“Flight” – Flying high

Dir. Robert Zemeckis
(2012, R, 138 minutes)

Flight opens with outstanding scenes it ultimately doesn’t live up to. It begins with Denzel Washington as airline pilot Whip Whitaker, waking up in a hotel room drinking and snorting cocaine with a naked flight attendant, and already we can tell this is not the kind of movie we’d expect from Washington or its director, Robert Zemeckis. The following scene, showing a terrifying plane crash, is extraordinary: paced, edited, and acted with the utmost tension, gradually building to mortal terror, and after it was over I thought, this just might turn out to be a great film.

“Argo” – Escape artists

Dir. Ben Affleck
(2012, R, 120 minutes)

Argo is the third film by Ben Affleck as a director, and it’s probably his best; Gone Baby Gone was an impressive debut, and The Town was a somewhat disappointing followup. This new film doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but it’s a taut, confidently made, straight-ahead thriller. It’s based on a true story, and generating suspense from documented events can be especially tricky – he’s building to an ending already in the history books – but Affleck succeeds.

“You Don’t Know Jack” – The right to choose

Dir. Barry Levinson
(2010, Not Rated, 134 min)
★ ★ ★ ½

The fascinating legal issue at play in You Don’t Know Jack comes down to the splitting of hairs. The courts, as they are shown by the film, deal with Dr. Jack Kevorkian based on reactionary whims. One prosecutor is dogged in his pursuit, driven by religious conviction that God is the sole arbiter of life and death. His successor doesn’t want to spend any more taxpayer money on a failed case and allows Kevorkian to go about his business. But then Kevorkian crosses the line.