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This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

Before Sunset (R, 80 mins.)
Nine years after they fell in love in Vienna, now memoirist Ethan Hawke meets Julie Delpy in her Paris hometown while on his book tour. The two are drawn to each other as if to fate itself, and the audience doesn’t breathe until it knows whether broken hearts will be broken again. Richard Linklater’s quietly spectacular real-time film is the best of the year.
Bright Young Things (R, 106 mins.)
First our hero, Adam Symes (Stephen Campbell Moore) and his beloved Nina (Ms. Mortimer) are engaged, then they aren’t, then they are, and so on. Meanwhile they attend gay parties, lavish lunches, and take jaunts to the country. Director Stephen Fry’s adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s novel “Vile Bodies” removes the ironic gaze on England’s effete jazz-age set, and there’s not much left.
The Brown Bunny (unrated, 92 mins.)
Writer, director, editor, and photographer Vincent Gallo stars as Bud, a motorcycle fanatic on a cross-country trip. Those who wait out Bud’s many gazes through a bug-splattered van window will be treated to Chloe Sevigny performing graphic fellatio on her co-star. Still, this one-man-band show has a pretty good tune.
Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence (PG-13, 99 mins.)
The images in Mamoru Oshii’s follow-up to his superb 1995 anime speak for themselves – stunningly rendered cityscapes; sleek, uncanny automatons; monumental phantasmagoria – but the movie just won’t shut up.
Goodbye, Dragon Inn (unrated, 81 mins.)
Set almost entirely inside a decrepit Taipei movie house about to shut down, Tsai Ming-liang’s latest masterpiece is a peculiar kind of haunted house movie. A gimpy cashier (Chen Shiang-chyi), a snacking projectionist (Kang-sheng Lee), a young Japanese man (Kiyonobu Mitamura), and several ghosts gather around the fading flame of “Dragon Inn,” a classic swordplay flick, to say goodbye.
Hero (PG-13, 96 mins.)
Nameless warrior (Jet Li) has a showdown with deadly assassins Flying Snow (Maggie Cheung) and Broken Sword (Tony Leung), who imperil the ruthless King of Qin (Chen Dao Ming). “Hero” mounts many delights for aficionados of multidirectional digi-fu while valorizing personal sacrifice to centralized political power.
Intimate Strangers (R, 105 mins.)
Anna (Sandrine Bonnaire) races into an appointment with a psychiatrist to discuss her marital problems. Unfortunately, her appointment isn’t with Dr. Moonier, but with William Faber (Fabrice Luchini), a fussy tax attorney, whose office Anna mistakenly entered. Director Patrice Leconte’s focus on how the deceptions that follow fall apart is a paean to Hitchcock.
Mr. 3000 (PG-13, 103 mins.)
Bernie Mac stars as Stan Ross, one of the greatest hitters – and jerks – in baseball, back after years of retirement to get his 3,000th hit. Mr. Mac is very funny as the Scrooge like athlete and the screenplay (by Eric Champnella, Keith Mitchell, and Howard Gould) has plenty of humor and a refreshing lack of reverence for the game.
The Models of Pickpocket (unrated, 75 mins.)
A visit with the three main figures of Robert Bresson’s “Pickpocket” is the subject of this footnote for the Bresson cult: Pierre Laymarie currently works in Caen as a genetic researcher; Marika Green, an actress, lives in Austria; and Martin Lasalle, the pickpocket himself, was found in Mexico.
Red Lights (unrated, 101 mins.)
Antoine Dunant (Jean-Pierre Darroussin), an alcoholic office drone, drives with his wife Helene (Carole Bouquet) to the Basque country. They squabble, Helene disappears, and Antoine picks up a hitchhiker (Vincent Deniard). Mr. Kahn’s graceful camera maintains an odd counterpoint to the tensions onscreen in this sly film.
Remember Me, My Love (unrated, 125 mins.)
The Ristuccias are a remarkably generic unhappy Italian family. When pater familias Carlo (Fabrizio Bentivoglio) meets an old flame at about the same time that his wife Giulia (Laura Morante) considers returning to the stage, their marriage loses quite a bit of ground. But Gabriele Muccino’s film is filled with charming actors and cannot help but be charming itself.
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (PG, 107 mins.)
When giant robots go on a rampage, it’s up to Sky Captain, a high-end hunky action-hero and defender of New York City (Jude Law), and his intrepid reporter ex-girlfriend (Gwyneth Paltrow), to save Gotham. First-time director Kevin Conway’s endearing, mostly computer-generated homage to 1930s futurism conjures a time when the future was filled with campy, ultramodern hope.
Tae Guk Gi (R, 140 mins.)
Kang Je-gyu’s blood-soaked epic chronicles Jin-tae Lee (Jang Dong-Gun) and his younger, educated brother Jin-seok (Won Bin), who are pressed into service with the South Korean army when war breaks out with the North. A disturbing and powerful film, “Tae Guk Gi” represents the best of the especially limited Korean War genre, but is not for the weak stomached.