Salt (2010)

“Salt” is a 5-Hour Energy Drink revamp of Cold War super-spy thrillers with Angelina Jolie as Evelyn Salt, a CIA agent who’s actually a Russian assassin tasked with doing in the U.S. of A. But, and this is no spoiler: She’s the hero. This is Jolie, after all, superstar and mother of no less than 14 children. Also, even with dozens of feds on her shoeless Soviet heels, Salt goes out of her way to leave her puppy with an African-America girl who lives nearby. Lee Harvey Oswald never did that. Oswald, by the way, figures into the film’s myriad plot twists and shockers, orchestrated by Phillip Noyce (“Patriot Games”). Yet all the “gotchya” moments are for naught. I pegged the real bad guy just by casting. Yet, I liked “Salt.” The action is wildly over the top but enjoyable, and Jolie is the match of Willis, Gibson or McQueen. One can always see the wheels turning behind her eyes: Dig the scene where Salt escapes from police, and she appears to plan every single move in one instant. And I'll take Jolie in action any day over sob stories such as "The Changeling." For summer flicks, this is good stuff. It’s high-time we get a cinematic female hero again. B

Hero (2004)

Yimou Zhang's "Hero" is about nothing less than the story behind the idea and the man who would become founder and first emperor of China, some 2,000 years ago. It also is one lush, gorgeous film from frame one: Landscapes recall Monet paintings and David Lean films, warriors clash in palaces decorated with huge flowing banners. Yet, I was unmoved. Bored. How many times can a person watch fantasy-laden martial arts warriors chase after each other, swords clanging, legs reaching like ballerinas, over lakes and tree tops ala "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"? Too many, for me. I'm long past the gimmick. Jet Li stars as Nameless, a prefect who gains audience with the King of Qin to tell how he slew three assassins out to kill the ruler. But is Nameless there just to tell stories? The answer is very "Rushamon." Li is so stoic heroic, he's lifeless, and Ziyi Zhang is wasted in a ho-hum role. Yes, this film has beauty and colors galore, but it lacks blood – both in passion and violence – and skims the heart and brain much like its heroes skim lakes. Always over. Never diving in. B-

Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010)

Is “Exit Through the Gift Shop” a true documentary or a prank by all involved? I don’t know. I’ve never seen another documentary with so many one-liners, where even an old lady dishes out a LOL hilarious comment on a piece of street art. Ninety percent of this flick’s joy comes from wondering what’s real, what’s fictional, and where and when the satire comes and goes. The gist: French-American retailer and OCD video camera freak Thierry Guetta becomes obsessed with illegal street art and eventually crosses paths with the illusive and infamous artist Banksy (always in shadow). Guetta proposes a documentary film. Banksy agrees. But tables are turned, and Banksy turns the cameras on Guetta, who himself turns artist. Guetta is a fascinating character. I admired his passion for daredevil artists, hated his dismissal of wife and children, and laughed out loud at his brash pride at ripping off dead artists. Yet, all this may be a jokey stab at eccentric artists and the rich elite who pander to them. Deadpan narration by Rhys Ivans only adds to the intrigue. A

Inception (2010)

Christopher Nolan’s “Inception” is not for every movie-goer. It is a brain-expanding, mind-blowing trip so far down the hole of human consciousness it makes “Alice in Wonderland” and “The Matrix” seem quaint. This is a film for cinema lovers such as myself who obsessed over “LOST” because it wasn’t easy just entertainment, it required handing ourselves over body and soul to a unique visionary’s imagination, a story, and becoming part of a puzzle. This isn’t a film to ask, “What’s it about?” The question is: “What do you think it’s about?” As with "LOST" or David Lynch's best works, the answers are wide, complex and likely unanswerable.

As director and screenwriter, Nolan returns to the themes of his earliest films: “Following,” “Memento” and “Insomnia.” The plot is hung around a very basic genre concept – here, the haunted criminal on one final job – and turns the box inside out, and upside down. The mystery here lies in the seeker, the film’s protagonist, not in whatever crime he is trying solve, undo or commit. Even “Batman Begins” and “The Dark Knight” were warm ups to this game. Nolan asks the audience with “Inception,” What makes us us? Our memories, our past sins, or our dreams? All those together? Can a person’s dreams become so solidly entrenched in his or her mind, they become as real as the memories of schoolyard games and or one’s wedding? Take over his life? Swallow him whole?

Leonardo DiCaprio is Dominick Cobb, a thief who breaks into people’s minds as they dream while sedated, and sets out to trick or force their subconscious into letting loose vital secrets, data and ideas. He works for and against multi-billion dollar corporations, apparently for the highest bidder. Among his team are Joseph Gordon-Levitt (“G.I. Joe: the Rise of Cobra”) as a planner and Lukas Haas (“Witness”) as a dream architect, with Tom Hardy (“Bronson”) as a “forger” and weapons man.

The film opens with Dom and his crew targeting a wealthy Japanese business man (Ken Watanabe), who quickly turns the tables on the crew. The corker: He hires the group to usurp a rival up-and-coming tycoon (Cillian Murphy). The plan is not to steal an idea, but covertly plant one. Hence, inception. This is all just the set-up. The payoff cannot be described.

As with “Memento,” there is no central villain. The hero’s mind is a scrambled mess, and that is enough of an obstacle to overcome. Dom’s wife is dead, and he is self-exiled from America, where his young children live with his former in-laws. Nolan slowly pulls back the layers of Dom as his own memory-warped dreams smash into the custom-designed dreams of his targets. His wife (Marion Cottilard) appears, alternately seductive, desperate and completely unstable. When a train appears to crash out-of-control through L.A. traffic, it is only a hint of what’s going on inside Dom’s head, where his grip on reality is tenuous at best. Ellen Page (“Juno”) playa an alternate architect, who knows Dom’s troubles.

With the freedom of the unlimited dream-state imagination, Nolan creates cities that fold onto themselves as if they were paper boxes, entire buildings move and twist and tumble as the dreamer’s body is thrown about a moving car. Thankfully, he avoids the crappy, acid-sucking ruin of the dream-heavy "What Dreams May Come." In the movie’s tour-de-force action sequence, Gordon-Levitt fights several gunmen in a hotel hallway where the rules of gravity do not exist. Nolan also plays with time, knowing that the sleeping brain’s timer does not adhere to real, defined time. The further one sinks into dream states of subconscious -– three, four, five levels down -- time crawls. Minutes are decades, and can drive a man -– or a woman -– mad.

With “Memento,” Nolan shattered the rules on how a story can be presented, creating a murder mystery told backward and then sideways, from the perspective of a man with no apparent short-term memory. He shatters the rules again here, picking up on the unfulfilled promise of “The Matrix,” by making the characters on screen, and the audience as well, not only question the “reality” on screen but that of our own existence.

Hanz Zimmer’s buzzing, thumping score and the ironic use of Edith Piaf’s “Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien” as a major plot device further breaks down the walls of reality on screen. Cottilard won a best Actress Oscar for playing Piaf in a French-language film. As well, a mysterious series of numbers – 528491 – take on the importance of those hatch numbers in “LOST.” As with that now-gone show, Nolan does not see the need to provide answers. Let the puzzle lay unsolved. DiCaprio’s most recent role in “Shutter Island” adds a weird layer as we grapple with trusting our protagonist in the first place.

All of this is mixed in with massive decaying cities, mind games and a snow-bound action sequence worthy of 1970s-era James Bond. With a sharp edge that is constantly off balance. Multiple viewings, I think, are required. The very final image will be debated among hardcore movie fans (nerds?) for years. The kicker isn’t the image itself, though. It’s the idea of the image. Love it or hate, or don’t get it, Nolan uses “Inception” to burrow deep inside our own heads. The movie isn’t about inception, it is an Inception. I've seen in three times, and still am awed. A

Tooth Fairy (2010)

Bill Murray, playing a dying Bill Murray, is asked in “Zombieland” if he has any regrets. He replies, “Garfield.” I predict that if Dwayne Johnson is ever asked that question on his death bed, he may offer “Tooth Fairy.” An equally baffling, terrible film. More so, maybe. The moment he’ll most dread: When his jerk hockey player character, wearing fairy wings and a blue satin outfit as the Tooth Fairy, shrinks and then flushes himself down a locker room toilet to avoid his teammates. I knew this one-joke comedy might be awful, but I never guessed the Rock-as-Fairy plot would be more "believable" than the romance subplot involving Ashley Judd as a single mom. Johnson’s stick man cruelly belittles her older son and steals money from her 6-year-old daughter, and Judd’s mom keeps taking him back. Even when he shows up at night to take the boy out, wearing … fairy wings and a blue satin outfit. Really, mom? The film credits the screenplay to six people, all of whom must have lost their brains along with their baby teeth. D

Finding Nemo (2003)

Pixar’s underwater adventure film “Finding Nemo” is another pearl in the studio’s collection. Here, a father clown fish (Albert Brooks in splendid Defcon 4 Meltdown) searches the Pacific Ocean for his only child, Nemo, who has been taken by an underwater diver. The captured boy fish is kept in a tank and befriends other sea creatures, quickly growing up away from his father’s helicopter parenting ways. Well, OK, so the plot riffs close to “An American Tail.” This is far better. “Nemo” has a pack of sharks forming a vegan support group, Ellen DeGeneres as a fish with a “Memento” problem, and a visual concept so marvelous, it’s a treat just to watch. The textures of the fish skins change in and out of water, and as they float, the body’s weight and fins are flawlessly rendered. I also dig Alexander Gould as Nemo, a scared boy with a damaged fin. In perfect child sync, Gould trips over many of his lines, barely able to get the words in order. In Pixar fashion, story and character still top the effects. Magical. A

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice (2010)

I dreaded “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice.” The previews looked terrible: Nicolas Cage as a sorcerer? The only thing he’s been able to conjure up for the past 10 years is crap movies, save a wicked role in “Kick-Ass.” But here’s the deal, this film, from the folks who gave us the “National Treasure” films, ain’t half bad. Don’t get me started on the silly plot schematics. Look far away from the plot. See, this has a magical Disney ’70s vibe to it, mixed in with favorite ’80s kid’s fare such as “Young Sherlock Holmes.” Its goofiness is its charm. The “Apprentice” is college geek David, a meganerd with the voice of a miniature Gilbert Gottfried, who is deemed by Cage’s magic dude to be Merlin’s long-awaited successor. David is played by Jay Baruchel (“Tropic Thunder”) in a performance so hilarious one is never sure if our hero will save the world or destroy it just getting his shoes on. Cage looks like a guy you want to walk waaay around at Times Square at midnight. He wisely abdicates the film to Barachel. Yes, there are magical walking mops. This is Disney. Bonus points: The world’s end begins at Wall Street. B-