Film Clips 

Current Releases

BOTTLE SHOCK To lay it out in terms that both an oenophile and a cineast would understand, if Sideways is the cinematic equivalent of an unopened bottle of the 1945 Mouton-Rothschild, then Bottle Shock figures to be akin to a plastic cup filled with 2007 Boone's Farm Country Kwencher. The movie's catchy, based-on-fact premise contends that, in 1976, a wine tasting event between France (considered the world's best producer of vin) and California (whose wineries weren't on anyone's radar) helped put The Golden State's Napa Valley on the international map. The vintner who organizes the event is Steven Spurrier (Alan Rickman), a Brit living in Paris, and as long as the film focuses on his exploits as he travels to California to sample the wines, the movie's in good hands: Watching Rickman's quizzical expression as his snobbish character bites into a piece of Kentucky Fried Chicken is probably the picture's high point. But whereas Sideways insisted on retaining the wine culture itself as a central player – that film made it clear that wine wasn't just a beverage but a life-force for its characters – this drowsy undertaking devotes far too much of its running time to the familial tensions between vineyard proprietor Jim Barrett (Bill Pullman) and his slacker son Bo (Chris Pine), and even more to a tepid love triangle between Bo, hottie intern Sam (Rachael Taylor) and Bo's best friend Gustavo (Freddy Rodriguez). Nothing any of these people say is particularly interesting, leaving audiences wishing that they – and the movie – would just put a cork in it. *1/2

DEATH RACE Look, there's nothing wrong with producing cinematic trash as long as it delivers, but Death Race, like most of director Paul W.S. Anderson's pictures, is about as much fun as having two flat tires during rush hour traffic. Yet it's not like Anderson didn't start with a reasonably sturdy foundation: The original film, 1975's Death Race 2000, is trashy fun, a campy Roger Corman satire with David Carradine and Sylvester Stallone as rival drivers in a nationally broadcast sport where the purpose (along with taking out fellow speed racers) is to run over as many people as possible. In typical Corman fashion, this cult item even made some sociopolitical statements amid all the carnage; this Race, on the other hand, is so thematically tired that in a few months, it will be impossible to separate it in the mind from other junky action flicks. Here, the hero is Jensen Ames (Jason Statham), a working joe who's falsely accused of murdering his wife and sent to a maximum-security prison, where the best drivers compete for their freedom in a three-day demolition derby that's televised to over 50 million Americans. On the track, Jensen's arch-nemesis is Machine Gun Joe (Tyrese Gibson); off the track, it's the sadistic Warden Hennessey (Joan Allen, WTF?). The most interesting aspect of this stupid and obnoxious film? It's set in 2012, when our present Bush-driven economy finally collapses, crime is running too rampant to control, and this country has basically gone to hell. Reading between the lines, does that mean this movie is predicting that John McCain (aka the bearer of Bush's third term) will win come November? *1/2

ELEGY Eloquent and understated, Elegy is an adaptation of Philip Roth's The Dying Animal, and it shares some similarities to 2003's fine filmization of Roth's The Human Stain. Both movies focus on the relationship between a worldly college professor and a beautiful younger woman, but Elegy is even more memorable than its woefully underrated predecessor. Its central character is David Kepesh (Ben Kingsley), an English professor who avoids emotional attachments by partaking in one-night stands with nubile students. David becomes involved with Cuban-American student Consuela Castillo (Penelope Cruz), but this time, there's a difference: There appears to exist a real affinity between this aged instructor and this woman who's three decades his junior. But David, incapable of dealing with his feelings, almost sabotages the relationship from the start. The character of the aging intellectual becoming involved with a younger woman is hardly an original one, but between the sensitive direction by Isabel Coixet – and how interesting to see a female ably tackling material by an author who's repeatedly had to fight charges of misogyny – the smart screenplay by ace scripter Nicholas Meyer (who also adapted The Human Stain), and the terrific performance by Kingsley, David Kepesh emerges as one of the most complex and fully realized screen characters of the season. As for Cruz, she's a revelation in this role. It's a given that she's always been wonderful in Spanish-language films and wooden in English-language ones, but on the heels of her scene-stealing work in Vicky Cristina Barcelona, she seems to have finally broken through the language barrier. ***1/2