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loose final act. Directed by Clin! Eastwood. (Beectrwood. Carmike) THELMA & LOUISE (R) 1991. Director Ridley Scotfis saucy aid darkly comedic “feminist flick’ tags along with an unhappy waitress (Susan Sarandon) and an unhappy housewife (Geena Davis) as they escape their mundane lives in Arkansas and take off across the country in a '66 Thunderbird. With Harvey Keitel, Michael Madsen, Christopher McDonald and Brad Pitt. Showing Thursday, 8/24. (Tate) WHAT LIES BENEATH (R) Is it a ghost story or a murder caper? Who knows? This weak thriller starts out like a creepy love letter to Hitchcock but suf fers from too many preposterous con trivances and eventually ends up like a Friday The 13th sequel. Michelle Pfeiffer and Harrison Ford are apparently a wealthy, h^ipily married Vermont couple, but trouble comes after their (laughter's exit to college. The film effec tively builds up to some very frightening moments but unfortunately relies too heavily on the new trick ol startling the audience with a loud, sudden blast of orchestral accent. Directed by Robert Zemekis. (Beechwood, Carmike) X'MEN (PG-13) Based on the popular Marvel Comics comic book series, director Bryan Singer's (The Usual Suspects) latest is an entertaining but slightly unbalanced first entry in what is certain to become a sci-fi superhero franchise. At the center of the story are Rogue (Anna Paquin), a confused young woman afraid of her power to absorb the memories of others by touch and Wolverine (Hugh Jackman), a gruff tough guy with a complicated past, keen senses and a skeleton enhanced by unbreakable metal. The good guys, led by Professor X (Patrick Stewart), include Jear. Grey (Famke Janssen), Cyclops (James Marsden), and Storm (Halle Berry). The villains are led by Professor Xls old friend-tumed-fiend Magneto (Ian McKellan), and include Toad (Ray Park), Sabretooth (Tyfsr Mane) and Mystique (Rebecca Romiin-Stamos). Fans will love this. Others may frown in contu sion. Ends Thursday. (Carmike) Two 4 One Original Freeze Flavors SPLIT HAIRS. But font bother splitting our original Freeze flavors. Mocha, Chai, Coffee Vanilla are now 2 for the price of 1. Try out our Freezes now and save! ® Park Steak with ® Mushroom drravy HAPPY HOUR 5-8 $ l GO*Domestic Pints $175 Domestic Kpttles $ 1 50 \J'ell Drinks $2 00 Frozen Margaritcis MONDAY Monday Night Football Special Mega Nachos & 60 oz. domestic pitcher $7.50 TUESDAY Tequila Tuesday: 60 oz. Frozen Strawbery or Lime Margaritas $8.50 Pints $2.75 GO l| Stuffed Peppers Trout with :® Mediterranean $al$a « Traditional Beef ® Losagrux Shrimp Salad Jerk Chicken I s Salad 229 East Broad St. 706-543-9552 S3 take-out available S3 MY BRAIN OR YOURS? THE CELL (R) If you can imagine a Marilyn Manson or Nine Inch Nails music video—with all of the expected horrorshow devices and torture chamber footage amped up to the nth degree— stretched into a confusing, two-hour crime flick with a decent cast and a relentless series of sprawling special effects, you'd be pretty close to the idea of The Cell. This visually stunning, problematic thriller from first-time feature film director Tarsem (AKA Tarsem Singh) makes weird use of science fiction, serial murders, vir tual reality and spotty psychology in an attempt to create a decidedly modernistic cine matic journey. The results, unfortunately, are varied. Tarsem, working from a script by Mark Protosevich, borrows heavily from the tones, visual elements and storylines of such recent thrillers and dramas as Seven, The Silence Of The Lambs, The Matrix and Stir Of Echos. The rookie filmmaker (Tarsem previously worked on televi sion ads and music videos, including R.E.M.'s "Losing My Religion") sets the whole thing up as a mind trip fantasy, then a cop movie, then a psychedelic descent into a hellish nightmare and back out again. One wishes the overly ambi tious director had concentrated on one angle in particular rather than running circles around some damned fascinating cinematic notions. Jennifer Lopez, who proved herself in the recent Out Of Sight, stars as Catherine Deane, a young, soft-spoken LA. child psychologist (with amazing makeup and nails) who has a talent for connecting with troubled clients. She is recruited for a project in which experimental technology is used to establish a link between her mind and that of a little boy who is comatose from advanced schizophrenia. Using an experimental technique called the "neurolog ical synaptic transfer system," she's able to enter his subconscious while donning strangely erotic-looking virtual reality gear. These ses sions take place in a sci-fi laboratory, with earnest scientists (Marianne Jean-Baptiste of Secrets And Lies and Dylan Baker of Happiness) monitoring through plate-glass windows. In a stunning opening scene, the amazing, lush imagery and the luring "what if?" factor of venturing into the mind of someone in a coma instantly reels in the audience. Enter the parallel crime story. The FBI is des perately chasing a seriously deranged serial killer named Carl Stargher (Vincent D'Onofrio in yet another madman role), a local schizophrenic who tortures, drowns, and "bleaches" his female captives, then reconstructs them to look like dolls. Stargher walks around with steel rings hanging from his back (hov/d they get there?) and likes to hover over his victims, suspended by chains. Gung-ho agent Peter Novak (Vince Vaughn) has been tracking this killer for months. When the FBI team finds the body of the latest victim, Novak somehow deciphers the killer's ritual and, using slim dues and brilliant lab work (the griz zled character actor James Gammon has some fine scenes here), figures out that the latest victim has only hours to live before a clockwork mechanism brings about her death. They find Stargher, but in a coma, and they enlist Catherine and the sdentists, of course. Enter the endless, Marilyn Manson-style freak show video montage. Tarsem pumps things up with some wild imagery in the first couple of "mindtrips" using slow and fast photography, bizarre sets and costumes, and a running S&M- in-Oz theme. As Catherine tip-toes into the killer's subconscious, the film treats the viewers to numerous frightening flashbacks into his vio lent, twisted childhood. When things get rough, Novak persuades Catherine's team to let him join her in Starghei's subconscious. And things get rougher—esperially for the attentive moviegoer. Altogether, it's an uneasy debut horn a bud ding director witn some enormous ideas. Ballard Lesemann THURSDAY Shooter Special FRIDAY Afternoon SUPER Happy Hour 247 EAST BROAD STREET WEDNESDAY Happy Hour All Night AUGUST 23, 2000 FLAGPOLE 03