NOVEMBER 20

"How the Grinch Stole Christmas"

Starring Jim Carrey, "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" is a live-action movie based on the beloved children’s story by Dr. Seuss. (Many people have also seen the animated adaptation of the story, which is narrated by Boris Karloff, on TV.) The feature-length movie version greatly expands the original story, including a flashback to when the Grinch was only eight years old and the other youngsters in Whoville treated him cruelly. Although the film has a happy ending, it isn’t overly cheerful, and much of it has a contemporary, slightly edgy feel. Carrey does lots of physical humor and cracks lots of jokes, but the film ultimately preserves the original story and its message that Christmas is more than just decorations and gifts.

"Planet of the Apes"

Directed by Tim Burton, this action-adventure movie is an update of the 1968 film of the same name. In 2029 Captain Leo Davidson (Mark Wahlberg) is flying in a space pod that winds up crash-landing on a planet where the human inhabitants are the slaves of a ruling class of talking apes. Davidson is captured and sold to Ari (Helena Bonham Carter), a female ape who believes in equal rights for humans and is physically attracted to him. Eventually, Davidson sets out for a place where he hopes he can be rescued, but he is pursued by the ape military, which is headed up by the nasty, bigoted General Thade (Tim Roth) and his second in command Attar (Michael Clarke Duncan). Charlton Heston, who starred in the 1968 movie, makes a cameo appearance in the updated version.

NOVEMBER 27

"Divided We Fall"

Set in a Czechoslovakian town during World War II, this Czech-language film is a domestic drama with some humorous elements. Josef and Marie are a childless Czech couple, struggling with the stress of the war and the German occupation. Then a Jew asks them to hide him, and they reluctantly acquiesce, letting him move into their pantry. Nevertheless, Josef and Marie still maintain a close relationship with a Nazi collaborator, leading to some unexpected and perilous conflicts. What sets "Divided We Fall" apart from most Holocaust-related movies is that the characters don’t fit neatly into the saint or sinner categories -- instead, they are ordinary people having to muddle their way through a series of morally complex situations.

"Made"

"Made" is a character-driven indie crime comedy that is written and directed by Jon Favreau. In L.A., Bobby (Favreau) and Ricky (Vince Vaughn) are buddies who inhabit a seedy world of boxing, nightclubs, and shady construction jobs. Bobby would like to make enough money so his stripper girlfriend (Famke Janssen) and her young daughter could have a better life, and Ricky tags along with whatever Bobby does. When Bobby’s sleazy boss Max (Peter Falk) sends Bobby to New York on a criminal errand, Ricky goes with him, and the buddies are in for quite an adventure, including tangling with a mobster named Ruiz (Sean Combs). Most of the humor in "Made" revolves around the hapless Ricky, who has a gift for getting involved in bad situations and making them worse.

"Pootie Tang"

"The Chris Rock Show," a comedy on cable television, featured a regular character called Pootie Tang, and now a movie has been made about him. In the film, Lance Crouther plays Pootie and Chris Rock has three different small roles. Pootie is a world-famous recording artist, movie personality, and crime fighter who speaks in an idiosyncratic way, saying things like "I’m gonna sine your pitty on the runny kine. Sipi-tai!" In the film, Pootie’s crusading against cigarettes, fast food, and malt liquor pits him against the nefarious Dick Lecter (Robert Vaughn), who heads up a company selling these products. Among those appearing in the movie are Wanda Sykes, Jennifer Coolidge, JB Smoove, and Reg E. Cathey. "Pootie Tang" is basically a series of comedy sketches that rely for much of their humor on references to pop culture.

"The Road Home"

Set in a remote Chinese village, "The Road Home" is a Mandarin-language drama directed by Zhang Yimou. In about 1998 Yusheng (Sun Honglei), a man in his late thirties, returns to the village where he was raised to help his mother Di (Zhao Yuelin) bury his father Changyu. These opening scenes are in black and white, but as Yusheng reflects on his parents’ marriage forty years earlier, the film bursts into color. The central story in the movie is set in 1958 and tells how the then 18-year-old Di (played by Zhang Ziyi of "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" fame) and the then 20-year-old Changyu (Zheng Hao) had a storybook courtship and married for love, breaking the tradition of arranged marriage. When Yusheng’s ruminations end, the film returns to black and white to show his father’s somber funeral procession.

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