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By Times Staff
Published May 5, 2005

NATIONAL TREASURE

DIRECTOR: Jon Turteltaub

CAST: Nicolas Cage, Diane Kruger, Justin Bartha, Sean Bean, Harvey Keitel, Jon Voight, Christopher Plummer

SYNOPSIS: The Declaration of Independence hides a treasure map that's being followed by a fortune hunter (Cage).

WHAT WE SAID: Times film critic Steve Persall gave the movie a D, describing it in his November review as "drab" and "sluggish." He wrote, "National Treasure looks like smart counter-programming on the surface; a summer kind of entertainment released in autumn when more serious films open for awards consideration. Then you realize it's purely for survival; Turteltaub's movie would have been eaten alive by summertime competition. National Treasure doesn't even look like an idea for a video game. These days, that's as unambitious as any action movie can get."

MPAA RATING: PG; mild violence, scary images

RUNNING TIME: 125 min.

DIRECTOR: Joel Schumacher

CAST: Gerard Butler, Emmy Rossum, Patrick Wilson, Minnie Driver, Miranda Richardson, Simon Callow, Ciaran Hinds

SYNOPSIS: A disfigured composer (Butler) terrorizes the Paris Opera House while mentoring a rising star (Rossum). Co-stars St. Petersburg native Wilson.

WHAT WE SAID: Times performing arts critic John Fleming gave the film a B-plus. "Eighteen years after it first portrayed a murderer as a sympathetic figure onstage, The Phantom of the Opera is finally a movie, with a sumptuous production that delivers Andrew Lloyd Webber's music in all its glorious schmaltz," he wrote. "The guilty pleasures of Phantom are not solely derived from the familiar music or even the richly detailed treatment by Joel Schumacher of the goings-on in a 19th century opera house. . . . The true appeal is camp of an extremely high order, as if a gifted window dresser (Schumacher's onetime job) had been handed a blank check and told to have a blast."

MPAA RATING: PG-13; brief violent images

RUNNING TIME: 141 min.

THE CHORUS (LES CHORISTES)

DIRECTOR: Christophe Barratier

CAST: Gerard Jugnot, Francois Berleand, Jean-Baptiste Maunier, Jacques Perrin

SYNOPSIS: A kind-spirited music teacher inspires boarding school delinquents to sing classical works. Received an Oscar nomination for original song and foreign language film. In French with English subtitles.

WHAT WE SAID: Fleming gave the film a B-. "American moviegoers may not take to its simplicity, but fans of choral singing will enjoy the music," he wrote. "Director Christophe Barratier, who co-wrote the screenplay, populates the school with stock characters: a crotchety maintenance man, cynical teachers and a cross-section of truants: from red-haired bully to withdrawn waif to bespectacled charmer. Little moral fables are sprinkled along the way to the inevitable bittersweet finale."

MPAA RATING: PG-13; some language/sexual references and violence

RUNNING TIME: 95 min.

DIRECTOR: Roger Michell

CAST: Daniel Craig, Rhys Ifans, Samantha Morton, Bill Nighy

SYNOPSIS: A hot air balloon tragedy creates ethical dilemmas between two strangers.

WHAT WE SAID: The Times did not review this film.

MPAA RATING: R; language, some violence and a disturbing image

RUNNING TIME: 97 min.

[Last modified May 4, 2005, 11:41:19]