9/9 – 9/11 Who ends up in the number one slot this weekend will depend almost entirely on whether audiences are in the Halloween mood yet. It’s September, which means we’re all generally pretty disinterested, but even in the worst months audiences will show up for horror. Sam Jackson or the Devil? You decide.

Misc. Limited Releases (Opening on fewer than 500 screens.)
It’s an interesting arthouse weekend. The Elijah Wood indie Green Street Hooligans is finally getting released, after months of positive critical buzz leaking out from the festival circuit. The catch is that you’ll only find it in seven theaters, and who knows if it’ll ever get much wider release. A little more accessible is Robert Redford’s long delayed An Unfinished Life, which sneak previewed around the country last weekend and continues to do so while simultaneously opening in 139 theaters in a few major markets. The slow paced, relationship film is worth catching just for the chemistry between Redford and Morgan Freeman. It can’t be killed by the presence of Jennifer Lopez.

The Man (Opens in 2,040 theaters.)
With only two fairly disinteresting wide releases in theaters this weekend, I flipped a coin to decide which one to throw down as the “recommend”. The Man called heads and the quarter landed on tails. A buddy-cop pairing of Samuel L. Jackson and Eugene Levy, the movie has its moments, courtesy of some great work from Sam. It’s utterly derivative and in some cases a flat out rip off, but there are funny moments and Sam gets plenty angry which is just about all his fans ask from him anymore. It’s a bad movie, but the audience I saw it with loved it and you might too.

The Exorcism of Emily Rose (Opens in 2,981 theaters.)
Emily Rose earns points for trying to be a little more brainy than your average Exorcist clone. Supposedly, the trailers are a little misleading, and the devil stuff is only a secondary component in what’s really more of a courtroom drama. Based on a real case, the film is about the trial of a priest who lets/causes a girl’s death during an exorcism. Was she really possessed by Lucifer, or did she in fact just need medical attention? We all have our own feelings on matters of faith, but watching it play out in courtroom fashion is an interesting twist on the old religion vs. logic and reason dilemma.


Still In Theaters And Worth Your Time: The 40 Year-Old Virgin, Wedding Crashers, Red Eye, The Constant Gardener, Sky High