naturally, Rachel feels resentment while other family members, including the well-meaning dad (Bill Irwin, excellent) and his icy ex-wife (Debra Winger), are at a loss for how to handle Kym and her frequent outbursts. Because the characters created by writer Jenny Lumet (Sidney's daughter) are nothing but brittle and bitchy at the start, it takes some time to warm up to these people and their plights (it's impossible, however, to ever warm up to the film's handheld camera technique, which is so 1990s). But Lumet and director Jonathan Demme ask us to respect their characters' space, and this leisurely approach allows us to more fully appreciate and understand the situations at hand. By the end, we're happy to have been invited. ***

THE READER The Reader, adapted from Bernhard Schlink's bestseller, arrives with all the obvious trappings of a year-end "prestige" picture. But since more time is spent exposing the milky white breasts of Kate Winslet than exposing the horrors of the Holocaust, viewers might be forgiven for thinking they stumbled into a big-budget remake of Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS. Winslet's Hannah Schmitz is a streetcar conductor in post-WWII Germany who enters into an affair with 15-year-old Michael Berg (David Kross); as a form of sexual foreplay, she likes him to read to her from the classics. She soon drops out of his life, and it isn't until a few years later, while he's attending college, that she reappears – as a former Nazi guard on trial for the atrocities she allegedly committed during the war. The Reader is a thorny story, and its failing isn't because it elects to answer key questions about its characters in shocking fashion – after all, many great movies are about less-than-admirable figures – but because it waves off these revelations with all the impatience of a restaurant patron shooing away a waiter attempting to remove the soup bowl before it's drained. At first glance, the movie's shifts through time periods (Ralph Fiennes is suitably moody as the older, troubled Michael) keeps us on our toes, but they eventually reveal themselves to be gimmicky to the point of distraction. The picture does head toward a major secret, but I wasn't sure if the answer to this mystery was supposed to provide insight or shift our sympathies or what exactly. All it does is reveal that, despite Winslet's strong performance, Hannah isn't really worthy of our attention – or perhaps even this movie. **1/2

REVOLUTIONARY ROAD This reunites Titanic stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, and they're both exceptional in this adaptation of Richard Yates' novel. Whether the film itself will satisfy moviegoers expecting to see the pair again in the throes of starry-eyed passion is another matter, since romance is kept at a minimum in this edgy drama, a must-see for adults who don't mind getting their hands dirty on messy emotions. Sam Mendes, the Oscar-winning director of American Beauty, has made another American beauty, this one a powerful examination of a young couple trying to deal with the plasticity of 1950s suburbia. Set in Connecticut, the story (adapted by Justin Haythe) concerns itself with Frank and April Wheeler, who view themselves as being different from everyone else in their pristine neighborhood. But time spent toiling away within the boundaries of the so-called American dream quickly takes its toll, so in an effort to revitalize their dreams as well as salvage their marriage, April suggests that they move to Paris and start a new life. Flush with excitement, the couple start to make plans, only to find that old routines – no matter how detested – die hard. Those with a willingness for navel-gazing will be receptive to this material far more than those who prefer to keep blinders fully attached, but there's no denying that Mendes and company have created an unsettling piece that gets under the skin. "You jump, I jump," the lovers in Titanic told each other. Here, the two aren't as united, each standing on the brink of uncertainty, peering into the dark abyss of an unknown future, and trying not to tumble into the chilly depths of American ennui. ***1/2

SEVEN POUNDS The last time Will Smith teamed up with director Gabriele Muccino, the result was the box office smash The Pursuit of Happyness. With their latest collaboration, it seems as if the pair were engaged in the pursuit of crappyness. That might sound like an especially harsh pronouncement for a film that seeks only to provide uplift, but why spend up to 10 dollars on a ticket when a Hallmark card expressing the same sentiments – and in a less laborious manner, to boot – can be had for a mere three bucks? Smith, charisma intact, plays Ben Thomas, an IRS agent who's clearly up to something good. Reaching into the lives of various strangers, he tries to get to know them before bestowing his blessings – and his finances – upon them. Among those he contacts are a blind telemarketer (Woody Harrelson), a battered single mom (Elpidia Carrillo) and, most importantly, Emily Posa (Rosario Dawson), a woman in desperate need of a heart transplant. Meanwhile, a deadly jellyfish lurks in the background (no, really). Scripter Grant Nieporte attempts to keep all the puzzle pieces from connecting until the end, but the scattered flashback sequences allow viewers to suss out what's up. The story thread distribution is also lacking: The movie might have had more emotional resonance had we been able to watch Ben spend equal time with all his targets, but because the focus is on the Ben-Emily romance, the other bits never gather much steam. Harrelson in particular gets gypped: His sightless man is the most intriguing character, but he's disappointingly held in check. Pound for pound, this ranks as one of the season's biggest downers. **

SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE I'm not sure how a film in which a small boy gets blinded by someone deliberately pouring hot liquid onto his eyeballs while he's unconscious ends up being hyped as the "feel-good" movie of the year, but that's the story with Slumdog Millionaire. The modern-day sequences find lanky, likable Jamal (Dev Patel) working his way through the questions on India's version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? Jamal has coped with poverty all of his life, and it's his unlikely ascension that has the entire nation rooting for him. But Jamal isn't doing this for money; he's doing it for the love of beautiful Latika (Freida Pinto), who, as we see in ample flashbacks, grew up on the streets alongside Jamal and his hotheaded brother Salim (Madhur Mittal). Initially, the movie's structure is ingenious in how it feeds on incidents from Jamal's past to allow him to get the right answers on the TV game show, in effect suggesting that what's most important in this life is what we learn firsthand. As for the sequences revolving around the characters' rough childhoods, they're refreshingly raw and uncompromising, a cross between Charles Dickens and City of God. It's a shame, then, that director Danny Boyle and scripter Simon Beaufoy toss aside all innovation in order to bind the final half-hour into a straightjacket of rigid formula plotting. The boy-finds-girl, boy-loses-girl, boy-tries-to-save-girl angle is flaccid enough, although it's the arc involving bad bro Salim that's especially groan-worthy. Still, three-quarters of a stellar movie is nothing to sneer at, meaning that those who take a chance on Slumdog Millionaire will get their money's worth. ***

VALKYRIE Ever the stalwart hero, Tom Cruise takes on the Nazis in Valkyrie, but it proves to be a losing effort for both the actor and the picture itself. Based on a true event that occurred in 1944, this handsome yet emotionally distant film centers on the efforts of a group of proud Germans to assassinate Adolf Hitler and wrest control away from the murderous tyrants (i.e. the SS) who served under him. Chief among these conspirators is Colonel Stauffenberg (Cruise), who, just like the progressives here in our own country this year, is willing to fight the fascists for change that he can believe in. Aided by a mix of officers, soldiers and politicians (among the familiar players are Kenneth Branagh, Eddie Izzard and Terence Stamp), Stauffenberg initially seems to triumph in his mission impossible, only to ... well, we all know how history turned out. Only marginally involving, Valkyrie is defeated by a thin script that fails to flesh out a single character, instead employing them all as pawns in a chess match in which the deck is already heavily stacked. Worse, the plan as presented in Christopher McQuarrie and Nathan Alexander's script doesn't seem like an especially sound one, and Stauffenberg's handling of his assignment makes him come across as a careless bungler. While the denseness of the good guys in no way ennobles the enemy, it does make them seem like the more worthy combatants. For better or worse, then, Valkyrie brings to mind that classic line from The Producers' "Springtime for Hitler" musical number: "Don't be stupid; be a smarty. Come and join the Nazi party!" **

THE WRESTLER Randy "The Ram" Robinson (Mickey Rourke) was quite the big deal in the wrestling world back in the 1980s. But now he's long past his glory days: Looking more like a sack of potatoes than a human being, he still manages to secure an occasional bout, but things are so tight that he has to work a second job at the local supermarket. Two decades of hard partying have wiped him out, and if he has any emotional reservoirs to tap, he wants to save them for the two women in his life: a sympathetic stripper (an excellent Marisa Tomei) and his estranged daughter (Evan Rachel Wood). On paper, The Wrestler sounds like nothing more than yet another inspirational sports saga – a Rocky reconfigured for the wrestling rather than boxing arena. But Robert Siegel's screenplay fleshes out the basic storylines in unique ways, and director Darren Aronofsky and Rourke add a rich palette to the proceedings, resulting in a movie that's frequently as colorful as it is meaningful. For despite the constant hype about Rourke's tremendous performance, it would be wrong to think that this is simply a one-man show. On the contrary, The Wrestler examines not just one individual's life but also the presence of the sort of hazy nostalgia that keeps our celebrities propped up long after their achievements have given out from under them. Beyond that, it also lines up nicely with my only other four-star pictures of 2008, collectively presenting a portrait of the uncertain, often unhappy America in which we presently reside. If Milk touches on America's prejudices and The Dark Knight examines America's fears, then The Wrestler explores America's regrets, offering a rueful look at society on the fringe. ****

YES MAN No one can really blame Jim Carrey for returning to the same spastic well time after time. When the actor attempts to stretch, as in Man on the Moon or The Number 23, audiences usually stay away in droves. So, yes, Yes Man finds the elastic comic working a variation on his patented routine from such hits as Bruce Almighty and Liar, Liar. The difference here is that there's a winning romance to go along with his hyperactivity – for once, he's as sweet as he is sweaty. Much of the credit goes to Zooey Deschanel, who matches up better than Jennifer Aniston, Renee Zellweger, or any of the other past movie g.f.s expected to stand aside as he cut loose. Carrey stars as Carl Allen, a perpetually gloomy introvert whose entire life changes after he's convinced by a self-help guru (Terence Stamp) that he must say "yes" to every situation that comes his way or risk a spell of bad luck. Thus, Carl ends up saying "yes" to a homeless man (Brent Briscoe) needing a ride, a nerdy boss (New Zealand actor Rhys Darby, very funny) who invites him to a Harry Potter costume party, and so on. Into this mix comes Allison (Deschanel), a free spirit who responds to Carl's newfound sense of adventure. As is often the case with Carrey, his shtick alternates between appealing and exhausting, and the film itself runs too long for its own good. But the sequences between Carrey and Deschanel provide the picture with a needed boost, as her off-kilter personality allows him to maintain his goofy brand of humor while also displaying a softer side. Is Yes Man worth seeing? Yes ... but feel free to wait for the DVD. **1/2