Double feature from China
As China becomes an increasingly important market for U.S. films, we have more opportunities to see Asian features here. This week two agreeable Chinese films featuring big stars hit Twin Cities area screens as individual features or — if you're in the mood — a double feature. Fan Bingbing shines in "I Am Not Madame Bovary" (⋆⋆⋆, unrated), a comedy about the national bureaucracy that oversees divorce. Her character, persuaded by her husband to end their marriage so the couple can use the separation to claim a better apartment, learns too late that he had other motives. She goes on a mission to reverse the ruling, driving officials crazy even as level after level of government falls apart. It's a playful, sarcastically shot and nicely plotted comedy. International superstar Jackie Chan returns for the 1940s-set action comedy "Railroad Tigers" (⋆⋆⋆, unrated). While he's not quite the leaping kung fu master of his younger days, he still knows how to hold the camera. A railway porter, he leads an "amateur hour" team of freedom fighters opposing the Japanese invasion of China. There's a ton of shooting, exploding and train crashing, and plenty of broad character comedy, too. ("I Am Not Madame Bovary" shows at St. Anthony Main; "Railroad Tigers" screens there and at AMC Inver Grove 16. Book a double feature screening Jan. 6-8 and 12 at St. Anthony Main by purchasing tickets for the 7:10 p.m. screening. )
Colin Covert
