This Week’s Movies in L.A., 7/14/07

Courtesy of Focus Features / Stéphane Fontaine

(For those who may have missed last week’s intro, this is a weekly one-stop resource for movies screening in L.A., with Rotten Tomatoes/Metacritic averages, showtimes, and more. Almost all of these movies are also either currently screening outside of L.A., or are going to be in the near future).

Talk to Me, starring Don Cheadle as iconic ’60s radio personality Ralph Waldo “Petey” Greene Jr., opens this week to mostly friendly (though hardly ecstatic) reviews. Standing out is the film’s music: Robert Koehler at Variety raves about the “dazzling use of Sam Cooke’s classic ‘A Change is Gonna Come’ and both Les McCann’s original and Meshell Ndegeocello’s fresh cover of Gene McDaniel’s immortal ‘Compared to What,’ which the movie turns into an anthem for Petey.” Elsewhere, crazy-guy-doc Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soapbox opens with a deceptively high RT score (only five reviews).

Sam Cooke – “A Change Is Gonna Come”: mp3

The new Harry Potter movie is awful, even with a nice final act that vaults it above every other installment in the series save for Prisoner of Azkaban. I feel it’s time we just acknowledge Azkaban as the anomaly it was, and not even consider it a part of this mostly insulting movie franchise. But on to this week’s screenings…

Note: RT and MC scores frequently change. Click on the movie titles for showtimes.

HIGHEST RATED FILMS SCREENING IN L.A. (7/14-7/19) (Ed. note: Most of these movies are obviously playing outside of L.A., too.)

Avg. – RT – MC
95.5 – 96 – 95 – Ratatouille
92.5 – 97 – 88 – Once
92.0 – 95 – 89 – The Lives of Others
88.5 – 91 – 85 – Knocked Up
83.5 – 89 – 78 – Rescue Dawn
82.5 – 84 – 81 – Paprika
82.5 – 91 – 74 – Sicko
81.5 – 89 – 74 – Waitress
80.0 – 78 – 82 – Lady Chatterley
80.0 – 100 – 60 – Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soapbox

This week’s openings, music-related films, and special screening picks after the jump.[Continue reading…]

OPENING IN L.A. THIS WEEK

Avg – RT – MC
80.0 – 78 – 82 – Lady Chatterley — LAT ‘enraptured’ – LAW ‘Go’ – CB ‘unremarkable’
80.0 – 100 – 60 – Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soapbox — LAT ‘well-rounded’ – LAW ‘ Go’
74.0 – 77 – 71 – Harry Potter and the Order… — LAT ‘muddier’ – LAW ‘Go’ – CB ‘complex’
73.5 – 83 – 64 – Ghosts of Cite Soleil — LAT ‘forceful’ – LAW ‘inexplicable’ – CB ‘meditative’
73.5 – 80 – 67 – Talk to Me — LAT ‘revelatory’ – LAW ‘predictable’ – CB ‘insightful’
73.0 – 79 – 67 – My Best Friend — LAT ‘doesn’t shy’ – LAW ‘Go’ – CB ‘tour-de-force’
72.0 – 79 – 65 – Tekkonkinkreet — LAT ‘hypnotic’ – LAW ‘rambling’
65.5 – 64 – 67 – Interview — LAT ‘less believable’ – LAW ‘Go’ – CB ‘absorbing’
63.0 – 70 – 56 – Lights in the Dusk — LAT ‘beautiful’ – LAW ‘oppressive’ – CB ‘admirable’
22.5 – 09 – 36 – Captivity — LAT ‘spirit-sapping’
(LAT = L.A. Times; LAW = L.A. Weekly; CB = L.A. CityBeat)

LAST WEEK’S OPENINGS, STILL SCREENING

Avg – RT – MC

83.5 – 89 – 78 – Rescue Dawn — LAT ‘riveting’ – LAW ‘Go’ – CB ‘engrossing’
77.0 – 80 – 74 – I Have Never Forgotten You — LAT ‘harrowing’ – LAW ‘Go’ – CB ‘dull’
64.5 – 60 – 69 – Joshua — LAT ‘creepy’ – LAW ‘Go’ – CB ‘unsatisfying’
61.5 – 61 – 62 – Vitus — LAT ‘charming’ – LAW ‘Go’ – CB ‘delightful’
58.0 – 56 – 60 – Transformers — LAT ‘tedious’ – LAW ‘Go’ – CB ‘muddled’
55.5 – 59 – 52 – Introducing the Dwights — LAT ‘refreshing’ – LAW ’embarassment’
17.0 – 08 – 26 – License to Wed — LAT ‘uninspired’ – LAW ‘dreadful’

SPECIAL SCREENINGS:

Francophiles are in luck this week: Abel Gance’s canonical silent epic Napoleon at LACMA on Saturday, July 14; the even more canonical Grand Illusion, by French godfather of cinema Jean Renoir, on Wednesday, July 18 (Bastille Day) at the Aero; on Wednesday-Thursday, July 18-19, all the French interracial/political/religious dynamics you can handle with the New Beverly double of Days of Glory and The Battle of Algiers. For adventurous filmgoers, the can’t miss of the week is the four-day run of three-hour mindfuck Inland Empire, by far the best film of 2006, at the Aero, Thursday, July 19, through July 22.

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