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By Peter T. Chattaway
It isn’t summer, and it isn’t Christmas,
so this may be the most eclectic time of year at the multiplex, with a
broader mix of awards-season contenders, indie films looking for an
audience, and would-be crowd-pleasers settling for smaller crowds.
Juno (now playing)
has gotten a lot of awards buzz for leading lady Ellen Page and
screenwriter Diablo Cody. It may also be the best of the
unplanned-pregnancy comedies that have come out in the last little while,
not least because it is also the most explicit in showing why its title
character rejects the opportunity to have an abortion. But this isn’t
necessarily a “pro-life” film, per se; it’s just a
clever, funny and moving story about a high school student who grows up a
little faster than she expected after she decides to carry her baby to term
and put it up for adoption.
 The Pirates Who Don’t Do Anything: A VeggieTales Movie (January 11). The second big-screen
VeggieTales movie – and the first that isn’t based on a Bible
story – shows how even the titular pirates can learn to do something
when they have to. It also, perhaps inadvertently, raises the question: Can
pirates be heroes?
Cloverfield (January 18).
From producer J.J. Abrams (Alias, Lost) comes this tale of a monster – or is it monsters,
plural? – attacking New York, which may or may not be seen entirely
from the point-of-view of survivors’ home video cameras.
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 Rambo (January 25). Barely
a year after he revived the Rocky franchise, Sylvester Stallone revisits
his other major recurring character – and this time casts him as a
cynical mercenary who is hired by a church to rescue some missionaries
captured in war-torn Burma. Stallone has dropped hints that John Rambo
might find some sort of new spiritual purpose as a result of his exposure
to these devout Christians, but the trailers released so far have
emphasized blood and gore in a big, big way.
Be Kind Rewind (January
25). Jack Black stars as a man whose magnetized brain erases every tape in
his friend’s video store. Naturally, instead of buying DVDs to
replace the damaged tapes, Black and his friend (Mos Def) remake all the
lost films instead. Written and directed by Michel Gondry, whose surreal
imagination was put to very good, and redemptive, use in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
 Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (February 12). Ben Stein explores the furor over Darwinism,
Intelligent Design, and academic freedom on college campuses.
Jumper (February 14). Star Wars alumni Hayden
Christensen and Samuel L. Jackson reunite for this sci-fi action flick
about a group of people who are born with the ability to instantly teleport
anywhere they like. Directed by Doug Liman, whose previous films include
Swingers, The Bourne Identity and Mr. & Mrs. Smith.
10,000 B.C. (March 7).
Director Roland Emmerich takes a break from apocalyptic disaster movies (Independence Day, The Day after Tomorrow) to look at how mammoth hunters fought to save their tribes from
harm back in the day.
The Forbidden Kingdom
(April 18). Martial-arts superstars Jackie Chan and Jet Li team up for the
first time ever in this flick directed by Rob Minkoff (Stuart Little).
Options Winter 2008
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