French filmmaker Cedric Klapisch is best-known for his beloved L'Auberge Espagnole, a buoyant look at international students sharing a flat in Barcelona. In his new ensemble piece, Paris, he attempts a similar intersection of viewpoints, cultures, and sexual adventures, but with less success. Too few of the characters are truly compelling, some are outright irritating, and their puny actions tend to pale next to the magic and magnitude of one of the most beguiling cities on Earth. Romain Duris stars as Pierre, a professional dancer sidelined by a heart defect, awaiting a donor heart. His sister, Elise (Juliette Binoche), a divorced, no-nonsense social worker, troops over every day to check up on him. Theirs is the most touching relationship in the film, as they squabble, tease each other, and trade romantic advice. (At 40, Elise believes that "Men don't like women like me. Women who talk back scare them."). Their pragmatic, yet tender sibling alliance (Elise loyally hunts up date material when Pierre fears he'll never make love again) is their defense against the looming possibility of having to say goodbye.

Bold outsider reinvents chic in ‘Coco Before Chanel’

Who doesn’t love a big, lush, biographical drama about a real-life woman who defies the conventions of her day to make her own place in the world? As long as the writing is at least plausible, and the actors don’t trip over the furniture, this is a pretty fool proof formula—especially for female audiences hungry for stories of self-empowerment. The story of  Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel, who rose from impoverished orphan and rural milliner to become one of the most influential fashion designers of the 20th Century, is—sorry— tailor-made for this kind of treatment. Still, in her thoughtful and persuasive Coco Before Chanel, Belgian filmmaker Anne Fontaine brings something extra to the mix; every lovely frame of the film is informed by the filmmaker’s resonant empathy for Chanel as a stylist, a woman, and an outsider hungry to succeed on her own terms.

AMELIA Hilary Swank stars in the role she was probably born to play, tousle-haired, tomboyish aviatrix Amelia Earhart, whose daring solo flights, unconventional lifestyle, and myserious disappearance have fascinated the world for nearly a century. Richard Gere and Ewan McGregor co-star as the men in her life. Mira Nair (The Namesake; Monsoon Wedding) directs.  (PG) 111 minutes. Starts Friday.

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East and West find common ground in 21st annual Pacific Rim Film Festival

As the Pacific Rim Film Festival sails into its third decade, the spirit of Aloha is alive and thriving in Santa Cruz. Dedicated to bridging the cultural gap between East and West, the six-day festival (Friday, Oct. 16, to Wednesday, Oct. 21) presents 17 features and shorts from 11 countries, all located along the vast geographical region of the Pacific Rim. This year’s event unspools at three county venues, the Del Mar Theatre and the Rio Theatre in Santa Cruz, and the Cabrillo College Watsonville Center. And as always, every film in the festival, except the closing night benefit, is presented to the public free of charge.

LAW ABIDING CITIZEN Gerard Butler stars in this crime thriller as a man imprisoned for taking the law into his own hands after the murder of his wife who orchestrates revenge from his jail cell against the killers—and the prosecutor (Jamie Foxx) who failed him. Viola Davis and Leslie Bibb co-star for director F. Gary Gray (R) 108 minutes. Starts Friday.

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Father, sons grow up in marvelous ‘Boys Are Back’

Everyone knows about the Neverland, the place where little boys go to avoid growing up. But it’s more than a fairy tale for a carefree, globe-trotting sportswriter thrust suddenly into single fatherhood in The Boys Are Back. Directed by Scott Hicks (Shine), and featuring a marvelous performance by Clive Owen as the conflicted dad,  it’s an extraordinarily wry, poignant, and perceptive look at fathers and sons who use creative anarchy as a means of helping each other come to grips with the cold, hard real world.

Adapted by scriptwriter Allan Cubitt from the memoir by real-life sports journalist Simon Carr, the film stars Owen as Joe Warr, star sportswriter for a major London newspaper. Joe’s the one his editor sends halfway around the world to cover the Olympics, or international soccer playoffs, but he always circles back to terra firma at the beachfront home in South Australia, where his loving, pragmatic Australian wife,  Katie (Laura Fraser), a former Olympic equestrienne, and their little son,  Artie (Nicholas McAnulty), are waiting.

COUPLES RETREAT Vince Vaughn and Jon Favreau team up again for this comedy they co-wrote about four couples on vacation at a lush tropical resort who find themselves forced to participate in marriage-healing therapy sessions. Malin Akerman, Jason Bateman, Faizon Love, and Kristen Bell co-star for director Peter Billingsley. (PG-13) 107 minutes. Starts Friday.

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THE BURNING PLAIN Mexican filmmaker Guillermo Arriaga (longtime scriptwriter for Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu on films like Babel and 21 Grams) directs this multi-layered drama about various disparate, but obscurely interconnected people along the border towns of New Mexico, in search of love and redemption. Kim Basinger, Charlize Theron, Jennifer Lawrence, and John Corbett co-star. (R) 111 minutes.

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