And in keeping with the environmental enmity theme, Gil Kenan’s Monster House (July 21) poses a typical suburban domicile as the ultimate evil in this deceptively blithe animation voiced by Steve Buscemi, Maggie Gyllenhaal and Jon Heder.
Somehow I don’t think the revival of Miami Vice (July 28) will afford much clarity to the world of A Scanner Darkly. Michael Mann brings his iconic ’80s series to the big screen with Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx as chic narcs Crockett and Tubbs.
AUGUST
If you can’t beat them, join them: NASCAR returns in Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby (August 4), in which Will Ferrell plays a wacky speedster and Adam McKay (Anchorman) directs. Resistance to the nightmare is futile, as Gael García Bernal realizes in The Science of Sleep (August 11), Michel Gondry’s follow-up to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Seek refuge in rationality and the demons win anyway, as Hilary Swank discovers in The Reaping (August 11), where she’s a religious debunker forced back to the faith when Biblical plagues terrorize Louisiana and FEMA folds like a two-dollar suitcase. Stephen Hopkins directs.
Is it too soon, then, to confront our deepest fears? I mean, of course, Snakes on a Plane (August 11). If the film proves as successful as the title, then star Samuel L. Jackson and director David R. Ellis (Cellular) have a hit.
But will it prepare us for World Trade Center (August 11), Oliver Stone’s account of two 9/11 first-responders trapped in the rubble? Nicolas Cage, Michael Pena, and Maria Bello star. Or the return of Clerks II (August 18), Kevin Smith’s attempt to recapture the magic that made him an indie favorite 10 years ago?
