Blinded By the Light - 3 smiles

"Blinded By the Light" combines an infectious spirit with a serious message to create a feel-good movie. It personalizes the lyrics of some of Bruce Springsteen's best-known tunes and illustrates the universality not only of the music but of the underlying ideas. Director Burner Chadha (Bend It Like Beckham) brings a little Bollywood flavor to a familiar story of the generational clash between an artistic son and a traditional father. In this case, Javed (Viveik Kalra) is a 16-year old with a love of poetry, Springsteen's music and a radical girl named Eliza (Nell Williams). Malik (Kulvinder Ghir) is his father, a factory worker for 16 years who immigrated from Pakistan to England in search of a better life for his son, who now finds himself out of work and forced to rely on his wife's sewing to make ends meet. Seeing no practicality in Javed's love of writing, Malik pushes his son toward economics and a good career.

The script is loosely based on the life and experiences of journalist Sarfraz Manzoor, who claims to have seen Springsteen in concert 150 times and whose memoir, Greetings from Bury Park, provided a template for the movie. He co-wrote the screenplay with Chadha and her husband, Paul Mayeda Berges. "Blinded By the Light" is a charming coming-of-age story that illustrates the power of music to provoke change not only in individuals but on a larger scale.

Where'd You Go, Bernadette - 2 smiles

I didn't like the first half of "Where'd You Go, Bernadette." The structure is uneven and the pacing off, with unsuccessful attempts at humor. Once Bernadette (Cate Blanchett) goes off on her own, to rediscover her artistic soul, the movie picks up.

The film is told from the perspective of Bernadette's 15-year old daughter Bee (Emma Nelson), whose voice-over narrative provides the glue to hold together the fragmentary story. Director Richard Linklater faces challenges that he is unable to fully overcome. Bernadette is never fully realized. It's like there are two versions of her and Linklater is unable to connect the young go-getter of the past with the vindictive, agoraphobe of the present. Blanchett's performance helps, moving the viewer's initial dislike to sympathy. She understands how to use pomposity to hide insecurity and excitability to reveal an awakening. Since I didn't read the novel by Maria Semple, I probably missed a lot of the nuance that goes with the written word. Nonetheless, watching Blanchett navigate Bernadette's character becomes a voyage of hope and self-discovery.

Angel Has Fallen - 1 smili

While I enjoyed Olympus Has Fallen, its first sequel, London Has Fallen and now, "Angel Has Fallen" is best suited for cable reruns. This time around, Mike Banning (Gerard Butler) has become a fugitive, on the run after being falsely accused of orchestrating an assassination attempt on US President Trumbull (Morgan Freeman) that kills 18 Secret Service agents and leaves the commander-in-chief in a coma. The Oval Office is having issues with someone leaking false information to the press, not to mention the looming threat of Russia, who, we're told, meddled in a recent election. There are the private contractors, like Banning's old military friend Wade Jennings (Danny Huston), who are longing for the good ol' days of lucrative wars and government contracts and Nick Nolte, playing Banning's estranged father Clay, who is living off the grid in the woods and having some regrets about abandoning his wife and young child years ago.

All this is thrown together in a mash-up that, surprisingly, is predictable for having so much going on at all times. Oh, and I forgot to mention a nerdy vice president who might be making a power grab and an FBI agent (Jada Pinkett Smith), who is leading the hunt for Banning.

Don't Let Go - 2 smiles

"Don't Let Go" has an interesting premise - police officer Jack Radcliffe (David Oyelowo) loses his brother, sister-in-law and beloved niece, Ashley (Storm Reid) to violent murder. Then he receives a phone call from Ashley and, as he discovers, she's two weeks in the past. Writer/director Jacob Estes treats the more interesting aspects of science fiction as an offbeat thriller. As a result, the time travel aspects are more or less ignored (they just happen), resulting in a surface cleverness that doesn't hold up to close inspection.

The strongest aspect of the movie is the chemistry between Oyelowo and Storm Reid. Oyelowo is a strong presence in any movie he's in and Reid, who played Meg in Disney's adaptation of A Wrinkle in Time, appears to be ready to venture out on her own. There's a strong sense of affection between their characters that provides viewers with an emotional investment to their fates. You have to think the studio had a reason to release "Don't Let Go" at the end of summer when expectations are virtually nonexistent.