Alix Madigan-Yorkin Movies
After entering into a passionate affair with a much younger woman, an unhappily married man resorts to murder as a means of sparing his frigid wife the humiliation of divorce in director Ira Sachs' suspenseful film noir. Set in the 1940s, Marriage tells the tale of Harry (Chris Cooper) -- a man whose faithful but emotionally distant wife (Patricia Clarkson) has become all but impossible to love. Smitten by the beautiful Kay (Rachel McAdams) but ultra-sensitive to the shame associated with divorce, Harry opts to poison his wife as a means of allowing the marriage to end with her pride still intact. Harry's scheme soon goes horribly awry, however, when after revealing the plan to his best friend, Richard (Pierce Brosnan), Richard too falls in love with the ethereal young beauty and sets into motion a cunning plan all his own. A serpentine tale of murderous deception, Marriage was co-scripted by director Sachs and screenwriter Oren Moverman. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pierce Brosnan, Chris Cooper, (more)
When a man who specializes in cleaning crime scenes washes away the evidence of a murder before the crime is reported, he soon becomes drawn into a deadly mystery in this thriller directed by Renny Harlin, and starring Samuel L. Jackson. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Samuel L. Jackson, Ed Harris, (more)
One woman's day goes all to pot in this resinous comedy from independent filmmaker Gregg Araki. Jane (Anna Faris) is a college dropout and aspiring actress who suffers from a certain lack of ambition, doubtless reinforced by her fondness for marijuana. One morning, Jane wakes with a busy day ahead of her -- she has a big audition, she has to pay the electric bill on her apartment to prevent the power from being shut off, and she needs to pick up some pot after paying her debt to her dealer -- and decides to take the edge off her anxieties by getting a little stoned. Under the influence, the cupcakes her roommate Steve (Danny Masterson) has made for his friends to enjoy at the weekend's Sci-Fi convention look too good to resist, and she gobbles them down. What Jane doesn't realize until it's too late is that the baked goods were laced with some especially strong marijuana, and what starts as a pleasant buzz turns into a world-class high that refuses to go away. As Jane struggles to make her way through the day, fate keeps throwing her into strange and surreal situations involving police officers, Steve's lovesick best friend, and a rare original manuscript of The Communist Manifesto. Smiley Face also stars Adam Brody, John Krasinski, Jane Lynch, Michael Hitchcock, John Cho and Roscoe Lee Browne. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Anna Faris, Roscoe Lee Browne, (more)
For the follow-up to In the Company of Men, the misogyny-on-parade debut that became an out of nowhere indie hit, auteur Neil LaBute wrote and directed a piece that gives more equal representation to the shortcomings of both genders than his earlier film. Three men stand on one side: Cary (Jason Patrick), a womanizing doctor who rehearses make-out lines and keeps his body almost grotesquely ripped; Jerry (Ben Stiller), a self-obsessed theater instructor who chews over every emotion like a morsel of dessert; and Barry (Aaron Eckhart), a man grown soft in his marriage to a woman who can't satisfy him sexually as well as he can himself. On the other side we have three equally well-defined women: Terri (Catherine Keener), a writer/editor whose prefers to keep words out of the bedroom, much to the chagrin of live-in beau Jerry; Mary (Amy Brenneman), a freelance writer whose attempts to find her own sexual fulfillment with both husband Barry and paramour Jerry meet with a similar lack of success; and Cheri (Nastassja Kinski), an art assistant who meets most of the other characters one by one at a gallery but directs her sylph-like affections in an unexpected direction. The lies, double-crosses, and confrontations between these characters resolve into a sinisterly comic indictment of the very idea of romantic fulfillment. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Amy Brenneman, Aaron Eckhart, (more)
