Escape from Reality with <i>The Adjustment Bureau</i>, <i>Rango</i> and <i>Beastly</i> in This Week's Film Roundup

BY Robert BellPublished Mar 4, 2011

According to the early Roman calendar, March was at one time the first month of a new year, honouring Mars, the god of war. Of course, now it's mostly associated with getting shitfaced on St. Patrick's Day. Since it's a little too early to get hammered at an Irish pub and your neighbours might look at you funny if you run around on your front lawn yelling "Sparta!," you may want to check out what's playing at the local cinema. As always, we have the latest reviews in the Exclaim! Recently Reviewed section.

The big release this week is The Adjustment Bureau (pictured), which stars Matt Damon and Emily Blunt. Blending Philip K. Dick's science fiction allegory with whimsical romance, it acts as a sort of high-concept Waking the Dead, which our reviewer asserts "is worth your time." Also worth your time is the impressively animated Rango, which features the voices of Johnny Depp and Isla Fisher in a cartoon parable about a lizard in the Wild West.

For something that entertains with unintentional humour and "pure camp fantasy," we have a review of the Vanessa Hudgens romance Beastly, wherein the Beauty & the Beast mythology is beaten to death with terrible acting and soft-focus close-ups. It's more accessible to the mainstream than I Love You Phillip Morris, however, as this sexually explicit comic romance features Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor satirizing heteronormative ideals with a very candid and uncompromising depiction of homosexual coupling.

We also have some reviews of non-American films, such as French-Canadian disco epic Funkytown, which mixes cocaine-snorting adulterers, closeted gays and struggling musicians into a film of "insurmountable missteps." More successful in its intentions is the clever Mexican comedy-drama Nora's Will, where a man learns of his ex-wife's passive-aggressive plans of family reunion following her suicide.

Read these theatrical film reviews and more over at the Exclaim.ca Recently Reviewed section.

Latest Coverage