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National Observer

MOVIES: A big showdown for the US long weekend: Tom Cruise in action vs Disney's live action Lilo & Stitch

It seems that we've got another case of two big films going head to head. It's Memorial Day weekend in the US and both Mission Impossible The Final Reckoning starring Tom Cruise and Lilo & Stitch, Disney's latest live-action remake of an animated film, are both predicted to be smash hits. The only question is, which one will be at the top. The other will be right behind. And here's a fun fact: Angela Bassett is an actor in one; her husband Courtney B. Vance is in the other. We've got other choices too, including a Jane Austen-inspired rom com and a gay rights/anti-Communist dissertation with a small Canadian connection. And watch out for a film I didn't have a chance to preview: Ocean with David Attenborough. It promises to be stocked with his usual wisdom about the natural world and revel in spectacular cinematography. And take note that Incandescence, the film about forest wildfires that I reviewed a month and a half ago, is about to start on the National Film Board ( website. It'll be free and with wildfire season starting up again, essential. In theaters, we have these: Mission Impossible The Final Reckoning: 3 stars Lilo & Stitch: 3 Jane Austen Wrecked My Life: 4 Bad Shabbos: 2 ½ MISSION IMPOSSIBLE THE FINAL RECKONING: This film finishes the story that started in Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning two years ago and is predicted to be a much bigger hit. But it's not the story that you come to it for; it's the action, the driving narrative and Tom Cruise again doing his own stunts. I don't know if he really did the main sequence, dangling from a plane in midair after jumping from another. Then climbing up to overpower the pilot. It's thrilling and pretty-well sums up what summer movies are all about. Don't explain, just energize. The story has Cruise as Ethan Hunt continue searching for the people behind a malevolent use of Artificial Intelligence. It's a program called The Entity. It can invade any computer system on earth and considering how much of our world is now run with computers poses an extreme threat. Nuclear missiles will launch in three days unless Ethan can stop the Entity. He has half of a key (he got hold of it last film) and now needs something called the Podkova, a gadget apparently sitting in a Russian submarine that sank, also last film. He assembles his crew (Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg, holdovers, and Hayley Atwell and Pom Klementiff, newcomers) and with the U.S. president (Angela Bassett) urging him on, gets to work. The details don't make sense and take almost three hours to play out but for gung ho action and intense moralizing this is more than worthwhile. (In many theaters) 3 out of 5 LILO & STITCH: Disney is at it again. They've made this live action version of the animated film which came out 23 years ago and has been very popular with children. This new one will probably be also, with kids about 8 or 10 years old. They'll love the recurring scenes of havoc and probably the family connections it espouses. Adults may find it glossy and pleasant but bland and repetitive, a milder counterpart of better films like ET, lower in emotional impact and certainly not bringing on tears. Instead it plays like a run-of-the-mill family drama like Disney used to make regularly. Lilo (played winningly by newcomer Maia Kealoha) is a young girl living in Hawaii. She's been raised by her older sister (Sydney Elizabeth Agudong) after their parents died sometime in the past. Lilo is a bit of a troublemaker at school (in self-defense) which brings both a teacher and two children's services people calling. Sis assures her she's not bad. 'You just do bad things sometimes,' she says. All that changes dramatically because out on a planet somewhere in space a rogue genetic experiment has produced a 'monstrosity.' The queen orders it disposed of. It looks like a small animal with a soulful face and ends up on Earth where an animal rescue group saves it and Lilo finds and adopts it. She thinks it's a dog. Cue the havoc it causes at her home, at various locations and even on a surfboard. All that is fun but very silly, as are the forces closing in. One is the CIA (really? Operating internally in the USA?). Courtney B. Vance is the agent investigating. Also in pursuit are a couple of agents sent from the planet that Stitch came from. They disguise themselves as humans (Zach Galifianakis and Billy Magnussen) but prove to be bumblers. Children may enjoy that. What may affect them more is the family separation threat looming over Lilo thanks to the child social workers. The film follows the original closely, with only a few changes. And live action isn't 100%. Characters on and from the alien planet are still animated; earthlings are live. Any reason, I guess, to re-visit old favorites. (In theaters) 2 ½ out if 5 JANE AUSTEN WRECKED MY LIFE: Here's a better-than-usual romantic comedy powered by a literary and classic English ambience. The word 'wrecked' don't fit though. The main character is a reader of Austen's novels and quite longing for some of the life in there, but she's not, as far as I can see, damaged by her. Influenced, sure. Agathe, played by Camille Rutherford, is single, hasn't had sex in years, writes but hasn't finished a novel yet, seems to be suffering a writer's block, and works in a bookstore alongside Felix (Pablo Pauly). She is attracted to him but makes no effort to show it. Felix says to her 'You don't live. You hide.' He helps, though. He reads the start of her in-progress novel, declares it good and recommends her to an English writers retreat. She's accepted, sheepishly goes and meets Oliver (Charlie Anson) who is a great, great, great, great nephew of Jane Austen's. He's a professor of English literature and considers Austen 'overated' which prompts Agathe to declare him 'unbearable and arrogant.' If you've seen any rom com before you know that feeling won't last. Gradually she warms to him and a love triangle, with him versus Felix, takes shape. Much like in an Austen novel. There are other smaller parallels envisioned by writer/director Laura Piani who herself, like Agathe, worked in a Paris bookstore. She steers the film's main theme to fight self-doubt and do what you dream of. A surprise cameo late in the film by the documentary filmmaker Frederick Wiseman sums that up. Satisfying. (Theaters in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver) 4 out of 5 BAD SHABBOS: The Jewish Sabbath is supposed to be a day of rest and family gatherings but is noisily disrupted in this comedy. Too bad it's not as funny as the writers, Daniel Robbins, who is also the director, and Zack Weiner, seem to think it is. It feels like one of those SNL skits that starts with a good idea but comes up short in the writing. It's not all that clever and the story reminds me of several films done before. At heart this is a standard meeting-of-cultures film. David, who is Jewish and played by Jon Bass, is engaged to marry Meg, a Christian, and brings her home to his family for dinner on the Sabbath evening. Her parents are to arrive later. So there are many opportunities to have slightly awkward misunderstandings over Jewish traditions. Meg (Meghan Leathers) says she has always wanted to find out more about Judaism and thinks the Torah is a prequel to the Bible. (One of the better jokes in here). Kyra Sedgwick and David Paymer play the Jewish parents; she written stereotypically and he easygoing. Another son is the problem. Adam (Theo Taplitz) dreams of joining the JDF (the Isreali army) but sets off a huge problem with a prank that causes the death of another of the evening's guests. How to hide the body before the potential in-laws arrive? Do you call the police? 911? Good complications but lackluster debate and an unsatisfying solution follow. And the laughs are pretty mild in this would-be dark comedy, although the rapper Method Man contributes some good ones as a doorman who helps. The film has been popular at many festivals including Tribeca, in New York. (In theaters: Toronto, North York and Vancouver, soon Victoria). 2 ½ out of 5