VALDOSTA — “Remember Me” (Drama: 1 hour, 53 minutes); Starring: Robert Pattinson, Emilie de Ravin, Chris Cooper, Lena Olin, Tate Ellington, Ruby Jerins and Pierce Brosnan; Director: Allen Coulter; Rated: PG-13 (Violence, Sexual content and profanity)

Movie Review: Numerous critics are denouncing this film, save a few like Roger Ebert who liked this film except for one incident in it. That one incident is perhaps most viewers’ reasons for objecting to this film. Conversely, movies should leave an impression. “Remember Me” does.

Seemingly, unhappy people exist within New York City. Yet these people lives, despite their socioeconomic status, have had bad experiences as youths. Ally Craig (a captivating Emilie de Ravin of ABC’s “Lost”) is a college student and the daughter of a detective, Sgt. Neil Craig (always moving Chris Cooper), one of New York’s Finest. He is an overprotective, single father. His former wife and Ally’s mother was killed while Ally witnessed the event 13 years earlier.

Several blocks away, Tyler Hawkins (Pattinson, nicely showing why he should not be stereotyped as that guy who plays a vampire) is a youthful college student in rebellion. He discovered his brother, who committed suicide about six years earlier. The event scars Tyler, and causes a major rift within in family. His parents, Charles Hawkins (Brosnan, who is intensely brilliant) and Diane Hirsh (Olin), are divorced, and Tyler has a discerning relationship with Charles. The father and son dislike each other. The glue that holds the family together is Caroline (an effective Ruby Jerins), the youngest of the Hawkins clan. Her biggest problems are a clique of girls in her class that dislike her.

As fate has it, these two families and their problems collide after Tyler’s best friend and roommate, Aiden Hall (Ellington, who agreeably provides useful comedy), connects Tyler with Ally on a dare. Relating to the other’s family problems, Tyler and Ally fall each other.      

Many people attempt making this film a love story. Just because a couple’s engagement is one of this film’s highlights, humanity appears keen on making any couple in films a romance. Sometimes a couple is just a couple — friends with benefits, just a momentary tryst or just two people’s exploration of life with another. This is not a romance; it is a fine drama making excellent use of its characters via a fine denouement. How a film ends is everything. The lead up to that ending is very important also. This screenplay inputs plenty of clues about its ending, but nothing appears eye-catching or memorable until a big conclusion.    

Will Fetters’ debut screenplay is a statement about life, death and the relationships throughout, and people forget movies should be about characters and their lives. If done correctly, audiences will care about these characters and have a vested interested in what happens to them. More important, those characters should facilitate a plot. “Remember Me” does a wonderful job with each of these aspects. Its objective is to show how differing life events become independent variables that contribute to something greater. This is the plot facilitated by “Remember Me,” a movie ably directed by Coulter (“Hollywoodland,” 2006), who is known as mostly a teleplay director helming greats such as “The Sopranos” and “Sex and the City.”

A number of trite, formulaic moments exist concerning the relationships, but this drama is a swell movie with some great lines. Ellington’s Hall is especially effective as the film’s comedy niche. When asked when was the last time he had just one drink at a party or other intoxicating occasion, Hall responds simply, “Communion.” He is a great opposite to Pattinson’s Tyler, who is demure and constantly self-destructive. Both play their parts with conviction.

Pattinson, with a brooding James Dean appeal, is impressive, showing he has the chops for acting and performing as a leading man. His performance with a splendid de Ravin is appealing. Of course, the actor making this film is Brosnan. He may be past Agent 007, but his acting is a perfect 10. Brosnan’s scenes are perfectly edgy and some of this film’s best.  

The cast is superb and the plot has a means of becoming a moving tribute to life and all its tribulations. Life can be terrible, and its outcome could be worst. Still, life is worth living, and “Remember Me” is worth remembering.

Grade: B+ (Memorable)

 

“Green Zone” (Thriller: 1 hour, 54 minutes); Starring: Matt Damon, Brendan Gleeson and Greg Kinnear: Director: Paul Greengrass; Rated: R (Violence, profanity and thematic elements including torture)

Movie Review: Chief Warrant Officer Roy Miller (Damon) is a member of the Army. Miller tires of daily searches for weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), yielding no discovery of new weapons. Soon he begins questioning orders based on false intelligence. With the aid of Martin Brown (Gleeson), head of the CIA’s chief bureau in Iraq’s Green Zone, Miller begins searching for evidence to contradict the notions that Saddam Hussein’s regime was in possession of WMDs. This puts Miller at odds with people, including a Pentagon intelligence administrator (Kinnear).  

Damon and director Greengrass (“The Bourne Supremacy,” 2004, “The Bourne Ultimatum,” 2007) team up again for this military thriller set in the post-Hussein Green Zone, not long after the 2003 Operation Iraqi Liberation began. Screenplays involving recent historical events always have their interpretation of what transpired. The intent of “Green Zone” appears to be an attempt to say the Bush Administration was wrong about WMDs.

Movies with agendas are fine if the realm in which they propose a statement is plausible for the realistic setting in which the plot occurs. This notion is not the case with this thriller. A rogue military soldier receives an order to cease with certain activities outside of his duties by a senior Pentagon official, yet the soldier constantly continues defying that high-ranking administrator. The Army soldier, as portrayed by Damon, appears unconcerned with the chain of command. Even more, command officers appear to let Damon’s character run rogue.

Anyone ever spending time with military personnel knows the chain of command is there for a reason. Damon’s character appears to behave as if the military is just some job where you are able to make decisions without consulting people with higher pay grades. This matter makes “Green Zone,” despite of its entertaining qualities, a farfetched piece for Damon, Greengrass and others involved to make a war statement through unrealistic material.  

Grade: C+ (Entertaining and unbelievable)

 

“She’s Out of My League” (Romantic Comedy: 1 hour, 44 minutes); Starring: Jay Baruchel, Alice Eve, T.J. Miller and Mike Vogel; Director: Jim Field Smith; Rated: R (Sexual innuendo, sexuality, crude humor and profanity)

Movie Review: Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agent Kirk (Baruchel) meets Molly (Alice Eve) to return her cell phone. The rendezvous becomes a relationship as a beautiful Molly falls for Kirk, who is a geeky, skinny guy not known for being an alpha male. Despite his friends’ disbelief, Kirk and Molly become a hot commodity as a pair.

This comedy is a formulaic piece masking itself as a romance. Every year about five movies debut as photoplays or teleplays, where some couple reunites at an airport terminal to discover they are correct for each other. Audiences knew they belonged together the day before.

Baruchel and his friends provide laughs, although some of it is just silly. Characters are affable but undistinguished. 

Grade: C (Out of my recommendation scale)

 

“Our Family Wedding” (Comedy: 1 hour, 43 minutes); Starring: Forest Whitaker, America Ferrera, Carlos Mencia, Regina King and Lance Gross; Director: Rick Famuyiwa; Rated: R (Brief strong language and sexual innuendo)

Movie Review: Lucia Ramirez (Ferrera), a Latina-American, and Marcus Boyd (Gross), an African-American, decide to marry. They decide to return to their hometown to announce their engagement. Their fathers, Brad Boyd (Academy Award actor Whitaker) and Miguel Ramirez (Mencia), who unknowingly encounter each other a day or two earlier, dislike like each other and prefer their children not marry. As the wedding itinerary commences, the Boyds and the Ramirezes go to war.

Wait. War would be easier to understand than the shenanigans of these characters. Whitaker, who apparently did this for a check, and Mencia behave like children. Any moment, one could easily get the feeling they are brothers of the “Three Stooges.” Their antics make this film childish.

Grade: D+ (Say we don’t.)