My pick for this weekend is Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day. I know it sounds like a fairytale or some boring, over-the-top, "cultured," kid's movie, but it's actually very much for grown ups. The story follows a nanny (Frances McDormand from Fargo) who keeps getting fired for a series of unjustified and superficial reasons--she's not exactly a beauty queen. Desperate for a job, she steals someone else's offer from the agency and ends up at the home of a beautiful socialite, Delysia (Amy Adams from Enchanted), who's in high demand. But instead of babysitting the woman's kids, she's babysitting the socialite, helping her keep all of her gentlemen callers in the dark about one another. Her official title: Social Secretary. Eager to please, she delves into slapstick funny antics to make her mistress happy, helping her choose between the three eligible bachelors. Nick (Mark Strong from Stardust) is a wealthy man who pays for her apartment, Phil (Tom Payne from "Waterloo Road") is going to make her a star, and Michael (Lee Pace from "Pushing Daisies") is genuinely in love with her. What's a girl to do? Doing her bidding isn't enough though, Pettigrew even has to dress the part--transforming her from "Oliver Twist's mom" to someone a particular gentleman, Joe (Ciaran Hinds from "Rome"), is interested in wooing. Besides Pettigrew's transformation, I also like the fact that Delysia has to choose between money, work, or love, because there's a saying that you can only have two at a time, and here's a girl who has to choose one.
Also in theaters is the prehistoric epic 10,000 B.C. directed by Roland Emmerich (Day After Tomorrow) that has a lot to live up to since it's been gaining digital comparisons to 300. The trailer boasts the story of the "first hero," a mammoth hunter (Steven Strait from The Covenant) who is said to be the chosen one that will lead his people to a new land...after he saves his girlfriend (Camilla Belle from When a Stranger Calls) from a self-appointed God who rules over slaves (sound familiar). And naturally he has to free the slaves too. If you want what's said to be a historically inaccurate history lesson to forgo the exhausting trip to the Museum of Natural History then take a seat. Watch Trailer.
Jason Statham's latest release, The Bank Job, is about exactly what the title implies with a couple of twists thrown in. Apparently, a married, sketchy car salesman (Statham) gets looped into a foolproof heist by a model (Saffron Burrows from "Boston Legal") from his old neighborhood to steal cash and jewels from a safe deposit box. However, she was actually after the top secret information in the boxes that would incriminate corrupt government officials and even the Royal Family. Dicey. Nonetheless, I'm a little more concerned about whether it's weirder that the writers, Ian La Frenais and Dick Clement, also wrote the Beatles-scored indie Across the Universe, the animated film Flushed Away, and the first installment of the soccer trilogy Goal! or that the director, Roger Donaldson, also filmed that craptastic Tom Cruise film Cocktail. Either way, UK heist films are always mildly entertaining--just ask Guy Ritchie. Watch Trailer.
Then there's the Martin Lawrence and Raven Simone family film College Road Trip, where Lawrence plays an overprotective dad who is hellbent on convincing his daughter to enroll in a college near home so he can control her social life. Somehow a kooky pig factors in--but not as cool as one did in The Simpson's Movie (spider pig...spider pig...does whatever a spider pig does...). Watch Trailer.
For the indie thriller lovers there's Married Life with a Marilyn Monroe-ish Rachel McAdams playing a girl a man (Chris Cooper from The Kingdom) is willing to slowly poison his wife (Patricia Clarkson from Lars and the Real Girl) for, while she dates another man (Pierce Brosnan) and his wife falls for a younger guy (David Wenham from 300). Watch Trailer.
For a kiddie movie you might not kill yourself watching, try the Chinese film CJ7 about a poor laborer who gives his son a weird toy he finds in a junk yard to compensate for the expensive toy that all the other kids have, soon discovering that it's actually an alien. Since it's written and directed by Stephen Chow (Kung Fu Hustle and Shaolin Soccer) you should expect a lot of funny stunts. Watch Trailer.
Lastly, there's the David Gordon Green (All the Real Girls) Sundance indie Snow Angels starring Sam Rockwell, Michael Angarano (Sky High) and the career-revamping Kate Beckinsale. The story is a dramatic tale about a woman whose daughter goes missing after her ex-husband becomes obsessed with getting back into their lives, which would be hard to do because she's having an affair with a married man (Nicky Katt from The Brave One) and because he's crazy. Angarano plays a kid Beckinsale used to babysit who has a huge crush on her, so there's a sick possibility that he did it. Also, IMDB says the movie is really about two broken families whose lives clash after a gunshot. If you're interested in solving the mystery, check it out. Watch Trailer.
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