Take Two

Gabriel Byrne, Jesse Eisenberg and Isabelle Huppert star in “Louder Than Bombs,” a thoughtful, well acted and profoundly sad look at how one family deals with grief after a tragic event. Russ says, "It’s smart, observant and involving, but never quite achieves the level of emotional devastation it was aiming for." Susan says, "I really had trouble with this film."

Kansas City's own Don Cheadle wrote, produced, directed and stars in this experimental "biopic" about legendary jazz trumpeter, Miles Davis. Susan and Russ have very different perspectives on this movie, which is fictional and not a conventional biography in any sense of the word.

Ice Cube and Common lead the cast in the third (or fourth, if you count "Beauty Shop") in the comedy franchise. This time out, the barbers and hairdressers are concerned about rising gang violence in their Chicago neighborhood. Susan and Russ chat about the mix of comedy, social commentary and soap opera in this production. Other cast members include Eve, Cedric the Entertainer, Regina Hall and Nikki Minaj.

British actor Tom Hiddleston (Loki in "Thor" and "The Avengers") takes on the role of country music legend Hank Williams. Elizabeth Olsen plays his talentless wife who also wanted to be a star. Famed producer Mark Abraham took on the screenwriting and directing chores on this one. Susan and Russ are of one mind about the movie's effectiveness.

Canadian filmmaker Atom Egoyan offers a dark drama about a Holocaust survivor who is suffering from dementia. He plots with another survivor, confined to a wheelchair, to assassinate a Nazi guard who was responsible for the death of members of their families.

Susan and Russ have very different takes on this film which stars two Oscar-winning actors, Christopher Plummer and Martin Landau.

Two-time Oscar winner Sally Field stars in a comic drama that serves as an offbeat character study. Field plays an emotionally-stunted older woman who falls in love with a much younger man she meets at work. The solid supporting cast includes Tyne Daly, Stephen Root, Max Greenfield, Beth Behrs and Elizabeth Reaser. It's written and directed by Michael Showalter ("Wet. Hot American Summer").

Russ and Susan take us into another dimension, "a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land of imagination." But the next stop isn't "The Twilight Zone," it's "10 Cloverfield Lane," an offbeat thriller about an eccentric man (John Goodman) who abducts a young woman (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) and takes her to an underground bunker. Is he a crazy kidnapper or is he saving her from an even worse fate? It's an effort by first-time director Dan Tractenberg and producer J.J. Abrams ("Star Wars: The Force Awakens.")

Susan and Russ take a look at Tina Fey's comic drama about a journalist and the experiences she had that were chronicled in her memoir, "The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan."The film also stars Margot Robbie, Martin Freeman, Billy Bob Thornton and Alfred Molina. It was directed by the team of John Requa and Glenn Ficarra ("Crazy, Stupid Love.")

Susan and Russ take on "Mustang," a film from Turkey that was nominated for this year's Best Foreign Language Oscar. "Mustang" tells the tale of five sisters who are virtually imprisoned in a family member's home to protect their virtue. They're removed from school and are taught skills needed to be obedient wives to the local boys that the family will choose for them. It was written and directed by Deniz Gamze Ergüven and won César Awards for Best First Feature and Best Original Screenplay.

Susan and Russ check out Michael Moore's latest documentary. This travelogue has Moore traveling the world to see how other countries are handling some of the problems we're trying to cope with here in the USA.