Weekend: MOVIES

Push

By now movie mutants have covered all the conceivable super powers, but it still takes a while to comprehend the abilities possessed by the mutants in Paul McGuigan's sci-fi action film. Some are telekinetic, while others can see the future. Two brothers burst blood vessels with their voices, and "pushers" insert thoughts in people's heads that make them do things they wouldn't normally do.

They're social outcasts, just like the X-Men, and the movie's story has to do with a U.S. government agent (Djimon Hounsou) with his own special powers tracking a young woman (Camilla Belle) who has escaped from an experimental facility. The trail leads to her old boyfriend (Chris Evans), a mutant who is laying low in Hong Kong.

The action is often exhilarating, but McGuigan asks the audience to accept the validity of situations that nobody, including the characters, seems to understand fully.

Directed by Paul McGuigan, starring Chris Evans, Dakota Fanning and Camilla Belle

Starting Saturday at theaters nationwide

The September Issue

If you are not interested in fashion you may find this documentary about Vogue magazine as compelling as Naomi Campbell's acting career. But as a portrait of a corporate culture, it's rich in psychological detail.

The movie focuses on the production of the September 2007 issue, which seems to take place outside imperious editor in chief Anna Wintour's bubble of self-involvement. The only employee willing to breach that bubble is creative editor Grace Coddington, who started at U.S. Vogue the same day fellow Brit Wintour did.

Coddington's idea of fashion as vanguard art tends to run up against Wintour's more practical concerns, but if Coddington seems pretentious, her boss's belief in the value of her enterprise is naive. She says some people are "afraid of fashion," and doesn't seem to realize that her own beloved daughter belongs in their company. When mom leaves the room, the younger Wintour confesses that she thinks the Vogue world is "weird."

Directed by R.J. Cutler

Starting Saturday at Shinjuku Wald 9 in Tokyo to be followed by theaters nationwide

This Is It

Stitched together from 120 hours of rehearsal video footage for his unrealized comeback concerts, "This Is It" provides little direct insight into the real Michael Jackson. There are no interviews with the late King of Pop, and the few glimpses of his state of mind show a man intent on his craft but occupying a different plane of existence than that of his collaborators, who are awe-struck at his talent while solicitous of his physical and mental frailties.

What you see is what you get; namely, the greatest entertainer of his generation making sure his reputation as such survives what he calls his "final curtain call." For the most part, it does, even if the production numbers are tacky in terms of conception.

Though Jackson tried to conserve his voice during many of these workouts, he doesn't hold back on the dancing. The ensemble work is familiar to anyone who hasn't been asleep for the past 30 years, but the solo stuff is often breathtaking. Jackson seems to be working out his moves through a mixture of conditioned reflex and pure instinct. As proof of how original his style remains the dancers are shown struggling through a lesson in crotch-grabbing. It's more difficult than it looks.

Directed by Kenny Ortega

Now showing at theaters nationwide(IHT/Asahi: November 6,2009)