This week’s movie releases
Hugh Jackman leads a powerhouse cast in abduction drama Prisoners Forest Whitaker serves eight US presidents in Lee Daniels' The Butler
Denis Villeneuve, the Québécois director of the Oscar-nominated Incendies, goes Hollywood with Prisoners, a film with a powerhouse cast and a moral quandary at its core — namely, how far can you go to protect your nearest and dearest? Hugh Jackman stars as the distressed Pennsylvania dad who takes the law into his own hands when his six-year-old daughter and her friend go missing. After detective Jake Gyllenhaal arrests and is then forced to release the driver of a clapped-out RV seen on the street around the time of the girls’ disappearance, Jackman abducts the young man (Paul Dano) and submits him to brutal questioning. Viola Davis, Maria Bello, Terrence Howard and Melissa Leo also star.
There’s another stellar cast in The Butler, the latest from Precious director Lee Daniels. Inspired by real-life White House valet Eugene Allen, it stars Forest Whitaker as Cecil Gaines, butler to eight American presidents over the course of three turbulent decades marked by the civil rights movement, the Vietnam War and more. Some eyebrow-raising casting includes Robin Williams as Dwight D. Eisenhower, John Cusack as Richard Nixon and Alan Rickman as Ronald Reagan, while Oprah Winfrey, David Oyelowo, Mariah Carey, Vanessa Redgrave, Cuba Gooding, Jr, Lenny Kravitz and, once again, Terrence Howard also feature.
Similarly inspired by real events, Sofia Coppola’s The Bling Ring introduces us to a group of young celebrity-obsessed kleptomaniacs who track down the whereabouts of their idols using the internet in order to rob them. The ensemble line-up features Katie Chang, Israel Broussard, Claire Julien, Taissa Farmiga and Harry Potter’s Emma Watson, with cameo appearances from Paris Hilton and Kirsten Dunst.
Cross generations
From Israel, Joseph Cedar’s Oscar-nominated Footnote charts the rivalry between father and son Eliezer and Uriel, both Talmudic scholars at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. When the former learns he is to get the recognition he deserves and receive the prestigious Israel Prize, his more charismatic son finds himself facing a conflict of interest.
Never ones to do things by halves, rock band Metallica take the music video to feature-length form in Metallica: Through the Never. Written and directed by Predators’ Nimród Antal, the 3D IMAX extravaganza mixes concert footage of the group with fictional sequences of a roadie (played by rising talent Dane DeHaan) sent on an important mission that grows increasingly surreal as the band plays on.
