Ill-Informed Gadfly

“Green Zone” tries to make an action thriller out of the fact that there weren’t any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Does that sound like a good idea to you? If so, you should know the first-rate filmmaker Paul Greengrass can’t pull it off. Greengrass established himself as a cutting-edge action director with two kinetic sequels starring Matt Damon as Jason Bourne. Closer to his heart, though, are his brilliant, uncompromising docudramas, most recently “Bloody Sunday” and “United 93.” “Green Zone” tries to blend the two styles, with disastrous results. Writer Brian Helgeland boils down the chaos of post-invasion Baghdad into a remarkably simplistic screenplay. Damon plays Roy Miller, an Army officer who goes rogue while hunting a Baathist general and, with laughable ease, uncovers the entire WMD fiction. Miller isn’t a character: He’s a stand-in for every American who was outraged by the Bush administration’s bogus pretext for war. All the actors play concepts, not people: Smarmy Greg Kinnear is the administration itself; rumpled Brendan Gleeson is the disrespected intelligence community; and nervous Amy Ryan is the complicit media. Finally, there’s Khalid Abdallah, who’s tasked with playing the entire nation of Iraq. He was oppressed by Saddam and maimed by the war with Iran. He welcomes the Americans but quickly becomes disillusioned and turns violent. Greengrass tries to rescue this tedious allegory by concluding with an endless, incomprehensible nighttime action sequence. You could say “Green Zone” accurately captures the war, because it’s a mess.

If nothing else, Tim Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland” is trippy to look at. Burton creates a world where no one and nothing is the right size, from the shrinking and expanding Alice to the bulbous head of the Queen of Hearts. But his use of digital 3D sometimes makes this conceit feel like a cruel joke. The flawed technology so mars your sense of perspective that you won’t be sure how big anything is supposed to be. The fearsome Jabberwocky looks more like an agitated insect when it makes its long-awaited appearance. Surface eccentricity aside, “Alice in Wonderland” is deeply conventional. Screenwriter Linda Woolverton has wrangled Lewis Carroll’s books into a machine-tooled adventure story with predictable proto-feminist undertones. Nineteen-year-old Alice mourns her dead father, bickers with her mother and considers an arranged marriage before following the white rabbit back to Wonderland, where she supposedly learns to self-actualize. You may not notice, though, given the blank and diffident performance of Mia Wasikowska. She’s like a young Nicole Kidman: pretty, Australian, technically proficient and personality-free. Johnny Depp, meanwhile, plays the Mad Hatter with a baffling mix of accents and mannerisms. I suppose he’s taking the name literally and making the Hatter bipolar, but there’s no point trying to parse his motivation. “Alice in Wonderland” is more or less what you’d expect from Burton at this stage of his career. Once a precocious and passionate filmmaker, he’s evolved into little more than a commercially reliable adapter of established properties.

Horror movies are often called review-proof, and “The Crazies” fits that description because there’s so little for a critic to react to. Directed by Michael Eisner’s son Dreck — oh, I’m sorry, I mean Breck — it’s been thoroughly scrubbed of any content that might make it interesting. The movie is a remake of a little-seen 1973 outing from zombie maestro George Romero. Though I haven’t seen the original, it’s easy to imagine what he’d do with the material. Romero is a trenchant political filmmaker with things to say about race relations, consumerism and military policy. “The Crazies” shows the military brutalizing civilians after an inadvertent release of a biological weapon that turns people into dead-eyed homicidal maniacs. Eisner’s not interested in politics, though — or satire, or paranoia, or humor, or emotion of any kind. He just wants to use atmospheric lighting and frenzied motion to create visceral sensation. Very occasionally, he stages some inventive violence, like the hero stabbing a crazy with a knife that’s impaling his own hand. The thrills arrive efficiently enough, but it’s safe to say thousands of movies have done it better. The audience for “The Crazies” hasn’t seen thousands of movies. Viewers may conclude it’s nothing special, but they won’t ask for their money back. They’re also expected to be deeply cynical. Like many contemporary horror films, “The Crazies” dashes any hope of redemption. You could call the ending a sucker punch, but it’s a sucker punch delivered by an infant.

“Shutter Island” is so good it makes me want to say something blasphemous, like it’s the best movie Martin Scorsese has ever made. Of course it isn’t. Scorsese will never recapture the incendiary energy and lyrical voice that made “Mean Streets” and “Taxi Driver” landmarks in film history. He kept trying, though, resulting in movie after movie that wasn’t the masterpiece it so desperately wanted to be. But in recent years, Scorsese has come to terms with his status as an elder statesman. “Shutter Island” is the work of an august filmmaker, supremely confident in his gifts, who feels he has nothing left to prove. Luckily, he still finds joy in moviemaking, and he seemingly has little trouble securing financial backing. And so he’s free to grace audiences with a mesmerizing and flawlessly executed psychological thriller. I think Hitchcock would stand up and cheer. The electrifying Leonardo DiCaprio stars as Teddy Daniels, a U.S. Marshal investigating a disappearance at a maximum-security mental hospital in 1954. Teddy is a World War II veteran and a widower, and he’s haunted by gruesome flashbacks and visions. Scorsese allows the logic of Teddy’s dreams to bleed over into reality. “Shutter Island” keeps secrets from the audience, but it doesn’t cheat. You’ll sense that something isn’t right as Teddy’s quest takes on an increasingly eerie rhythm. Scorsese assembles first-rate character actors to match wits with DiCaprio, and the mystery deepens in scene after beautifully directed scene. “Shutter Island” is a magnificent and heartbreaking film from our preeminent chronicler of tortured souls.

Jeff Bridges inhabits his roles with preternatural ease. When he’s at his best, you see neither calculation nor artifice. In “Crazy Heart,” Bridges doesn’t just play a rundown, alcoholic country singer named Bad Blake. He is Bad Blake. Actor and character show equal parts grit and grace. When he wins the Oscar, it will be richly deserved. In more than four decades of screen acting, Bridges has delivered great performances in better movies: “The Last Picture Show,” “The Fabulous Baker Boys,” “Fearless,” even “The Big Lebowski.” But with “Crazy Heart,” you can simply bask in his brilliance, because there’s nothing else remarkable about the film. It is a massive cliché, entirely lacking in insight or surprise. Bad used to be famous, but now he drives himself around the Southwest in a beat-up Suburban, playing roadside bars and bowling alleys, perpetually soused. He grants an interview to a music writer for a local paper, played by Maggie Gyllenhaal with her characteristic grating snideness, and they begin a wary love affair. Not much else happens, at least nothing you can’t predict. Robert Duvall turns up as an elderly Texas eccentric and complements Bridges with his offhand mastery. Colin Farrell isn’t quite as comfortable as a country star and former protege of Bad’s, but then Farrell rarely looks comfortable. I often enjoy his fidgety energy, but he could learn something from Bridges, who’s equally at peace charming an audience or vomiting in a toilet. “Crazy Heart” simply lets him be, and writer-director Scott Cooper can be proud of that, if little else.

“Edge of Darkness” gives Mel Gibson his first major acting role in more than seven years and keeps him firmly within his comfort zone. Once again, he plays a man who endures the brutal and senseless loss of a loved one. His lively eyes and quick smile give way to a cold, expressionless stare. The audience girds for a signature Mel Gibson revenge fantasy, marked by sickening violence and cloying sentimentality. But then something unexpected happens, as long as you’re unfamiliar with the BBC series “Edge of Darkness” is based on: It blossoms into a nifty film noir. Gibson plays Thomas Craven, a Boston detective who sees his daughter shotgunned to death. Craven’s quest for revenge reveals an intricate mystery, an abyss of secrets and lies. Like the best noirs, “Edge of Darkness” evokes a world consumed by paranoia and moral rot. It even has nuclear energy as a plot point, a charmingly retro touch that recalls the fine 1957 noir “Kiss Me Deadly.” Director Martin Campbell shrewdly casts the right actors for this sort of genre piece, men whose faces instantly signal their characters’ aims. The best of the bunch is Ray Winstone as a shadowy fixer who experiences an existential crisis while looking into Craven’s case. If only Campbell had contributed a modicum of visual flair, the movie could be a real knockout — at least for most of its running time. In the final reel, “Edge of Darkness” strains credulity, and Campbell undermines the appropriately bleak ending by tugging at the heartstrings in a way the old noirs never did. I’m sure Gibson approves, though.

“A Single Man” is about what I expected from a movie directed by a fashion designer. I don’t mean it’s all about the clothes, although the clothes are important, and Colin Firth looks fabulous in monochromatic “Mad Men” attire. What I mean is that director Tom Ford, the former Gucci designer, has no background in film, and it shows through his cavalier treatment of the medium. Whatever Ford feels like trying, he tries. He messes with the color timing; he uses super-slow motion almost fetishistically. If he feels like shooting a scene in black-and-white, he does — it doesn’t signify anything other than Ford finds it pretty. And it’s important to note that none of this monkeying around makes “A Single Man” any less of a chore to watch. Adapted from a novel by Christopher Isherwood, it takes place on a single day in 1962. Firth plays George Falconer, an English professor mourning the death of his longtime boyfriend and preparing halfheartedly to commit suicide. It’s a sort of uncloseted “Mrs. Dalloway,” a long interior monologue in which mundane events become fraught with meaning. Firth, sure to be nominated for an Oscar, is in top form. In public, George maintains a guarded exterior that jells with Firth’s buttoned-down persona, but the actor also gets a welcome chance to cut loose both physically and emotionally. He has superb chemistry with Matthew Goode, who plays George’s lover in limpid flashbacks that communicate the magnitude of his loss. But none of this is compelling stuff. Strong performances and a few affecting scenes can’t rescue “A Single Man” from its glamorous torpor.

For a filmmaker who routinely gets to work with massive budgets, Peter Jackson directs with an astonishing lyricism. He’s known for his mastery of digital effects, but he often does his best work in quieter moments, when he matches visceral intensity with emotional sensitivity. The opening reel of “The Lovely Bones” is as good as anything Jackson has ever done, good enough to recall the delirious energy of his 1994 masterpiece, “Heavenly Creatures.” Jackson crafts a mesmerizing snapshot of Pennsylvania teenager Susie Salmon’s life in the days leading up to her murder. She doesn’t stay alive for long, though, and that’s sad for more than just the obvious reasons. There’s a miscalculation at the center of “The Lovely Bones” that not even Jackson can overcome: A dead 14-year-old girl is not interesting. Nothing he draws up on his computer can bring dramatic urgency to Susie’s long stay in limbo. Having Susie tell the story of her murder and its aftermath was a shrewd gimmick for novelist Alice Sebold. But on film, Susie, played by Saoirse Ronan, becomes a distraction from the real story about her surviving relatives. The big names in the cast — Mark Wahlberg, Rachel Weisz, Susan Sarandon and Stanley Tucci — are mostly just adequate. But as Susie’s younger sister, Rose McIver offers a fierce portrait of determination in the face of loss. “The Lovely Bones” is weird and wildly uneven, a domestic tragedy on an operatic scale, a supernatural thriller wrapped around an intimate study of grief. The mass audience will likely dismiss it. But I’d rather watch Jackson fail than most directors at their best.

With his smooth cheeks, stringy build and fluttering countertenor, Michael Cera could continue playing teenagers until he’s 30, although it probably wouldn’t be a good career move. The 21-year-old Canadian actor goes to the well again in “Youth in Revolt,” the first movie built entirely around his meek and fey persona. Say this for Cera: He’s a hard worker, and his sly, mumbling wit enlivens a pedestrian setup. He plays Nick Twisp, a sensitive young man of refined tastes who falls in love with the like-minded Sheenie, played with appealing self-possession by newcomer Portia Doubleday. When their budding romance hits a snag, Nick creates a rebellious alter ego to ensure his and Sheenie’s future happiness. Veteran boutique director Miguel Arteta crafts some fine scenes in the early going, and he’s in tune with Cera’s delicate sensibility. Nonetheless, it’s hard to view this slight and forgettable movie as anything but a baldly commercial enterprise. “Youth in Revolt” is set in California, but Arteta shot it on the cheap in Michigan, home to the nation’s most generous production incentives. He’s clearly working at the pleasure of the money men, Bob and Harvey Weinstein, who hope to clear an easy profit on the backs of the moviegoers who put “Juno” and “Superbad” into the black. Rather than build a true ensemble around Cera, the Weinsteins rope in the likes of Ray Liotta, Steve Buscemi, Fred Willard and Justin Long for what amount to extended, unfunny cameos. There’s nothing inept about “Youth in Revolt,” and you likely won’t be bored, but it’s more commodity than movie.

If movies were made for adults more often, I think “Up in the Air” would be judged as merely above average. But since Hollywood caters mostly to adolescents or, at best, immature adults, you can’t fault discerning moviegoers for being seduced by a mainstream film with a glossy patina of good taste and respectability. “Up in the Air” also has timeliness on its side, a rare commodity from the slow-footed major studios. George Clooney plays the star employee of a firm that does the nasty job of firing people for companies that can’t stomach delivering the bad news in-house. Director Jason Reitman captures the anxiety we all feel at the prospect that our life’s work could be tossed aside. His best touch is to use actual laid-off workers to play most of the recipients of Clooney’s ax. Their regular-guy looks ground the movie, and the emotion in their voices comes easily as they re-enact the trauma of losing their jobs. Clooney skillfully suggests a similar undercurrent of panic as his character realizes he may have to give up his cherished frequent-flier lifestyle. Yet despite the elegant parallel between Clooney and his victims, “Up in the Air” never quite takes off. Reitman hits his story beats with an almost too surgical precision and has his actors race through artificially snappy dialogue. He’s a glib and manipulative filmmaker who manhandles the audience with clumsy third-act revelations — one of them predictable, the other so out of the blue that it’s disingenuous. As Oscar front-runners go, “Up in the Air” isn’t bad, but don’t mistake this proudly middlebrow movie for a work of art.