Adapted from a story by H.P. Lovecraft. A Seattle history professor, drawn back to his estranged family on the Oregon coast to execute his late mother’s estate, is reacquainted with his best friend from childhood, with whom he has a long-awaited tryst. Caught in an accelerating series of events, he discovers aspects of his father’s New Age cult which take on a dangerous and apocalyptic significance.
Terminal Island: The very near future. The world’s hunger for extreme sports and reality competitions has grown into reality TV bloodlust. Now, the most extreme racing competition has emerged and its contestants are murderous prisoners. Tricked-out cars, caged thugs and smoking-hot navigators combine to create a juggernaut series with bigger ratings than the Super Bowl. The rules of the Death Race are simple: Win five events, and you’re set free. Lose and you’re road kill splashed across the Internet. International action star Jason Statham leads the action-thriller’s cast as three-time speedway champion Jensen Ames, an ex-con framed for a gruesome murder. Forced to don the mask of the mythical driver Frankenstein, a Death Race crowd favorite who seems impossible to kill, Ames is given an easy choice by Terminal Island’s ruthless Warden Hennessey (Joan Allen): Suit up and drive or never see his little girl again. His face hidden by a hideous mask, one convict will enter an insane three-day challenge in order to gain freedom. But to claim the prize, Ames must survive a gauntlet of the most vicious criminals—including nemesis Machine Gun Joe (Tyrese Gibson)—in the country’s toughest prison. Trained by his coach (Ian McShane) to drive a monster Mustang V8 Fastback outfitted with 2 mounted mini-guns, flamethrowers and napalm, an innocent man will destroy everything in his path to win the most twisted spectator sport on Earth.
The French master of suspense Claude Chabrol returns with the razor-sharp, darkly seductive, A GIRL CUT IN TWO. Gabrielle Deneige (Ludivine Sagnier of SWIMMING POOL) is an independent, ambitious TV weather girl torn between her love of a distinguished author several decades her senior (Francois Berléand), and the attentions of a headstrong, potentially unstable young suitor (Benoit Magimel). An unspoken past between the two men heightens tensions, and though she’s initially certain of her love for one them, the see-saw demands and whims of both men keep confusing - and darkening - matters. Before long she’s encountering emotional and societal forces well beyond her control, inexorably leading to a shocking clash of violence and passion. Inspired by the sensational Gilded Age murder of Madison Square Garden architect Stanford White, A GIRL CUT IN TWO is trademark Chabrol: fiendishly entertaining and impossible to shake.
