Desert Flower

Opening in theaters this weekend: Desert Flower, directed by Sherry Hormann

Cracks

Opening this weekend: Cracks, directed by Jordan Scott

Synopsis from AllMovie:

A teacher who prides herself on being different meets a student who matches her nonconformist nature in this period drama. It's 1934, and Miss G (Eva Green) is a teacher at a private school for girls near the eastern coastline of England. While most of the teachers at the school are severe and strait-laced women who reinforce its reputation as a repressive environment, Miss G is more youthful and glamorous than her colleagues, and enjoys dropping hints of a free-spirited past to her young charges. Miss G encourages her students to challenge conventional norms of the day, and organizes a diving team at the school, which she oversees with great interest. Miss G also sees a danger in the cliques that dominate the school, and she tries to undermine them, much to the annoyance of Di (Juno Temple), who holds a high place in the school's pecking order. But things change for both Miss G and her students when Fiamma (Maria Valverde) enrolls at the school. Fiamma is from Spain and has a strong independent streak; she doesn't look to her peers for approval and insists on doing things her own way, which makes her all the more exotic and appealing to the other students. Fiamma also earns the approval of Miss G, but before long rumors begin to spread that the teacher's interest in her new student is more than academic.

Motherland

Opening this weekend: Motherland, directed by Doris Yeung

Synopsis from the film's website:

After a long absence abroad, a young Asian American woman, Raffi Tang, is called home when her estranged mother is murdered. She becomes increasingly drawn into a web of deception and incompetence while at the same time dealing with her own grief. The ultimate betrayal leads to her confronting truths in her family that have been hidden for far too long. The American Dream can come at too high a price.


Confusingly, the film shares a title with a documentary by Jennifer Steinman about women who've lost children. Rotten Tomatoes, for one, can't seem to tell the difference.

Red Riding Hood

Opening this weekend: Red Riding Hood, directed by Catherine Hardwicke


I am excited about this movie and will plunk down money to see it, not because I love Hardwicke (Twilight was a little too much plotless-meditation-on-the-beauty-of-R-Pattz for me), but because she is one of the few women out there directing potential blockbusters and I want her to succeed, damnit! Also, I love Amanda Seyfried.


Synopsis from AllMovie:

Amanda Seyfried stars in this dark retelling of the classic Little Red Riding Hood fable, set in a medieval village where a werewolf has been terrorizing the citizens. Though the night has become a more and more dangerous time for the villagers, who never know when the beast will leave more bodies strewn in its wake, Valerie is a girl on the brink of womanhood, and is so preoccupied with her love and lust for an orphaned woodcutter that she risks leaving herself vulnerable — both literally and figuratively. Meanwhile, the townspeople hire a werewolf hunter (Gary Oldman) to track down the monster and kill it before it wreaks more bloody havoc. But as suspicions brew, the people of the once peaceful town begin to turn on each other, letting the innocence of their formerly happy community fall further and further into the past.

The movie's official website is here.

Dear Lemon Lima

Opening today: Dear Lemon Lima, directed by Suzi Yoonessi

Synopsis from AllMovie:

Lovelorn and lonely, 13-year-old Vanessa Lemor (Savanah Wiltfong) plots to win back her popular ex-boyfriend Philip (Shayne Topp) by winning a minority scholarship to the private academy he attends, but finds her plan backfiring when she's immediately lumped in with the unpopular kids. Vanessa is a Yup'ik (Western Eskimo) with a major crush on Philip. Though they were dating for a while, Philip cut things off in order to spend the summer in Paris. Heartbroken, Vanessa pours her heart out to her imaginary friend, Lemon Lima. Then, just when it seems that all hope is lost, Vanessa hatches a brilliant plan to enroll in the same school as Philip and win back his heart. Upon arriving at her posh new school, however, the smitten student receives the brush-off from her former boyfriend and winds up in the company of the misfits known as the FUBARs. Later, when it's announced that the students will be participating in the annual Snowstorm Survivor competition, the unpopular new arrival rallies her reject friends in a concerted effort to take first place, and impress Philip in the process. But as the even gets under way and the competition heats up, Vanessa begins to reevaluate her priorities and question her devotion to the boy who rejects her at every opportunity.

The movie's official website is here.

In Theaters: Cairo Time

Opening this weekend: Cairo Time, written and directed by Ruba Nadda

Lucky Days

Opening in Brooklyn this weekend: Lucky Days, directed by Angelica Torn and Anthony Torn

Synopsis from AllMovie:

A young woman seeking freedom from her abusive boyfriend, her embarrassing family, and her own self-constructed cage encounters a long lost childhood sweetheart who taps into her inner turmoil during the course of an explosive weekend at the Coney Island amusement park. All Virginia wants is to live life on her own terms, but something deep within is preventing her from truly striking out on her own. Now, as Virginia reaches a crucial turning point, life as she knows it is about to end. The only choice for Virginia now is whether to resign herself to the fact that the greedy developers intent on tearing down the boardwalk will accomplish their goal regardless of what she does, or allow herself to disappear right along with the only world she ever knew.

Helen

Opening in New York this weekend: Helen, written and directed by Sandra Nettelbeck

Synopsis from the film's Facebook page:

In the heartwrenching new film Helen, Ashley Judd portrays a beautiful, intelligent university professor who is happily married to David (Goran Visnjic) and enjoys a loving relationship with her teenage daughter (Alexia Fast) from a previous marriage. Despite all her good fortunes, Helen is hiding a secret; and a sudden, unexpected breakdown sends her spiraling into severe depression. Helen’s profound love for her family, which once kept them inseparable, now is tearing them apart. Amid the desperate battle for her life, her love and her sanity, Helen finds herself pulling away from David and seeking comfort from a fierce yet fragile, enigmatic and troubled young woman, Mathilda (Lauren Lee Smith), who is also struggling with a mental disorder – and whose extraordinary spirit and devotion shines like a flickering light inside Helen’s darkness.

In Theaters: The Extra Man

Opening this weekend: The Extra Man, written and directed by Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini

The Contenders

In theaters: The Contenders, directed by Marta Mondelli

Synopsis from the film's website:

Nora and her husband Ken host a birthday party in their vacation house by the sea.  The guest of honor arrives first but, due to some inexplicable ailment, retires upstairs.  The other guests, Veronica (returning from an eight-year-spell in Europe) and Marc (an unfaithful married man) complete the party.
As the night unravels, one of the guests inexplicably dies.

Will the marriage of Ken and Nora, marred by Ken’s repressed subservience and Nora’s obsessive jealousies, last the evening?  And will the nostalgic Veronica, and the childish Marc will find peace?  Before dawn, the remaining friends indulge in sex and slices of cake, as they grapple with their own relationships, their friend's death, and the secret of happiness.

When the sun appears, who of these "contenders" will ultimately find what they are looking for?

Lost Persons Area

Showing at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival: Lost Persons Area, directed by Caroline Strubbe

Synopsis from the KVIFF website:

The story, located for the most part in an industrial no-man’s land, between tall electricity pylons on which the leading male characters are working, is not easy to sum up. This reflective, highly personal debut by writer-director Caroline Strubbe doesn’t rely on a strict narrative line. It offers reflections of solitude, feelings of disquiet and longings, all observed through a searching, roving camera. The film is an intimate and mysterious chronicle of relationships in general and family relations in particular. The young daughter Tessa is more or less left to her own devices, but manages to fill her days with rangy rambles and a strange passion for collecting things. For her part, her mother Bettina appears to dream of another life: a more normal one or, perhaps, on the contrary, a more adventurous one. Lost Persons Area is a subtle drama about restless people’s search for happiness.

Netflix It: Whale Rider

Available from Netflix: Whale Rider, directed by Niki Caro

This is one of those movies where you just want to scream at the mean grandpa to stop being such a mean grandpa. Go ahead. But he won't hear you.

(Somewhat spoiler-y) synopsis from the movie's website:

In a small New Zealand coastal village, Maori claim descent from Paikea, the Whale Rider. In every generation for more than 1000 years, a male heir born to the Chief succeeds to the title.

The time is now. The Chief's eldest son, Porourangi, fathers twins - a boy and a girl. But the boy and his mother die in childbirth. The surviving girl is named Pai.

Grief-stricken, her father leaves her to be raised by her grandparents. Koro, her grandfather who is the Chief, refuses to acknowledge Pai as the inheritor of the tradition and claims she is of no use to him. But her grandmother, Flowers, sees more than a broken line, she sees a child in desperate need of love.

And Koro learns to love the child. When Pai's father, Porourangi, now a feted international artist, returns home after twelve years, Koro hopes everything is resolved and Porourangi will to accept destiny and become his successor.

But Porourangi has no intention of becoming Chief. He has moved away from his people both physically and emotionally. After a bitter argument with Koro he leaves, suggesting to Pai that she come with him. She starts the journey but quickly returns, claiming her grandfather needs her.

Koro is blinded by prejudice and even Flowers cannot convince him that Pai is the natural heir. The old Chief is convinced that the tribe's misfortunes began at Pai's birth and calls for his people to bring their 12-year-old boys to him for training.
He is certain that through a gruelling process of teaching the ancient chants, tribal lore and warrior techniques, the future leader of their tribe will be revealed to him.

Meanwhile, deep within the ocean, a massive herd of whales is responding, drawn towards Pai and their twin destinies.

When the whales become stranded on the beach, Koro is sure this signals an apocalyptic end to his tribe. Until one person prepares to make the ultimate sacrifice to save the people. The Whale Rider.


   

Let It Rain

Opening this weekend: Let It Rain, directed by Agnès Jaoui

Synopsis from the film's website:

Agathe Villanova, féministe nouvellement engagée en politique, revient pour dix jours dans la maison de son enfance, dans le sud de la France, aider sa soeur Florence à ranger les affaires de leur mère, décédée il y a un an. Agathe n'aime pas cette région, elle en est partie dès qu'elle a pu. Les impératifs de la parité l'ont parachutée ici à l'occasion des prochaines échéances électorales. Dans cette maison vivent Florence, son mari, et ses enfants. Mais aussi Mimouna, femme de ménage que les Villanova ont ramenée avec eux d'Algérie, au moment de l'indépendance.

Le fils de Mimouna, Karim, et son ami Michel Ronsard entreprennent de tourner un documentaire sur Agathe Villanova, dans le cadre d'une collection sur «les femmes qui ont réussi».

On est au mois d'août. Il fait gris, il pleut. Ce n'est pas normal. Mais rien ne va se passer normalement.

Or in other words:
 

Agathe Villanova, a feminist who has just entered politics, returns to her childhood home in the south of France for  ten day to help her sister Florence go through their deceased mother's possessions. Agathe never liked the area; she left as soon as she could. However, the demands of women's equality in the legislature have brought her here for the next election. This is the house where Florence, her husband, and her children all live, as well as Mimouna, the housekeeper that the Villanovas brought with them from Algeria when that country gained its independence.

Karim, Mimouna's son, and his friend Michel Ronsard are filming a documentary about Agathe, as part of a collection about "successful women."

It's August, but the weather is gray and rainy. That's not normal... but nothing is going to be normal.

Mundane History

Showing at the Edinburgh International Film Festival: Mundane History, directed by Anocha Suwichakornpong

Synopsis from the EIFF website:

Thai cinema continues to come of age with this exciting debut. Pun is a home nurse, tending to the recently paralysed and angry Ake, who has a fractious relationship with his father. As tensions boil, a mundane day trip reveals how fragile the universe is, and a life-affirming change takes place. Featuring an astounding planetarium scene, this deeply felt cry for change is simply spellbinding.

Act of Dishonour

Showing at the Edinburgh International Film Festival: Act of Dishonour, directed by Nelofar Pazira

Synopsis from the National Film Board of Canada:

In a land beset by endless strife, honour can come at a high price – even for the innocent.

Mena, a young, beautiful bride-to-be, lives in a small, remote village in northern Afghanistan, a harsh landscape that still shimmers with breathtaking colours. Respecting the deeply conservative local customs, she and her fiancé, Rahmat, have little contact yet cherish a special bond. The arrival of a Canadian film crew briefly opens a window on a new world for Mena, a foray beyond the boundaries of convention that leads her inexorably down a dangerous road.

Directed by Nelofer Pazira, the star of Mohsen Makhmalbaf’s acclaimed Kandahar and co-director of the documentary Return to Kandahar, Act of Dishonour is a compelling drama in which East and West, love and honour, modernity and custom clash with tragic consequences. In this rich microcosm of a fractured society, many stories intertwine, including those of Mejgan (played by Pazira), the Afghan-Canadian translator who befriends Mena, and thoughtful Ali, a member of an ethnic minority who wrestles with the prospect of eternal exile from his childhood home.

Act of Dishonour shuns easy answers, challenging rigid moral paradigms and preconceptions on both sides of the cultural divide. This eloquent, nuanced portrait of life in Afghanistan is part lament against injustice, part testament to the spirit of a people who have survived decades of war.

Au voleur (A Real Life)

Showing at the Edinburgh International Film Festival: Au voleur, directed by Sarah Petit

Synopsis from the EIFF website:

Reacting impulsively to an inappropriate crush, a respectable young teacher lays her safety on the line for a grubby petty thief. Before she knows it, she's on the run — Bonnie to his Clyde, appropriately accompanied by Depression-era American folk tunes. Wayward, warm and genuinely unpredictable, this is a beautifully directed film, and a worthy vehicle for its late lead's idiosyncratic talents.

Netflix It: Laurel Canyon

Available from Netflix: Laurel Canyon, directed by Lisa Cholodenko

Cholodenko's The Kids Are Alright will be released very very soon, but in the meantime you should check out Laurel Canyon. It went places I wasn't expecting it to, possibly because I didn't read the spoiler-y synopsis below...

Synopsis from AllMovie:

Writer/director Lisa Cholodenko follows up her much-acclaimed 1997 debut High Art with this examination of a young couple seduced into a hedonistic, left-coast lifestyle. Taking its title from its central locale, Laurel Canyon focuses on a pair of upper-middle class lovebirds from the East Coast who relocate to Los Angeles. Freshly minted from Harvard, Sam (Christian Bale) and Alex (Kate Beckinsale) are eager to continue their medical studies out West, but they need some lodging while they hunt for a home. Enter Jane (Frances McDormand), Sam's estranged, Age-of-Aquarius mom, who's more than willing to put the couple up in her lavish digs. Jane is a successful record producer whose latest charge — both in the studio and in her bedroom — is Ian (Alessandro Nivola), a brazen, libidinous twentysomething Brit-rocker. As Sam and Alex settle in at Jane's, they gradually lose their straight-and-narrow approach to life and begin to experiment. Alex takes to Ian and Jane, while Sam is wooed by co-worker Sara (Natascha McElhone). Laurel Canyon features a score by Shudder to Think's Craig Wedren; the music for Ian's band was provided by Sparklehorse's Mark Linkous and indie-rockers Folk Implosion.

Animal Heart

Showing at the San Francisco International Film Festival: Animal Heart, directed by Séverine Cornamusaz

Synopsis from the SFIFF website:

Paul and Rosine live deep and isolated in the craggy, breathtaking Swiss Alps where they have a small dairy farm. The day-to-day work attendant on this rustic if somewhat modernized two-person operation is punishing and relentless. Life is made no easier by the fact that Paul is an emotionally stunted brute. While treating his cows as tenderly as family pets, he bullies Rosine mercilessly, both physically and verbally. She finds a few moments of pleasure when left alone to milk the cows or shimmy to the radio while making goat cheese—reveries more often than not interrupted by Paul’s crude appetites. Hints of backstory suggest what these two used to see in each other, and though Rosine remains fearful of Paul, their bond is obviously deep, melancholy and forbearing. Paul’s softer side finally surfaces when he takes the pain in Rosine’s belly as a sign she’s pregnant with what he presumes is his son. He immediately hires a Spanish laborer to take over for her on the farm. The man’s scruffy charm and insouciance slowly alter the couple’s lives in unforeseen ways, dragging Rosine into an act of defiance and Paul into confrontation with his own malevolent heart. Séverine Cornamusaz’s potent first feature is a courageously clear-eyed and forgiving look at a dysfunctional Old World marriage running headlong into the 21st century. —Tod Booth

Linha de Passe

Showing at the San Francisco International Film Festival: Linha de Passe, directed by Daniela Thomas and Walter Salles

Synopsis from the SFIFF website:

In a city of more than 20 million people, São Paulo presents many challenges and too few opportunities. For a mother and her four fatherless sons, it’s a confusing metropolis of many temptations and few clear guidelines. Directors Walter Salles (recipient of this year’s Founder’s Directing Award) and Daniela Thomas masterfully show, however, that the city does offer choices besides gangs and drugs. Dario pins his hopes on soccer. Dênis is a motorcycle courier, forced to consider crime in order to support his child. Dinho, working in a gas station, finds hope and meaning attending an evangelical church. Finally, Reginaldo, the youngest, is obsessed with finding his father, knowing only that he’s one of the city’s countless bus drivers. Cleuza, the mother of this difficult brood, is a loving parent but at somewhat of a loss when it comes to giving her boys the support and skills they need. The foundation for this rich familial drama is Salles and Thomas’s probing style, which gets under the surface of São Paulo to show life as it is lived, adding to the film’s astonishing verisimilitude with a cast of largely nonprofessional actors. Sandra Corveloni brings an affecting world-weariness to the part of Cleuza, and deservedly won the Best Actress Prize at Cannes. And those who remember Vinícius de Oliveira, the charming little boy Josué from Salles’s Central Station, will thrill to see him a decade later as the hopeful athlete Dario. Memorable and moving, Linha de Passe is a triumph of neorealist storytelling. —Rod Armstrong

Paper Man

Opening this weekend: Paper Man, written and directed by Michele and Kieran Mulroney

Synopsis from AllMovie:

Jeff Daniels, Emma Stone, Ryan Reynolds, and Lisa Kudrow headline co-writer/directors Michele and Kieran Mulroney's affectionate comedy drama detailing the unlikely friendship between a failed writer (Daniels) and the Long Island high school girl (Stone) who teaches him what it really means to take responsibility in life. Meanwhile, the author's long-suffering wife casts a disapproving gaze, and an imaginary superhero weighs in with his own take on the unusual bond.