István Szabõ's film walks a fine line between a display of bad acting and a meditation on same. Based on W. Somerset Maugham's novel, it charts the All About Eve-ish rise-and-fall-and-rise of stage diva Julia (Annette Bening), much-adored and working constantly in London, 1938. For all her success, though, she's "tired," and implores her manager husband (Jeremy Irons) to get her some time off. Recently dumped by very good "friend" (Bruce Greenwood), she's all set to give up entirely when she's suddenly smitten with young, snobby American Tom (Shaun Evans). Their affair rejuvenates her, granting her self-esteem and, more importantly, her performances all kinds of zip. The inevitable realization that Tom is a gigolo (and not a very good one) makes her yearn for payback, leading her to target Tom's new girl, an aspiring actor (Lucy Punch) who wants to play opposite Julia in her latest production. While Irons is typically and effectively low-key throughout, Bening's performance is so convincing that you wonder at times if she's playing Julia awkwardly, or if she's demonstrating the character's annoying, limited range of affects (Evans, on the other hand, is never convincing as anything). When the showdown comes (onstage, predictably), Bening erupts into large-scale performance mode, a shift that makes all the previous strained and clumsy moments seem like they might have been purposeful. But maybe not. --Cindy Fuchs (Ritz Five; Ritz 16)

Given its premise—wealthy widow is stalked by a 10-year-old who claims to be her dead husband—it's tempting to dismiss Birth as New Age piffle, if not for the people involved: Doubtful Sexy Beast director Jonathan Glazer is prone to fits of sentiment, and co-screenwriter Jean-Claude Carriére (That Obscure Object of Desire) surely knows a thing about displaced passions and malleable realities. Aided immeasurably by cinematographer Harris Savides (Elephant), Glazer imagines a wealthy Manhattan where even the interiors are overcast, and even the radiance of Nicole Kidman's skin can't dispel the darkness. Rarely has a director placed so much trust in an actress: Kidman's conversion from skeptic to believer is conveyed in an unbroken 3-minute take focused solely on her face as Wagner blares around her. (Well, it's either conveyed or it isn't; the gamble doesn't quite come off.) As her suitably baffled fiance, Danny Huston redeems himself for Silver City, and Lauren Bacall is a magnificent ice sculpture as Kidman's society-matron mother. But the movie belongs to Cameron Bright as the maybe-he-is 10-year-old. It's not just his Osmentian self-possession but the eyes that might hold the sadness of a decade in the ether. There's no good way to wrap up this story, and Birth doesn't find one. An awkwardly "plausible" explanation for the kid's knowledge of Kidman's intimates is advanced and hurriedly withdrawn, and the muddiness of the movie's final minutes threatens to break its spell entirely. But Birth is the rare movie that begins with a far-fetched premise and actually grows more plausible as you keep watching. It makes you believe, though you're not sure in what. --Sam Adams (Ritz Five; Ritz 16)

First released Oct. 26, 2001, Richard Kelly's most excellent first feature disappeared from theaters before most people knew it existed. (It never opened in Philadelphia.) The cause is commonly understood as (understandably) poor marketing, post-9/11—the film, complicated, philosophical, and fantastical, includes a devastating death by jet fuselage in a Middlesex, Va., bedroom. Kelly's "Director's Cut" (actually a latter-day reworking) maintains the essential storyline: Donnie (Jake Gyllenhaal), distressed and unstable, seeing a therapist (Katharine Ross) and on medication. Fighting with his mother (Mary McDonnell) and sister (Maggie Gyllenhaal), Donnie is also encouraged by his English teacher (Drew Barrymore), attracted to his new neighbor (Jena Malone) and troubled by Frank (James Duval), a 6-foot-tall rabbit with fangs. Set just before the 1988 presidential election, the film is front-loaded with phenomenal performances and funky ideas. The new edition is good to see because it puts this amazing imagery on a decent-sized screen (the swirl off the school bus and into the high-school hallway just has to be seen large). Slightly more coherent and less strange than the first version, it walks you through the logic, including passages from Grandma Death's book on time travel. Still perverse, still lovely, maybe trying too hard to make up for the gaping mouths first time around. --C.F.

Having dropped a reported 60 pounds for The Machinist, Christian Bale is so skinny he'd disappear if you looked at him from the wrong angle, which unfortunately goes for the movie as well. Director Brad Anderson whips up plenty of industrial-noir style, but the movie's semi-sci-fi look feels like an affectation, more reflexive than reflective. An insomniac who says he hasn't slept in a year (he should try watching Equilibrium), Bale is menaced by an unseen presence who leaves menacing Post-its on his refrigerator and apparently removes the light bulbs in his Stygian apartment. Anderson's technically skilled enough to make you feel like a satisfactory explanation's coming, but that just heightens the disappointment when it doesn't. --S.A. (Ritz at the Bourse)

There's nothing outstanding about Taylor Hackford's Ray Charles biopic, but it's satisfying all the same: Just try not to grin like a damn fool as Ray (Jamie Foxx) cobbles together "What'd I Say" in the studio. Foxx's expert mimicry notwithstanding, he was more memorable in Collateral, and the arc of James L. White's script is straight out of Great Men 101, complete with childhood trauma (blindness, his brother's death) and phony resolution—Ray kicked junk, quelled his demons and got rich, end of story. Charles' gift for synthesizing black gospel, white pop and country is explicitly referenced, but Ray doesn't add anything to understanding his music, though regular doses are dispensed with gratifying regularity. The movie's most distinctive quality, though, has only incidentally to do with its subject: Here's a high-toned, high-budget Hollywood production cast almost entirely with black actors, so good, one after the other—Kerry Washington, Regina Kina, Clifton Powell, Harry Lennix, Aunjanue Ellis, and that's just for starters—it shames the industry that underexposes them. --S.A.(AMC Orleans; Bridge; Ritz 16; UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Main St.; UA Riverview)

Photographer Leigh Whannell and surgeon Cary Elwes come to consciousness, discovering that they're chained to opposite sides of a basement bathroom. Gradually, they piece together (by way of over-explanatory flashbacks) how they've come to be here, victims of one of those ingenious serial killers, this one seeking retribution for general sinfulness. This first film by James Wan (co-written with fellow Aussie Whannell) is classically grotesque, with a raggedy, Se7en-ish aesthetic and a particular inclination to torment (emotionally) Elwes' young daughter (Makenzie Vega), held hostage with her mother (Monica Potter) back at their house. The scary gimmicks are helped considerably by David A. Armstrong's cinematography; the plot is less satisfying, with a tangent involving a tenacious detective (Danny Glover) and his loyal (read: dead meat) partner (Ken Leung): they clamber through the flashbacks, trying to find and stop the psycho killer, even, for a time, suspecting Elwes (who is, strangely, both weak and overwrought in this role, and not helped at all by the low-rent makeup). The payoff is surely tricky, even if it's not precisely sensible (not really a prereq for a horror film, anyway). Wan has admirable nerve, though, mostly visible in brief, sped-up nightmarish sequences. Hopefully, he'll be back. --C.F. (AMC Orleans; Bridge; UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Main St.; UA Riverview)