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Weekend Movie Forecast: <em>Donkey Punch</em> or, um, <em>Inkheart</em>?

Read the following in your best Don LaFontaine voice: "After meeting at a nightclub in a Mediterranean resort, seven young adults decide to continue partying aboard a luxury yacht in the middle of the ocean. but when one of them dies in a freak accident, the others argue about what to do, leading to a ruthless fight for survival." That's the description of British film Donkey Punch, and it sounds kinda boss when you give it the LaFointaine treatment. But Stephen Holden at the Times sarcastically wonders, "Will anyone finally escape this floating slaughterhouse? Do you even care?" On the other hand, Nick Pinkerton at the Village Voice seems to "get it": "The personnel behind Donkey Punch could've released anything with such a "No way" titleâif you haven't been on the Internet since 1999, well, ask aroundâand probably recouped their costs off titillated adolescents trying to slip one past the 'rents. But they made a workmanlike thriller that works as an (unconscious?) auto-critique of mainstreamed Internet-age hedonism." — Gothamist

Published Jan 23, 2009

Modified Jan 23, 2009

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Click on the images above for more details and reviews on each of this weekend's rather modest batch of new releases. Or you can catch up on watching some Oscar-nominated films—details on nominations here.