By Roger Moore


FILM: The Cobbler
CAST: Adam Sandler, Steve Buscemi, Melonie Diaz, Dustin Hoffman
DIRECTION: Tom McCarthy

Tom McCarthy transformed himself from an actor into an indie writer-director, and became a critics’ darling. Who knew what he really wanted was to make Adam Sandler comedies?
A prologue in the film tells us of a kindness that a cobbler rendered to a vagrant in The Old Country, which led to his ownership of a magic shoe-stitching machine. Three generations later, that machine is almost forgotten in the present day shop of lonely, downtrodden Max Simkin (Sandler).
He looks after his aged, forgetful mom, swaps depressed pleasantries with the barber (Steve Buscemi) who owns the shop next door and forlornly resists the attentions of the pretty neighbourhood activist (Melonie Diaz) who wants to preserve this corner of the Lower East Side where four generations of Simkins have fixed shoes.
Then a rude and menacing street hoodlum named Leon (Method Man) bounces in and demands new soles for his alligator shoes. Max’s sewing machine shorts out, and he’s stuck making the repair with the old pedal-operated one in the basement. He tries on the repaired shoes, and darned if that isn’t a guy who looks like Leon staring back at him in the mirror.
Max adjusts to the shock and figures out that every pair of size ten-and-a-halfs in the shop that he fixes with this magic machine transforms him into that person when he slips on their shoes. Then, it’s game on.
He can make time with the supermodel and assorted other hotties that his DJ neighbour (Dan Stevens) attracts, be as tough as Leon, pass incognito through any of the lives whose shoes he wears.
Sandler dials down the dopey and seems more engaged with the work here than he has in a while. Supporting players Ellen Barkin, Fritz Weaver and Dustin Hoffman show up as those impacted by the magic shoes as the plot dives into a real estate shakedown. -Tribune News Service

Solid performances

By Rick Bentley


FILM: Black or White
CAST: Kevin Costner, Octavia Spencer, Jillian Estell
DIRECTION: Mike Binder

Films that deal with race issues need sensitivity, intelligence and understanding because any slant to the cultural, emotional and political elements deprives the audience of being able to make up their own minds.
Mike Binder, director and writer of Black or White, manages to find dead centre with this story — based on real events — of two families who believe their world is the best place for a young girl. It’s a slight variation on the nature vs nurture argument.
Binder’s ability to make smart arguments for both sides of the issue, without becoming overly sentimental, gives Black or White a solid foundation. Then, Kevin Costner and Octavia Spencer — who represent each side of the debate — take over and deliver solid performances that give the film passion and life.
When Carol (Jennifer Ehle) is killed in a car accident, her husband Elliot (Kevin Costner) faces the prospect of raising his 7-year-old granddaughter Eloise (Jillian Estell) by himself. The grandparents assumed custody of their granddaughter when their daughter died in child birth.
The drug-addicted father Reggie (Andre Holland) has never been in the picture because he was in jail.
Even though Elliot is much more financially capable of taking care of the girl, his drinking problem is a major concern to Reggie’s mother Rowena (Spencer). She suggest it might be better if Eloise lived with her, where she has a large, loving family and a chance to better explore her racial heritage.
What starts out as a family feud eventually leads to a showdown in court.
Binder’s script keeps making solid arguments for both sides.
Both Costner and Spencer turn in solid performances. The big surprise is Jillian Estell. Child actors can make or break and movie and this young actress creates the strong pivotal point necessary for this story to work. — The Fresno Bee/TNS

DVDs courtesy:
Saqr Entertainment Stores, Doha

A thrill ride


FILM: Last Passenger
CAST: Dougray Scott, Kara Tointon, Iddo Goldberg, David Schofield, Lindsay Duncan
DIRECTION: Omid Nooshin

A runaway train tale is a disaster made for the movies. It happens in real time, a ticking clock thriller where “the end of the line” is literally the end of the line for its victims. We learn which characters have “character” over the course of the crisis.
The special effects don’t have to be exotically special. And every now and then, this sort of thing really happens. So yeah, we buy into it.
It’s no wonder that movies from Runaway Train to Unstoppable have succeeded with this simple plot line.
Last Passenger is a London commuter train runaway tale, a handful of people on The Hastings line who notice they’re skipping stops, that something happened to the porter/guard on board, that the brakes don’t work. What will, what can they do?
Lewis (Dougray Scott) is headed home to Tunbridge Wells, a doctor who expects to drop off his kid (Joshua Kaynama) and be in surgery “in 47 minutes”. It’s the holidays, and he’s in a rush. Then, suspicious people show up and suspicious things start to happen.
Sarah (Kara Tointon) is a friendly and somewhat flirtatious blond who indulges the doctor’s kid and suggests a perhaps too-keen interest in who Lewis is and what he does.
Then there’s Jan (Iddo Goldberg), an aggressive Polish punk who seems to have a grudge against the world.
A prickly businessman (David Schofield) furiously demands that they wait for “the authorities” to solve their woes.
So the doctor scrambles to keep the kid calm and find a way to get to the engineer or whoever is making the train hurtle through the London suburbs at 100 miles per hour.
Director Omid Nooshin gives this story harrowing touches largely through arresting camera angles and aggressive editing. —Tribune News Service


Ravishingly endearing


By Troy Ribeiro


FILM: Beauty and the Beast
CAST: Lea Seydoux, Vincent Cassel, Andre Dussollier
DIRECTION: Christophe Gans

With elements of fantasy such as a castle in the forest, a curse, a prince charming and a damsel in distress, fairy tales have always been fascinating and Beauty and the Beast, is no different.
First written as Belle et la Bete by French novelist Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont in 1756, there have been many variants of the original in literature, television, stage and films.
Ironically, Director Christophe Gans’ Beauty and the Beast is the second major French film adaptation of the classic fairy tale after 68 years. The previous film with the same name was directed by Jean Cocteau in 1946. Well this latest edition, with a bit of digression in the narration, offers nothing out of the ordinary in terms of plot, acting or presentation.
But nevertheless, it is still mesmerising. It is so magically beautiful with its phenomenal music, exquisite visual style and enchanting craftsmanship, that it would enthral kids of every age group.
Narrated as a layered story within a story mode, the film begins with the opening of a book as Seydoux’s voice reads a bedtime story, Belle et la Bete to two adorable kids. She tells them the tale of a rich merchant who has three sons — Maxim, Tristan and Luis and three daughters Anne, Clotilde and Belle.
Belle the youngest, is known for her beauty and the film is her journey of how she meets the beast and falls in love with it.
Lea Seydoux as Belle is ravishingly endearing. Vincent Cassel as the Beast is adorable too. —IANS

DVDs courtesy: Kings Electronics, Doha