Movie Guide

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Director: Justin Lin. With Lucas Black, Zachery Ty Bryan. (104 min.)

When his addiction to street racing lands him in trouble with the authorities, Sean (Black) must move to Japan or go to jail. In Tokyo he falls in with some yakuza gangsters whose hobby is drift racing, characterized by fast cornering and controlled slides. To lose his gaijin (outsider) status – and win the girl – Sean must beat the Drift King in a deadly race. Fans of the series will find lots to like in the almost nonstop racing action of this third installment. Let's hope they heed the don't-try-this-at-home warning at the end of the film. Grade: C+
– M.K. Terrell

Sex/Nudity: 6 scenes of innuendo or implied sex. Violence: 9 scenes. Profanity: 11 strong expressions, 9 milder. Drugs/Alcohol/Tobacco: 12 scenes of smoking and/or drinking.

Director: Kevin Bacon. With Kevin Bacon, Kyra Sedgwick. (84 min.)

In this dismal drama directed by Kevin Bacon, Kyra Sedgwick plays Emily, a single mother who is fiercely overprotective of her young son (Dominic Scott Kay). We're supposed to see her as a screwed-up free spirit, but she seems a great deal more deranged than that. Bacon lavishes his camera on her in various states of dress and undress, but the script, by Hannah Shakespeare – talk about having to live up to a name! – is a cheat. It rarely expands on the boy's crises in having to deal with such a mother. Grade: D
– Peter Rainer

Director: Georg Wilhelm Pabst. With Louise Brooks, Fritz Kortner. (100 min.)

2006 is the centennial of actress Louise Brooks, and to honor it, her greatest film, "Pandora's Box," is being released in a new 35-mm print in New York's Film Forum before being taken around the country. Brooks was a silent-era starlet of minor stature before appearing, improbably but unforgettably, in two Pabst classics in 1929. In "Pandora" she plays Lulu, the blithe vixen with a boyish bob haircut who drives men to their doom. Brooks's erotic appeal combined clean-cut wholesomeness (she was raised in Kansas) with a devastating sensuality. Happy 100th! Grade: A
– P.R.

Director: Patrick Creadon. With Will Shortz, Bill Clinton, Jon Stewart. (94 min.)

Here is yet another documentary built around a competition – in this case the 28th Annual Crossword Puzzle Tournament in Stamford, Conn. Hosted by New York Times crossword puzzle editor Will Shortz, the competition brings together puzzle nuts – er, competitors – from all over the world. Creadon focuses on a handful of likely contenders for the prize, most of whom seem ingratiatingly nerdy. At times the film resembles a promo for Shortz and the Times, and the celebrity puzzlers, who include filmmaker Ken Burns, Bill Clinton, and the Indigo Girls, have an unfortunate tendency to bloviate. Not so Jon Stewart, who seems to regard each Times puzzle as an opportunity to go mano a mano with Shortz. Grade: B+
– P.R.