Music & Performing Arts

The most tasteless third graders on television graduate to the big screen, as Trey Parker and Matt Stone expand their animated series with foul-mouthed humor that might breach the boundaries of basic cable. In the small Colorado town of South Park, good-natured Stan Marsh, slightly neurotic Kyle Broflovski, fat and petulant Eric Cartman, and perpetually doomed Kenny McCormick are psyched for the premiere of the first feature film from flatulent Canadian TV performers Terrance and Phillip, entitled "Asses of Fire." The movie is rated R, but that's not about to stop the boys from sneaking into the theater. However, when the boys' language gets bluer by the minute after seeing the film, their parents and school administrators decide that something must be done. Kyle's mother comes up with the ideal solution: blame Canada. Terrance and Phillip end up in jail for corrupting America's youth, while the Canadian Air Force retaliates with an air strike targeting the Baldwin brothers. The boys soon organize a children's underground resistance force to free Terrance and Phillip before they can be executed; meanwhile, in a sensitive subplot exploring relationship issues, we're permitted an inside look at the domestic problems of Satan and his lover, Saddam Hussein. As on the TV show, Parker and Stone perform the voices of most of the characters, and they also wrote several songs for the film; George Clooney, Minnie Driver, Eric Idle, Dave Foley, and Mike Judge contribute voices. Not to spoil the plot, but rumor has it that Kenny dies. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

One of the most popular stage musicals in the history of Broadway and London's West End makes its long-awaited arrival on the motion-picture screen in this lavish adaptation directed by Joel Schumacher. Christine (Emmy Rossum) is a beautiful and gifted young woman who longs to join the company of the Paris Opera House. During rehearsals for one of the opera's grand productions, a backdrop falls and crashes to the floor, nearly crushing leading lady Carlotta (Minnie Driver). When several members of the company suggest this could be the work of the "Phantom of the Opera," a spectral presence said to haunt the building, Carlotta drops out of the show, and the fates permit Christine to step in as her replacement. Christine's performance is a triumph, and on opening night she becomes reacquainted with Raoul (Patrick Wilson), a former childhood friend who is now a wealthy and well-known nobleman. Christine soon finds herself smitten with the handsome Raoul, but the same evening she makes a startling discovery -- the story of the Phantom is not just a legend. A brilliant but horribly disfigured composer (Gerard Butler) lives deep in the depths of the opera house, and taken with the beauty of Christine's voice, he abducts her and brings her to his lair, where he offers to help her perfect her talents, offering to write an opera especially for her. As the terrified Christine is comforted by Raoul, the two fall in love, but the phantom sees her affection for Raoul as a tremendous betrayal, and the jealous phantom nearly kills Christine as he nearly killed Carlotta. When the phantom emerges to present the opera's management with the piece he has written for Christine, the singer is asked to put her life on the line in an effort to capture the mad genius once and for all. Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical version of Gaston Leroux's novel, which had already enjoyed several stage and screen adaptations in the past, opened in London in 1986 and has been a popular favorite around the world ever since; the show was still running in New York and London when the film version premiered in late 2004. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide