Movies: New and Noteworthy

By Steven Rea

I Saw the Light Tom Hiddleston picks up a guitar and puts on a cowboy hat, playing country and western great Hank Williams in the music biopic, with Elizabeth Olsen as his wife Audrey. From director Marc Abraham, responsible for the 2008 inventor-of-the-windshield-wiper drama, Flash of Genius. R

Midnight Special Philly's Jaeden Lieberher, who co-starred with Bill Murray in St. Vincent, is a kid with something strange going on in the new film from Jeff Nichols. Just saying "the new film from Jeff Nichols" - writer and director of Take Shelter and Mud - should be enough of an incentive to head for the theater, but the cast is killer, too: Adam Driver, Kirsten Dunst, Joel Edgerton, Michael Shannon, Sam Shepard. PG-13

My Golden Days Mathieu Amalric stars as a man looking back at his past, its tragedies and triumphs, in this much-praised French film. Director Arnaud Desplechin teamed with Amalric on 1996's truly great My Sex Life. . . or How I Got Into an Argument. My Golden Days serves as a kind of prequel, and sequel. R

Born to Be Blue Director Robert Budreau reimagines the late 1960s comeback of jazz legend Chet Baker (Ethan Hawke).

Collide An American backpacker gets mixed up with drug smugglers in Germany.

Take Me to the River A teen's plan to come out at his family reunion goes awry.

Reviewed by staff critics Steven Rea (S.R.), Tirdad Derakhshani (T.D.), and Molly Eichel (M.E.). W.S. denotes a wire-service review.

Brooklyn Saoirse Ronan is an Irish girl who travels to New York in search of a new life. It's the early 1950s, and she is full of courage, dread, and loneliness. One of the most memorable characters of recent film, born from Colm Tóibín's novel and brought to exquisite life through a screenplay by Nick Hornby and smart direction by John Crowley. 1 hr. 53 PG-13 (profanity, sex, adult themes) - S.R.

Embrace of the Serpent Ciro Guerra's profoundly beautiful black-and-white film, set in the forests of Colombia, follows two explorers from the West: German ethnographer Theodor Koch-Grunberg in 1909 and American biologist Richard Evans Schultes in 1940 as each encounters the same shaman, the last of his tribe, in the quest for a rare and transformative plant. A nominee for best foreign-language film at this year's Academy Awards. 2 hrs. 05 No MPAA rating (violence, nudity, adult themes) - S.R.

Rams Out of Iceland, a wry and affecting yarn about prize-winning sheep and the brothers who raise them on neighboring farms and who haven't spoken to each other in years. After a deadly disease infects nearby livestock, the authorities decree that all sheep must be killed to contain the outbreak. Grímur Hákonarson's wry, dry tale of sibling rivalry and sibling bonds takes it from there. Winner of the Un Certain Regard at Cannes last year, it's funny, resonant, and surprisingly affecting. 1 hr. 33 R (profanity, nudity, adult themes) - S.R.

The Confirmation Oscar-nominated screenwriter Bob Nelson (Nebraska) makes a brilliant directorial debut with this tragicomic take on Vittoria De Sica's Bicycle Thieves about an unemployed carpenter (Clive Owen) who has sunk into alcoholism since his wife (Maria Bello) left him. A lapsed Catholic, he finds a sliver of grace in his relationship with his 8-year-old son (Jaeden Lieberher in a remarkable turn). 1 hr. 30 PG-13 (mature themes, smoking) - T.D.

Krisha ***1/2 A study in dysfunction and the damage wrought by someone lost in the maze of addiction, Trey Edward Shults' intimate and artfully unnerving indie drama stars the filmmaker's aunt, Krisha Fairchild, in a performance that calls to mind Gena Rowlands at her nerve-rattling best. It's Thanksgiving, and the title character returns to the family fold after a long estrangement. Let the horror (and horror movie sense of dread) begin! 1 hr. 22 R (profanity, adult themes) - S.R.

The Lady in the Van Maggie Smith stars as a homeless woman who pulls into writer Alan Bennett's driveway and stays there for 15 years in the film adaptation of Bennett's memoir and play. Alex Jennings is Bennett in bifurcated mode: the timid, reluctant host and the ready-at-the-typewriter artist, eager to get what he can from the unkempt, unpleasant "eccentric" he's allowed into his life. PG-13 (adult themes) - S.R.

Marguerite Loosely based on the life of socialite Florence Foster Jenkins, writer-director Xavier Giannoli's ingenious tragicomic satire stars Catherine Frot as a singularly untalented amateur soprano who uses her great wealth to stage a recital. 2 hrs. 9 R (brief graphic nudity and sexual content, and a scene of drug use) - T.D.

Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice *** A booming, brooding pair-up between the DC Comics superhero icons, with Ben Affleck as a gloomy-gus Bruce Wayne aka you-know-who, and Henry Cavill as Clark Kent aka the Kryptonian with the S on his chest. Jesse Eisenberg, acting nutty and quoting from The Wizard of Oz, is the meglomaniacal Lex Luthor, and Amy Adams, Laurence Fishburne,and Jeremy Irons are in on the action, too. Finally, in the climactic half-hour of this epic affair, Gal Gadot whips up her magic lasso and strikes a few supermodel-y superhero poses as Wonder Woman. 2 hr. 33 PG-13 (violence, intense action, adult themes) - S.R.

City of Gold *** Laura Gabbert profiles Los Angeles Times food critic Jonathan Gold, whose specialty is finding out-of-the-way ethnic cuisine. But it's not just Gold's story - his biography is only a minimal part of the documentary - it's also the story of Los Angeles. Like Gold, the doc shines a light on parts of the city not often shown on screen. It's a lovely portrait of a city usually seen through the sheen of Hollywood or the grit of its more dangerous neighborhoods. i hr. 29 R (language) - M.E.

Deadpool *** Ryan Reynolds delivers a wonderfully maniacal, career-defining performance as a former Special Forces soldier turned mercenary in this frenetic, loving send-up of superhero movies. Morena Baccarin is kittenishly sexy as his true love. 1 hr. 48 R (strong violence and profanity throughout, sexual content, graphic nudity) - T.D.

The Divergent Series: Allegiant - Part 1 ** The worn and weathered third installment in the four-part film adaptation of Veronica Roth's post-apocalyptic dystopian YA books, with Shailene Woodley back as Tris, the nonconformist heroine and hope for humankind. Naomi Watts and Jeff Daniels are authoritarian figures with conflicting hidden agendas. No one can be trusted, except maybe hunky Four (Theo James), who sticks as close to Tris' side as he can. Divergent fatigue, anyone? 1 hr. 46 PG-13 (violence, adult themes) - S.R.

King Georges *** A wistful and wonderful documentary portrait of Philadelphia chef Georges Perrier and the rise and fall of his fabled eatery, Le Bec-Fin. 1 hr. 17 No MPAA rating (profanity, adult themes) - S.R.

Knight of Cups *1/2 Christian Bale stars as a Los Angeles screenwriter in the throes of existential crisis in the latest Inner Monologues R Us shambles from Terrence Malick. The voice-overs ricochet around in a kind of self-parodic free-for-all, as a bevy of actresses - Cate Blanchett, Isabel Lucas, Teresa Palmer, Freida Pinto, Imogen Poots, Natalie Portman, Teresa Palmer - cross paths with the mopey protagonist. It all looks beautiful; it all feels terribly empty and cliched. 1 hr. 58 R (profanity, nudity, sex, adult themes) - S.R.

London Has Fallen *** A rip-roaring sequel to 2013's White House-under-siege hit Olympus Has Fallen, with Secret Service agent Mike Banning (Gerard Butler) called on to protect the prez (Aaron Eckhart) when all heck breaks loose in the city on the Thames. An impossibly enjoyable live-action cartoon that plays on our real-life anxieties about vengeful cadres of foreign radicals blowing up people - and places. 1 hr. 39 R (violence, profanity, adult themes) - S.R.

Miracles from Heaven **1/2 Jennifer Garner stars in this fact-based Christian film as a Texas woman whose chronically ill daughter is healed in what appears to be a miracle. Appealing subject matter and good performances aren't enough to make up for the sappy story or its cloying tone. 1 hr. 49 PG (thematic material, including accident and medical images) - T.D.

My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2 *1/2 The cast of Nia Vardalos' 2002 hit romcom reunites for this tired, predictable follow-up. A new wedding is in the offing when Toula's (Vardalos) parents (Lainie Kazan and Michael Constantine) discover their 40-year-old marriage certificate was never signed. 1 hr. 41 PG-12 (some suggestive material) - T.D.

10 Cloverfied Lane *** From producer J.J. Abrams and Philly native Dan Trachtenberg, a wickedly clever nightmare entertainment (and a spiritual successor to 2008's Cloverfield), with Mary Elizabeth Winstead as a woman who wakes up shackled in some weird survivalist's bunker. John Goodman is that guy, John Gallagher Jr. is a fellow houseguest, and the world outside the airlocked lair ain't what it used to be. 1 hr. 45 PG-13 (violence, adult themes) - S.R.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot *** Tina Fey plays Kim Baker, who leaves her boring New York life to become a war correspondent in Afghanistan. The darkly comic script by Robert Carlock never gives a sense of who Kim is as a fully fledged character, but the story of a woman finding herself without the help of a man is an important one for the big screen. 1 hr. 51 R (language, sexual situations, violence) - M.E.

The Young Messiah (Not reviewed) The story of Jesus at age 7, as he and his family discover his religious identity. Based on the novel Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt by Anne Rice. 1 hr. 51 PG-13 (violence, thematic elements).

Zootopia *** A colorful Disney 'toon about a seemingly idyllic town where all the different mammals get along - until a sinister conspiracy intrudes. The heroine of the tale is a plucky bunny who joins the police force (the first bunny cop!) and quickly gets caught up in a noirish missing otter case. There otter be a law. With the voices of Ginnifer Goodwin, Jason Bateman, and Idris Elba. 1 hr. 48 PG (some scares, adult themes) - S.R.