“Kong: Skull Island,” “The Ottoman Lieutenant,” “My Life as a Zucchini” and “Apprentice” are being released in the Seattle area the week of March 10.
Four movies come to Seattle-area theaters on March 10. Here’s what our reviewers thought of them.
★★½ “Kong: Skull Island” (PG-13): This creature feature won’t win any points for the brilliance of its writing (or for the way it reduces a terrific actor like Brie Larson to a personality-free camera-clicker) — but oh, that ape. Full review.
— Moira Macdonald, Seattle Times arts critic
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★★ “The Ottoman Lieutenant” (R): The film belongs to a very specific movie genre: It’s a period romance set in a country torn by war, in which attractive people struggle with their emotions while tossing their subtly excellent hair. I’ll admit to a weakness for this sort of thing (which Merchant-Ivory made into elegant art), but even I couldn’t muster up much enthusiasm for this one, a tepid love triangle (Michiel Huisman, Hera Hilmar, Josh Hartnett) set in the Ottoman Empire in the early days of World War I. Full review.
— Moira Macdonald
★★★ “My Life as a Zucchini” (PG-13): This stop-motion French-Swiss coproduction, which was nominated for a best-animated-feature Oscar, is at once melancholy and engaging as it explores the psyche of its title character, a 9-year-old boy at a home for damaged children. Full review.
— Soren Andersen, Special to The Seattle Times
“Apprentice” (not rated; for mature audiences): “The trick is to place the knot just behind the left ear and above the jaw.” Those instructions on how to carry out a “humane” hanging are given early in the Singaporean film by the chief executioner at a high-security prison (Wan Hanafi Su) to his new assistant (Firdaus Rahman). The tricky mentor-protégé relationship between the two men is the heart of this moderately gripping film. Full review. (The New York Times does not provide star ratings with reviews.)
— Stephen Holden, The New York Times