Heading to the movies this weekend? Find out what's worth your time according to the top women film critics at the nation's best publications. Every Friday morning we'll give you the female perspective on what to expect when the curtain rises.
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Constantine
Stars: Keanu Reeves, Rachel Weisz, Djimon Hounsou and Gavin Rossdale
Director: Francis Lawrence
Rating: R
The Leading Ladies love Keanu Reeves, and applaud the visual efforts of music video director Lawrence, but find little else to like overall about the DC Comics-inspired Constantine, an action flick about a dying man eager to win his way to heaven by helping to rid the world of half-breed humans sent to do the devil's work.
"Keanu Reeves has no peer when it comes to playing these sort of messianic roles ‑- he infuses them with a Zen blankness and serenity that somehow gets him through even the unlikeliest scenes with a quiet, unassuming dignity," says the Los Angeles Times' Carina Chocano. And LA Weekly's Ella Taylor says Lawrence "has perfected a visceral, in-your-face visual style that never lets up."
But the overall vibe of the flick is another matter, with Entertainment Weekly's Lisa Schwarzbaum calling it "ornate, arbitrary and fetishistic, too, with the added challenge of being hell to follow for those without access to crib notes," while TV Guide's Maitland McDonagh targets a lack of real drama, saying that "for all the end-of-the-world mumbo jumbo, nothing much ever seems to be at stake."
Female consensus: Handsome Keanu and slick visuals aren't enough to save this mess of a story
Because of Winn-Dixie
Stars: Annasophia Robb, Jeff Daniels, Dave Matthews
Director: Wayne Wang
Rating: PG
A lonely girl meets an orphaned dog and helps bond the citizens in her small Florida town... what's not to love about this movie, based on Kate DiCamillo's Newbery Award-winning novel of the same name, say the female critics.
Entertainment Weekly's Lisa Schwarzbaum says the "well-bred charmer" is a "dandy, dignified movie," and USA Today's Claudia Puig calls it a "whimsical family film about longing and belonging told with gentle humanity."
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Eleanor Ringel Gillespie says the movie "arrives like manna from heaven in the midst of the Hollywood desert otherwise known as January and February," and the Washington Post's Ann Hornaday says fans of the book "should be pleased with how [director] Wang has faithfully preserved the novel's clear-eyed depiction of both pain and joy."
Female consensus: Charming girl + cute dog + quirky townsfolk... really, what's not to love?
Son of the Mask
Stars: Alan Cumming, Jamie Kennedy
Director: Lawrence Guterman
Rating: PG
The sequel to Jim Carrey's beloved 1994 comedy romp The Mask found no fans among the Leading Ladies.
The New York Times' Dana Stevens says the movie is "an irredeemable mess, a computer-animated Punch and Judy show without wit, heart or a single memorable performance," and that Carrey's flick should "demand a paternity test to divest itself once and for all of any responsibility for this mutant spawn."
The Dallas Morning News's Nancy Churnin says that "while Mr. Kennedy is no Jim Carrey, none of the actors comes off particularly well," and Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's Mary-Liz Shaw says the "whole thing has a tacky, WB sitcom vibe."
Female consensus: Without Carrey, the story doesn't carry this movie.
In limited release: Downfall, a foreign-language Oscar nominee about Hitler's last days, is "powerfully disturbing" and "a stomach-turning look at the horrors of war" says USA Today's Claudia Puig. The L.A. Times' Carina Chocano says Turtles Can Fly, a drama about Kurdish children dealing with the war, is "a gentle, intelligent reminder of how small our world is, how similar we are, how porous our borders and our cultures." Bigger Than the Sky is "two hours of an earnest, predictable comedy about a pathetic schlemiel who hopes to redeem himself by acting in the community theater," says the New York Post's Debra Birnbaum. LA Weekly's Ella Taylor says German comedy Schultze Gets the Blues, about a depressed laid-off miner who heads to America to get his groove back, is "merciful, wise and affectionate."
