MONDAY, MAY 26
Breakfast With Scot
Eric (Tom Cavanagh) is a deeply closeted sportscaster and ex–Maple Leaf; Sam (Ben Shenkman) is his patient partner. When Sam's brother's girlfriend dies, and the brother can't be located, where is her son Scot going to go? Where, I ask you? Given this schematic premise, this film's charm is that it relaxes as it goes—it loses its high-concept rigidity just as Eric himself stops being so uptight and paranoid about Who Knows, leading to a big, squishy, genuinely moving Christmas-party finale. The agent of both transformations is Scot, who turns out to be a doe-eyed, scarf-wearing, drag-dabbling preteen—the kind of mini-'mo who, trying on a jacket, gleefully squeals, "Oooh, look how it hangs!" Eric's attempt to tone him down and butch him up via peewee hockey fails, sure, but with unexpected results. It's all done with a smart, light touch, with no clichéd villains (you know the sort of thing: "This court hereby decrees that fags are unfit parents"—gavel) and no preaching ("Do you want Scot to grow up living a lie? LIKE YOU?!?"). Noah Bernett plays the high-camp role of Scot without a trace of archness in his acting, making the kid's fey flamboyance the most natural, unself-conscious thing in the world. He's kind of magnificent. (NR) GAVIN BORCHERT Harvard Exit: 6:30 p.m. (Also: Egyptian: 4 p.m. Tues., May 27.)
The Greening of Southie
SIFF
The Fall, with Justine Waddell, is all spectacle.
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Too much access can be a terrible thing. After their well-received food doc King Corn, Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis made a case study of green building techniques at a South Boston condo selling "luxury green living." Units range from $500,000 to $2 million, we're told, but there's little other detailed information on what the project cost. Because the developer, architects, contractor, and even laborers are so darn likable, Cheney and Ellis surrender to the enthusiasm for a project whose goals they also clearly share. A few dissenting voices are heard from the insular Irish Catholic community (think Gone Baby Gone), but there's no real debate about gentrification and community displacement. (The one happy buyer who's interviewed looks to be a single gay man.) Slick and well-presented, Greening would initially seem suited to an audience of progressive Seattle architects. But they'd immediately point out what's wrong with the doc: When novel green building materials like wheat-board and bamboo flooring fail and have to be replaced, no one mentions the overages. Did the building pencil out or did it not? Reducing the carbon footprint of residential construction—up to the turning of the key—depends on specifics. This doc just gives us smiling faces and green platitudes, like an infomercial for Dwell magazine. (NR) BRIAN MILLER SIFF Cinema: 6:30 p.m. (Also: Harvard Exit: 4:30 p.m. Tues., May 27.)
TUESDAY, MAY 27
Mongol
Never trust a Mongol with short hair, especially not back in the 12th century. Directed by Sergei Bodrov (Prisoner of the Mountains), this sweeping biopic about Genghis Khan presents its hero as a kind of long-tressed amalgam of Putin, Moses, and Obama. He's all about rejecting the politics and divisions of the past. He's a new kind of leader, ready to unify the fractious clans of Central Asia into one nation under a new code of law. (For starters, we will no longer kill women and children; then we invade China.) A bit hard to find underneath that mop of hair, Japanese actor Tadanobu Asano plays the grown Genghis with bland nobility. Among all the prayer, reform governance, wooing his wife, and playing with the children, how did he find the time for sharpening his sword and chopping off heads? The battles are relatively few and surprisingly far between for a guy with such a bloodthirsty reputation; and the gore is hardly more plentiful than in the LOTR cycle. The grassy steppes of Central Asia are suitably majestic, but Bodrov's leaden history book lurches back and forth without creating a majestic story. Lawrence of Arabia is obviously the template being followed here, but a compelling hero must have oversized—dare we say Clintonesque?—flaws to enliven the historical lessons. (R) BRIAN MILLER Egyptian: 6:30 p.m. (Also: Uptown: 4 p.m. Thurs., May 29.)
They Killed Sister Dorothy
SEE THE WIRE, TUESDAY.
