ADAM

Starring Hugh Dancy, Rose Byrne, Amy Irving
Opens July 29

It's hard to see a film these days about any mental or physical disability without thinking about Robert Downey Jr.'s Tropic Thunder rant about going “full retard” or thinking about Cuba Gooding Jr.'s saccharine performance in Radio. So it is with Hugh Dancy as the titular character in Adam, a 29-year-old man-child with Asperger's Syndrome. Not long after his father's death, Adam meets his new upstairs neighbor Beth (Rose Byrne of Damages), a brittle and love-weary young New Yorker with whom he develops an intense friendship that becomes a full-on love affair. For the first ten minutes or so of Max Mayer's directorial feature debut, you struggle with Rain Man fatigue—please, you think, not another movie about an idiot savant. Yet Mayer's film wins you over; first, with a gentle sense of humor that acknowledges the moment-by-moment comedy of the difficulties of communication between lovers; and throughout by Dancy's measured, assured performance. It helps that Dancy, beloved in romantic comedies like The Jane Austen Book Club, is adorable, but the actor never allows his natural good looks to turn into an inspirational pile of treacle. He turns what could be an afterschool special into a polished, minor gem. —Dan Loughry

AFGHAN STAR

Starring Setara Hussainzada, Rafi Nabaazda, Hameed Sahkizada
Opens July 24

Afghan Star is an eye-opening documentary about the American Idol-like competition that one local fan describes as being “better than politics.” Given the contestants—a cross-section of two men and two women of different ages, genders, incomes and ethnicities—it is hard not to get caught up in the excitement. However, while director Havana Marking follows four charismatic contestants in this hugely popular contest, her tedious film lacks the same magnetism.

The purpose of showcasing the performers and the fans is to present what may be the first experience the Afghan people have with a democratic process. Allowed to vote with their cell phones, the fanaticism the viewers have for the contestants from their region is quite intense.

Afghan Star is most interesting when it provides a glimpse into the risks the female contestants take to appear on the show, and when one dances and uncovers her head, there are death threats. These and other controversies surrounding Islamic law and issues of immorality are fascinating, but the contest itself lacks verve and suspense—even though the four singers are all immensely likeable.

Marking captures the changing face of Afghanistan in these young performers, who want peace and feel happy being able to sing and listen to music, but what it means for one of them to win the prize is not fully explored or properly illuminated. This film comes in second-best.
—Gary M. Kramer

THIRST

With Song Kang-ho, Kim Ok-vin, Shin Ha-kyun
Opens July 31

The antithesis of last year's acclaimed moving/creepy vampire romance, Let The Right One In, Thirst is more akin to a vampire War of the Roses meets In the Realm of the Senses. A priest, Sang-hyun (Kang-ho), volunteers for a vaccine study to combat a deadly virus, but when administered a transfusion tainted by vampire blood, he finds himself transformed. While fighting the unholy urge to kill for blood, instead nursing from a comatose patient's IV line, he gives in to more lusty temptations—an affair with a friend's mentally unstable wife, Tae-ju (Ok-vin)—to devastating consequences. Director Park Chan-wook (Oldboy) saturates his tale with a hysterically dry camp sensibility that emphasizes the grotesque and surreal (ie: exaggerated slurping sounds during gory bloodletting and finger/toe-sucking sex). Accenting the vampire's incredible strength and agility, the visual effects are pretty neat and effective, but many scenes frequently play out at too portentous a pace (Thirst clocks in at over two hours). Still, those hungry for a strange, dysfunctional new tilt on the vampire flick will come away satiated. —Lawrence Ferber