Director: Attila Tenki
Studio: 3D-MEDIA.tv
Rated: PG

Director: Jason Paul Collum
Genre: Art House & International
Studio: Tempe DVD

Elliot, a shy young man, is shunned by his family, friends and fiancée when he falls for another man, Corin. Unfortunately, Corin already has a significant other, and as Elliot finds himself rejected at every turn, he slips into paranoia and rage, determined to get what he desires most...

Director: Peter Hedges
Studio: Disney
Rated: PG

To purge their grief at failing to conceive, Cindy (Jennifer Garner) and Jim (Joel Edgerton, "Animal Kingdom") write down all the attributes they wish for in a child, put them in a box, and bury them in the garden. That night, a boy smeared with dirt, with leaves sprouting from his legs, appears in their house and says his name is Timothy. Thus begins a fable that's sort of about uniqueness and conformity, as Timothy's magical nature proceeds to hearten the lives of everyone he encounters--including a young girl with her own secret, the stern woman who owns their town's pencil factory (Dianne Wiest), and Jim's gruff, emotionally distant dad (David Morse, "The Green Mile"). What the movie is really about is Cindy and Jim learning to be better parents by working through their own childhood issues (Cindy always felt overshadowed by her sister; Jim felt abandoned by his father). But even that is half-baked; almost all problems are solved by simple exposure to Timothy's irrepressible sunny nature, not by anyone actually doing anything. Timothy himself, despite the sweetness of young actor CJ Adams, never becomes a genuine character and not a plot device. Still, the actors are charming, the movie's visual gloss is very pretty, and "The Odd Life of Timothy Green" somehow maintains just enough awareness of life's difficulties to keep from being unbearably cloying. "--Bret Fetzer"

Director: Stephen Sommers
Studio: IMAGE ENTERTAINMENT
Rated: Unrated

Small-town fry cook Odd Thomas (Anton Yelchin) is an ordinary guy with a paranormal secret: he sees dead people, everywhere. When a creepy stranger shows-up with an entourage of ghostly bodachs – predators who feed on pain and portend mass destruction – Odd knows that his town is in serious trouble. Teaming up with his sweetheart Stormy (Addison Timlin) and the local sheriff (Willem Dafoe), Odd plunges into an epic battle of good vs evil to try to stop a disaster of apocalyptic proportions. Based on the best-selling thriller by Dean Koontz, ODD THOMAS is a supernatural action thrill-ride from the acclaimed director of The Mummy and G.I. Joe: Rise of the Cobra.

Director: Sven J. Matten
Genre: Drama
Studio: Paradigma Entertainment

Andi has come to Fuerteventura to see his estranged father Chris, who left the family years ago to live on the island and hasn't been heard from since. The local surfer clique welcomes Andi with open arms and he quickly falls for surfing instructor Tina, forming at the same time a reluctant friendship with a mysterious surfer. But his relationship to his father, whom Andi has never met before, is strained. Soon old wounds start to rip open again and a long-kept family secret threatens to turn Andi's world upside down.

Director: Mike Judge
Genre: Comedy
Studio: Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation
Rated: R

In the Initech office, the insecure Peter Gibbons hates his job and the abusive Division VP Bill Lumbergh that has just hired two consultants to downsize the company. His best friends are the software engineers Michael Bolton and Samir Nagheenanajar that also hate Initech, and his next door neighbor Lawrence. His girlfriend Anne is cheating on him but she convinces Peter to visit the hypnotherapist Dr. Swanson. Peter tells how miserable his life is and Dr. Swanson hypnotizes him and he goes into a state of ecstasy. However, Dr. Swanson dies immediately after giving the hypnotic suggestion to Peter. He dates the waitress Joanna and changes his attitude in the company, being promoted by the consultants. When he discovers that Michael and Samir will be fired, they decide to plant a virus in the account system to embezzle fraction of cents in each financial operation into Peter's account. However Michael commits a mistake in the software and instead of decimals, they steal a large amount....

Director: Roman Polanski
Genre: Drama
Studio: Sony Pictures
Rated: PG-13

If Charles Dickens were alive to see Roman Polanski's faithful adaptation of "Oliver Twist", he'd probably give it his stamp of approval. David Lean's celebrated 1948 version of the Dickens classic and Carol Reed's Oscar®-winning 1968 musical are more entertaining in some ways, but Polanski's rendition is both painstakingly authentic (with superb cinematography and production design) and deeply rooted in the emotional context of the story. Both Polanski and Dickens had personal experiences similar to those of young Oliver (played here by Barney Clark) -- Polanski in the Nazi-occupied ghettos of Poland during World War II, and Dickens during his hard-scrabble youth in Victorian London -- and this spiritual kinship lends a certain "gravitas" to the tale of a tenacious orphan who escaped from indentured servitude in London society and is taken in by Fagin (Ben Kingsley) and his streetwise gang of pickpockets. As the evil Bill Sykes, who exploits Oliver for his own nefarious needs, Jamie Foreman is no match for Oliver Reed (in the '68 musical) in terms of frightening menace, but even here, Polanski's direction hews closer to Dickens, while the screenplay by Ronald Harwood (who also wrote Polanski's "The Pianist") necessarily trims away subplots and characters for the sake of narrative economy. All in all, this "Oliver Twist" rises above most previous versions, and with the benefit of Kingsley's nuanced performance, Polanski arrives at a compassionate conclusion that captures the essence of Dickens' novel in a way that viewers of all ages will appreciate for many years to come. "--Jeff Shannon"

Director: Carol Reed, Ronald Saland
Genre: Kids & Family
Studio: Sony Pictures
Rated: G

Film buffs and critics can argue until their faces turn blue about whether this lavish Dickensian musical deserved the Academy Award for Best Picture of 1968, but the movie speaks for itself on grandly entertaining terms. Adapted from Dickens's classic novel, it's one of the most dramatically involving and artistically impressive musicals of the 1960s, directed by Carol Reed with a delightful enthusiasm that would surely have impressed Dickens himself. Mark Lester plays the waifish orphan Oliver Twist, who is befriended by the pickpocketing Artful Dodger (Jack Wild) and recruited into the gang of boy thieves led by Fagin (played to perfection by Ron Moody). The villainous Bill Sikes (Oliver Reed) casts his long shadow over Oliver and his friends, but the young orphan is still able to find loving care in the most desperate of circumstances. Full of memorable melodies and splendid lyrics, "Oliver!" is a timeless film, prompting even hard-to-please critic Pauline Kael to call it "a superb demonstration of intelligent craftsmanship," and to further observe that "it's as if the movie set out to be a tribute to Dickens and his melodramatic art as well as to tell the story of Oliver Twist." "--Jeff Shannon"

Director: John Moore
Genre: Horror
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Rated: R

If you can overlook its glaring redundancy, "The Omen" is a faithful and well-crafted remake that does adequate justice to Richard Donner's popular 1976 original. It's a completely unnecessary film, given that David Seltzer's original screenplay wasn't even rewritten (as would normally happen with a Hollywood remake), but when viewed with fresh eyes, or by anyone who's unfamiliar with the original, it retains most of the serious, intelligently plotted chills that made Donner's horror thriller a box-office sensation. It skews to a younger audience (of course), with Liev Schreiber and Julia Stiles in the roles originated by Gregory Peck and Lee Remick. As newly-promoted U.S. Ambassador to England Robert Thorn and his troubled wife Katherine, they grow increasingly suspicious that their young son Damien (Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick) may be the devil incarnate. An anxious Roman priest (Pete Postelthwaite) and a freelance photographer (David Thewlis, in the role memorably originated by David Warner) are equally terrified of this Satanic scenario, and Damien's new and eerily protective nanny (played to perfection by Mia Farrow) adds further evidence of Damien's malevolence, as Vatican prophesies of Armageddon are rapidly fulfilled. Director John Moore (who also remade "The Flight of the Phoenix") offers a few minor improvements in suspense and gruesomeness (including a more graphically inventive death for a prominent character), but he's also hampered by the weaker presence of Davey-Fitzpatrick, who's not nearly as creepy as the original film's Damien. Otherwise, this copy of "The Omen" justifies its existence as a worthwhile diversion for stormy-night viewing."--Jeff Shannon"

Director: Morgan Jon Fox
Studio: Sawed-Off Collaboratory Productions
Rated: Unrated

An independent coffee shop owner finds out she is pregnant, a transgender girl who runs storytime at a local bookstore has to decide if she's going to go say goodbye to her dying father who violated her for years, a 14yo boy walks around with the weight of the world on his shoulders wondering how he is as a parent to his "child", a boy turns 23 and is told he cant bring his boyfriend of 6 years to his parents house for a birthday dinner, and a 17yo kid seeks more from life than the rootless, angry household he lives in, trying to shed light on his group of disconnected, cold friends.

Director: Jed Weintrob
Genre: Drama
Studio: Wolfe Video
Rated: R

An award-winning new film directed by Jed Weintrob! The regular customers on the erotic web site Intercon-X break the boundaries of their streaming video fantasy lives. Set and shot in New York City, ON_LINE uses state-of-the-art digital technology, split screens and streaming Webcam video to tell this highly charged sexual tale of searching for love on the Internet.

Director: Mark Romanek
Genre: Drama
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Rated: R

"One Hour Photo" may be more civilized than "Taxi Driver", but it's just as effectively creepy. Like Martin Scorsese's classic, this riveting character study is so compassionately detailed that we sympathize with poor Sy Parrish (Robin Williams) even as he grows increasingly unhinged. Sy is a meticulously dedicated one-hour-photo technician, but the pictures he processes--particularly those belonging to the successful, seemingly happy family of Nina and Will Yorkin (Connie Nielsen, Michael Vartan)--turn into the unhealthiest kind of obsession. The Yorkins' snapshots portray a joyful life that the lonely and traumatized Sy could never hope to achieve, and he sinks deeper and deeper into the solace they bring... until evidence of infidelity turns him into a seething crucible of righteous indignation. Propelled by Williams's flawless escape from the feel-good schmaltz of earlier roles, "One Hour Photo" is a simmering tour de force, tempered by writer-director Mark Romanek for maximum psychological impact. "--Jeff Shannon"

Director: Nacho Vigalondo
Studio: Cinedigm
Rated: Unrated

When Nick (Elijah Wood) discovers that he's won a dinner date with his favorite star Jill Goddard (Sasha Grey), he's incredibly excited to finally get the chance to meet her. That excitement deflates when Jill refuses to honor the contest and all of Nick's hopes are dashed. He's intrigued when Chord (Neil Maskell), a man claiming to be Jill's campaign manager, offers him something he can't quite refuse: Chord will give Nick the ability to constantly view Jill via computer. Nick is initially reluctant but is finally persuaded, unaware that this decision will put both himself and Jill at risk.

Director: Brian Helgeland
Genre: Mystery
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Rated: R

A young priest is sent to Rome to investigate the troubling death of the head of his order.

Director: Jaume Collet-Serra
Studio: Warner Home Video
Rated: R

The tragic loss of their unborn child has devastated Kate and John, taking a toll on both their marriage and Kate's fragile psyche as she is plagued by nightmares and haunted by demons from her past. Struggling to regain some semblance of normalcy in their lives, the couple decides to adopt another child. At the local orphanage, both John and Kate find themselves strangely drawn to a young girl named Esther. Almost as soon as they welcome Esther into their home, however, an alarming series of events begins to unfold, leading Kate to believe that there's something wrong with Esther--this seemingly angelic little girl is not what she appears to be. Concerned for the safety of her family, Kate tries to get John and others to see past Esther's sweet facade. But her warnings go unheeded until it may be too late...for everyone.

Director: Juan Antonio Bayona
Genre: Art House & International
Studio: New Line Home Video
Rated: R

It's only his first film, but Spain’s Juan Antonio Bayona has already figured out the secret to a successful supernatural thriller: emphasize character over special effects. Like Walter Salles's "Dark Water" and Alejandro Amenábar's "The Others", "The Orphanage" pivots on a pretty woman and an unusual child. When her old orphanage goes on the market, Laura (Belén Rueda, Amenábar's "The Sea Inside") and Carlos (Fernando Cayo) settle in with their son, Simón (Roger Príncep). Once acclimated to the remote seaside surroundings, they plan to re-open it as a home for special-needs children. Meanwhile, their seven-year-old doesn't know he's adopted or that he has a life-threatening illness. He does, however, have a lot of imaginary playmates. When Simón disappears without a trace, his parents contact the police, but to no avail. Because Laura has been hearing odd noises and having strange visions, they proceed to consult a medium. Aurora (Geraldine Chaplin, speaking perfect Spanish) is convinced they aren't alone. Carlos has his doubts, but Laura makes like a detective and revisits her childhood--through photographs, home movies, and exploration of the spooky stone manor--to determine who or what abducted her son. Produced and presented by Guillermo Del Toro, "The Orphanage" is less fanciful than his works, though it does bear a vague resemblance to the ghostly "Devil's Backbone". There are a few gory make-up effects, but Bayona mostly preys on our fear of the unknown to craft a first-rate fright fest. "--Kathleen C. Fennessy"

Director: Johannes Roberts
Genre: Horror
Studio: 42
Rated: R

A family lives an idyllic existence abroad until a tragic accident takes the life of their young son. The inconsolable mother learns of an ancient ritual that will bring him back to say a final goodbye. She travels to an ancient temple, where a door serves as a mysterious portal between two worlds. But when she disobeys a sacred warning to never open that door, she upsets the balance between life and death.

Director: Alejandro Amenábar
Genre: Horror
Studio: Dimension
Rated: PG-13

A welcome throwback to the spooky traditions of Jack Clayton's "The Innocents" and Robert Wise's "The Haunting", Alejandro Amenábar's "The Others" favors atmosphere, sound, and suggestion over flashy special effects. Set in 1945 on a fog-enshrouded island off the British coast, the film begins with a scream as Grace (Nicole Kidman) awakens from some unspoken horror, perhaps arising from her religiously overprotective concern for her young children, Anne (Alakina Mann) and Nicholas (James Bentley). The children are hypersensitive to light and have lived in a musty manor with curtains and shutters perpetually drawn. With Grace's husband presumably lost at war, this ominous setting perfectly accommodates a sense of dreaded expectation, escalating when three strangers arrive in response to Grace's yet-unposted request for domestic help. Led by housekeeper Mrs. Mills (Fionnula Flanagan), this mysterious trio is as closely tied to the house's history as Grace's family is--as are the past occupants seen posthumously posed in a long-forgotten photo album.
With her justly acclaimed performance, Kidman maintains an emotional intensity that fuels the film's supernatural underpinnings. And while Amenábar's pacing is deliberately slow, it befits the tone of penetrating anxiety, leading to a twist that extends the story's reach from beyond the grave. Amenábar unveiled a similarly effective twist in his Spanish thriller "Open Your Eyes" (remade by Cameron Crowe as "Vanilla Sky"), but where that film drew debate, "The Others" is finely crafted to provoke well-earned goose bumps and chills down the spine. "--Jeff Shannon"

Director: Tony Krantz
Genre: Comedy
Studio: Flame Ventures
Rated: Unrated

Suburban America gone haywire. In the midst of a serial abductor/killer's rampage, a beautiful young teen, Riley Lawson, goes missing. When her desperate parents, Will and Kate, are contacted by her kidnapper, an insufferable FBI Special Agent takes charge of the case.But, from deep within the psychopathic subterranean world created by Otis, Riley turns the tables on her tormentor, manages to escape and to contact her parents. And, fed up with the tragi-comic inability of the FBI to find their girl, Will, Kate, and Riley's brother, Reed decide to take matters - and justice - into their own hands.

Director: Robert Sarkies
Genre: Art House & International
Studio: Ifc
Rated: NR

One horrific day, David Gray suddenly snapped. Based on the true story of a quiet, friendly town turned nightmare, Gray massacred those he'd known for all of his life, holding the whole town hostage through the night. A stunning portrait of a madman Out Of The Blue forces us to question the safety of our own communities and neighborly ties.

Director: Howard McCain
Studio: Vivendi Entertainment
Rated: R

It s Beowulf vs. The Predator when a spacecraft crashes into Viking-era Norway, bringing with it two bitter enemies, a futuristic warrior and a bloodthirsty creature bent on destroying everything in its path.

Studio: Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment
Rated: PG

For sheer visual splendor, Oz the Great and Powerful is hard to beat. Even before the hot-air balloon of carnival magician Oscar "Oz" Diggs (James Franco) gets swept up in a tornado and hurled to the Technicolor land of Oz, the sepia tones of Kansas have a lush, almost velvety texture. Once Diggs arrives in Oz, he learns of a prophecy that he might be the wizard to free the land from the grips of a tyrannical witch--and from there, the movie juggles visual delights with a story that is regrettably half-baked. Some sequences and characters are skillfully realized (a little girl made of china is perfectly developed, both visually and narratively), while others seem propped up like cardboard cutouts. (Unavoidable comparisons to The Wizard of Oz, a masterpiece of vividly drawn characters, don't help.) Franco doesn't have the theatricality one might want for a carnival huckster, but fortunately his low-key performing style helps to ground the bright spectacle in human emotions. As witches wicked and good, Mila Kunis, Rachel Weisz, and Michelle Williams all display charm and verve. The movie is flawed, but when Oz the Great and Powerful hits a right note, merging wonder and fear, dazzle and darkness, it's easy to forgive the weaknesses. --Bret Fetzer