Philadelphia Weekly

New Releases

War Dance
Directed by Sean Fine and Andrea Nix
C+
Reviewed by Matt Prigge
Opens Fri., Nov. 30

Memo to documentarians: Enough already with the competition docs. Great movies tend to spawn a wave of copycat tripe, and it's hard not to wish ill will on Spellbound--the superior spelling bee movie, not the uncharacteristically insipid Hitchcock thriller--for inspiring the entertaining but frustratingly shallow likes of Murderball, Mad Hot Ballroom, Wordplay and King of Kong.

If it seemed odd that docs on crossword puzzles and arcade games ended--somehow, some way--in hand-to-hand combat, then you've yet to behold the surreal conceptual prowess of War Dance, which depicts the ongoing atrocities in civil-war-ravaged northern Uganda by way of a competitive music and dance festival for children. It's Mad Hot Ballroom crossed with the forthcoming Darfur Now. Depressed by the inhumanly awful tales of children watching their parents decapitated? Don't worry! There's rousing music on the way.

To their credit, directors Sean Fine and Andrea Nix devote a large chunk of running time to back-story, following a trio of children living in a displaced persons' camp in Patongo. All have had their families torn apart to varying degrees, and they all tell their horrifying stories in beaten-down, near-robotic tones as cinematographer (and co-director) Sean Fine aestheticizes their faces with picturesque images.

"Being sad about it doesn't make it any better, does it?" remarks one subject about her own tragedy. Elsewhere, another subject sits down with a rebel officer to inquire about his missing brother. The officer soberly informs him that, since his brother was one of the many children forcefully inducted into the army to become a killing machine, he's likely dead. The boy calmly replies, "I'll go inform my mother, so we can move on."

War Dance offers no social or political examination of what's going on in Uganda, content to portray it as just another example of the misery going on in pockets of Africa. It's impossible not to be moved by statements like, "When I dance, my problems vanish" or "In my heart I know I'm more than a child of war. I'm an artist."

A simple portrayal of music therapy may have been one-note, but at least it wouldn't have had the questionable, somewhat crass spectacle of watching hollowed-out children in fierce competition with 315 other groups. Performing may do wonders for Ugandans, but as portrayed in War Dance, it only lets the audience off the hook.

Not Reviewed

Awake
In a dramatization of "aesthetic awareness," a condition in which a patient is conscious during an operation but cannot move, Hayden Christensen plays a man who wakes up during heart surgery. A thriller then unfolds around him and his young wife Jessica Alba. (Opens Fri., Nov. 30.)

Ongoing

American Gangster
Denzel Washington stars as real-life Harlem heroin kingpin Frank Lucas, a straight-laced, uptight family man savvy enough to apply corporate business models to the smack trade. From the mid-'60s through the fall of Saigon, Lucas' shady contacts were smuggling uncut dope into the U.S. inside the caskets of dead soldiers. But don't think any of this escaped the notice of Garden State cop Richie Roberts, a doggedly single-minded detective portrayed here by Russell Crowe. Director Ridley Scott seemingly never saw a scene he couldn't flutter-cut into ribbons, turning on the smoke machines and overaestheticizing everything into a glossy perfume commercial. So the biggest shock is how plainly and unobtrusively he's helmed American Gangster. After a couple of hours, Denzel's silky-smooth, cold-blooded killer finally comes face-to-face with Crowe's twitchy lawman, in the kind of larger-than-life face-off that makes going to the movies worthwhile. B (Sean Burns)

August Rush
A single night of rooftop booty between cellist Lyla (Keri Russell) and rock guitarist Louis (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) leaves Lyla pregnant. Her father thinks a baby will ruin her career, so after Lyla gets hit by a car, he puts the kid up for adoption and tells her it's dead. Eleven years later Evan (Freddie Highmore) runs away from the orphanage to find his parents. The stilted contrivances that move the story forward range from the hoary--a telephone number lost to a gust of wind! A dying father's confession!--to flat-out unbelievable. A real passion for music is August Rush's one redeeming aspect. But it's not nearly enough. D- (Nadine Kavanaugh)

Acorn-y bloke: Jerry Seinfeld's Barry B. Benson sues the human race for stealing honey in Bee Movie.

Bee Movie
Jerry Seinfeld makes his big comeback--as the voice of a bee who sues humans for stealing honey. (Not reviewed.)

Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
Opening with a revolting, seemingly endless shot of Philip Seymour Hoffman having disgusting doggy-style sex with Marisa Tomei and checking himself out in the mirror the entire time, it's one grim walk on the dark side. Hoffman and Ethan Hawke play sad-sack brothers drowning in debt. Their only hope is a half-witted scheme to knock off a suburban jewelry store. The place is a mom-and-pop operation, literally--it's run by their parents (Albert Finney and Rosemary Harris)--and nobody's supposed to get hurt. But as Kelly Masterson's mean-as-a-snake screenplay indicates time and again, nothing is simple. Director Sidney Lumet shrewdly hangs back and observes from a distance, exploiting the long-take potential of his crappy DV and letting scenes play out for what feels like ages, discovering contours in the behavior and granting this naughty little noir a soul that probably never existed on the printed page. B+ (S.B.)Bella

Eduardo Ver�stegui (Chasing Papi) plays a scraggly bearded cook with a coyly withheld mysterious past, toiling at an upscale Mexican restaurant run by his soulless, whip-cracking brother (Manny Perez). After Perez cruelly fires a frequently tardy waitress (Ali Landry) who happens to have just found out she's pregnant, Ver�stegui walks off during the lunch blitz to spend the quintessential New York day with her. In between taking in the city's diverse cultures, Landry monologues about her rock-hard decision to get an abortion. Ver�stegui, in turn, monologues about the coyly withheld event that made him grow his scraggly beard. And one or two monologues later it becomes clear this is actually a histrionic cautionary tale about the vileness of abortions, carefully disguised as a cutesy New York romantic drama. C- (M.P.)