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The Fighter is quite good. There aren't all that many surprises here, and those of us who ♥ed David O. Russel's out-there Huckabees will be a little disappointed by its safeness, but it is definitely good. Quite good, even.

The film's obvious standout is Christian Bale as Dicky, demonstrating his range and relevance as an affable, crack-addicted former fighter. Mark Wahlberg plays Dicky's still-fighting brother with unending restraint; he scores points for subtlety in the film's familial drama while losing as many in his charmless, unsmiling romance with Amy Adams's Charlene. There is exactly as much here as is necessary to make the film's finale engaging and rewarding, but very little to remember afterward--it really is quite successful in its predictable underdog ambitions, but it never really aims any higher.

All things considered, the Fighter is almost exactly the lackluster triumph implied in its generic title and trailer--it doesn't reinvent the sport underdog story, but it isn't trying to. This movie only aims to be a quite good entry in its admittedly overaccessable genre; in that it succeeds entirely.

In 1928, Charlie Chaplin wowed audiences by appearing on screen with a real, live lion for his celebrated film The Circus. A lion! Real! On screen! Audiences were mesmerized by this fascinating new art of cinema, an art made all the more engaging for the fact that the plastics of its image had roots in reality; that somewhere else in space and time, Chaplin had actually stood next to this lion and the reality of this image was now available to them for their own viewing pleasure.

For a contemporary equivalent, I give you Steve-O launched through the stratosphere in a PortaPotty full of dog poop. In 3D.

Jackass 3D appeals to cinema's time-honored capacity for ontological testament, and makes an equally compelling case for the camera's potency as an empathy machine: We see the setup of a stunt, we endure its execution, and we then either clutch our balls or puke in our mouths, depending on what the stunt entails. Cinema is reality, and their pain is ours.

Jackass isn't simply effective in the art of its performers, however, as there is a genius to the framing and editing of each segment as well. Many of the film's laughs are built in to its premises, and the crew smartly eschews over-explanation. We see a tee ball, we see the path this ball is on track to take, and we see Steve-O's nuts--as an intelligent and discerning audience, it is left to us to piece together the narrative before it unfolds, resulting in our increased engagement and a far greater potential for humor upon realization. And we then hang in that moment of anticipation, until the situation's potential energy is quickly and cathartically rendered kinetic.

Jackass 3D is notable as well for its use of stereoscopic 3D cinematography. In one scene, Johnny Knoxville fires a projectile toward the screen in slow motion to great effect: shallow depth of field slowly reveals this item to be a dildo, and 3D reveals the dildo to be humorously close to your face. Elsewhere, stereoscopy is employed in the service of some truly excellent model work; the scene's genuine beauty makes its ultimate subversion all the more effective.

Needless to say, Jackass 3D will not appeal to everyone. But as the film so effectively marries the ontology of outrageous stupidity to so many facets of cinematic expression, it's definitely worth seeing if you think you can stomach it. TK 10/17/10

I recently attended a midnight screening of David Yates's latest Harry Potter film with my younger sister and her friend, both girls age 11. The two sat enraptured throughout, and walked out of the theater with a nearly full tub of popcorn. "Hmm," said the friend, looking at how little she'd eaten, "I guess that wasn't really a popcorn movie." She said a mouthful there.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 is worlds away from Chris Columbus's charming children's films, both in tone and impact. Where the series began in light ooh-look-at-that fantasy, it now accepts the wizarding world as established and takes its stories and subjects seriously. This means that those uninitiated will likely be very confused, but who cares. Deathly Hallows 1 exists as a bridge between the six films proceeding it and the one to come; there is perhaps limited narrative potential in that purpose, but there's plenty of room for character, exposition, and style.

These three functions offer mixed returns. In terms of character, I do feel that any realistic appraisal of the film must acknowledge a certain amount of sketchy dialog and strained conversational rhythm. This can occasionally be distracting, particularly as the three protagonists' interactions dominate the film's second act. The best developments on the character front come in Hallows's subtler moments; Emma Watson's Hermione is afforded a heartbreaking opening only alluded to in the source material, and Yates allows Rupert Grint's Ron to carry much of his performance in sustained emotional gazes.

In terms of laying out exposition for the series finale, Hallows delivers about as well as it can. As I was already familiar with J.K. Rowling's novels, I can't be entirely sure how understandable this will all be for the film-only crowd; some things are intentionally not yet explained, others may simply be unclear--I knew what was going on so I can only speculate. One block of exposition that I had been dreading actually turned out to be a highlight: the story of the Three Brothers is accompanied by a lucid sequence of stylish animation; it offers effective visual interest without disrupting the film's tone.

In fact, it is in the film's style that it truly exceeds expectations. Yates, as mentioned earlier, takes this story seriously and photographs it as such. The film's effects are rarely ostentatious, and when they do tend toward spectacle, the grandiosity is earned from Hallows's quieter passages. Yates mostly commands the camera as a tool of framing and focus, which lends the film a maturity of form to match its more mature content.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 will please its fans and most likely baffle everyone else, but whether one is familiar with the books, the films, both or neither, this is a solid, serious, and stylish entry in the series. Its effectiveness will be best judged when Part 2 arrives to ideally validate the work done here, but until then this film exists as an unexpectedly compelling placeholder. To those in it for long hall, Part 1 comes highly recommended--just don't expect to eat much popcorn. -TK 11/19/10