Movie Nation

She got her first acclaim on TV’s “The Secret Life of an American Teenager,” and burst out on the big screen as the rebellious daughter in “The Descendants.”

Then, there was a spectacular turn in “The Spectacular Now.”

And now, Shailene Woodley is on the brink of Jennifer Lawrence-sized stardom, should Woodley’s “Hunger Games-ish” sci-fi franchise “Divergent” take off. She plays the heroine, “Tris,” a kid who doesn’t fit the mold and is therefor “dangerous” to the powers that be.

Sounds familiar, I know.

Questions for Ms. Woodley? Post them as comments below, and thanks.

　King Leonidas slipped into legend at the Battle of Thermopylae, martyred with 300 Spartans for the sake of Western Civilization and Spartan glory.
“Go, tell the Spartans, stranger passing by
That here, obedient to their laws, we lie.”
So it was too much to hope that someone with Gerard Butler’s charismatic, bellowing swagger would be around for the sequel, “300: Rise of an Empire.” His Leonidas and his oiled-down eight-pack are sorely missed, as are the quotable quatrains of that famous fight, the Spartan trash talk that sings through the ages. So many Persian arrows will rain on them that they will “blot out the sun”?
“Then we shall fight in the shade.”
There’s nothing that moving in “Rise of an Empire,” a more visually stunning but less thrilling epic with bloodier slo-motion swordfights, this time at sea. It lacks the contorts history, and lacks the heroic proportions and poetry of “300,” mainly thanks to a less impressive cast and murky, forgettable script.
Sullivan Stapleton (“Gangster Squad”) is Themistokles, the Greek general who took the oracle’s prophecy that Greece could only be saved “by a wall of wood” (i.e., ships) to heart and fought the enormous Persian fleet at Artemisium and Salamis. That prophecy, by the way, isn’t shown — a clever and quotably theatrical moment discarded as Queen Gorgo (Lena Headey) relates this oral history.
The movie opens at the end of Thermopylae, flashes back to the earlier Battle of Marathon, then flashes forward to the fictive present as Themistokles rallies the city states and prepares for battle at sea as Leonidas marches to his fate at Thermopylae.
The Persian fleet is led by the she devil Artemisia, played by one-time Bond babe Eva Green, a seductive swordfighter in jet black hair, Egyptian eye makeup and ancient Persian fishnet stockings. She purrs about “the ecstacy of steel” and demands of her admirals, “Is it too much to ask for victory?”
It is. The clever Greeks foil her and crush her huge war galleys at every turn.
Things get so bad that Artemesia summons Themistokles for a mid-Aegean parlay. And things turn so hot and heavy there that Themistokles has to teach her a little Latin — coitus interruptus.
Director Noam Murro did the college professor romance “Smart People,” in no way a recommendation for directing a red-blooded digital epic of an ancient sea battle. Zack Snyder, who directed the original film, had a hand in the tin-eared script. It’s not graphic novel creator Frank Miller’s fault that Thermopylae, the basis for his “300” book, made for more elegiac history than Salamis.
But the design — a sea of greys and whites covered with heaving digital black ships and black sails and Persians clad in black battling Greeks in tiny brown boats — is stunning, an improvement over 2006’s “300.” And the action never disappoints.
It’s a pity this colorless cast doesn’t hold a candle to the Butler/Headey/Michael Fassbender/David Wenham crew of the original, that the writers couldn’t conjure up thrilling speeches to match the original.
Go tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, that these pretenders spoiled their franchise, and here their movie lies.

MPAA Rating:R for strong sustained sequences of stylized bloody violence throughout, a sex scene, nudity and some language
Cast: Sullivan Stapleton, Eva Green, Lena Headey, Jack O’Connell, Andrew Tiernan, David Wenham
Credits: Directed by Noam Murro, scripted by Zack Snyder and Kurt Johnstad, based on the Frank Miller graphic novel. A Warner Brothers release.
Running time: 1:42

“Grand Piano” is a nail-biting thriller in the classic Hitchcock style. And the best word to describe it is one that went out of fashion long before Hitch’s death, over 30 years ago.
This tale of a concert pianist performing under a sniper’s threat — “Call for help and I’ll shoot you right between the eyes!” — is a real corker.
You’ve got the famous, nervous wreck of a pianist (Elijah Wood) pounding away at a work everybody calls “the unplayable piece.” You’ve got John Cusack’s voice in his ear, whispering threats to him about his actress wife (Kerry Bishe). And the pianist is stage whispering pleas, complaints and the like back to the sniper. While playing, mind you.
A laser sight dances across his fingers as he tickles the ivories. There are cell phones ringing in the concert hall, a jovial conductor (Don McManus) who breaks classical music concert decorum — repeatedly — and a pianist who dashes off stage between pieces and movements of pieces.
This just isn’t DONE, you know.
It’s all rather daft, but cleverly so. And the occasional jaw-dropping moment will make you wonder, “Who says classical music is dead?”
Wood is Tom Selznick, a long-dormant concert pianist who is giving a concert in tribute to his late mentor using that mentor’s massive Bosendorfer concert grand piano. His nerves made him give up performing five years before, but conductor Hugh (McManus) jokes around and puts him at ease.
“You’re going to hit a wrong note. And you know what? They (the audience) never know.”
The actress-wife is pushing him to get back on the stage, and even pushier radio interviewers urge him to “break a leg.”
If only.
The trouble starts when Selznick strolls onstage to join the orchestra. He opens his score, and there,in bright red Sharpie marks, is “Play one wrong note and you die!” As he works through the program (Wood is a pretty convincing pianist) and the threats mount, you think of “Phone Booth” and “The Call.” And as Selznick fights panic and sprints offstage to try and out-think his adversary, maybe you think of Bugs Bunny and the classic “Rhapsody Rabbit.” This is that nutty.
“Now you know the meaning of ‘stage fright,'” the unseen sniper hisses, a play on both the bane of any performer and a 1950 Hitchcock film. And a producer named Selznick was the bane of Hitchcock’s early career, so we know who was on screenwriter Damien Chazelle’s mind as he concocted this.
While your eyes may roll at the far-out aspects of “Grand Piano,” you need not fear that Hitchcock himself is rolling in his grave over this tribute. The execution is far from flawless, but I think Sir Alfred would approve.
“What a corker,” he’d say. And he’d be right.

MPAA Rating: R for some language
Cast: Elijah Wood, Kerry Bishe, John Cusack, Don McManus
Credits: Directed by Eugenio Mira, written by Damien Chazelle. A Magnet release.
Running time: 1:37

Three Oscars, as of 1010 pm. Maybe.

Ellen DeGeneres is owning the show, which is funny and relaxed and offhand and a bit clumsy. Like Ellen. Lots of stumbling. Teleprompter issues? A late script?

The music’s been showcased nicely. But stumbles stumbles stumbles.

“After Earth” was honored in a way that befits its derisive reviews, taking home Golden Raspberries for star Will Smith, his spawn Jaden, and worst picture.

“Movie 43,” which is really not worth nominating or berating, took worst script.

Kim Kardashian took a worst prize for daring to turn her preening self-absorbtion lose on whatever Tyler Perry movie she made her “debut” in.

And “Lone Ranger” took a worst remake/sequel prize.

No, Will and Jaden didn’t show up to collect.

A very big weekend for a very big actor as Liam Neeson’s “Non-Stop” continued his run of action hits released in the spring. Over $30 million came in for this far-fetched but moody and entertaining thriller. You’ll never guess the ending.

“Son of God” might have beaten it at the box office, but we already KNOW the ending to that one, yes? Over $26 million for a movie made from recycled footage from a cable TV series. Not bad.

“American Hustle” is doing the best of the remaining best picture contenders, not as well as “Frozen,” not as well as an “even dirtier” version of “Anchorman 2” re-issued to theaters. But well enough.

Weak reviews haven’t stopped “Non-Stop” from giving Liam Neeson another action hit on his post-“Taken” resume. The airborne thriller is headed towards a $27-28 million opening, based on a robust Friday.

“Son of God,” mostly clipped together from scenes from the cable TV series “The Bible,” is laughing all the way to the money changers — $24 million, or so. It had a very good Thursday night, and a decent Friday. Saturday will be telling.

“The Lego Movie” will clear $200 million by end of business Saturday, a most impressive run at #1, the upshot being that a franchise is born. It’ll do nearly $20 million this weekend.

“3 Days to Kill” is doing OK, but not nearly as much for Costner as Neeson’s “Non-Stop.” It’ll make half as much money as the Neeson film, when all is said and done.

“Monuments Men” has sneakily found its way over $65 million and looks to hit $75-80 by the time its run ends.

My personal gauge of how a movie will do over a given weekend is the blog traffic on my review of said film.

By that standard, “Son of God” should open big. Not huge, but big.

And looking to Box Office Mojo for a prediction, I see that confirmed — $27-29 million. Really? I see that as a bit high, considering the film is a clipped together summation of the New Testament stuff from “The Bible,” the cable TV series. They’ve sold DVDs from it and everything. Not that much of the film is new material. But Mr. Mojo is saying Big Big Big opening, with “Non-Stop” hitting low to mid $20s.

How about Box Office Guru? He’s saying $24 million or so, not enough to best “Non-Stop.”

Liam is box office now? May be. Alls I’m saying is readers are flocking to reviews of “Son of God” at a 20-1 rate over “Non-Stop.” Seriously.

Both major prognosticators are saying “Lego Movie” will drop to $19-20 million this weekend.

None of the movies opening this weekend have the benefit of good reviews to help them cross the finish line. I found “Son of God” moving enough, and Liam is worth the price of admission for “Non-Stop,” much as Costner is for “3 Days to Kill.”

Blame Mel Gibson for it if you like, but no Jesus movie these days is worth its salt without an utterly unflinching treatment of his torture and crucifixion. And “Son of God” has stretches where the agony we watch this poor man endure is avert-your-eyes awful. If history ever produced a more excruciating form of punishment, it probably included lions at dinner time.
But “Son of God,” a big screen version of Mark Burnett and Roma Downey’s History Channel TV series “The Bible,” has a redemptive optimism about it that makes the brutality go down easier. Their Jesus may be all business. But he sports a beatific smile as he renders unto audiences lines that feel like rough drafts of the polished poetry of the King James Bible.
“I’ll give my stone to the first man who tells me he has not sinned” doesn’t have the memorable ring of “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” But that’s what Shakespearean editors can do for you.
It’s a standard issue Christ picture — hitting the high points from Jesus (Diogo Morgado) taking that first fishing trip with Peter (Darwin Shaw) to Lazarus to “Where’s Judas?” to “Give us Barabbas” and the long, final walk with a cross.
Unlike “The Passion of the Christ,” there’s no Aramaic with English subtitles, a lot less blood and no anti-Semitism. No character feels like a caricature — not the hypocritical Pharisee Caiaphas (Adrian Schiller) or the gruff and dismissive Pontius Pilate (Greg Hicks of “Snow White and the Huntsman”). But it’s also dramatically flat, with few actors making much of an impression as they play saints and sinners, the icons of The Bible.
An eight minute prologue takes us from Eve and Adam through Noah and Abraham to the Biblical “present,” in which the Apostle John (Sebastian Knapp) narrates the story — from recruiting Peter to the Miracle of Fishes and Loaves (unleavened pita bread here), from tackling the money changers in the Temple to the Sermon on the Mount.
The settings are passable versions of ancient Israel — digital models of Jerusalem, here and there, amidst the arid, rock-strewn landscape.
Among the cast, Hicks and Shaw have the most presence, with co-producer Downey (“Touched by an Angel”) managing a perfectly weepy Mother Mary.
And while Morgado’s Jesus suggests little of the charisma of this first “fisher of men,” it is a pleasantly retro, “Hippies will Inherit the Earth” take on the man. The film emphasizes his conection with children, his role as rabbi or “teacher,” and his big lessons about forgiveness, humility, compassion for the poor and wariness of the wealthy. Morgado’s Portuguese accent makes him stand out from the often Brit-accented Apostles, Pharisees and Romans.
Like the criticized TV series it is culled from, the film’s main aim is to be inoffensive, and with multiple directors and screenwriters, they at least manage that. Parts of the story emphasized by the Catholic Church (the redemption of Dismas, on the cross next to Christ) and that inspired “Raiders of the Lost Ark” (the spear of Longinus delivers the coup de grace) are touched on.
And unlike the bloody blockbuster by Mr. Gibson, this loving, forgiving “Son” comes back long enough to remind us of why the religion, founded in his name, has endured.

Roger Moore’s interview with the big screen Jesus and the creators of “Son of God” is here.

MPAA Rating: PG-13 for intense and bloody depiction of The Crucifixion, and for some sequences of violence
Cast: Diogo Morgado, Greg Hicks, Roma Downey, Darwin Shaw
Credits: Directed by Christopher Spencer, scripted by Richard Bedser, Christopher Spencer, Nic Young and Colin Wash. A Fox release.
Running time: 2:20

The once and forever hobbit Frodo Elijah Wood has had a pretty interesting career post-Middle Earth. Not that a lot of people have noticed.

He was terrific in a small role in “Sin City,” was perfect in “Everything is Illuminated,” starred in a lot of interesting films that no one saw — from “The Romantics” and “The Oxford Murders” to “Maniac.” He had a couple of TV series, including that one where he interacted with a dog that only he could see was a man dressed up in a dog suit — “Wilfred.”

In “Grand Piano,” he’s a concert pianist forced to play an “unplayable” piece, in front of an audience, and play it perfectly or a sniper will off him and his movie star wife in the theater in front of everybody. It opens in a couple of weeks.

Questions for Mr. Wood? Comment below, and thanks for the help.