X-Men Origins: Wolverine **1/2

Cast: Hugh Jackman, Liev Schreiber, Danny Huston, Will.i.am, Lynn Collins, Kevin Durand, Dominic Monaghan, Taylor Kitsch, Daniel Henney, Ryan Reynolds
Director: Gavin Hood
Running Length: 1:47
MPAA Classification: PG-13

In Canada, in 1845, two half-brothers named Logan and Victor, go on the run after Logan kills his father. They go on to fight in all the major wars, both being able to heal quickly and being just about indestructible. In the 1970’s, they are recruited by William Stryker (Huston) who is putting together a mysterious team. While Victor (Schreiber) is comfortable doing the team’s dirty deeds, Logan (Jackman) isn’t, and breaks from the team to lead a normal life. Eventually, Victor and Stryker come looking for Logan, so they can return him to his place in that team, but Logan won’t go easily, and soon pays the price.

With the success of the “X-Men” movies, it was only a matter of time before Wolverine got a solo movie, this time in the form of a prequel. In “Wolverine”, we get his origins, as well as a look at a number of other new mutants. We see the bond that Wolverine and Sabertooth have, and we see a glimpse of further X-Men movies to come. Jackman is clearly comfortable in the role he has played three times before. He does nothing special here, but he doesn’t disappoint either. Schreiber gives depth to Victor/Sabertooth that wasn’t there in the first X-Men movie. That being said, “Wolverine” falters due to an enormous amount of other mutants and a story where the ending is pretty much a given. It has to get to “point B” to stay in continuity with the first X-Men movie, and so there is never any real doubt as to who will live between the characters we have seen before. X-Men fans will be pretty happy though regardless.

Rendition ***Cast: Reese Witherspoon, Jake Gyllenhaal, Peter Sarsgaard, Alan Arkin, Meryl Streep, J.K. Simmons, Omar Metwally
Director: Gavin Hood
Running Length: 2:00
MPAA Classification: R

Egyptian-American Anwar El-Ibrahimi (Metwally) is returning to the United States to see this wife Isabella (Witherspoon) and son. When a CIA official (Streep) receives intelligence that El-Ibrahimi may be involved with a North African terrorist attack, she orders him subjected to rendition, the policy of shipping detainees to foreign soil so they can be tortured to elicit information from them. Soon he is being interrogated in part by CIA analyst Duncan Freeman (Gyllenhaal), who comes to believe he is innocent. Meanwhile, Isabella goes to Washington to try to find her husband.

“Rendition” attempts to tackle a current issue and has mixed success. The story is compelling, but Anwar’s guilt or innocence seems pretty cut and dry. That robs the story of some of its punch. Witherspoon and Gyllenhaal, as the leads, seem to have less screen time than would be warranted for lead actors. Witherspoon has the meater role as the terrified wife, while Gyllenhaal spends a lot of time watching the actions of other characters. “Rendition” is a politically charged film that obviously takes a shot at the current administration, and those that may be turned off by that should probably look elsewhere. Overall, “Rendition” is a good movie that could have been better. While slightly disappointed with it, it is still worth seeing.