Reel-View Ratings: The Bigger The Beard, The Better The Movie

Metro-082616-Ratings-DontBreathekewl

DON’T BREATHE

Three teenagers embark on a tour of petty larceny before targeting one big, final score: a blind man hiding a fat settlement in his dilapidated Detroit home. The twist, of course, is that this is a horror movie, not a drama — and that blind man is hiding a lot more than money in his dark home. Director Fede Alvarez, best known for his 2013 debut in Evil Dead, does a masterful job of building tension and scares in a plot firmly grounded in reality (that basement sequence!). However, his characterization falls a little thin — though it’s fun to watch these kids scream, we don’t really care about them all that much. Opens Aug. 26 in wide release

Metro-082616-Ratings-LightBeneathFeetkewl

A LIGHT BENEATH THEIR FEET

A bright young woman, Beth (Madison Davenport), has her whole future ahead of her: boyfriend, a pick of colleges, everything — except that her mother, Gloria (Taryn Manning), has bipolar disorder and needs constant caretaking. Gloria doesn’t want her daughter to leave her, but Beth also knows that staying would be sacrificing too much. It’s a heartfelt, nuanced story that is surprisingly absent from theaters, and both women offer compelling portraits of how mental illness touches whole networks of people. If the film has any flaw, it’s in trying to juggle too many side plots, and yet, that, too, is still a mirror of Beth’s daily struggle.

Plays at 11 a.m., 3:15, 5 and 9:15 p.m. Aug. 29 at the Movie Museum

Metro-082616-Ratings-Southsidemeh

SOUTHSIDE WITH YOU

A fictitious reimagining of Barack Obama and Michelle Robinson’s first date is … hard to swallow, in many ways, not least because the man is still very much our president. But this film manages to produce a charming, even awfully-pleased-with-itself first date movie that offers a compelling, sunny portrait of No. 44. Race is dealt with candidly, as is the double standard that plagues Michelle’s career, if not Barack’s. Charming as it is, the film never shakes that sense of smug foreshadowing that its subjects are destined for greatness, and it distracts too often to be a true success.

Opens Aug. 26 at Kahala Theatre