Reel News: Week of May 8 — Hot Pursuit, Selma, Mr. Turner, Fifty Shades of Grey

Upcoming Theatrical Releases

Hot Pursuit
Director: Anne Fletcher
PG-13; 1 hr. 27 min.
Trailer

In “Hot Pursuit,” an uptight and by-the-book cop (Reese Witherspoon) tries to protect the sexy and outgoing widow (Sofia Vergara) of a drug boss as they race through Texas, pursued by crooked cops and murderous gunmen. (Synopsis by New Line)

Exactly as terrible as the trailer makes it look. The saddest part is that Witherspoon and Vergara were the executive producers—meaning they had a direct hand in just how awful this turned out. Skip it.

Upcoming DVD Releases

Selma
Director: Ava DuVernay
PG-13; 2 hr. 17 min.
Trailer

SELMA is the story of a movement. The film chronicles the tumultuous three-month period in 1965, when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. led a dangerous campaign to secure equal voting rights in the face of violent opposition. The epic march from Selma to Montgomery culminated in President Johnson (Tom Wilkinson) signing the Voting Rights Act of 1965, one of the most significant victories for the civil rights movement. Director Ava DuVernays SELMA tells the real story of how the revered leader and visionary Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (David Oyelowo) and his brothers and sisters in the movement prompted change that forever altered history. (Synopsis by Paramount)

While it may hit a little too close to home for us right now, this is still a magnificent and emotional film. This is a live wire that pushes past political and racial boundaries and makes the case for all of us to take action against injustice. See it.

Mr. Turner
Director: Mike Leigh
R; 2 hr. 29 min.
Trailer

This film explores the last quarter century of the great if eccentric British painter J.M.W. Turner (1775-1851). Profoundly affected by the death of his father, loved by a housekeeper he takes for granted and occasionally exploits sexually, he forms a close relationship with a seaside landlady with whom he eventually lives incognito in Chelsea, where he dies. Throughout this, he travels, paints, stays with the country aristocracy, visits brothels, is a popular if anarchic member of the Royal Academy of Arts, has himself strapped to the mast of a ship so that he can paint a snowstorm, and is both celebrated and reviled by the public and by royalty. (Synopsis by Sony Pictures Classics)

Even with an extended running time and a script that is closer to a documentary than a drama, this is an exceptionally intelligent and beautiful film. Rarely does a film about art embody the subject as creatively as this. See it.

Fifty Shades of Grey
Director: Sam Taylor-Johnson
R; 1 hr. 50 min.
Trailer

Literature student Anastasia Steele’s life changes forever when she meets handsome, yet tormented, billionaire Christian Grey (Synopsis by IMDB)

This is a movie about sex for people who understand copulation from trashy grocery store romance novels. It is abhorrently fake with a script that is barely better than the source material (read: still awful). Want a more artistic film about sex and bondage? See Lars von Trier’s “Nymphomaniac.” Skip it.