This Week at the Movies

“Star Trek Into Darkness” is a serviceable enough entry into the long-running franchise that is frantically paced, but not among the most memorable voyages on the Starship Enterprise.  

The film was directed by J.J. Abrams, whose work on “Lost,” 2009’s “Star Trek” reboot and the upcoming “Star Wars” films has made him a household name.  

“Into Darkness” is full throttle for its entire two-hour running time, which is good news if that’s your thing, but not as satisfying if you’re interested in seeing the characters stop and talk for a moment.  

Also, one of my problems with the new “Star Trek” pictures is that Abrams seems so reverent to the original series that he has instructed the cast of these new films to essentially mimic the performances of the original actors, rather than branch out and give them their own spin.  

Although Zachary Quinto makes a decent Spock, it is only Chris Pine as Capt. James Kirk who gets to add some layers to his character.  

There’s a plot twist, of sorts, revolving around the film’s villain, who is played by an icy cold Benedict Cumberbatch. It will no doubt be utilized for future “Star Trek” movies to come.  

The film is filled with chase sequences, battles, special effects and jerky camera movements as the Enterprise is battered about in the cosmos. Although I found the proceedings a tad too frenetic, the film is an example of technical mastery.  

I’d lump “Star Trek” in with the latest “Iron Man” film. I wouldn’t pan either movie, but I can’t wholeheartedly endorse them either.  
With his past three films, Noah Baumbach has become the chronicler of bitter, disappointed members of the upper middle class. I don’t intend this as a criticism as I was a big fan of “The Squid and the Whale” and “Greenberg” and held “Margot at the Wedding” in pretty high esteem.    

So, it comes as a surprise that his latest, “Frances Ha,” also tells the tale of a sad sack, but the filmmaker has mixed in some sweetness with the melancholy. And the film’s lead, played with great comedic timing by Greta Gerwig, is as charmingly naïve as Baumbach’s previous characters were misanthropic.  

In the picture, the titular character is going through a spell that would qualify as a mid-life crisis if Frances were not a mere 27 years of age.  

Near the film’s beginning, Frances declines an offer from a boyfriend to move in with him, instead opting to remain with her roommate, Sophie (Mickey Sumner), with whom she shares a platonic love. “We’re sort of the same person,” Frances tells others of their relationship.  

But things start to go awry for Frances: she finds out that she will not be utilized in upcoming performances by the dance troupe of which she is a member, Sophie tells her that she will be moving in with a friend whose apartment is in a better locale and financial woes ensue.  

“Frances Ha” is a wry, heartfelt and witty portrayal of a free spirit in flux.   Frances’s adventures lead her to crashing on the couch of two young men she befriends at a party and then rooming with a snooty dancer from her troupe. On a whim, she travels to Paris for a few days and then ends up on the doorstep of her parents in Sacramento for the holidays. She eventually takes a job as an RA in a college dorm, which provides her with a cheap place to live.  

Gerwig manages to make Frances simultaneously sympathetic and frustrating, riotously funny and occasionally humane, which can be witnessed during a brief, but effective, sequence when she spots a student weeping in a dormitory hall.  

“Frances Ha” may wear its influences - which include everything from Woody Allen and the French New Wave to a direct homage to Leos Carax during a sequence in which our heroine takes leaps and bounds down the street to the tune of David Bowie’s “Modern Love” - on its sleeve, but the picture is very obviously driven by the thematic interests of its director and the personality of its star.  

It’s a funny – and often forlorn – look at post-college malaise that I’d strongly recommend.  

“Star Trek Into Darkness” is playing at AMC Loews Bay Terrace 6 and Douglaston’s Movie World. “Frances Ha” is screening at Manhattan’s IFC Center and opens on May 24 at Kew Gardens Cinemas.