New Movie Shorts

BE COOL
The Rock can do no wrong. Whatever else goes on around him, Mr. Charisma sticks it. As the neatly Afro-ed, tight-pantsed muscle/driver for black-talking record exec Vince Vaughn, he's as exuberant and delightful as ever, poking fun at his raised-eyebrow shtick, much-discussed desire to be a movie star and fabled Samoan heritage, not to mention all those gay rumors. All this in the context of the much-anticipated Get Shorty sequel, supposedly focused on the return of John Travolta's Chili Palmer, along with new squeeze Uma Thurman, label exec Harvey Keitel, producer Cedric the Entertainer, thug-lite André 3000, and Brandy-new singer Christina Milian. As Chili brings his usual faux gravity to the music business (flush with Russian mafiosi and gangstas), director F. Gary Gray makes use of his music video days via cameos, knowing asides and inside jokes. While the movie isn't as tight as the original, it's frequently and surprisingly entertaining, with the major exception of Vaughn's Jamie Kennedy/Vanilla Ice imitation, which is tired after two minutes. --Cindy Fuchs (AMC Orleans; Bridge; Ritz 16; Roxy; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Riverview)

THE JACKET
A supernatural mystery with style to burn, courtesy of director John Maybury (the Francis Bacon bio Love Is the Devil), The Jacket lacks only story, sense and a reason to exist. Beginning, apparently for convenience rather than comment, during the first Gulf War, the movie follows Adrien Brody from one near-death experience to the next: No sooner has he recovered from the wound inflicted by a gun-wielding Arab boy than he's landed in a hospital for the criminal insane, where doc Kris Kristofferson "cures" patients by locking them in a morgue-like chamber for hours at a time. Thus ensconced, Brody apparently begins to travel in time, all the way to 2007 — a world much like our own, except Keira Knightley speaks with an American accent. There, he learns that he "died" long ago, at which point he settles into flip-flopping between future-Brody's attempts to investigate his own death and past-Brody's inexorable progress toward said demise. Not a worthless premise, perhaps, but neither Maybury nor his fleet of screenwriters (Massy Tadjedin, Tom Bleecker, Marc Rocco) seem to realize that Brody's far-fetched illness ought to, you know, mean something until it's far too late. Slapping on a few voice-overed words about how we should enjoy life, or life for the present or somesuch, hardly makes up for the two hours you've lost. --Sam Adams (AMC Orleans; UA Riverview)

THE PACIFIER
Even as new kid-movie star Ice Cube takes over Vin Diesel's XXX role, the once promising star of the Riddick franchise here descends into a horrific holding pattern. Cast as a Navy SEAL assigned to babysit a family of kiddies while their mom (Faith Ford) is away trying to guess her never-home-but-still-beloved-and-now-dead scientist husband's secret password, he's diapering babies, barking major-dad-type orders to children, flirting with the ex-Navy principal (Lauren Graham) and teaching that big-meanie wrestling coach (Brad Garrett) a lesson. No one is convincing for a second, but Diesel is particularly egregious. Worse, the plot takes up a hysterical war-on-terror theme that would be comic if it weren't so pathetic. In between learning to appreciate one another and cleaning the house for mom's return, Diesel and kids do battle with North Korean spies and a highly predictable traitor — if you don't spot him within two minutes, you're just not paying attention, which is, frankly, the healthiest approach to this utter embarrassment. --C.F. (AMC Orleans; Cinemagic; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Riverview)